Jerry Seinfeld is the Devil. His show ruined my life. I can hardly go a single day without something happenening that causes me to make a lame Seinfeld reference. This day was no exception. The Shangri-La hotel, nice as it is, is situated next to a 24-hour gas station. The shades on the windows of the Shangri-La might as well not be there. The light poured through the window, keeping me up most of the night. So, of course, it didn't take me long (it was probably before we left the Shangri-La, but after we had both showered in our flip-flops) [View Full Entry]

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There were signs throughout the city for the "Monet to Dali" exhibit at the Vancouver Art Gallery. The exhibit sounded great but, unfortunately, it didn't open for another two days. It was raining though and so we decided to check out the Art Gallery anyway. From the guidebook, we learned that the museum has a permanent collection of paintings by Emily Carr. We had never heard of her, but the Lonely Planet said she is Bristish Columbia's best-known painter and so we went. The girl who sold us the museum tickets was kind, giving us the student price. The discount made [View Full Entry]

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The next day, we started slow. After sleeping late, we wandered down the street to a small crepe shop. We spent a good hour there, drinking coffee, reading the newspaper (in case you were curious, Paris Hilton is front-page news even in Vancouver), and eating absolutely delicious crepes. After a relaxing morning, we decided to take the scenic route to North Vancouver. We caught the Seabus, a large public ferry, from Waterfront Station across the bay to Lonsdale Quay. During the ride over, we had a nice conversation with the ferry conductor. In addition to warning us (too late) about the [View Full Entry]

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We decided to have breakfast at the Elbow Room, which the guidebook told us is “a Vancouver institution.” We were not sure what to expect given that the primary description of the place is that it has abusive waiters. It turned out to be a great choice. The food was delicious and our waiter was only surly once, when Michael attempted to pour coffee from the staff-only pot. (One of the restaurant’s rules, which are humorously outlined throughout the menu, is that if you want a refill on coffee, get up and get it yourself.) During breakfast, we plotted our day. [View Full Entry]

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Refreshed from a relaxing day of whale watching and driving, instead of hiking, to the top of Mt. Constitution, we were up for the 8:00 a.m. serving of breakfast at the Kangaroo House and then back out to Mt. Constitution for some hiking. We started at the southwest end of the park and hiked around Cascade Lake. That was a bit more challenging than it looked because of a detour around the Lagoon. Apparently a bridge had been washed out, and that added a mile to our hike. Plus we got lost and had to backtrack a time or two to [View Full Entry]

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After two days of tough hikes and long drives, we wanted to take it a bit easy and relax on Orcas Island. We started the day with a nice breakfast at the Kangaroo House and then headed downtown East Sound to explore our options for the day. There are three main activities on Orcas Island: hiking, whale watching, and sea kayaking. We decided that hiking could wait a day, and since the island looked so nice we decided to sign up for another night at the Kangaroo House. Knowing that we didn’t have to rush helped in our decisionmaking, and we [View Full Entry]

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At 5:45 a.m. Rachel woke up and rolled over to look out the window and check on the weather. Confronted with a majestic view of Mt. Rainier she couldn’t wait to get out on the trails. And neither could I. (Yes, I said majestic. I don’t care if it does sound cheesy, because it WAS majestic. Check the pictures and then question my choice of words.) We had pre-purchased a packed trail lunch from the Inn (a great idea, as it had a sandwich, an apple, sunflower seeds, a granola bar, and a small chocolate bar, and we didn’t have to [View Full Entry]

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We didn’t expect to hike in the snow in early June, but that’s exactly what we found ourselves doing. The Paradise area of Mt. Rainier is billed in the travel books as an expansive meadow of wildflowers during the summer. But summer on Mt. Rainier starts late, and the flowers are really in bloom in July and August. In June, at least this June, Paradise is still covered in snow. Of course, we didn’t figure that out until just before we took our first steps up the “trail.” We started that morning in Seattle, which is about 95 miles from Mt. [View Full Entry]

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Even though we had gone to bed at what for our bodies was 3:00 a.m., we were up early and ready to do some serious vacationing. We headed down to Pike’s Place Market to get some breakfast, stopping in at the Athenian Inn. The food was ok, but the views of Puget Sound from our window table were enough to whet our appetites for a day of site-seeing. It also turns out that the Athenian Inn appeared in Sleepless In Seattle, and their walls were adorned with lots of Tom Hanks paraphernalia. After breakfast the cashier informed us that Martha Stewart [View Full Entry]

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Friday June 1 and we're finally off on the long awaited and highly anticipated trip to the Pacific Northwest. We left work a bit early and headed down to Union Station. From there, we caught the MARC Train, the commuter train that runs from D.C. to Maryland, and made for BWI Airport. We decided to fly from Baltimore instead of D.C. because the tickets were so much cheaper. It's a hassle to get there, although not much moreso than going to Dulles, but when the tickets are more than $200 cheaper each it's worth it. Our flight left BWI just before [View Full Entry]

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