Sunset from Everest

With lots going on, John and Mary Jo took some time out to have a dinner out at Din Tai Fung on a Wednesday night. Afterwards, they went over to John's building at Amazon to sit on the deck and watch the sky light up for the sunset. Very nice evening!

Boulder!

After two-thirds of a week on the East Coast, Henry returned to Seattle while John flew to Denver to spend the weekend with Jack. He arrived to snow falling, with four inches accumulating overnight!

John and Jack skied at Eldora on Friday, and then after walking around campus for a bit on Saturday, drove into Denver and went to a well-timed Mets game, with deGrom on the mound for the first game.

Before & After

John & Henry's trip to the East Coast revisited many familiar spots from long-ago. Here's a side-by-side of some photos from yesterday and today.

East Coast Trip - Post #2 (Sightseeing)

In addition to visiting colleges on their trip, John and Henry also had a chance to do some other activities.  We took lots of transportation around - three different Amtrak trains, plus subways in four different cities, two buses, a few Lyfts, and even a bike share! Here are a few of the highlights of our trip:

Bike share got us to BU, on a beautiful day in Boston

Faneuil Hall, on the Freedom Trail

Our Acela arrived at a brand new Moynihan Train Station

We had dinner with Janet and Meghan in Greenwich Village

Grant's Tomb

1500 Locust (no historical marker noting that's where John & Mary Jo lived from 1993-1995??)

Beautiful night on the Mall

WWII Memorial

Exorcist Steps!

Metro at Farragut West

Rental car pickup at Pan Am Shopping Center!

Driving by a familiar house

Spaghetti Carbonara at Villa Bella

Dropping Henry off at Vienna Metro for his solo flight back to Seattle

East Coast Trip - Post #1 (Colleges)

For Henry's Spring Break, John and Henry flew to Boston and then took Amtrak down the East Coast, to see several colleges as well as fit in some sightseeing. Henry is very interested in going to college in an urban environment, so we focused on four cities: Boston, New York, Philadelphia, and Washington DC. While no colleges are doing tours or any activities on campus, we were able to compare eight different campuses: Harvard, Boston University, Boston College, NYU, Columbia, Penn, George Washington, and Georgetown. 

The campuses were very different - some isolated campuses within a city, others blended into the city iteself; some on the fringes of a city, some in the more central parts.

Harvard

Boston University

Boston College

NYU (rainy day!)

Columbia University

Penn

George Washington University

Final stop - Georgetown!

Vaccine!

The pandemic has been going on for over a year now, and Mary Jo, since she is a healthcare worker, was vaccinated first in the family, in March. 

John took advantage of an opportunity to get a slot in Yakima, and drove 2 hrs each way in early April to get his first shot. There was a long line of cars, but it was a fairly efficient drive-through facility - great to be on the road to normalcy!

John Completes Soaring Eagle Mountain Biking Trails

John took a goal to bike the entire trail network in Soaring Eagle park. It's a well-marked trail system, with numbers at every intersection of trails, making it somwhat easy to plot out a course. It took six or seven trips before completing all the trails - getting to intersection #18 below was the final segment of trail to complete!

More Hiking in Cougar Mountain

John & Mary Jo continued their hiking in Cougar Mountain park and wrapped up the Harvey Manning portion of the park on a somewhat-spring like April weekend. Flowers are starting to bloom on the trails now, though it still is a bit on the chilly side.

Lookout over Lake Sammamish

Clay Pits - clay from here was used for some of the red brick buildings at UW