Our route:
Thursday, May 3: Fly into Seattle. Salmon Cooker. Pike Place Market. Uwajimaya Japanese supermarket. Hong Kong Bistro (because Maneki was booked until almost 10 p.m.).
Friday: Drive to Vancouver. Lunch at Benkei Ramen. North Vancouver Lonsdale Quay Market. Stanley Park. Sushi Mart dinner. Hang out on Robson Street.
Saturday: Drive to Whistler. Fish and Chips at Wigam Pier in Squamish. Britannia copper mine tour. Shannon Falls. Whistler. Howe Sound.
Sunday: Tsawwassen to Shwartz Bay on BCFerries. Hang out in Victoria. Dinner at Nando's Chicken.
Monday: Miniature World. Red Fish Blue Fish lunch. Butchart Gardens.
Tuesday: Washington State Ferry from Sidney to Anacortes. Dinner at Maneki.
Wednesday: Seattle Pier. Smoked halibut. Fly home.
I'll start with a roundup of the food we ate. Then I'll do the travelogue.
Smoked salmon from the Salmon Cooker on the Seattle pier. I would drive to Seattle just to eat a smoked-salmon sandwich for lunch and a smoked-halibut platter for dinner.
Hot Pot at the Hong Kong Bistro in Seattle near Uwajimaya supermarket. We came here because Maneki, where we had planned to eat and for which we'd already paid parking, was booked until 9:45. This was an excellent second choice.
I'd drive to Vancouver just to eat at Benkei Ramen on Robson Street.
When Chieko saw the Sushi Mart on Robson Street in Vancouver she wanted to eat there because the prices were cheap. I expected cheap sushi to have thin fish and thick rice, but we were pleasantly surprised that this sushi was really good.
We found Santouka Ramen also on Robson Street in Vancouver and had to try out this crowded place with the long waiting line.
The chef preparing ramen at Santouka.
The soup stock boils at Santouka. The three stocks are all pork based and come in shio, shoyu and miso.
We were looking for pretty much anyplace with edible food (in other words, not McDonalds) in Squamish. We found this spot via the GPS. An Indian gentleman reading the paper in the hall of the very small mall this restaurant was attached to said the food was very good--genuine English. After we got inside we thought maybe he was the owner. Turns out he owns the building, but the restaurant owner is from England. And the fish and chips were superb. Thin, light batter, thick moist cod. Thick chips.
The Tsawwassen Ferry terminal is really quite nice, with a good food court and some souvenir shops. This egg muffin thing was mediocre, which I expected, but Starbucks makes some darn good hot chocolate with whipping cream.
We couldn't check into our hotel in Victoria for an hour, so we found this chain chicken place called Nando's Chicken across the street. It's Portugese and good. "Medium hot" is plenty spicy.
Red Fish Blue Fish on the Victoria wharf is my favorite fish and chips restaurant of all time. The fish and chips are super, and the view is too. Because I had just eaten fish and chips the day before, I ordered two batter-fried cod tacones, and Chieko ordered two spicy Pacific fish (mixed fish) tacones. They were good, but next time I would get the standard fish and chips. The fish is thick and juicy, and the batter is light and thin.
The Washington State Ferries terminals aren't up to par with the BCFerries terminals. I ended up getting a soft cookie and watery hot chocolate on the boat going from Sidney, BC, to Anacortes, WA.
This time I made a reservation at Maneki. We shared a black cod collar. I then had unagi-don (fresh water eel on rice), and Chieko had chirashi-zushi (raw fish on a bed of rice). Very good. We've eaten here before. The server (and owner?) wanted to know why she didn't know Chieko, because she knows every Japanese person in Seattle.
Finally, back to the Seattle pier and the Salmon Cooker. Chieko ate smoked halibut and clam chowder, and I had the smoked halibut platter (with a roll, cole slaw and potato wedges) and chowder. And a drink. This definitely hit the spot. The fish is very moist, has a nice alder smoked flavor, and is plentiful.
We had some time before our flight so we wandered Pike Place Market again and ate a cup of fruit while watching the boats go by. Not too much action on Puget Sound this day.
That's the food. Now for the travelogue, sort of.
