A local tour of Seattle’s Pike Place Market

A local tour of Seattle’s Pike Place Market

We’ve signed on for Seattle’s only chef-led tour of the market with Elizabeth McClure’ new company Eat Seattle Tours. She also does cooking classes in the Market’s Atrium Kitchen, shopping with the students first for ingredients .

Innovation on display at Seattle Museum

Innovation on display at Seattle Museum

Seattle has always been a center of innovation and it’s on display at the Bezos Center of Innovation at the Museum of History and Industry. Did you know the Native Americans and traders invented a whole new language?

A haunting visit to an elementary school in Hiroshima

A haunting visit to an elementary school in Hiroshima

I’ve got chills as Amber Whaley, 12, and her friend Miko Uno, 11, lead us into their elementary school’s basement. This was all that was all that remained of the Honkawa Elementary School when the atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima 70 years ago this past August 6.

Getting out of the car at Great Smoky Mountains National Park

Getting out of the car at Great Smoky Mountains National Park

Are you a windshield tourist? That’s what they call the many visitors to Great Smoky Mountains National Park who simply traverse the park’s famous 30-plus mile Newfound Gap Road through the park and don’t get out of the car much, if at all.

Shopping in Tokyo’s ‘Kitchentown’

Shopping in Tokyo’s ‘Kitchentown’

There’s shop after shop of kitchen wares—ceramic sake cups, wooden bowls for miso soup, colorful bowls for rice, all varieties of chop sticks and of course hand-made Japanese knives that will be engraved on the spot with your name in Japanese. And everything is a bargain!

Hiroshima school: memorial and symbol of peace

Hiroshima school: memorial and symbol of peace

The Honkawa Elementary School is in the heart of Hiroshima and when the Atomic Bomb was dropped on August 6, 1945, all but one of the 420 students and teachers perished. Today is a again a bustling school and a memorial to those who died.

Finding real books and bookstores on your family trips

Finding real books and bookstores on your family trips

I know a lot of kids don’t even read “real” books anymore. Everyone is all about interactive books kids can read on tablets with all sorts of fun features. But there’s still something to be said for stopping in at a local bookstore — or a national park visitor center — and browsing their collection of children’s books.