Living the Life...in Poulsbo

So, Luke and I have been back from our year-long overseas adventure for about two and a half months. After making one complete circle around the globe, we landed in one of the most improbable places -- Poulsbo, WA.

Poulsbo is a sweet little town and while just a short ferry ride away from the hustle and bustle of Seattle, it might as well be half a world away. And if Poulsbo feels like it's half a world away from Seattle then it might as well be on another planet in comparison to Taiwan.

While Taiwan was loud, busy, crazy and always an adventure, Poulsbo is quaint, quiet and tranquil. Whereas everyday in Taiwan was full of unfamiliar sights, sounds and smells, Poulsbo is comfortably routine. And while our Europe travels brought new and unexpected experiences everyday, in Poulsbo we have settled into a quiet, mostly predictable life. While we miss our overseas adventures we have also been thankful for the stability and proximity of family and friends in our new life here.

Maybe you are asking, "Why Poulsbo?"

Luke's grandma lives in Arizona but has a house in Poulsbo which she asked us if we would want to live in and take care of for her. A whole house, rent-free? Sure! Plus, as mentioned before, Poulsbo is close enough to Seattle that it's not too much of a struggle to get there if we want to see friends or have a day or evening in the city. And we have the added bonus of living closer to Luke's parents than we ever have before.

Not sure how we would adjust to our quieter life, we decided in the beginning that we would try to have friends over often for weekends and try and explore the Olympic Penninsula just as we had gone about exploring and seeing Taiwan.

The good thing about Poulsbo is that not only is the town itself charming and beautiful, but there are also tons of your typical Pacific Northwest scenery practically right in our backyard.

One of the first weekends we were there, we had some friends come over for Seattle and stay for the weekend. On the first day we decided to strike out and do some sight-seeing. It was October and the trees were changing into their vivid hues of red, orange and yellow. All of these trees were surrounded by the dark green of the pine trees with the mountains and water for a backdrop.

We decided to take a turn-off that wound up the side of a mountain. Lazily, we drove to the top (hey, the road just kept on going!) where we found two older women and a dog bragging shamelessly (kidding!) that they had walked up the trail on the other side.
After this, we continued our drive and took a walk next to a river.
And then we saw...elk!
A few weekends later, some more friends came for a weekend (with their puppy!) and we decided to head out to the beach at Point-No-Point (yes, that's the real name) in the sub-freezing degree weather. Suffice it to say, we didn't stay long but still managed to have a nice sunny walk with Albus, the super-Corgi in the arctic air.
And last of all, here are some pictures from Poulsbo. We see the mountains from our front yard and the harbor is always really pretty and full of boats. The downtown is a single Norwegian-themed (!) street, abounding with Viking paraphernalia!
We have also discovered Sluy's, a bakery famous for its giant cinnamon rolls overflowing with cream-cheesy goodness. We have made it a goal in life to try every one of the pastries there. A noble achievement, I think!

And last but not least...we have discovered Rock Band!! Here is a picture from our recent Ugly Sweater Christmas Party.
Other than all the things aforementioned, Luke has been finishing his masters and we have been applying for work. I recently accepted a position at the Bread of Life Mission, a nonprofit that works with Seattle's homeless population. So, while our schedules may be filling up soon and will leave less time for exploring and pastry-tasting, we are still focused on exploring and experiencing the world around us.

Oxford: City of Dreaming Spires

With just a couple days left of our European adventure we decided to spend them close to London. For a long time we had both wanted to see Oxford and visit one of the oldest universities in the world.
Oxford began unofficially around the year 1100, making this university almost 1,000 years old. As you can guess, the city is dominated by gothic architecture and the skyline is punctuated by literally hundreds of spires, thus giving it its name. It is also ideally situated at the conjunction of two rivers, the Thames and the Cherwell.
We arrived in Oxford, eager to put down our bags and see this town that we had been wanting to see for so long. The first thing that we noticed was that it did, indeed, feel like a college town. Very similar, in fact, to San Luis Obispo where I went to college. The two towns could not be more opposite but the laid-back, fresh feeling was the same.
Apparently it was orientation weekend so we were often marveling at how young the college freshmen looked and how far beyond that point we felt. It also happened to be summer graduation so we had many sightings of newly graduated students looking very scholarly and accomplished in their stately, hooded black robes.
In addition to the robes and feel there was a sense of grandeur and history that I can only imagine is felt at some of the older ivy leagues in America.
The town is small and we were there for a couple of days so we really got a sense of what it is like to go to college at one of the oldest and most prestigious colleges in the world. The students looked like ordinary students, engaged in ordinary activities but the surroundings were not and I'm sure added a special touch that I would hope most students would not forget.
We, in turn, felt nostalgic about our own college experiences and felt that they had passed by much too quickly. Ahhh, to be a student where the biggest pressure is to do well on tests and papers and the sense of urgency that becomes so prevalent after you leave the safe confines of your college has yet to take hold of you. All this nostalgia made us think that maybe it would be nice to go back and further our studies sometime in a place such as Oxford.
So, we walked the town, went into the old cathedrals, admired the architecture, read and napped next to the Thames and just generally enjoyed our last couple of days in fresh and beautiful Oxford before it was time to begin the journey back to the states.