These are the Salmon Cooker fishermen.
The Seattle pier will soon have a giant ferris wheel.
This tug and barge are helping to build the ferris wheel.
Street light by the (many) stairs going up to Pike Place Market.
People lock their bikes to this rail.
Handbills plastered to the cement wall below the bike wheels and just below the Pike Place Market main level.
Welcome to Pike Place Market.
Pike's main hallway.
Welcome to the fish sellers in the market.
You can buy almost any seafood you can think of. Salmon, halibut, scallops and rock fish seem to be the most popular.
Seattle seems to have a lot of left-over hippies, and a lot of them sell their wares in Pike's Market.
The flowers here are incredible and incredibly inexpensive.
The fruit and berries also look very good.
Tulip.
Chieko looking at the flowers.
Strawberries.
These ladies are working behind the flower counter.
I thought this girl selling scarves had Gypsy eyes. She caught me taking her picture.
One of several street performers. (Yes, I dropped some money in his guitar case.)
Walking down the stairs from Pike Place Market.
Gas in Bellingham, WA, just before the Canadian border. Gas in Salt Lake was about $3.55.
I haven't seen one of these cloth towel machines in a gas station restroom for many years (Bellingham Chevron).
Our hotel in New Westminster, BC.
The view from the balcony of our hotel.
This is "The World's Largest Tin Soldier" just outside our hotel.
I think this was in North Vancouver, near the Lonsdale Quay Market.
Flower petals we found on the ground near the parking garage in North Vancouver.
A cruise ship leaving the port next to the Pan Pacific Hotel in Vancouver. Maybe it's going to Alaska. If so, I wish I were on it.
North Vancouver.
The Lonsdale Quay Market in North Vancouver.
Vancouver from North Vancouver.
A lot of sea planes take off and land at the Vancouver harbor.
I thought this could be a poster: Together we can accomplish big things.
A totem pole in Stanley Park.
We took a drive up to Whistler, and on the way we went on a tour in the Britannia Mine, a former copper mine in operation from about 1904 to 1974.
The first air-powered drills were very noisy and created immense amounts of dust, causing the miners to go deaf and to die from silicosis. The guide ran the drill for a few seconds to demonstrate the noise.
They kept the dynamite in a wooden cabinet to protect it from sparks generated by the rail cars. The only fixed light in the tunnel was in this box to keep the dynamite warm and thus a little more stable. Cold, damp dynamite explodes unexpectedly.
These are core samples from all over the mountain, stored and indexed.When the price of copper was high, the miners mined copper. When copper was low and zinc was higher, they knew where to dig based on the core samples.
Climbing the 365 or so uneven and rickety stairs on the right (with no handrails at the time) were where many of the mill workers started their shift. If they were caught riding the rail car (on the left) they were fired on the spot. It had no brakes and sometimes broke loose from its hand-cranked cable.
In the mill.
The mill is several stories high and sits against the mountain. The ground-up ore was poured from the top, where it flowed down through a soap bath. The metal adhered to the bubbles and was thus captured, while the slag ran off.
In the mill.
Where is Chieko? I'm not sure this truck belongs here. The guide never mentioned it, but maybe it was used to carry off the slag, which was dumped in Howe Sound. Later the mine owners discovered they could sell the slag, because it was high in silica. So they ended up selling everything they mined.
A tribute to the miners carved in rock.
Next we stopped at Shannon Falls, which pours over a tall granite cliff.
Like everything else in the Pacific Northwest, this area is damp and mossy.
I didn't take any pictures at Whistler, because it's just a bunch of hotels and stores with people skiing on ice and mud (I think this was the last ski weekend of the season). But the mountain peaks around here are amazing.
This valley was carved by glaciers.
Several glaciers still reside in these mountains.
Howe Sound was also carved by glaciers.
Waiting for the BCFerries boat to Victoria, we weren't sure whether this was someone's pet dog or pet bear.
BCFerries.
The crew gets to use these powered lifeboats that are put in the water by a handy crane.
The passengers get to use these lifeboats that are rolled up in tubes and have to be deployed by panicky people.
