Seattle

I flew to Seattle after San Francisco and spent 1.5 days there. They still haven't been able to open the Monorail. It has been out since the crash about a year ago. Embarrasing for the city. And it was a little rainy, as usual. But otherwise I must say I like Seattle - a lot! There's of course the Public (Fish) Market with all the great fish on display, and great small places like The Market Grill, with cheap, but good fish dishes.


But there's all kind of strange and even weird stuff in the market, too. And surprisingly in the street a guy with a piano - playing very well. But that's just a lot of fun, a good variety of things to experience. The best thing about Seattle is - apart from all the Starbuck's :-) - all the really nice and friendly people. Starting from the guys I met for business, and continuing with the people I meet when I went out.


The best experience this time was "Matt's In The Market", a small great place with a very friendly personnel, very nice customers, and great food. And Matt seemed to have everything in stock... Had (among others) a great duck patee, tasted something that wasn't port but tasted so (allthough a little lighter), got to taste a very good Valpolicella Ripasso from a customer, just because I gave some room for their party - and had a very good time! The Robot guys recommended me this place, and I am truly grateful for that! They also recommended me a place called Alibi Room for a drink afterwards, but I'll have to go there - next time.


The best part was still waiting for me. At the Seattle airport I didn't get any seat number when checking in, so I got a little worried. And yes, I heard that there was some severe overbookings, which they had to solve. Well, in my case they solved it by upgrading me to Business Class on SAS, which wasn't bad. The best if course all that legroom, the electrically controlled chair that you can find an excellent position in. But of course there's the great service, all the good food (there was a great 4-course meal)

SFO and Sausalito

You might not be that surprised that I spent some time in the San Francisco area... It's almost becoming "another home" for me. That's why I don't have that many pictures from SFO area this time - I didn't have much spare time, and I've seen most things in the center. Anyway, the trip started well, because I received an upgrade from Hertz. It was a Pontiac Grand Prix that actually looked quite nice, but like most US cars, it was not a driver's car, and the engine only sounded like it was potential - nothing really happened when stepping on the throttle. 3.6L engine and 240 (or 280Hp). Disappointing...


And I received an upgrade on the Hilton, too. A Junior Suite again, but not as huge as last time (that was almost too much). Otherwise there was not that much (new) to tell about SFO. I had a fantastic creme brulee (but a terrible picture) at Roy's, but otherwise is was mostly meetings and/or working/testing in the hotel room. 7am - midnight, basically. Well, you do see some funny signs every now and then. And the garage at Hilton is kinda special.


I had a meeting in Sausality, just on the other side of the Golden Gate bridge. Small and cozy, beautiful place, nice restaurants, with a view over the bay towards San Francisco. And some house boats. So close, and I had never been there before. And you can get there with a ferry. Highly recommended for a day trip.


And lastly, just some drawings on the wall in the Hilton garage, quite nice, actually.

One day in Stockholm

Sirpa had booked this trip to Stockholm quite a while ago, and suddenly the day was there. It must've been the millionth time we go to Stockholm with Silja (no advertising here), but it's still a nice way to relax. According to their ads, Silja had done a facelift to their ferries, so it was interesting to see what was new and/or changed. On board we found out that there wasn't that much that had changed, at least not on Symphony. The main change was the cafeteria, which was now a little more fancy and called Mundo, and the pub in the front had been "encapsulated", so that the music wouldn't disturb people in the nearby cabins. And there was a Hall of Fame. Oh, yeah, and there was some show with acrobats, pretty cool.


But the ferry was great before the facelift, so no problem. We travelled in style in the Commodore class, having gathered so many points again (and being spoiled with good cabins). It's great not only because the cabin is so big (two rooms), but because the cabins are in an area of their own, with a lounge and saunas only for the "Commodore people", etc. A good way to relax properly.


We started the trip by having a 7-course dinner in Bon Vivant, with good wines included. The meals weren't big, but they were good, and as often is the case, the dessert was the best. We didn't do any shopping that night, saving that to the return, where we bought lots of wine, and one special bottle of Penfold's St Henri Shiraz (no, I didn't dare to buy the Grange).


The weather forecast for Stockholm was bad, but we were lucky getting a day with sunshine and good temperatures (+13C in the morning, and a lot warmer during the day). Because the weather was good we just walked around and enjoyed it, starting with taking the subway to Gamla Stan, where some major changes in the foundations are being done, in order to keep the old buildings from sinking/crashing into the sea.


As mentioned before, the weather was great, and the city seemed to be a few weeks ahead of Helsinki when it came to being closer to Summer. Lots of people in the street having coffee (like us) and lunch, selling/advertsing stuff, or just sitting and enjoying the good weather. BTW, this statue always looks interesting. But this water brand would never be a best-seller in Finland...


We did lots of wine shopping on the ferry going back (and we did buy some clothes in Stockholm, too). The evening was beautiful, and we had again a good dinner, this time in the "Captain's Table" (the picture of the dessert earlier was actually from this night). Although the Champagne Cocktail was awful, by changing that to a Pina Colada we could sincerely say "thanx for a great trip, and Cheers!".

Suddenly Summer

The weekend came and suddenly it was sunny and almost 25C! I had almost forgotten what it could be like, and what you're supposed to do when it comes. One thing we start to do is to have breakfast out on the balcony (on the weekends). There was one slight problem, though. The warehouse was filled with stuff and I didn't feel like emptying it all before having breakfast.


