Seattle Baby!! We were heading to the home of 50 Shades of Grey situated in Washington DC - The Evergreen State because for Christmas Matt had purchased Tom and myself tickets to see an Australian guy called Tommy Emmanuel in the American city situated only a four to five hour drive away from Whistler, so we roped in Jordan and Phteven and set about organising a few days away from the ski village we were calling home. Unfortunately Phteven had to drop out of the trip due to a lack of shifts therefor giving him a lack of funds, but we had a readymade replacement in Sam, who was heading that anyway to continue our travels. To get there we decided to hire a car, a loss of driving license on Matt's behalf, me coming off a night shift and Tom and Jordan being too young to drive left Sam the man to take control of the wheels. Our trip to Seattle coincided with me having to move out of the Powder Horn for a week because the owners selfishly wanted to use the place for a week. So after I moved my things to Matt and Tom's for temporary storage we were on or way to Seattle.

The road trip there was a good crack, Jordan, Matt and myself plied ourselves with several cans of old Milwaukee, had a sing song, a cheeky McDonalds and we got lost so ended up visiting an Animal Sanctuary for a short while. Then after surviving some shocking Seattle traffic for an hour or so we were finally at our hotel and checking in having banter with Chappo on reception. The room was fairly snug, we had two double beds and one rollaway meaning we had to share, it was ok though just a bit awkward if any one of us pulled. While Matt and Sam got lost taking the car back Jordan, Tom and I chilled out watched some Simpsons and got ready for the night ahead. Sam and Matt eventually returned bringing with them a crate of bud light. We had one and then belted off to find The Moore Theatre where we would see Tommy Emmanuel. Tommy Emmanuel is an acoustic guitarist and when I skyped Jack, he was gutted he wasn't with me to go and see him; apparently he is a god of the acoustic guitar. We got there just in time for the support act, a British guitarist called Clive Carroll, he was decent but an acoustic guitar set wasn't really my thing, yeah I appreciated the music and talent but I missed vocals and catchy lyrics and I thought that the set would put me to sleep, it didn't as I became entailed in a conversation with the landlord of the powder horn, the owners had backed out of staying and wanted us to stay, I said we would as long as it was rent free as it was too short notice for us to reschedule trips away, there places we had organised and so forth. A cheeky strongbow at the interval and we were ready for the man event, and surprisingly I enjoyed it a lot more than I thought I would with him only have a sing very occasionally, his guitar playing was second to none and I particularly enjoyed his Beatles medley. I think if you're a hard core music fan, especially guitarist he is a person you must see. With the gig over it was time to re-join Sam and Jordan back at the hotel, o our way back to the travel lodge we picked up some cheap vodka - 1.75 litre for $12 plus tax and a couple of bottles of orange juice to accompany the Citron Vodka fuel. Once we got back banter started as Tom was out in his business shirt, Sam and Matt dressed like each other and we realised that Jordan looked like Henry VIII. We (I especially) drank cup after cup of citron vodka and orange, for a cheap 'nasty' vodka it went down surprisingly well. We then headed out at perhaps the slightly too late a time of 12.30, the citron sent me a bit whappy as I was stood up in a taxi at one point of the night and looking for argument, which unfortunately Sam got the brunt off. Still we visited a few local establishments one I can't remember but had a pinball machine as a table, the one next door called Rabbit Hole and then we tried to get to a place called Neighbors which was closed so we partied at the side of a car blasting music with some gay guys and doing limbo. At one point I strolled off to get a ham and cheese sandwich and then meandered off again later. When we all returned to the hotel we were the kind of guests I hate on the night shift - ones causing a rucas. We were loud, Matt was running around the streets naked and we got three noise complaints and on our final warning I told the receptionist I loved him, we were lucky not to be thrown out.

