Seattle; home of the Space Needle, Pike Place Markets and Grey’s Anatomy. It’s also the home of Andrew’s mate Ozzie, who hooked us up with an Air B’n’b in his apartment complex.

Checking out a city on your own, versus having some show you their city is such a different experience. I love both versions, but having Ozzie show off Seattle was pretty special.

He’s a gem, not the kind of guy you would picture either of us being friends with, but has an absolute heart of gold and generous nature. He drove us around to a couple of bars when we got into the city, and played the most intense game of Jenga with us. 27 stories high, the leaning tower of pisa did so well! and I don’t want to talk about how it’s existence came to an end…

We snuck in another run, this time around Lake Union. Such a beauty!

Ozzie is half Puerto-rican, half Colombian. He drives a Mercedes, with R’n’B tunes blasting from the speakers. He works as a consultant, making deals and schmoozing clients all day long. He’s also a massive foodie and picked out the BEST food for us all day. You see why I like him?

Mac and cheese, BBQ pork skewers, steamed buns, lemon cheesecake greek yoghurt and oyster shooters were all delectable. Ozzie also wanted to sample some ghost pepper syrup (literally the oils drained from the hottest chillies in the world). We spent the next half an hour watching him sipping milk and looking very sorry for himself.

We hit up some touristy sights, rode the monorail, checked out the city a little more before Ozzie and his girlfriend Lily took us to meet up with their mate, Ahmed.

Ahmed is exactly the kind of friend you want to have. Not only was he pretty cool and a super nice guy, he also had a boat rental.

So, in Seattle you can sign up for a boat share programme which lets you pick from 10 boats to take out up to three times a week. You only have to pay during summer, and they get new boats in every year, plus do all the maintenance and storage.

He took us all around the lake for some pretty sweet views of Mt Rainier. I’m usually not the biggest fan of boats, but this was a spectacular sight!

The night ended with Ozzie’s home cooked pulled pork tacos, glasses of wine and laughing about the state of the American politics.

The next day we had to ourselves, so we set off to check out more of downtown and Pioneer Place, before heading to the baseball!

This was SO much fun! I thought I’d enjoy the atmosphere and the energy around the field, but I found myself loving the game too. It was such a close game, going into 11 innings with the Mariners winning off a walk-off home run.

Surprisingly, this has been one of the best days on the trip, I had the best time on another glorious day in paradise. Also, red wine spritzers are not the worst thing in the world 😉

Let’s just say I’m pretty happy that Seattle is so close to the border, because I’d love to come back here again. Perhaps when the football is on… maybe this live sport thing ain’t so bad.

Hanbel.
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