Tossed salad and scrambled eggs

Yesterday afternoon we arrived in Seattle, Washington. In the evening we met up with a colleague of Matt's and his family for some Chinese food.

This morning we treated ourselves to a nice lie-in. It was nice to be in a proper bed!

When we finally left the hotel we headed down to the waterfront of the bay...

We then headed to the market at Pike Place

We were then ready for lunch and so we headed to "the crab pot" for an amazing meal. We ordered the Westport Seafeast for 3 people (Dungeness crab, snow crab, shrimp in the shell, steamed clams & Pacific mussels, andouille sausage, corn on the cob & red potatoes in their jackets).

It arrived in 2 buckets which were then dumped onto the table and we were given wooden mallets and then left to rummage through the delicious assortment of seafood.

We were also provided bibs as it can get rather messy when you're smashing the hell out of a crab...

Matt, fat and happy after the feast :)

 Josh's shellfish remains...

It was a really fun experience, we were there for about 90 minutes slowly making our way through the feast. It was a really good value for the amount of seafood that we ate, $25 per person. Anybody visiting Seattle should definitely give this place a go.

After lunch I was in need of a nap so I headed back to the hotel while Matt and Josh took a ferry tour of the port.

We then met up again and headed to the Space needle, which is a lot smaller than I had previously thought.

As we are in Seattle we thought it only right to grab a Starbucks, although we didn't go to the original one in Pike Place. Joshua, who doesn't like coffee, found that he has a fondness for non-fat caramel frappacinos! He had a sip of mine and then was hooked!
We chillaxed on a lawn beside an amphitheater next to the space needle.

We then went to see the International fountain...

And watched some young Koreans play the drums...

We then headed back to the waterfront, past some interesting fountains...

Saw a train...

And decided to stop at Elliot's Oyster House for dinner. Josh tried his first Oyster, there wasn't a second one ;) Matt and I asked the waiter to pick a selection for us. I'd never had more than one type of Oyster at a go, so it was interesting to notice the differences in the tastes and textures!

For my entree I chose the Cioppino, a shellfish and fish stew. Delicious!

Here was our view from the restaurant...

Goodnight Seattle, we love you!

Oregon

Wednesday morning we headed into Oregon under cover of cloud and rain, but still we got to see some lovely scenery on the coastal road...

I'm very happy to report that Joshua is apparently a perfectly normal teenager, happier playing games on his phone rather than looking at awesome views ;)....

This is the view from our Kabin....

 
Our Kabin....

This morning we woke up to lots of rain, we couldn't even see across the bay!

So we decided to head up north to the fishing town of Newport to visit their aquarium. Not expecting much we were pleasantly surprised to find fun exhibits. I got to touch an anemone, my finger still tingles ;)

We also got to see my favourite bird, the puffin, as well as sea otters, sea lion, octopus and the largest shark tunnel I've ever seen.

It was then lunch time and so we headed to a place I found on Yelp.... it has 311 reviews and 4.5 stars (311 is a HUGE number of reviews for around here, they are usually less than 30)

It was right on the side of the town port....

My handsome company...

I like this shot of Matt's beer and Joshua's Mountain Dew

We had some delicious dungeness crab cakes

Steamer clams in a white wine, garlic and lemon sauce....

Josh and I split this Fisherwife stew: crab, shrimp, prawns, clams, mussels, scallops and fin fish in a tomato garlic broth. Heaven!

I was too busy noshing on the above dish to take a photo of Matt's Crab Po Boy sandwich.

After lunch we walked around the port to look at all the ships.

For the late afternoon we headed back to the Kabin so that Matt and Josh could change into swimming trunks, and then we headed to a local beach as the sun had finally made an appearance. We spent about 3 hours there, relaxing, exploring and building sand castles.

Upon arriving back at the Kabin we bought some ice creams and walked around the campground. We're now going to have some ramen noodles for dinner before packing up the truck ready for an early departure tomorrow for Seattle.

Catch up

I haven't written for 5 days due to internet accessibility.
My birthday, June 14th was great. We spent the day exploring more of San Francisco and in the evening we met up with Angeline Tan, a Singaporean (not Chinese as previously thought) colleague of Matts.
She took us on San Francisco public transport into the heart of China town to a Chinese restaurant where we literally ordered a set 'feast' of 7 dishes for just the 4 of us. So a lot of food and a lot of chinese beer was consumed. However, it was the cheapest meal we had in the city by $50!!!

Here is Matt with the head of a chicken...

After dinner Angeline took us to an Italian pastry shop for 'birthday cake' and espresso.
We then, at 11pm, took a bus into the financial district to then take a cable car back to hotel.

The  next day we said goodbye to San Francisco and headed up the coast to Manchester Beach state park.... where it is FREAKING COLD!!!!!!!!! The weather in this area of the states reminds me of autumn back home in England/Ireland. I had thought that it would be more like summer back home, so I packed t-shirts, cardigans, capris and socks..... which apparently is not enough. I have had to buy a pair of jeans, a hoodie, a rain jacket and camo pants.
Between San Francisco and Seattle we have 6 nights of camping. We are doing it in 2 night stints at different KOAs up the coast. KOA stands for Kampgrounds Of America. We rent a basic cabin which contains only beds and mattresses. It is, however, always clean and safe. Each location is slightly different. The location in Manchester Beach had a heated pool and hot tub. The location we are in at the moment has no pool, but has free wifi in a churchhall-style rec center that is open 24/7.

Here is our Cabin in Manchester Beach

KOA kampgrounds allow tent camping, RV camping and offer differing levels of Kabins. There are often social events like ice cream socials, out door movies, local bands playing and pancake breakfasts.
There are always laundry facilities and clean bathrooms and showers. Luckily for us they also have small stores that sell warm clothing!!!!
On our first night the Kabin next to us was occupied by a group of Koreans. They had a huge box of Soju that they drank at night, a great idea in the damp coldness of the Northern Californian coast. I might pick some up in Seattle for our final leg of camping!

In Manchester Beach we were right next to the beach and so we ventured down there. Apparently it was rather cold....

The Barcomb boys fear nothing! (except cold ocean)

Beautiful cliffs in the Manchester Beach area...

 Our current KOA is right next to the Redwood National Park as well as the Pacific shoreline, so today we explored both. Here are a few photos of our adventures... I left my camera at the Kabin, so these were all snapped with my iphone.

Tomorrow we leave California and make our way into Oregon where we will spend 2 nights before entering Washington on our way to Seattle.

No idea if there will be wifi/cell phone service at our next stop, so I might have to do another catch up when we arrive in Seattle (where I am hoping we can have some Korean, I'm having Kimchi withdrawal)