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One Day in Seattle with a Toddler
Tosha Tingey • July 22, 2019
The Seattle experience in a day with a toddler!
Pike's Place Market
Pike’s Place Market place is the longest-running farmer’s market in America! The hype and the buzz of the atmosphere is palpable. You have flowers lining one side and the most unique crafts, food, art, jewelry, anything you can think of on the other! On the lower level, you’ll find shops dedicated to vintage prints, toy cars, magic shops, and more unique products! And of course, the famous fish throwing vendor will not leave you disappointed.
I usually get anxiety in large crowds and people trying to sell me stuff. But the vibe here was so family-friendly. The crowds felt less annoying and more like I just found the after party of Seattle.
Just a short stairway away is the somehow popular and extremely gross, gum wall. This alleyway is just covered in gum on the walls and it looks really cool, just don’t think about it too much.
Savor Seattle Chocolate Indulgence Tour
One of the best ways to experience a city is through your taste buds. Seattle has hundreds of restaurants and it can be overwhelming to find those one of a kind food spots that allow you to experience the Emerald City. The best way to taste the city of Seattle is through a food tour and boy did we do it right with the Chocolate Indulgence Tour offered by Savor Seattle! Chocolate is my love language, so doing nothing but eating, learning, and indulging in chocolate for two hours was the best way to spend my time. We ate at five different restaurants, trying two desserts at each. And yes, chocolate is the focal point but you get to try a large variety; from coconut pie to cheesecake, to ice cream, to fancy truffles.
Our tour guide, Katya was AMAZING! She was so upbeat, knowledgeable, and so good with Addie. She helps trains the other tour guides so I’m positive all of the food tours are in good hands.
Savor Seattle offers six unique food tour experiences. Ranging from Pike’s Peak Market food tours to Gourmet, to Booze & Bites. Pro tip for those going on a tour with young kids - be sure to bring an extra pair of clothes. But if you have to learn the hard way like us, there is a Target just a block away from where you tend. ;)
Center for Wooden Boats Tour
Seattle is a unique city because it is surrounded by water. So, naturally one of the best ways to experience it is on the water! The Center for Wooden Boats
is a non-profit organization that offers a variety of ways to get out on the water. You can access the docks for free and see all the beautiful hand-crafted boats they make inside their workshop. And if you want to get out on the water you can rent rowboats, canoes, kayaks, and even sailboats. And if you’re in Seattle for a while they offer Sailing programs for both kids and adults, along with boat making classes in their workshop. But if you’re looking for a great family-friendly activity out on the water, definitely go on Sunday for the Sunday Sail! Added bonus, it’s FREE!
Ned, our tour guide, has been sailing since he was a kid and you could tell how passionate he is about being on the water. He shared a lot of information about Seattle and the history behind it. It was awesome having a more one on one experience and being so close to the water. I loved watching the seaplanes take off and land right near us too! There are a lot of options to get out on the water, but The Center for Wooden Boats is as one of a kind as they come.
Argosy Cruises
Another great way to get out on the water is with Argosy Cruises! The ships are bigger and offer drinks and concessions. We went for the Stay & Play tour that starts you off on Lake Union and cruises you all the way around to Pike Place Market. If you know anything about Seattle, that means we got to go through the famous Ballard Locks! If you’re scratching your head about what these “locks” are then you were like me. It's essentially a boat elevator and I learned that they are the third most popular attraction in Seattle, just behind Pikes Place Market and the Seattle Space Needle! Most people go over and watch the boats go through, but on this tour, we were one of those boats.
Our tour guide, Billy, was very knowledgeable about all the things to see on this cruise. Just to name a few of the cool things, we saw gorgeous houseboats, the house where they filmed Sleepless in Seattle, a lighthouse, cool bridges, industrial fishing boats, and on a good day you can even see wildlife!
My favorite part of our cruise was going up on the bridge and talking with Captain Greg. Definitely the best views up there and he was so awesome to let Addie run around while we asked him a billion questions. Addie even got to steer the ship! Don't tell the rest of the group that it was being steered (ever so slightly) by a two-year-old for a little bit. ;)
Overall, we were so impressed with the staff and the experience as a whole. We ended the trip just across the street from Pike’s Place Market where we could go explore and shop! Argosy Cruises offers a huge variety of cruises, from 1-hour harbor cruises to a 5-hour cruise to Blake Island for a Northwest Native American experience. There are plenty of options for a great family-friendly adventure to explore as much of Seattle and the surrounding areas as your heart desires.
We jam packed so much into one day in Seattle! But the bottom line is that there is SO much to do and we barely scratched the surface. We loved how many toddler friendly activities there were to do! The city was clean and felt very safe. We definitely will be back for a longer family-friendly stay!
When you're on a cruise it can be difficult to experience the island or country you are in when you only have a few hours. The other challenge we had was finding an excursion that our entire family could join. And by entire family I mean my parents, my sister's family with four kids, and our family! So when we found Chukka Caribbean's excursion that included Zip-lining, River Tubing, ATV ride, lunch, and a bird aviary - it was the plan for a perfect day!
If you’ve ever gone to Rocky Mountain National Park, you most likely came through Estes Park. It’s pretty well known but from now on when we go to the National Park we will be going to Granby. Granby is on the western side of Rocky Mountain National Park. We found an AMAZING campground to stay at that has so many amenities and the area all around is packed with fun things to do!
I always want to be real with anyone reading this blog about full-time travel, tiny living, Airstream life… all of the above. So I want to share some of our hardest moments that had us either wanting to quit or had us seriously questioning, “what are we even doing?” So here we go…
Glacier National Park is one of those National Parks that you hear about and just KNOW that it is going to be amazing. And it was. Right upon entering the park it felt more like home and less like a tourist attraction. The park itself is huge but upon arrival, it feels like you’re entering a little town with an ice cream shop and café, boat rentals, and a small visitor center. After going to the visitor center we headed to get our kayak inspected. The inspections are free and pretty basic. You will have to rinse it off if it’s wet or dirty but that’s about it. If you aren't bringing your own gear you can rent for a good price right across the street from the lake. Life jackets are required to be worn by children and adults must have them in the boat with them or worn. After that, we went right to the dock next to the Village Inn and set sail! The pictures can show just how gorgeous this place was better than I could ever describe.
As with just about anything in life, you can only prepare so much until you are actually living it. We have been living in a 150 sq ft Airstream for the past 3 months and here are 3 things we love and 3 things we don’t.
1. Self-Cleaning Vacuum We have a little hidden cubby where we keep our Deebot (googly eyes not included). This almost didn’t happen and I am SO glad it did. I learned within one day how dirty our floors get. It’s awesome to run the little robot vacuum while we are gone or asleep or packing up and have it do all the work.
Pacific City RV Resort had so many amenities and the biggest, most private campsites we've ever had! It's across the street from the beach and lives in the beautiful small coastal town of Pacific City, Oregon.
The Thousand Trails campground, Russian River was just a half way stop near Santa Rosa, CA and we were pleasantly surprised with what this RV campground had to offer!
The Yosemite Lakes campground was actually the one that got us interested in a Thousand Trails to begin with. This campground is chuck full of amenities in the campground itself, and it’s 10 min away from the Yosemite National Park entrance. And I’m apologizing in advance, we were enjoying it so much that we forgot to take pictures until we left! So I only have a few but hopefully it’s better than nothing.
Our first mistake with our stay in Rancho Oso is that it wasn’t long enough. This stop was an in-between stop to break up driving days. So after they tell us about the fun rodeos, activities, horseback riding, and more they were doing this weekend we looked at each other and wished our stay was longer.