spend a weekend in seattle

how to spend a great weekend in seattle (and have some fun in tacoma too!)

nick and i just got back from an amazing week long trip to explore washington state! i can’t wait to share all the amazing things we did and saw while we were there. somehow we were blessed with sunshine and beautiful weather for our entire trip!

i am planning to break up our trip into three posts so check back for my recaps of our time at mount rainier national park as well as olympic national park coming soon. 

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pikes place market

we got to seattle early in the morning and were able to check into our air bnb early. from there we headed downtown for a tour of pikes place. there is so much to explore there i recommend checking out a tour to make sure you don’t miss the highlights. and the flowers. the flowers were absolutely amazing!

if you have been to europe you might have heard of free walking tours since they are popular in most major cities there. there are actually free walking tours in seattle too! one of the few cities stateside to have them. we did a free walking tour for pikes market and our guide joe was great. he is a seattle native and was a lot of fun for the hour or so we spent together walking through the market. we even got a sample of some of the best smoked salmon there!

during our tour we saw the oldest starbucks with their original logo, which is a little risque for today’s market. and we got to stop at the gum wall in post alley for a little gross but intriguing history. 

the market is a great place to grab lunch or a snack and people watch too. we had some seafood here, fish and chips, as well as some homemade ice cream while we were walking around. 

chihuly glass museum

it’s a nice 20 minute walk from pikes market to the chihuly museum, the space needle, and mpop. we decided on the chihuly museum to save on funds and to prepare for an activity later in the weekend! we did get a look look at the space needle from the ground and the cool exterior of the mpop (museum of pop culture). 

the chihuly museum has indoor and outdoor exhibits and it is truly amazing to see these huge pieces of glass art. also there are free professional photographers throughout the exhibits that will take your picture and all you have to do is have the picture emailed to yourself. they also have an outdoor garden with glass pieces of art and even had a small scale glass blowing demonstration going on in the beautiful weather. 

after the museum and a bit more people watching we headed back to west seattle where we were staying and walked to the bridge to split a burger, some great fries, and a few drinks before calling it a relatively early night. 

glassblowing class

sunday morning we ate a late breakfast at luna park cafe. it’s a great place in west seattle that had a good basic breakfast and a place to sit outside and enjoy the weather even more. 

after breakfast we headed to the part of our time in seattle i had been looking forward to the most! we have long used air bnb for booking places to stay in our travels, but i recently discovered air bnb experiences. we booked a glass blowing class! that’s right, we got to blow our own glass, just like chihuly….or almost lol. with the guidance of our teachers and our inspiration from seeing chihuly’s work we each made three pieces: a paperweight, ornament, and glass. this was truly a once in a lifetime experience and something i recommend for anyone spending some time in seattle.

alki beach

after finishing our masterpieces we headed back to west seattle and alki beach to continue to enjoy the sun and people watching. getting my toes in the water i quickly determined the one person i saw swimming must have been either crazy or a polar bear, but there were countless people enjoying the sun and sand. 

we ate dinner at cactus alki beach for some good queso, fajitas, and margaritas just across the street from the beach. and because we were on vacation we headed to full tilt for some ice cream. this is a really cool place with unique flavors of ice cream, beer, and arcade games all in one place! i had ube, which is purple sweet potato, and it was soooo good!

tacoma

on our last night before flying home we stayed in tacoma. this gave us a very short exposure to the city, but we did get to see some cool stuff. there is a free small botanical garden with some weird and beautiful plants. we walked down to the water front to watch the ships and see a giant totem pole in firemans park. we could also get a good view of mount rainier from tacoma and a highway in seattle. check out a future post to hear about our day trip to mount rainier national park. 

we ate dinner at a great mexican place called the matador which has an amazing brussel sprout appetizer and happy hour special. it was so good even nick liked it! and let’s not forget the margaritas! we could also get a good view of mount rainier from tacoma and a highway in seattle. check out a future post to hear about our day trip to mount rainier national park. 

and let’s not forget about dessert for our final night of vacation! we got some ice cream at ice cream social. a few unique flavors including lavender and huckleberry and fresh made waffle cones made this a place i would visit again any time i’m in town. 

seattle ferry ride by car

when we left seattle we actually headed to olympic national park for a few days of exploring and we did it in a truly seattle way. who knew you could drive a car on to a ferry?! we drove our rental car onto a ferry and headed from west seattle across the puget sound to continue our adventure. stay tuned for another blog post all about that adventure! there are a lot of ferries in seattle, so take one if you have the chance!

final thoughts

getting to explore a big city like seattle (and tacoma) was a great experience. there is so much to do and see and eat that we were just able to hit the highlights in our two days there. i like to think we got a good feel for this hip, beautiful, waterfront city and wouldn’t hesitate to visit again. 

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have you been to seattle? what was your favorite thing to do? check back to read about the rest of our adventure in washington!