How many of us have them? FRIENDS! On this trip Alycia and I stayed with a mutual friend/former coworker of hers. Big travel tips, if you know people in a city you’re traveling to, use your resources. Seattle was on our list of places to visit and staying with a friend allowed us to save on lodging so it was a no brainer. We booked a long weekend trip, Thursday to Sunday. We had an idea of what we wanted to do but we went with the same logic we use for all our trips, look at the bucket list and live local. The fact that we were staying with residents of the city made that really easy. One thing I did not expect was for the food to be so good, I mean it wasn’t that I didn’t think it would be, but I experienced some dishes that make me want to go back. And on top of the food being good, I enjoyed the aesthetics and vibe of the city. It had its own personality, forward and progressive without the over crowdedness and saturated living space. A place where you can stand the rain, it’s like the kiss of the city.

Things to Do in Seattle

So what’s there to do? Of course in Washington there’s nature so we, by mistake, ended up hiking Mount Si (Big Si to be exact) on the first day. If you’re an outdoorsy person and like to be in nature, we used the All Trails app to find a list of the trails in and just outside of Seattle. The app tells you how long and strenuous the hikes are so you’re able to choose what activity level you’re into. This wasn’t your average hike (Alycia almost didn’t make it), but when we made it to the peak it was worth the hassle. The views were spectacular! If you’re afraid of heights you may want to rethink this one because we felt like we were on top of the world. When you come back down, you’re going to be ready to go so make sure to arrange transportation prior to the hike. We tried to call an Uber and a Lyft and lets just say it took a while for someone to want to pick us up. It’s in Wacoma which is a neighboring city and most rideshares weren’t trying to go out that far.

We left time for some of the main tourist attractions as well. We visited the Museum of Pop Culture Seattle (MoPOP) which was $30/per person. It was a cool museum that highlighted all of the major singer/songwriters that came out of Seattle. I didn’t realize Seattle had such a rich history when it came to music. And of course we had to stop by the Space Needle. We also were able to catch the On The Run II concert while we were there. Always check for different events that may be coming through the city while there. Major cities like Seattle attract a lot of major events. We took a tour of Microsoft, nerdy yes, but we’re into tech so it was a highlight for us. We also blocked a day off to take a train to Vancouver, so if you have your passport handy I’d recommend spending a day or two in Vancouver which is across the border of Washington and is a buzzing city. There’s great shopping available, restaurants, and more attractions like Grouse Mountain which we visited but decided to take a ski lift up this time because we had done enough hiking for the weekend. There was so much more to explore in Vancouver which is why I’d say spend more than a day there if you can. Our Seattle trip ended with the Rams vs Seahawks game on that Sunday right before we headed to the airport to say goodbye. Seattle definitely left us with a good first impression, wanting more.