Every year, Sammy and I like to get away and take a trip, just the two of us. This year, we headed to Spokane, WA for a Shakey Graves concert at the Knitting Factory!
We stayed at the Montvale Hotel, which was beautiful and super awesome. I loved it's uncluttered simplicity.
After getting checked in and settled, we headed out for a stroll. Spokane is probably the only city I could see myself living close to. It really is quite beautiful, and shockingly clean compared to other cities I've been to. After walking for a bit and taking in the sites, we found ourselves enjoying huge bowls of ramen at Nudo Ramen House. Seriously delicious.
After eating, we walked to the River Park Square Mall, which from the outside just looks like a big fancy building, but once inside, is literally a mall. It was crazy. One second you are on the streets of downtown Spokane, and the next you are inside a multi story mall. It felt so strange, haha! We walked the mall for a bit, going in a few stores. One in particular was amazing. It was a shop made up of artists. Each artist had a small portion of the shop. It was hard to leave there without buying every single item we loved....which was a lot! Definitely a shop I'd love to go to again. We purchased the most delicious smelling lemon candle. After smelling that candle, there was no way we were leaving the shop without it!
Saturday we had all day to hang out until the concert that night. We googled "What to do in Spokane" and Monito Park pulled up. We thought what the heck, a stroll through the park sounded lovely! We were not disappointed!! What I thought was going to be just a short walk around a park, turned into a whole morning adventure!
Monito Park isn't just one trail around a pond, but actually 90 acres of different specialty gardens. To start, we found ourselves parked at Mirror Pond. The weather was perfect, and I really enjoyed the huge willows surrounding the pond. I especially enjoyed when we had to time the sprinkler system correctly on this one part of the trail and make a run for it so we didn't get soaked!
Duncan Garden was just a short walk up and away from Mirror Pond and was our next stop. Obviously it's late August....but look how beautiful it is! Can you imagine what it looks like in Spring? I'm normally not a huge flower fan (except for Lupin and a few others), but I definitely loved our walk among the flowers. I got a lot of great shots, including a few of a friendly little bee working away.
Right at the head of the stairs of Duncan Gardens was Gaiser Conservatory. On one side they had tropical style plants, and on the other cacti and succulents. I LOVED IT. Truly, I didn't want to leave. I could have sat in there all day. I think that was my favorite part of the day.
Walking all around the 90 acres of Manito Park helped us work up an appetite! So we headed back to our hotel to park, then walked to the Riverfront Park, which was just a few blocks walk from the hotel. We couldn't pass up getting a few drinks and eating a delicious meal at O'Doherty's Pub!
The Riverfront Park is a pretty amazing location. There are so many little shops and restaurants to check out! We went inside this one little shop that had so many cool things. I think we were in there for about an hour, hahaha. There's even an inside carrousel called the Looff Carrousel at The Riverside Park! It's only a couple bucks to ride, so you better believe we purchased tickets! That was a lot of fun!
After our carrousel ride, we learned there were gondola rides via Numerica SkyRide just a short walk away, so we did that too! It was amazing!! It was a short 15-20 minute loop trip, but definitely worth it. I had never been on a gondola before, and I thoroughly enjoyed the ride and the views!
After a full morning and afternoon of fun, it was time to head back to the hotel for a short nap and then get ready for the Shakey Graves concert!!
The Knitting Factory venue was right outside our hotel, so after getting ready, it took no time at all to walk to the venue. We got there at 6:15 and were the 2nd people there, lol. Yay! We got through security and then waited inside the venue hall until the main event doors opened at 7:00. Once those doors opened, we ran up to the balcony, which is for 21+ only, and the only area in the venue that had stools to sit on. And I definitely wanted a stool to sit on! It would have been fun to be on the ground level and to have been right up by the stage, but I'm so short...I feared I wouldn't be able to see over the people standing in front of me. I also didn't think I could stand for 3 hours without getting a major neck and back ache. So up the stairs to the balcony we went, and I was soooo thankful we had gotten there early to be the first in line so we could actually grab stools!
We had a super great view of the stage, however the performance had a lot of smoke machines going, as well as a major light show with each song, so although I could see the stage just fine with my own eyes, it was hard to get decent photos with my phone....from a balcony. That's ok though....this is the 4th time I've seen Shakey, and every other time I've worried about getting photos and videos, but decided this time I was going to take a few photos, a video or two of my favorite songs, and then kick back, relax and truly be in the moment and enjoy the concert!
The concert was AMAZING! Shakey never disappoints. He played a great mix of old and new, just him stripped down with his kick drum, and full bodied with his whole band. I loved every second of it! And I loved being with Sam. We had a lot of fun! Even Shakey's opening act, Jade Bird, was awesome. I'm going to have to look her up and buy some of her music.
By the end of the night we were pooped out! The concert ended at 11, and I am so thankful our hotel was literally just across the street! We were back in our room and looking out the window at people still leaving the venue within 5 minutes!
I feel so thankful for opportunities like this to make new memories with my love! Thanks for the great trip, Sammy!
With love,
Mama Hauck
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