Tom had a banging head ache the next morning, I felt like I couldn't function and everyone was generally feeling a little worse for wear as we de-briefed the night before. We decide not to waste our day feeling sorry for ourselves in bed and get out and see some of Seattle. Our first stop was breakfast and we went to a 24 hour diner called the 5 points café. I indulged in a Bacon and cheese burger with tater tots which helped the hangover somewhat. Sam needed to change his Canadian dollars so we popped down the street to Wells Fargo where the ginger Swindon man was convinced to open up a bank account. Thirty minutes later and Sam was eventually done so we headed to the EMP museum where Sam made up for his delay, by knowing the guy on reception who got us in the museum for free, all we had to pay for was the limited edition star was special they had at a measly eight bucks. I think if I had paid the full $32 asking price for the museum I would have been a tad disappointed but because it was only $8 I quite enjoyed it seeing memorabilia from star wars films, horror films and fantasy TV and films. There was also a retro gaming section, and tributes to local artists Jimi Hendrix and Nirvana. We spent most of our time upstairs in the sound room, where we jammed with musical instruments and even did our own ten minute recording. After the EMP museum we made the short trek to the space needle, it's easily spotted when you look at the Seattle skyline and looks like it was in one of the men in black movies! The cost to go up was $21 we probably wouldn't have done it but we got the majority of the museum for free to treated ourselves to Seattle's main tourist attraction. It was like going up any tall building - overpriced for what it was, we were only up there for about 10 minutes getting photos of the impressive view of Seattle.

