Vancouver Visit via Seattle

Here's a good thing about the current state of the economy: cheap flights. Since I arrived here in Santa Cruz from Peru over a month ago and decided to stay, I've been itching to go back to Vancouver to get a few things. Mostly some more clothing items (getting kind of tired of the same 4 shirts) and my beloved bicycle. But especially my bicycle.

When I saw flights to Seattle for $79 each way and knew I could get a cheap car rental through Priceline.com, I couldn't resist. The total of the car rental and flight was just under $300. Not bad considering a return flight directly to Vancouver would have been $480. And this way I would also have a car to buzz around Vancity for a few days.

The stop in Seattle actually worked out quite well because I was also able to visit a potential farm dinner chef there that afternoon. We already had the interest of Tamara Murphy of Brasa (the "pig lady of Seattle") and so I was just stopping in that day to discuss details and hopefully confirm her participation. She's recently taken over the cafe under the Elliot Bay Book Company, a fairly iconic bookstore in Seattle. The cafe had evolved into a sad-looking soup kitchen of late and Tamara wanted to revitalize the place. I hadn't seen the place before, but it's definitely looking wonderful now. The old brick walls have an interesting story as well: they used to be above ground. This was a history lesson for me, but apparently Seattle was actually elevated after a devestating fire in the late 1800s. It's kind of hard to explain, so take a look at the story here and/or at wikipedia. Tamara and I had a great time chatting and visiting for over two hours. She was enthusiastic about Outstanding in the Field and participating since it lined up so well with her great support of the local Seattle-area farmers. She also does a really interesting annual event herself called Burning Beast (a big meat-fest collaboration by Seattle chefs) and has a very informative "Life of a Pig" blog on her website. Hence Pig Lady. Anyways, it seemed like everything was set for her doing a July 15th event with us in the Seattle area, but then she emailed me a few days later saying she'd forgotten about the plans she'd already made to leave town that week. Unfortunate, but I'm glad I was able to get to know her a bit better anyways. I'm sure she'll be on the schedule sometime in the future.

It was a quick but fun weekend in Vancouver, complete with an evening of beer and good food at Stella's with Jordan, dinner at Abigail's Party and shenanigans with Colleen, a good walk around UBC and down to the beach with Jordan and Duke, a visit to the Winter Market at Wise Hall, a Salmon Armian disco-funk party and of course gathering of my things and bicycle from "storage" in White Rock.

Hiking down at Spanish Banks near UBC
with Jordan, Duke and the other dogs and people

How could I forget, I also had the pleasure of hanging out the LUSH factory one morning with Jordan, who is now the new manager of the bubble room. He even has his own sticker now- check it out!

Yay Jordan!

So just like that and I'm back in Santa Cruz again. I've been working on some home improvements lately, which I'll share with you soon.