Here's the mechanism for deploying the passenger lifeboats. In case you don't have time to read the instructions on the sign while the boat is capsizing, memorize this (what's written on the sign to the right): To release 50-person liferaft canister No. 1 pull out pins (item 1 detail A) and push release bar (item 2 detail A) outboard. Liferaft canisters Nos. 2, 3 & 4 can then be released by opening rope clutches (item 3 detail B) in sequence. Painter lines can be released individually, once each liferaft has been loaded with passengers. Got that?
This is a passenger I found stuffed behind the crew lifeboats.
Passing the time while the boat sails to Shwartz Bay. We saw two pods of killer whales on this little boat ride to Vancouver Island.
This is the Empress Hotel on Victoria Wharf. We found the blue whale on the grass by the sidewalk. We left him on the wall.
A view of the wharf from the other side.
Chieko really likes the Empress. Someday we'll stay here. Whenever our ship comes in.
Hey, look. Gas is only $1.31. Wait. That's Canadian dollars per liter (or litre as they'd say). About US$5.25 per gallon. And quite a bit cheaper than Vancouver, where it was $1.43 to $1.47 per liter.
The Parliament Building is a beauty. It is also on the wharf, around the corner from the Empress.
People waiting in line for dinner at Red Fish Blue Fish, which occupies a shipping container on the wharf.
Chieko with a WWI vet.
The wharf under the Empress is pretty much all street performers and trinket sellers.
Chieko hates these loud Canadian mailboxes.
The Miniature World museum is on the side of the Empress Hotel. This is an amazing display of dioramas. This one is the U.S. Civil War.
U.S. Civil War.
U.S. Civil War.
World War I.
World War II fighter planes from various countries.
Berlin after the war.
Sitting Bull escaped to Canada and lived for a while after being chased down in the United States. Meeting with Canadian authorities.
Natives of North America deal with soldiers.
Charles Dickens's Oliver Twist.
Charles Dickens's Nicholas Nickleby.
Gulliver.
A cowboy and his girl. Or is it a cowgirl and her guy?
A fire engine show.
And a car show.
Castles from all over Europe in one place.
A street in Old London.
Street merchants in Old London.
Shopping and punishment in Old London.
Modern London.
Cleaning the windows that museum visitors are looking through.
The circus is probably the most amazing exhibit in the museum, with so many buildings, animals, people and moving parts.
Circus parade.
Under the Big Top.
The circus arcade at night.
A visit to Vancouver Island without stopping at the Butchart Gardens would be a crime. We haven't been here for several years.
Is this a poppy?
Calla lilies are considered a "noxious weed" in Australia, according to Wikipedia. They are native to South Africa, where the Afrikaans word for the flower means pig's ear.
Behind Chieko is the sunken garden. This was a gravel pit before the Butchart lady made it into a garden.
The garden has about 7,500 tulips, which will all be dug up when the tulip season ends soon.
Lots of color in the gardens.
Resting.
Contemplating.
In the greenhouse.
Japanese maple.
Back in the greenhouse.
More colors.
These are tulips.
Next we rode the Washington State Ferries boat from Sidney to Anacortes through the San Juan Islands.
Ferry boat negotiating the San Juan Islands.
Just another safety tip: If you're on the car deck, and the boat starts to capsize, pull this bolt thingy attached to the crinkly cable thingy, and 80 life jackets (10 child, 70 adult) will appear from somewhere, though I couldn't figure out where. Maybe they fall from the ceiling, if the boat isn't upside down.
The crew getting the boat ready to dock at Friday Harbor.
Chieko on deck.
A very small lighthouse on a very small island.
This is a Japanese garden in the University of Washington Arboretum. Actually, this is a Japanese person sitting on a bench in the Japanese garden.
Chieko calls the koi by clapping her hands.
Normally clapping means food. But we think it's funny that the koi come, and we have no food to give them. I think the koi enjoy the joke, too.
The view from in the stream.
The view across the water.
Red flowers. But you knew that.
These turtles are plentiful here.
This turtle is trying to swim away from the fire. Another funny joke: He doesn't know it's not really a fire.
A white flower. But you probably knew that, too.
Mount Ranier. Chieko took this picture with my phone on the flight home.
