Put on your hiking shoes and pony up for a long day.

Stop 1: General Porpoise Doughnuts, oh man oh man oh man. I already gave a mini review in this post: Capitol Hill – Seattle. The short of it is that the interiors are gorgeous and the doughnuts fantastic.

Stop 2: Take a Lyft out to Discovery Park. My sister had wanted to go hiking while on this trip and I was making it too complicated by researching hikes on Mount Rainier, driving distance, and rental cars – in the end, a day-long trip just didn’t fit our budget. So when I saw Discovery Park on the map it saved us a lot of time in the car. We hiked/walked the 3 mile Loop starting at the East Parking lot. It was a lot of fun and absolutely gorgeous, so much so I forgot to pull out my camera.

Stop 3: Walk from Discovery Park to the Ballard Locks

Stop 4: Ballard Locks. Here is the deal, I had been to the locks in Chicago last year and those are huugeeeeee. Chicago vs Seattle? Chicago wins. The locks here are much much smaller but still a good stop if you haven’t experienced this water mechanism before.

Stop 5: Hang around the Historic Ballard District, there are lots of little shops and places to eat.

Stop 6: Lunch. You are going to be starved at this point, trust me. Le Carta de Oaxaca had been recommended to me several times but I am stubborn about Mexican food and wasn’t interested in stopping here. Terrible rain and the need for food drew us in. Lucky we snagged seats at the counter since this place was packed. We were surprised to find legit Mexican food in Seattle. It didn’t blow me away but it wasn’t disappointing. Above is the pozole I ordered.

Stop 7: BEER. Next we walked to Peddler Brewing Company which has ended up being on of my favorite breweries maybe ever. It was really good with lots of options, not just 8 different IPA’s coughfieldworkcough.

Stop 8: Fremont. It was pouring so we took a Lyft from Peddler to the Fremont Troll. Spoiler alert, the Troll is pretty lame and it isn’t worth the hype. It wasn’t a total waste of time since Fremont is a cool neighborhood to walk around in. If you get hungry tryout Paseos(this has been recommended on a ton of different blogs), Pie, or Lucky’s. 

Stop 9: Walk over to Theo Chocolate.We had just missed the tour but it was still a fun experience. They have a ton of different options and the chocolate bars made a great souvenir especially since they are made in Seattle. Try something odd while there like the onion truffle (so good) or habanero chocolate.

Stop 10: Walk along the Burke Gilman Trail until you get to Gas Works Park. If you loved 10 Things I Hate About You, then this park will be super recognizable. I didn’t capture a picture since we got caught torrential rain but it was worth seeing and I would love to go back on a sunny day.

Stop 11: Home. Originally we were planning on continuing on to the U-District but we hit a wall and headed back to Capitol Hill for dinner. It was nothing special but rain + pho = good nights sleep.

Ximena.