Bavaria to Norway

It was a drizzly and overcast day (welcome to Washington!) but we still had a beautiful drive through the Cascade Mountains.  Fall colors are displayed in brilliant reds and yellows.  Route 2 is a very scenic route.  When we got to the Sultan area, we took routes 522 and 524 to Edmonds, where we caught the car and passenger ferry to the Kitsap peninsula.  It was cold to be outside so we sat in an inside lounge where we still had nice views.  There are a lot of expensive large homes on the peninsula, especially hugging the water (Puget Sound).  We figure a lot of rich Silicon Valley transplants and Microsoft employees have homes here.

Once on the peninsula we drove west and south to Poulsbo, a little Norwegian settlement.  It has been fun to celebrate Mark's Bavarian heritage yesterday and now my Norwegian heritage today.  It was late afternoon when we got to the inn.  We dropped off Tuna and our luggage and hightailed it to the little downtown so that we could visit some stores before they closed.  I was hoping to find a bakery that sells lefse.  My Norwegian friends and relatives will understand but for the rest of you, lefse is rather like a tortilla made out of potatoes.  It's often served with butter and sugar.  Besta, my grandmother, used to make lefse often and I love it.  I made it once; what a time consuming chore, especially the part where you have to knead together the potatoes and the flour.  I haven't had lefse for years; it's not something you can buy in any old market.  Suys Bakery in Poulsbo not only sells lefse but also lots of other Norwegian specialties.  We walked out with a bag of lefse, fatigmand, rosettes, and pepparkakor.  Yum!

Our inn room has a small kitchenette so we decided to stop at Albertson's and heat up dinner in the room.  We missed the turnoff, by chance saw Central Market and went there instead.  Wow, it is much larger and has better stuff than Whole Foods.  Mark says it's what Whole Foods wants to be when it grows up.  We bought too much of course but enjoyed it very much.  Wish we had one of these stores in Anguilla.  :-)  For a vegetarian with Norwegian blood, Poulsbo would be a great place to live; of course, you'd have to give up sunshine!