Well, we have some smaller chairs and a table that we have at the entrance of the house, so we took them to the balcony and had our breakfast. No, this was not all we had...
I went through the warehouse later and was shocked by the amount of empty bottles I found. Fortunately (for our liver), most of them were water bottles, but still! I have to take a picture later with all the furniture in place on the balcony.


I had a couple of long, nice walks during the weekend and there sure was lots of activity everywhere! At the beach close to our place some people were already in the water. That's pretty tough considering the water temperature was maybe max +10C. OK, it was +24C in the air, but anyway. Well, the people didn't seem to enjoy the water too much. People have their boats in the water, here is a really nice one.


We had the people in our "housing association" gathered together during Saturday, in order to fix all kinds of things in general and to make the surroundings of everybody's house look nice after the long winter. At some time I remember we talked about speed limits. Well, here's a speed limit that it's tough not to exceed.

Out with the guys from work

We had some good reasons to celebrate at work, so we did. Started with some champagne and snacks at work, in order to get in the mood, and continued to Punavuoren Ahven to celebrate in a more relaxed manner. The evening was quite ex tempore, thx for that TM (the other guy who seems to enjoy himself).

Vappu/Wappen in Brussels

We spent the previous weekend in Brussels, a weekend that most of our friends spent in Finland, celebrating the traditional Vappu (Wappen). The journey started nicely, because we had been upgraded to Business class on Blue1 and enjoyed champagne, roast beef - and proper knives & forks. Arriving to the hotel wasn't that bad either. We had a room high up on the executive floor, and enjoyed some free champagne (Nicholas Feuillette) and snacks there every day. And the view wasn't bad, either. Palais de Justice to the right, I believe. Sirpa liked other things at the hotel, too.


We spent most of the time in the Lower Town, just a few blocks walk from our hotel. Great old houses, statues, winding streets, cafes, great old buildings and cathedrals, and of course yummy chocolate and waffles. The only annoying thing was that we heard Finnish several times in the streets :-) When it comes to language, no problem managing in English, allthough street names and restaurant menues are mostly in French or Flamish.


We spent some time in the Cathedrale Sts Michel et Gudule, the national church of Belgium. Work on it began in 1225, but continued over 300 years. The Last Jurgement Window is famous, but I was even more impressed by the Baroque Pulpit, but the cathedral was filled with beautiful details.


We also walked around the Galerie St-Hubert, a "mall" with exclusive shops and cafes. And some funny details outside of it. We continued to Rue De Bouchers, a street filled with restaurants with seafood as speciality - and very affordable prices. It looked so touristy that we didn't try out any of them, though.


We actually walked for 6 hours the first day, so we had to take a break every now and then. We found a very nice cafe on Rue Neuve. A very small place with narrow stairs, very cozy, and great capuccino. So good that it was finished very quickly. To be honets, we found out that the capuccino was great everywhere... Here's another great place, with a cat that doesn't like tourists, but a great atmosphere - and great cappuccino. Yes, I know it's not Belgium-specific. I just happen to like cappuccino.


The Grand Place is another "must" area with great buildings all around you, in a square. Very impressive, and lots of details, a choir, etc.. Around that place there was all kinds of tourist shops, and all kinds of cute stuff. There were of course lots of places with one of the things Belgium is famous for - the beer. But since we're not beer-drinkers we have no idea how great they are.


But there's another thing that Belgium is famous for, and that's the chocolate. There was chocolate and other yummy stuff everywhere. It seems that everything that you can eat is great in this country. I read that there's more Michelin class restaurants in Belgium than in France, and the class of the food we had was really high, everywhere. Oh, and we even headed to a chocolate museum (which wasn't that impressive, BTW).


Next great-teasting stuff - the waffles! You could buy them everywhere, and they tasted just lovely! Take a look at the one I had, not bad, eh? And Sirpa's choice wasn't too bad, either. You could have anything in the street, like seafood snacks from a bowl. And I loved that, too. There was everything in the streets nearby, and lots of tourists (like the busses filled with people from Asia, but let's not get in to that here). Nearby we met Vincent Van Gogh, first Sirpa, and then me. We tourists? Nooot :-)


If you're a tourist in Brussels there's another must-see, the Manneken Pis. It's actually much smaller than you'd think. No, I don't mean that, but the statue itself :-) According to our guidebook in the 12th centure the some of a duke was caught urinating against a tree in the midst of a battle an dwas this commemorated in bronze as symbol of the country's military courage. I'd heard another story about the son being lost and found urinating against a tree. Oh, well, the statue is there, anyway.


There was of course all sorts of fresh seafood available in the restaurants, too, and what variety! like in Le Jardin de Catherine there was oysters, and you could choose from which part of the country (or if they came from abroad) they originated from. But my most memorable dish was still this dessert at La Belle Marraichere; usually the desserts are quite heavy, and after a proper entree and main course that can be too much. But this was fresh fruit, no (or very little) sugar, but so tasty!


I especially liked the building with cartoons on them, you could see them all over the place. Also some strange statues. And a very interesting way to move your furniture, but I guess it has to do with the fact that the stairs are so narrow in the houses that there's no other choice than going outside. Talking about strange, I found a strange small door in the toilet. Above it there was a sign saying "Shoe Box". Opening it and quessing a little we believe that you could put your shoes there, the cleaning woman would pick them (from outside your room) and have them cleaned. Other stuff at the hotel.


I was told by somebody accompaning me that the city is also great for shopping. Well, it has to be true, because even I bought something, and that's rare. What else, we tested the tram, experienced a hail shower (it got quite cold), saw one place greater than the other, and once again. A great place to visit, Brussels!