A McDonalds later and we were back in our cosy hotel room, all feeling a bit jaded we had a power nap before smashing out the remaining beers and straight citron vodka and heading out for round two. This night we went out at a much earlier time of 8pm as Sam had a friend playing in a band at a bar called Barboza. The band was pretty decent, nothing spectacular but it was a good way to get the night kicked off. Banter was still flowing there, especially from Matt who when a girl asked if she could here accents put on a big Jamaican accent and when the same girl insinuated she wanted a drink pointed her in the direction of the bar, she never did get a drink off anyone of us but did end up buying Sam and myself one. After the gig had finished we made our way to a place called Cha Cha, Matt got talking straight away to a girl at the bar who we both thought looked like April O'Neill from the turtles, even though she had blonde hair and April O'Neill had more of an auburn colour to her hair. Matt and I stayed there for most of our time in Cha Cha having banter with April O'Neill and her friend who looked like she was the sister of Sol Campbell. The lads gave us the call to move on to a place called Linda's but Matt had just got a hefty round consisting of Sambuca shots and double vodka red bulls, so while Sam and Jordan headed off, Matt (who gave a fairway song of Ebony & Ivory to April & Sol Campbell's sister), Tom (who was in a very bad way) and I stopped and tried chatting ultimate wing manning two other girls one called Laura Tulli, and the other only known for having hair that felt like sheep that Tom owned a three star hotel in Whistler, obviously we didn't get nowhere that night but myself and Matt did ended up with Laura as friends on Facebook. Eventually we were on or way to Linda's and I guess what would normally be a ten minute walk took much longer as we tested out Hamish & Andy's ultimate wingman on every girl we come across this included a stunning blonde who was already married and a chick on a bike named Jill whose chain fell off and Matt ended up fixing it for her. While Matt was fixing the bike, Tom was requesting to go home, talking with one eye open and being extremely pissed, however, I was in no mood to go home and said we might as well have one more and see how the night goes. Tom must have been thankful that I did as in the next bar he got talking to a girl he met in Cha Cha's and eventually ended up taking her home. Meanwhile I was in the midst of getting very drunk and trying to chat up girls, the first I did with great success asking the bar man to supply Matt, Tom and myself for three drinks that would get us absolutely f***ed for less than $20, we each ended up with a pint of gin & tonic, perhaps the worse drink in the world. The second attempt didn't go great either as each girl I chatted too ended up not playing for my side, a girl sat alone told me she was on a date, I instantly assumed it was a man, but a girl appeared, and a group of four ladies we chatted too, when four left the remaining two got very cosy. It was at this point Sam and Tom took their ladies to a karaoke bar called the crescent. Matt and myself were still nursing our G&T's so said we would meet them there, we ended up necking said drink and following shortly after, as always we made a short walk take forever, as we met a crazy man on the streets and ended up doing some slam poetry with him, we also were still doing our ultimate wingman to any girl we came across, and to be honest we didn't have a clue where we were going until we ran into Zack. Zack was presumably stood outside his apartment in a vest, shorts and 60% peeled orange, we asked him for directions, which he started to give us and then thought f*** it and took us there himself, infact he advised us not to go in the crescent because it was a bit of a dive and instead to a bar opposite which brewed its own ginger ale and had cocktails on tap. Hew new the bouncers there I pretended I knew one for an old geometry class to add to the already ample amounts of banter going off. For some reason Zack added me on Facebook which I though slightly peculiar as he had only gave me directions to a bar. But I had no time to be concerned about that there was banter to be had as we ordered three Moscow Mules, we got talking to a group in the corner as I was curious where they got their burgers from and a girl there loved Irish songs, Matt and her hit it off bigtime as she sang some Irish songs in her voice and Matt failed to get a good attempt of the rattling bog. It was soon closing time and Matt got the girls contact details (which he later lost) and we began the walk home which was easy as we just had to head towards the space needle. I got a quick burger from the joint up the road and then we made our way home. Jordan got pretty pissed at Matt and myself's tendency to cross roads when we wanted too and walking on grass with a fence at the far end so stormed off home, while Matt and I continued having great banter on the way home, first up was a black woman called Pat, we had much banter with her saying she must have done the nearby car crash and we would be her alibi, she also loved us trying to ultimate wingman her, in her thick northern American accent she said 'I was about to walk away and you were doing all the 'whaaaaatttt' business, I loved that' She eventually stormed off though when I asked her to tie my shoelace which I think she took as racist but it completely wasn't I would have asked anyone. This meant we had to move on and the next set of people we came across could only be desribed in one word - 'gangsters' the main guy 'Cavalli' had a mouth of silver teeth and a handful of $100's, he was trying to sell us his debut rap CD but we had no money at all. I tried to give him some change but he wanted a twenty, so I guess it wasn't a donation at all, he even wanted us to go and use the bank machine which we flatly refused. Things got a bit tense when they asked us what room we were in and if we wanted a lift, so we made our excuses and go out of there before they could shoot us and on the plus side we got a CD for free. We walked off wondering what the bejesus was happening and headed to seven eleven for the two for 9.99 offer we had saw earlier in the day. On the way Matt pissed on a psychic's hut, something they should have really seen coming and then had banter in 7/11 with and absolute unit of a dog called freak, a homeless guy, a crack w**** I kept hugging and the less than impressed staff member Moshin. A quick conversation with two Hispanic gangsters and an apology to the guy working nights at the hotel and we were in our room munching on the pizza reflecting on a bizarre night out and walk home.

I tried to wake up the next morning to watch Swansea vs Man Utd but the remote was nowhere near me so I drifted off back to sleep. We eventually woke up and reflected on the crazy night out we had. Sam arrived back from the girl he stopped at, but Tom was nowhere to be found. We waved goodbye to Sam who was staying in Seattle and eventually heading to L.A. and Vegas. We ade our way to 7/11 so I could get a much needed juice and eventually met Tom, who had eventually returned from his birds house in Capital Hill. Pike Market was the next place on the agenda to see what that was like, it was ok just like most markets, I wouldn't have minded getting food there but all we got were fruit smoothies and went to the golden archers for a hangover cure. We then headed bac to the hotel to collect our baggage, we tried to get the notes about us on their system but apparently there was nothing about people running through the corridors naked and not even that we were loud!

After a hectic couple of days it was time to say goodbye to the American state and catch the Greyhound back to Whistler, this was where dreams of epic road trips began!!

So until next time take care and stay safe

Adi

xx