Text 11081, 101 rader
Skriven 2008-07-26 01:18:02 av Dale Shipp (1:261/1466.0)
Ärende: Alaska Trip report 1
============================
As we mentioned, Gail and I took a long anticipated trip to Alaska.  We
booked it through a tour group (World Wide Country Tours) that is owned
by Reader's Digest and is affiliated with several cooking magazines that
we get -- such as Taste of Home.

Gail took some notes along the way, and I'm going to extract from them
the food stuff, and a few of the interesting sights.

We started out with a flight to Seattle from Baltimore (BWI to SEA) on
11 June, which gave us about two extra days in Seattle.  Very early
flight, leaving home at 0430.  We had upgraded to first class when we
made the plane reservations back in December. The extra space and leg
room was a pleasure.

Breakfast was a two egg cheese omelet with turkey ham and roasted red
pepper slices with red potato wedges potatoes. Also a croissant/butter
and fruit punch jelly.  A fruit bowl of red grapes, cantaloupe slices,
honeydew slices and a very large strawberry on top. Gail traded her
melon slices for some grapes and a strawberry.  Real silverware :-}}

More snacks and drinks before we landed at Phoenix.  Flight arrived 15
minutes late. Managed to make our connection with 10 minutes to spare.
Arrived in Seattle with no problem.  After we got to the hotel, we
called Hap and chatted for a bit.  He was super busy doing photography
at the Luthier's convention that was on the same dates as our stay in
Seattle.

Decided not to venture into Seattle that evening and had dinner at the
Hotel.  We ordered grilled salmon and halibut - both generous portions.
Each fish was served with a rice pilaf and steamed stir fried vegetables
(asparagus, red bell pepper, yellow squash, red onion, baby carrots).
Both dinners were excellent.

The next morning was an early breakfast buffet  in the hotel - standard
upper class hotel buffet items. Scrambled eggs, pan roasted potato
hunks, French toasts, bacon, sausage, hot oatmeal from the hot section.
Juices, grapefruit sections, pineapple chinks, honey dew hunks,
cantaloupe. Yogurt selections. Several types of muffins, bagels and
croissants along with butter, fruit spreads. Selection of dry cereals.
They said that they would do omelets, but the station was not manned and
we did not bother asking.  During the course of the trip, we had many
breakfast buffet meals.  This was better than most, but all gave
reasonable selection and could fill you up as much or as little as you
wanted.

We had booked a bus tour into Seattle with a 8:30 pick up. Turned out it
was a new company, formed by a guy and his friend.  The guy had lived
for some years on a houseboat, and seemed to know the city pretty well.
He had a "routine speech" to go along with the tour -
informative but a bit too commercial.  The tour stopped for lunch at
Fisherman's Wharf.  There were several restaurants in the center and we
choose "Little Chinook" . We split an order of Cod Fish and Chips.

I had what they called New Jersey Clam Chowder (a half and half mix of
traditional New England and a red based chowder).  We enjoyed the  lunch
at an outside table watching the seagulls and the fishing boats.

Near the end of the tour we happened to mention to the driver/narrator
that there was a place at Pikes Place Market that sold fried chicken
livers and gizzards.  He seemed quite interested, and I think that after
checking it out, he is going to add that fact to his spiel.

Dinner that night was again in the hotel.  The hamburger was okay, and
the onion rings great.  Bowl of clam chowder was really good. We also
added a mixed appetizer platter of coconut shrimp, egg rolls, mozzarella
cheese sticks and potato skins along with three sauces.  A fair platter
- nothing special.

The next day, we had most of the day free.  Decided to take the express
bus down into Seattle from the airport (only cost $1.70 -- told to us by
the tour driver).  We were aiming for breakfast at Pike Place
Market.  After getting there, we wandered about a bit and then bought
some pastries and coffee from the Three Sisters Café and sat outside at
a small table and watched people go by.  Wandered around some more and
bought some Bing Cherries for a snack later on in the day.

Went outside the Market and looked for a favorite Cajun restaurant from
years ago on the street one block up.  Originally it was run by a deaf
and blind chef with much of the staff also being deaf.  We knew that it
had closed down the last time we were in Seattle.  To our surprise the
restaurant had reopened under a different management but they still were
doing Cajun cooking. Needless to say we had to have lunch there.  One of
order of Chicken/Sausage Gumbo and one order of Crawfish Etoufee - both
served in a large bowl along with a fresh baked corn muffin/butter.
Generous servings and very good.

The day ended when we joined a meet and greet with the tour members and
tour director at the hotel at 7:30 pm.  Since we were fairly satisfied
with the day's food, we just grazed on the snacks supplied there --
mostly cookies.

                               Dale Shipp
                  fido_261_1466 (at) comcast (dot) net
                              (1:261/1466)


... Shipwrecked on Hesperus in Columbia, Maryland. 00:27:00, 26 Jul 2007
___ Blue Wave/DOS v2.30

--- Maximus/NT 3.01
 * Origin: Owl's Anchor (1:261/1466)