Ahhh, Paris

How does one reflect on a recent trip to Paris? What does one say about a city that has been considered one of the most beautiful and talked about cities in the world for something like the last 2000 years? After all we had heard about Paris, we expected to be both wowed by its beauty and taken with its seeingly irresistable charm. After leaving our wonderful (but all too short) stay in the south of France, we hopped on the TGV and made our way to Paris.

Traveling through France has been an interesting collision of expectations and realities.

After a couple hours on the train, we arrived in Paris and made our way to our hotel. Here was the first of those interesting collisions. Expecting to be taken with the city of light/love, our first impression was rather: wow...this hotel room is maybe a little bigger than our closet was in Taiwan and we don't have any water. That's right, upon waking up our first morning, we discovered that our shower/water system was having some difficulties. For a while it wouldn't work at all...then after some waiting and fiddling with knobs, it wouldn't turn off. So there we were, our first morning in Paris watching the faucet spew out scalding hot water (or ice cold...but nothing in the middle) while we tried everything to get it to stop.

However, once this little obstacle was overcome (the hotel worker gave me a very disapproving frown after I told him about the water and told me, "Wait." He walked away and I never saw him again, but our water problem worked itself out sometime later...guess he was right!), we made our way into the city and we fell in love with it.

Paris is this beautiful and inspiring jewel of a city with open spaces, priceless art, winding alleys and people just walking around searching for the perfect picnic spot. It took only a few minutes of being in the city for our hotel experience to fade away and we were just overcome with gratitude that we were able to see a city like this.

As far as what we "did" in Paris: we walked around, ate croissants, baguettes and cheese, saw many of the sights, spent a day in Versailles wandering through the palace gardens, picnicing almost every night and just enjoying our surroundings.

Versailles!

Here is a typical Luke and Katie meal:
One highlight was spending an evening with a friend who lived in Paris and seeing the city from a Parisian point of view. Just like our experience in the south of France, we enjoyed time being with locals: seeing local places, eating at a local restaruant and enjoying time away from the tourists.

Too soon our time was up and we had to consider where we would be going next. But as we left Paris for the UK, we reflected on the importance of first impressions not being the final say, but rather just the beginning of the story. So in the end, we can really say: Ahhh, Paris!

Marathon Dinners in the South of France

After a nice stop in Camogli and a failed visit to Monaco we pulled up at our friend's house in the south of France. Until this point, we had spent most of our nights in hotels and seeing the major tourist attractions. Their house felt nothing like a hotel and staying with our family friends, we felt far from the tourist crowds that had previously been so prevalent in our trip.

The house was built in the 1600's and they have spent the last five years or so lovingly restoring, updating, working on the grounds and creating a nice place for their children and grandchildren to spend time.

Staying in their house felt like a dream, not to mention their wonderful and welcoming hospitality. Here we got to experience a true French dinner. It started around 5 with tea in the greenhouse, then moved to an "aperitif" in front of the fire, then a starter, main course, vegetable course, cheese and dessert at the dining table all accompanied with three distinct types of wine. The whole dinner finished about midnight when we went to bed sleepy and satisfied with good food in our stomachs and conversations in our heads.

The next day we went with my parents in the car to visit some little villages in the area. Again, we were thankful and feeling a little spoiled to have a car for this part of our trip. No figuring out train tickets, no hopping on the wrong bus, no trekking with the backpacks...just dad to drive us around. ; )

Our first stop was a little village, part of it in ruins called Lacoste. We were told by our friends that the french fashion designer, Pierre Cardin, had actually bought the castle and was working to restore the whole village.

The castle at the top that he also restored:
The rest of the village:

The next stop was Bonnieux, a bit larger and in better shape than Lacoste.
The last stop was the village nearest to our friends house. Here are a few pictures:
Too soon it was time to leave and we somewhat reluctantly packed our bags, hoisted them on our backs and had one last easy car ride to the train station from my dad. We felt rested and relaxed after our wonderful time in the south of France, having felt that we had experienced what life was really like for the residents of this beautiful and peaceful area.