trip itinerary

Friday, October 11 - Departure Travel Day

Students will experience their first taste of getting around solely via public transportation immediately upon arrival in Seattle, when we take the Sound Transit Link light rail from SEA TAC airport to our hostel in the International District. We will spend the rest of our day learning the public transit system and getting settled into our local neighborhood, ending with a trip up to the observation deck of the Seattle Space Needle and a group grocery shopping trip to stock our larders for the next couple of days. 

Saturday, october 12 - Make like a tourist day

For our first full day in Seattle we will orient ourselves to this new (to us) city with the help of local guides and experts! We will begin with a local tour guide company that will help us get to know many of the neighborhoods and some history of Seattle with a driving tour of the city. We will then spend some more time in Seattle Center before hopping on a boat in Lake Union for a cruise down the Fremont Cut, Lake Washington Ship Canal, Salmon Bay, and through the Hiram M. Chittenden (Ballard) Locks into Puget Sound, around the West Point Lighthouse, and south along the coastline back into Elliott Bay. 

Sunday, october 13 - Cultural heritage day

What is a city without the people that live there and have helped to shape a community's history and culture? And what about the people or peoples that lived there before it became a city? What about the history erased and impact unacknowledged to underrepresented peoples that are still important members of the urban community? On this day we will learn about the Native history of what is now known as "Seattle," in addition to the impact that massive development and a lack of affordable housing has had on underrepresented populations living in the city, including the unhoused ("homeless"), low-income individuals and families, and communities of color. We will visit the Daybreak Star Indian Cultural Center for a self-guided tour. We will also learn more about the neighborhood where we are staying for our trip, the International District, some of its history, and the people that live there, historically and currently, by participating in a walking tour and group meal with the Wing Luke Museum. 

Monday, October 14 - Sustainable architecture & infrastructure day

On this day we will experience multiple examples of sustainable architecture and landscape architecture as attempts to improve development's impact on the environment and the wellness of the people that live and work within these spaces. Several extremely important species to the Pacific Northwest, both environmentally and economically, are the local Pacific salmon populations, and we will have the chance to learn more about how certain projects are acting to protect these fishes' well-being in the Elliot Bay area, including the sea wall reconstruction project and bioswales below the Aurora Bridge. Hosted by the University of Washington's Center for Integrated Design, we will tour "the greenest commercial building in the world," the Bullitt Center, a building constructed under living building challenge practices. We will end the day with a tour guide from the Seattle Architecture Foundation, who will showcase some special landscape architecture projects within the Fremont neighborhood, focusing on environmental and ecosystem values. 

Tuesday, october 15 - Return travel day

We will spend the first couple of hours of the morning with some free time to get one more sightseeing option in before heading back to the hostel to collect our bags, hop on the Link, and head back to the airport to fly home.