2020 PNW Trip - Washington 2

We started our full day in Seattle with a quick breakfast at Oddfellows Café and a stroll around Capital Hill. The rest of the day was mostly spent driving around the greater Seattle area, working our way counter-clockwise around Lake Washington from Renton and New Castle, up through Bellevue, Redmond, and Kirkland, and finally shooting all the way over to Edmonds before settle back down to Greenwood area. Overall it was interesting to get a sense of how each neighborhood was like and the “vibes” they had compared to their online descriptions.

Saw a couple of these rigs, really cool trucks that look like the product of AEV, an overlander focused company that’s known for using Rams as a foundation. They’re very pricy and not really well known so spotting one is pretty rare.

One thing that was not rare during our trip were the number of JDM 4X4 vans that have been imported to the States. They’re not common in CA where our SMOG laws prevent them from being registered, but up here that’s not an issue.

On our last day we drove around West Seattle before returning the rental and flying home. I’m lucky enough to already live in one of the prettiest cities in the world, but both Portland and Seattle really do have a lot going for them. One of the few cities that I enjoy every time I visit.

2020 PNW Trip - Washington 1

Last day in Portland, most of it was taken up with a roadtrip along the Oregon coast and into Seattle late afternoon. But before we left, we had to get another taste of Portland food.

Between Seattle and Portland, each city has it’s strengths and weaknesses, but when it comes to food we definitely feel Portland just slays. Maybe if I were a huge seafood fan I’d better appreciate Seattle’s food scene, and their scene is no slouch, but the options in Portland genuinely made me excited just so much more often. Maybe even more than Bay Area…

Once on the road, I wanted to swing by Tillamook’s factory for some of their ice cream. Unfortunately, we chose the one day that they were filming a new commercial. They were letting a limited few in at a time for a factory tour, but the food was closed until they wrapped up their shoot which was indefinite. So being mindful of the distance we needed to cover, we decided not to wait and went straight to the coast.

I don’t know if it’s normally like this or we just got lucky with a break from the weather, but the moment we got to the coast the sun really came out and turned the whole place into Studio Ghibli level beauty. We had to stop at Cannon Beach of course and after stretching our legs a bit and a great lunch, we got back on the road to Seattle.

After checking in we grabbed some nice warm ramen and then walked around Capital Hill for a bit. Had to swing by a Starbucks of course, but this is one location that (as long as the crowds aren’t crazy) I don’t mind going to. Afterwards we drove up to Kerry Park for a good view of the city before turning in for the night.

2020 PNW Trip - Oregon 2

We continued to explore most of eastern Portland but also spent time around downtown, trying to take advantage of some tax-free shopping (even though we hardly bought anything). The weather was also on and off with the rain during the whole day so we ended up doing a lot of the exploring in the comfort of our rental.

It’s probably safe to say the donut is Portland’s local delicacy, but don’t be tricked into automatically going to VooDoo’s crazy cereal/meat creations. Try to look for independent shops, but if you’re gonna go for a chain, I’d recommend either Heavenly if you’re feeling something Winchell’s-like or our choice Blue Star for something a little fancier but so, so good.

See See Motor Coffee is a local chain that I had to visit. Good coffee, cool bikes, and that really cool Camel Pro banner they had on the ceiling made it a good place to take a break from the rain. Afterwards we cruised around Portland’s North District and stopping by 10 Barrel Brewing for great beer, seasoned fries, and amazing, chili-thick minestrone soup. From that point on the rain just hit harder so I didn’t really shoot much more for the rest of our day in Portland.

2020 PNW Trip - Oregon 1

Since 2020 lit ablaze into the dumpster fire that we now know and loath and we had got back from our UK trip just as everything started shutting down globally, we had been bunkered down in the Bay Area and holding off on any of the major trips we’d typically try to do throughout the year. As things started to stabilize a bit and with the storm of the elections and holidays looming ahead, we decided to take advantage of the short window and do a little trip up north to Portland and Seattle.

