On being away from The Gorge

One thing the Travel the Gorge Team is known for is...travel.  What a concept.  And recently we honored our name with a short trip to Edmonds, Washington.  Edmonds is a waterfront town of about 40,000 people north of Seattle.  It IS a lovely city with a vibrant arts community, small churches, graceful older homes and the Mukilteo Ferry dock.  We had fun.  We rode the ferry, did their Thursday night art walk, ate in their restaurants, bought artisanal cheeses and perused used books. It is a town very much worth visiting.  But, this being a blog about The Gorge, Edmonds is actually NOT the subject here.

The Team has a lot of miles under its collective belt, and we've found that travel is as much about the place you left as the one you went to.  Travel for us is very often about comparisons.  We figured this out over a bottle (who are we kidding here) of wine on a rainy Edmonds night in a little French Cafe.  Our musings:

We missed the sound of the wind teasing at the windows and rustling the trees.
We missed great white mountains appearing suddenly at a turn in the road or out a random window.
We missed the keening of coyotes in the distance and the instinctive answering yips of family dogs.
We missed the crystal air, so clear that the whole Gorge is a High Def  'ViewMaster' slide. 
We missed bumping into so many people we know at the grocery store that we have to plan extra time into our errands for socializing.
We bristled at streets FULL of cars and missed the many courtesies of Gorge drivers.
We had to GO somewhere to take a hike.
We missed the roasted garlic at Stonehedge Gardens and the biscuits and gravy at Cousins and the pizzas at Solstice. 
We found there are churches that aren't attended by people in jeans.
We got truly angry at having to pay $7 to park at a Hospital - yes a Hospital.  Like you really wanted to go there in the first place.
There are a lot of places in the world that don't have waterfalls, or rivers, or vineyards, or orchards, or fields of wildflowers, or trailers with great Thai food.

Dang, it's nice to be home!!!

For more great dining options, see www.TravelTheGorge.com/dining