Trippin' 4

There's this inherent security problem with taking your bike on a driving vacation with you, if you are to have the freedom you desire, to roam wherever the hell you want.  Bikes on roof racks, or bikes on hitch racks doesn't get it done.  You have to always be arriving at a place where you can offload them and stash them into your secure hotel room, or some such other place.  What a royal PITA.  You could throw them inside your Sprinter van, if you own one, but then you have to be willing to drive your bigass van around highly congested urban cores, if those are part of where you need to go, which for us it was, because that's where our daughter is.  And then you have to figure out how to live with your Sprinter for the other 51 weeks of the year.  Make it your daily driver?  I can't imagine how that would not totally suck.  Buy another economical daily driver and park your Sprinter most of the time, and insure and make space for and maintain them both?   I can't imagine how that would not totally suck.   It's not a trivial problem to deal with, but some form of solution was a serious priority for this trip.

I really like my Nissan Frontier.  It's a small truck that is still a really capable 'truck', that suits my city life and allows me to park in a narrow supermarket parking space or parallel park downtown.  And it still has enough power to kick ass on the interstate.  So I rigged a scheme that allowed our bikes to live securely in the back of our canopy-covered-truck during this trip.  We didn't have to make any compromises in terms of where we went or parked, and I had total peace of mind throughout the entire trip, with respect to the security of our bikes.

So with that in mind, our next stop was Seattle proper.  We met up with our daughter Jacque and BF Nate and did a walkabout from their apartment, towards our destination, while enjoying some of the Seattle-unique sights.

We ended up at the renowned Boat Street Cafe, which will soon be closing, and enjoyed the most delightful  brunch.

At some point during the course of the day, J & N routed us through Fremont Brewing.  It was a lovely day in Seattle and the place was a-hoppin.

That evening, J & N prepared a Thai meal for us in their apartment.  They both work in the food industry and know a lot about what they are doing when it comes to putting a fine meal together.

While they were cooking, I was keeping an eye on the sunset from their fire escape.  Word.

Elegant, cozy.  The food was SO GOOD, and SO HOT.  We laughed until we cried over our dilemma of pain versus pleasure.  It was a wonderful meal/experience, shared with people I love, that I will never forget.

Patty and I spent the night at the Inn At Queen Anne.  Not only was it a dump, it was on overpriced dump.  But location is everything, and our desired location was close to Jacque and Nate, so it worked for us.

Damn, what a good day.

All the while, the bikes were sitting in the back of the truck, and nary one ounce of worry was expended over their safety.  So all in all, a pretty rad, comfortable, bikes-on-vacation visit to the big city.