It has been a while since I have blogged. Life gets in the way some time. My oldest started Kindergarten, I have been busy at work, and there is just too much going on this time of year. My hubby gave me a wonderful present, a new (refurbished) laptop. This is my first “new” laptop in over seven years. I have been writing my past blogs on my work computer, but I have decided that I no longer wanted to use that computer to express my creativity. There is time for work and time for me.

Well, I wanted to start my blogging off with a trip report. This one started in October 2015. While on our 10 year anniversary Western Caribbean cruise I decided to put down a deposit on a cruise for my 40^th birthday. My theory is that now that I am “old” that I need to go on an Alaskan cruise. Of course this would be a Disney cruise, no surprise to those who know me. We decided to fly into Seattle even though the cruise deports out of Vancouver, British Columbia. I have never been to Seattle, but my husband has been in the past. I thought since the cruise took off on August 7^th and my birthday is the 5^th, let’s enjoy a day in Seattle before making the trek up to Canada. So the plan was fly into Seattle August 5^th, take a bus up to Vancouver the next day, then enjoy some time in Vancouver before leaving on the 7^th on the ship.

To get most of our trip, we got up super early and took the first flight out of Detroit to Seattle on Alaskan Airlines, which was cheaper than Delta. Just a side note, this is not a cheap trip. Between, the three different hotel stays, the transportation, and the actual cruise (which I saved for weekly for over two years), it adds up. After dealing with a Saturday morning flight out of the other terminal (what I call the non-Delta terminal in Detroit) I am going to get TSA approved for my next flight. I am not going to tell you how bad the security line is. I don’t know if was the time of day or what, but the line was literally out of the door. By the time we went through the Alaska Airlines line to check the luggage, went through the security check, then picking up something for breakfast, it was time to get on the plane. So off we go an our adventure!

We landed in Seattle on time and we were so excited to finally do some exploring.

After our car picked us up we dropped off our luggage at the hotel and did some walking. Fist stop was to find Pike’s Place.

We just walked around and enjoyed the views. But we were getting hungry. It was lunch time at home, but just the end of breakfast time on the West coast. We decided to eat at the Hard Rock Cafe since I had a free meal for my birthday. So we finally found the location and it was time to eat! It was awesome to see some guitars from the greats that I listened to my teen/college years (which most of them are now gone). We just enjoyed our burgers and the sights before we headed back to the hotel.

I was getting really tired from only sleeping one hour the night before and I needed to recharge. We both enjoyed a three hour nap before we headed back out to check out the other side of the city, near the Space Needle. After freshening up we walked over to the Space Needle, bought our tickets, then walked around. I also wanted to visit the Chihuly Museum, but there was an event there that evening so we opted to check out the scenery. After an iced tea from Starbucks and a mini cheesecake from a stand nearby we got to wait in line for our trip up.

Because of fires in the area we were unable to see Mt. Rainier, but we still got to enjoy the views.

It was getting late, so we went to dinner at a pizza place called Zeeks Pizza. We happened to walk past it on the way to the Space Needle. The pizza was amazing. I can’t remember which pizza we ordered, but we got a salad as well and it was really yummy. After dinner it was time to get some rest. It was midnight back home and I was running out of fuel.

Up next, Vancouver!