Good morning, Granny calling……This morning we will leave CouerD’Alane to head for Seattle, we are all really excited as it’s somewhere all four of us want to see. First though, Robyn has to find out where we can get an oil change on the van and a replacement key for the one lost in the river. We can’t expect Uncle to pay for that, so Robyn will ring around. We found somewhere for the oil change, which needs to be done at 5,000 km for the warranty as the van is new. The key though, is half the price in Saskatoon as it is in the States, so we will get it done there. The oil change was quick and we got a free premium carwash thrown in….. perfect.
We took an hour out and visited the lake before we left CouerD’Alane, the lake is huge, like and ocean and you can take pleasure flight s in a plane that lands on the sea. There are jet-skis, lovely boats and allsorts of water activities going on. Adam found the walk difficult with his swollen foot, so sat on a bench and Martin, Robyn and me went across the bridge to a viewing point to take pictures. We have lots of pictures already, I reckon we have taken over 2,000 in the first two weeks. We took a picture of a hotel we thought of booking, overlooking the lake. It was very expensive, so we decided on a cheaper option. The lake was lovely but we needed to go as we had a long drive ahead.
The decision for the day was that we buy supermarket sandwiches and eat on the road, Robyn was driving as Adam’s foot was like a balloon again, it would take around 5 hours to get to Seattle so it will be a long day. At Safeway, you can ‘build your own sandwich‘. We had Focaccia bread, with a pile of meat (cheese for the veggie), ham, turkey etc and salad. This sandwich was a ‘beast’! Robyn and Adam had 12 inch baguettes with ham, salad and avocado, they were huge and it took the lady 25 minutes to build 4 sandwiches! We bought a fruit platter with strawberries, melons etc and some bags of crisps and cold drinks and headed out of town at midday. By 12.20 pm we had entered Washington State, what a place of contrast, from high mountainous areas with snow topped peaks, through areas of sparse vegetation and desert heat and then lush green fields, lakes and rivers in other areas. Stunning scenery, was followed by long straight roads, with nothing but flat fields, wind farms and endless skies. We drove through a short rain shower, but the temperature outside was climbing steadily and it was now up over 30 degrees, thankfully we had air conditioning in the van.
Adam needed to raise his swollen foot and I thought if I was sat behind him with my short legs, he could put his foot up on the dash. I said to Martin “let’s swap seats” Adam said “that would be good if you don’t mind”. So I undid my seatbelt and Martin undid his, I sat on his lap and he shuffled from underneath me to sit on the opposite side as we were travelling along, we puffed and panted and climbed over each other like a game of Twister and when we were re-seated in our new places Adam proceeded to slide his seat back. We were all in fits of laughter, because after all the struggle, I swear the seat only moved 1cm, all that effort for such a small gain!
We drove through Spokane Valley, West towards Seattle, we passed Medical Lake and a small place called Tyler in Cheney…hhmmmm Tyler, where have I heard that name before? I miss my little princess. We passed a sign that said, ‘leaving apple maggot quarantine area’ sounds gross to me. The names of some of the places are quaint, like Steptoe-Edwell and Sprague-Hamilton. There are ranches dotted all over, with huge expanses of land, just like you see in old Western Films, their nearest neighbours must be 10 miles away.
We passed grain fields, potato farms and all sorts of crops. At one point Robyn asked Adam, “what do you think’s growing in that field?” Immediately Adam said “Field grain” and then he named the next crop and I thought, boy this man is super-intelligent and really knows his crops. He named some more and then Robyn realised, he was reading it on signs at the roadside, there was a sign earlier that had said, crop signs for the next 15 miles. We laughed like hell as we all started reading, peas, alfalfa, sweet corn amongst other things.
We drove on, Hiawatha road, Adam road….wait a minute, Adam has his own road? Eventually we came to a place called George, yes George, in Washington state, George- Washington and on every sign there was a silhouette of the man himself, very apt I thought. We drove through what can only be described as desert, for miles and entered Wanapum National Park. As we rounded a bend high up and started to head down a hill, the sign said, scenic viewpoint in 1 mile. What an understatement as the Columbian River came into view, this was a river of epic dimensions and it stretched as far as the eye could see, it was surrounded by scrub land and small lizards ran around the scorched rocks. The sign said ‘watch for rattle snakes’ and we took pictures in the searing heat. It was 35 degrees outside but felt much hotter and my Pandora bracelet go so hot it burned my wrist. What a sight, Martin and me never thought we would see sights like this, it’s amazing. As we drove away we took pictures from the bridge as we drove across the entire width of this huge waterway.
Further on, as we drove over the Yakima River, Robyn had to brake hard as all the cars in front stopped really suddenly, a lorry had lost some hay bales on the road and a little man was trying to move them in between the traffic. We drove on towards Seattle, through the Wenatchee National Forest with it’s huge trees and greenery and by stampede pass lake and Snoqualmie Pass and entered Seattle at 4.07pm, it was still about 20 minutes before we saw anything that resembled a city though.
We found the Mediterranean Hotel after a short while and having taken a couple of wrong turns, it’s was ok, the staff were pleasant, the beds and bathrooms clean and there was an in-house Starbucks coffee shop…bonus! We arranged to have an hour in our rooms and finish our humungous sandwiches and meet at 6.30 to go for a walk, we didn’t want to waste any daylight and wanted to see the Seattle Centre Fountain and take a trip up the Space Needle. We walked a few blocks until we found the fountains in the Seattle Centre, which is a huge square with stadiums, a fairground, the fountains and the Space Needle. We sat and took photographs at the fountains and I filmed some children playing in the water. The atmosphere was lovely, the weather pleasant, evening sun and a soft breeze and a smell of donuts that makes you feel hungry. We rushed along as fast Adam could manage with his foot until we got to the Space Needle, $18 each to go up and well worth it. I am afraid of heights but was determined to go up and I’m so glad I did. After the initial lift ride in a glass fronted lift which travels 520ft in 43 seconds, seems faster it felt like we went up like a bullet. The Space needle sways 1 inch for every 10 mph of wind speed, but I was surprisingly calm and proud of the fact that I got to the top without having a panic attack!
At the top, the view over Seattle was amazing, the city, the skyline, the sea, was breathtaking. We wandered outside for about half an hour and then went in for a drink, Robyn and me had a glass of wine, the men got beer and we sat and watched the sun go down. What an amazing experience and one I never imagined I would see in this lifetime. Martin and me fell so lucky. The kids are doing us proud! When we went back down we walked a couple of blocks to the Irish bar and had some supper before strolling back to the Hotel in the coolness of the evening and falling into bed.
Before we said goodnight, we made a plan the get up at 8am and meet at 9am for coffee in the Starbucks at the hotel. From there we were off to Pike road Market, but especially to see the world famous fish market….but that’s another day and another blog…..Granny….to be continued