The plans were to first land in Seattle where we’d rent a car to get us down to Portland, back up to Seattle, and cruise around both cities in the car so as to limit the amount of time spent on shared transportation. One constant challenge throughout the trip though was getting food as seating options and hours were limited compared to normal times. Fortunately, both cities are full of great food options which made it easy to pivot to an alternative when our first choice wasn’t available. “Happy little accidents” is a perfect way to describe how we ended up eating at a super good Mediterranean food place for our first stop. Juicy, grilled chicken with honey sauce? Oh yeah!

And of course you don’t visit the PNW without constantly consuming their most famous local delicacy: coffee. After visiting Tokyo and Seoul, it was actually a little surprising to feel like coffee shops were a little sparse for the areas, but that doesn’t mean we were ever out of reach for some great brews. Olympia is a local chain but we ended up going to one in the city itself as we headed down to Portland.

Arriving to the city within a few hours and with good weather on our side, we quickly checked into our hotel and started exploring some of Portland’s eastern neighborhoods.

When we were planning for our food stops, we did our best to find ones that provided outdoor seating, though that only really works when the weather is decent. We knew it’d be colder up north, but having just flown out from a heatwave that the Bay Area was experiencing that week, we were probably a little more optimistic with the temperatures than we should have been.

Heading back to the hotel, we turned in early for the night knowing we’d be going all around the city the following day, though not before admiring some of the modern Portlandia decor our hotel was filled with.

2019 Japan/Korea - Seoul 5

On our last day, we decided to head further east and explore a little over the river as well. We probably traveled the most on this day, but because much of it was in the train there weren’t too many opportunities for photos along the way. First stop, the Lotte World Tower!

The tallest building in Korea and the 5th tallest building in the world (according to wikipedia anyways) it was definitely the tallest structure I’ve been in. The blazing fast elevators shot us all the way up from a few floors in the basement to the 117th floor. From there there was a couple more floors served as the observation deck. We got up to the 122nd floor, but the building tops out with a reserved 123rd floor. In other words, pretty dang high, accented by the fact that nothing else in the city was anywhere near as tall.

Next stop was another architectural highlight, the Dongdaemun Design Plaza (or DDP) which houses an art museum and shopping plaza. Unfortunately wasn’t able to get any good shots of the building as a whole, but the way the building shaped the space up close was just amazing. Like Gehry’s Disney Hall in LA or MoPOP in Seattle but bigger and simpler forms.

Needless to say, it was pretty fun shooting photos here.

Not wanting to push ourselves too hard on the last day (the trip back involved a transfer in Tokyo where we had about half a day in between Haneda and Narita airports) we decided to spend the rest of the afternoon and evening exploring more deeply the lively neighborhoods near our hotel.

During our wanderings, we discovered a place that immediately got our attention; a cafe with a corgi!

This was Watson, a sweet (albeit a little tired) lil guy. The cafe owner was clearly a big fan of corgis in general as you can tell from the decor.

And from one dog to another, we found a stand that sold corndogs! Turns out these are actually a staple of Seoul, locally known as just a Seoul Hot Dog. A few key differences between theirs and ours however is that theirs are fried in a crispier coating, similar to tonkatsu, and are also sprinkled with some sugar. I was already a big fan of regular, American corndogs, but they are nothing compared to this Seoul styled ones! Soooo goooood.

Soon we wandered to a cafe that had a unique take on its interior design. Everything was penned as if you were inside a comic strip. It was a pretty amazing at first, but also got a little disorientating after a bit.

That evening had been pretty on and off with the rain, so after waiting a bit in that cafe, the rain appeared to have ended for the night and we went back out, wandering our way back to the hotel.

Seoul was a place that I had modest expectations for going in, but those expectations ended up being far exceeded. The people, the food, the art, the food, the architecture, the food, the style, and oh yeah, did I mention the food? All of it was just a blast to experience. If I had to choose, I feel I still enjoy Japan more, it’s more my speed, but Seoul was really fun.

I guess the difference between Tokyo and Seoul would be like the difference between London/Paris and Amsterdam. Sure Tokyo has a stigma for being a city that promotes “weird stuff”, but to me Seoul was definitely the more funky, looser of the two. One thing that I really noticed was the style of Seoul’s art culture was distinctly non-Anime, as if when defining their visual style they started with “Rule 1: Don’t look Japanese.” Much of it genuinely felt more modern and Northern-European with a light layer of “Kawaii” tones than it did Japanese or some of the styles I’ve seen from China.

