Not so sleepless in Seattle

I've never been to Washington, so I was really looking forward for this trip. Besides, it's Mothers day weekend.. a little bonding time with Mama & AJ would make this trip pretty memorable. We flew to Bellingham WA on Friday and drove to Seattle the next day -- a good 1.5 hours drive.

It's so nice driving in Washington, no wonder they call it the evergreen state -- lush greens all around, it looks like the road is lined up with Christmas trees.

My cousin Kuya Dan Pinga, who lives in Renton WA, agreed to go with us for the day. I haven't seen Kuya Dan for more than 25 years -- he is the son of Mommy Puring who is my mom's older sister -- so, it was kind of a mini-reunion of sorts.

First agenda of the day, Ride the Ducks.

When in Washington, one should not miss a visit to Seattle and when I was checking online for Seattle attractions, "Ride the Ducks" looked like a fun way to see the city for the first time. It's a 90-minutes ride on a fully-restored WWII amphibious landing craft driven by "Captain Whoo Wa" -- a very funny guy -- who gave us trivia, local folklore, historical information and some funky music while we drove along downtown Seattle.

For a "Greys Anatomy" fan like me, the Seattle backdrop is pretty familiar, who knows, I might bump into Dr. McDreamy -- but, that's just a wishful thinking. According to Capt. Whoo Wa, this building is being used as the exterior shot of Seattle Grace Hospital. For those who doesn't know Greys Anatomy, it's a TV show on ABC every thursday night.

Unfortunately, Dr. McDreamy is nowhere in sight... he's probably somewhere in Hollywood.

The duck took us around downtown Seattle. We saw the Pike Place market, Pioneer Square, Safeco field, Qwest field, Fremont, and at least a dozen Starbucks outlet... ka-ching!!! That's what you should say each time you see a Starbucks in Seattle.

The duck also made a splash into Lake Union. Who can forget that boat house in the Tom Hanks-Meg Ryan movie "Sleepless in Seattle"?! Can you believe it really exists? As Capt. Whoo Wa informed us, it was just in the market for $2.5 million... too bad I'm a little short on cash. :)

All in all, a 90-minutes duck ride to get a glimpse of Seattle is pretty awesome.

2nd and last agenda... the Space Needle.

Across the parking lot of ride the ducks is the Space Needle. Standing at 520' above Seattle, the Space Needle is the ultimate Seattle icon. Now, I live in Vegas and I wondered... I had been to the Stratosphere tower, so being in the observation deck of another tower would not make much of a difference... I think... but, what-the-heck... this is AJ's and my Mom's first tower experience. And on a semi-cloudy semi-clear day, we were able to see the amazing Seattle skyline, and a glimpse of Mt. Rainier... it's pretty spectacular!

A day in Vancouver

A day in Vancouver.

It's been 6 years since I last saw my cousin TJ. The last time was at a mall back in Manila when he accompanied me to pick up my plane ticket on a trip that will eventually change my life. Six years later, and after countless emails, phonecalls and text messages, we finally set up a time and date to meet. Not in the Philippines nor in the states, but in Vancouver Canada.

It's mothers day weekend, and while I wished that my mom could have joined us in the trip, I was not able to get her a visa for that one day trip. So, me and AJ took that one hour drive from Bellingham Washington to Vancouver Canada. I almost had a problem with immigration when the officer asked for the letter of permission from my husband, which I forgot to bring. {note for future travels: always have a letter of permission from your husband if you're planning to bring your kid outside the border}. But luckily, a nice smile, a little charm & a promise not to forget it next time around, finally did the trick. :)

After a couple of wrong turns.. wrong exits, we finally made it to downtown Vancouver. Thank God for GPS..[or to the person who invented GPS]...and thanks to Matt of Enterprise rent-a-car for suggesting the GPS, I don't know where we could have ended up without it.

TJ picked us up at the Pan Pacific hotel, and managed to get us visitors passes so we can actually enter the ship. That was a good private tour!!! Zaandam is a very nice ship, pretty big and pretty expensive. They were in Canada for a day to pick up passengers for a 7-day Alaskan cruise. How I wish we could have joined the cruise.... but hopefully next year. TJ will be joining another Holland America ship by June, the newly built Eurodam... so that's something to look forward to.

After the tour, we headed back to downtown Vancouver for lunch, see the sights and catch up. How time flies when you're having a lot of fun. Next thing I know, TJ has to go back to the ship as they were sailing off at 5pm, and me & AJ has to drive back to the states.

Oh well, until we meet again cuz'.... and thanks for the dam ship sweater.