Seattle – Day 2, and the end of the trip

So I was “that guy” last night – no, not the guy who brings a girl into his male dorm room for a late night rendezvous (see: Lauren’s Welsh boytoy), but the girl who coughed all through the night in a room of 10 travelers trying to sleep. It was pretty terrible. I FELT terrible about it, but I just couldn’t help it. I slept in my top bunk with a water bottle and a bag of cough drops, put sweatshirts under my pillow so that my head would be elevated, and covered my feet with Vicks Vaporub before going to bed. FAIL FAIL FAIL. If I didn’t keep people up with my horrific phlegmy noises, I sure as hell disturbed them with the masculine pine smell of Vicks. So gross! And nothing I did even helped minimize the cough. Sigh.

Finally around 8:15 I decided not to stay in bed pretending to sleep and got up and made myself some pancakes. Yes, this is one of those lovely hostels that provides you with everything you need to make your own pancake breakfast. It’s a brilliant idea, and so cheap and easy for the hostel to do – and they get to promote themselves as providing free breakfast to travelers. Win-win!

I had a few places in mind to visit in Seattle before coming here, and since I spent the first day wandering around like a helpless puppy dog (well not really, but I sure didn’t hit much on my list), today was the day to be touristy. Part 1 of today’s adventure took me to Capitol Hill on the other side of town, in search of the so-called glorious coffee at Vivece Roasteria Espresso Bar. I was slightly underwhelmed by the whole experience: it was overpriced, and it wasn’t even a proper cafe where you could sit and relax for awhile. It was more like an espresso cart, if anything. I sat at an outdoor table and people watched while I had my coffee, but I just wasn’t feeling Capitol Hill so I didn’t linger.

I took the bus back downtown to the Smith Tower observatory. Everyone goes to the top of the Space Needle, but I figured I’d try this view because a). it’s 1/3 of the price, and b). you can actually see the Space Needle from the tower. The view of Puget Sound, the mountains, and the city itself was nice, but once again I was underwhelmed. That is, until I was walking out of the building and heard some guy holler at me: “Yo girl, I don’t care what they say – you put the ‘h’ in hot!”. Really?! Ok then! People are nuts, seriously.

It was a short walk from there to Pioneer Square, which I felt like I had to see because of the token totem poles. Now, sing with me: “un-der-whel-ming” (dun dun dun-dun-dun). To console myself, I got some coffee from the Cherry Street coffee shop on the square. Ah, much better.

I finally got ahold of Lauren and met her back up at the hostel, and we walked down the street to Pike Place Market to catch up on what we’d been up to the past day in Seattle (since I’d barely seen her). We hung out at the Local Color coffee shop and I continued to OD on coffee (whatever, it’s Seattle, perfectly allowed!). I updated her on the various touristy things I’d forced myself to see in the past 24 hours, and she recapped last night’s escapades. I swear to god, Lauren always has the best stories because she has a knack at getting herself into the most ridiculous of situations. She’s always down for whatever and open to meeting all sorts of people, often getting me involved in interesting scenarios that I wouldn’t otherwise find myself in. And I love her for it!

We wandered around the market for a bit and then walked uphill a ways to another coffee shop so she could buy some beans as a gift for someone. If my head weren’t spinning from the previous 3 cups of coffee, I’d have ordered another from here because it smelled so amazing.

We parted ways after that – I let her spend our last night of the trip with the Welshie, since it’d probably be the last time they’d ever have together. I honestly don’t even remember how I spent the rest of the day, except I remember eating dinner at a mediocre Indian restaurant. In the evening, I took a bus up to Queen Anne in search of Kerry Park, where many a Seattle skyline shot is taken. Unfortunately for me, the bus driver had no idea where it was, so I ended up getting off the bus at the end of the route and walking a few miles all the way back toward the top of the hill through a residential area after dark looking for it. Not fun, especially when I had no clue where it was and was basically just following my sense of direction to where I thought would be a good lookout point. When I travel, I often find myself in these situations where I’m alone and somewhat lost, but somehow I never get nervous about it. I have this mentality that things will always work themselves out, and often rely on my common sense to get me through them. It probably also has something to do with my fierce sense of independence and slightly foolish “I’m invincible!” mentality. But so far it hasn’t failed me, and has only added to my adventures.

Kerry Park is more like a small pull-off from the road, but has a lovely view of the city from across the water. Totally worth the hassle of getting there.

From there, I eventually found the right busstop and got back into the city, bought myself some cough medicine, and spent the night getting ready to leave the next day.

The next morning, by the way, was nothing short of frenzied. I woke up to an empty bottom bunk again, but Lauren returned shortly after and frantically packed up all her stuff so we could leave for the airport. She had misplaced her cell phone the night before, so we were searching all over the hostel for it. Couple all this stress with the pain of leaving one of the most amazing guys you’ve ever met forever, and Lauren was an absolute wreck. Poor kid.

But, we made it to the airport in time. And she eventually found her phone stashed in one of her bags. *phew*

Man, what an awesome trip we had. Too short!