That said, I’m not at all suggesting that they’re just adopting European styles: It is through and through a genuinely Asian culture and it packs all of the energy and intensity that I never felt in Europe. NYC is probably the closest I’ve experienced that feeling outside of Asia, so it’s probably down to the number of people living so close together. Either way, the whole trip was a wonderful experience and each opportunity I get to be out here just makes me more eager to go back again.

2019 Japan/Korea - Seoul 4

We pick back up in Jongno-gu, near the Gyeongbokgung Palace . Lots of pics so I’ll be brief with the descriptions. This was one of my favorite areas though, with the architecture and Kiwa Taproom in particular being really memorable to me.

A cool funky building located near the modern art museum.

Of course visiting the palace itself. It was surprisingly popular for people to visit the palace wearing traditional outfits which you can rent from a bunch of shops just outside the walls. We expected the main customers to be the foreign tourists but there were a surprising amount of Koreans who also rented out the outfits, maybe incentivized by the reduced entry costs for those wearing the outfits.

Lots of effort put into this themed clothing store.

Decided to get a little fancy this night and went to a recommended Korean BBQ restaurant. Not that we encountered any bland food on the trip, but if I had to choose a best meal in Seoul, it’d probably be this one.

Before ending the night we swung by the Kiwa Taproom for a few drinks and late night snacks. It’s hard to see here but the place was actually more like a covered patio which let the city air and sounds come in and provide a more lively ambiance without needing a large crowd.

Also their glasses had childrens-book styled paintings of cats and dogs, so cute!

Ok, that’s it for this day. Next up will be the last full day in Seoul.

2019 Japan/Korea - Seoul 3

Started off the next day heading over to a nearby cafe for some breakfast. One thing that struck us while there was that compared to other places we’ve been to, Seoul felt like it started relatively late. Again, breakfast wasn’t as widely common as it is in other cities and to further support that fact, most of the morning meals we ate were from Australian-based or themed locations.

So while I got to visit my Honda museum in Japan, Michelle got to get her plant kicks at the Seoul Botanic Park. We expected something smaller but it actually ended up taking a good amount of time exploring the whole area. Especially enjoyed the little plant theater stands.

Michelle thinking about how she can smuggle a few in our luggage case.

Definitely one of the more memorable cafes we visited. Seriously, Seoul’s cafe density is shocking. Even as a massive coffee addict, it was even a little overwhelming for me.

Gonna take a pause here as there are many more pics from the 2nd half of the day.

2019 Japan/Korea - Seoul 2

Starting off our first full day in Seoul, we headed towards Namsan Tower to grab some breakfast. This proved to be a bit of a challenge partially because breakfast in the Western sense isn’t as widely supported in Seoul as it is in the other places we’ve traveled (God knows UK doesn’t pull any stops), but also because South Korea is the one country on earth that doesn’t support Google maps.

You heard that right, Google maps will work in North Korea, but due to some issues regarding government privacy, Google maps is not full supported here. You get to have a map and (thankfully!) you get information regarding the time and routes of their local public transportation system, but when it comes to answering the question “Where am I?”, you need to rely on Korea’s own apps for that. Imagine if Google maps for whatever reason couldn’t use GPS and that’s about how things work here. Fortunately we were able to figure things out and by the end of the 2nd day we weren’t really affected by it, switching between Google maps and Korea’s maps app like pros. On the bright side, tons of free and fast wifi!

One thing that surprised us a little was the presence of Tartine Bakery, a chain known in the Bay Area. Not only was there this one, but there are 4 locations throughout Seoul. Then again, Seoul was filled to the brim with cafes (more so than Europe or Japan) so it fit right in pretty well.

Of course we had to swing by Gangnam District, best known for Gangnam Style by PSY. To understand both the song and the area, Gangnam is more or less Seoul’s “Beverly Hills” and this mall (with it’s very pretty book store) could be comparable to Beverly Center except bigger. That screen by the way was absolutely MASSIVE. It played a bunch of commercials, but this moment I caught gave off very strong Orwellian vibes.