hello portland and seattle

as promised in my last post, here's a recap of our week long trip to the pacific northwest. we've been talking about taking this trip for a long time. i've been to portland once (in 1996 with my family) but never to seattle. thatcher went to seattle in high school, but had never been to portland. and since he's such an urban nerd (i say that in a loving way), portland has been at the top of his list for a long time. we had a great time in both cities! in fact, if we were ever to move away from minnesota, i think portland would be our first pick! such a perfect mix of urban utopia and natural beauty. seattle is nice too, but portland was definitely our favorite of the two. here are a few pictures (i say "a few" because we took over 400) of our trip:

first of all, it rained a lot, but we were well-prepared with rain coats and umbrellas (which the locals don't seem to use! ha!) 

we stayed with my parents' good friends who they've known since before i was born. we couldn't have asked for better hosts. they took us all around the city (and out to the coast!), treated us to countless meals and kept us laughing. 

garry, kathy, and their daughter, london in their gorgeous back yard. 

we also met up with thatcher's cousins, jade and lloyd who are originally from alaska, but call portland home now. 

thatcher, jade, and lloyd outside shanghai tunnel where we went for dinner

the famous voo doo donuts was right around the corner, so of course we had to try it. we even lucked out and there wasn't a line.

jade and i with our donuts (yes, mine has crushed oreos on top). yum!

although we had our fair share of city exploring, we managed to make it out to multnomah falls one afternoon. 

i remember this from my last visit to portland, it's incredible! we even hiked up the path the top of the falls. it claimed it was 1 mi, but it was SUPER tiring. i mean, i'm sort of out of shape, but not that bad. 

but we made it to the top and the view was pretty incredible

that night kathy and garry took us to "last thursday" on alberta street. it's basically a free-for-all street festival where people sell their art, play music, and dress up in crazy outfits. portland at it's finest. i loved it! 

another day we drove out to the coast with garry. it's about an hour and a half drive from portland. 

i think this was the rainiest day that we encountered, but we still had fun

saturday we went to...you guessed it...the saturday market with jade and her boyfriend ben. then we headed over to mississippi street, which was very cool. 

here are jade, ben, and me taking a rest on mississippi street

that night kathy and garry took us to an incredible restaurant on the top floor of a hotel downtown. it had really good food and an amazing view. 

check it out!

sunday we hung out with london, since she was home from college for the weekend. 

i love this girl :) 

on memorial day, we took the train up to seattle. it was a really nice ride and it went fairly fast, which is always a bonus. 

here we are on the train. weee!

when we got in, we went to pike place market for lunch. 

the rest of the day, we explored sunny(!) seattle.

including taking the mono rail

our second day in seattle included taking bill spiedel's underground tour. it was recommended to us as one of those touristy things, you shouldn't pass up. for more information on the underground tour, click here. 

last but not least, we met up with one of thatcher's friends for yummy vietnamese food in capitol hill on our last night.

thatcher and sara

whew! are you still reading? :) now that we are back, summer seems to be in full swing with bbqs, graduation parties, birthdays, showers, etc every weekend. i'll try to be good about taking pictures and sharing them!