05.24.07
Step 2: First Night in Seattle
I arrived in Seattle about 18:30 local time and set about locating my luggage and getting my rental car. I got a Ford Explorer; apparently “Standard” size car now includes small SUVs. To me, however, it’s pretty big.
I make the drive from the Seattle-Tacoma Airport to try to find my hotel. After a couple of times passing it and having to circle back, I find the front door. I expect to be walking or taking public transportation for most of my time in the city, so I leave the car with the valet.
I’m staying at the Grand Hyatt hotel in downtown Seattle. The room is nice enough, but the bathroom is really nice. A marble tub and a separate glass shower. I took a few photos for the restroom-inclined.
My plan to be hungry by the time I got here has worked, and by the time I’m all checked in to my hotel I’m starving. I hook my laptop and get online, publish the previous post before I forget everything that happened in Chicago, and then set off on a mission to locate Saito’s Japanese Café & Bar. I don’t exactly remember how I found about the place online, but it was supposedly rated one of the top 5 sushi spots in the West Coast (and therefore, one presumes, the US).
It turns out, thankfully, that Saito’s is not beyond walking distance from the hotel… maybe a mile or so at most. I get there a little after 9pm, and they close at 10, so it seems I got there just in time. The place is relatively empty. I get a seat at the sushi bar and order a sashimi assortment along with an order of uni (sea urchin roe) and a small tokkuri of hot sake. It’s all absolutely delicious… the best sushi I’ve ever had. The uni is amazing, but they make up for it in quantity. Despite my voracious appetite, I try not to eat too fast so I can have time to savor the fresh fish taste that one simply cannot find in Rochester.
At the sushi bar, I meet a girl visiting from U of Idaho named Liz and and older lady with her of indeterminate relation whose name I’ve forgotten. I stay and talk as they finish their meal. By the time we leave, it’s about a quarter past 10, but the staff at Saito’s doesn’t seem too annoyed (besides, some people were just getting their sushi at 10, so I don’t feel so bad). It turns out they are staying at a place two blocks from my hotel, so we walk back together. We part ways at Pine & 6th, and I hike the two blocks to 8th where my hotel (and most importantly, my bed) awaits. It’s almost 2am in Rochester time, so I’m good and exhausted.
Photos will be forthcoming once I find a more convenient way to upload them to flickr and link them here.
