Spokane Special Insert June | July 2018

DAY
2
NO INDULGENCE goes unpunished, so it was out
to Canfield Mountain Mecca Trail for a 10-mile loop,
logging miles on old logging roads. If you trod lightly
the night before, try a more relaxed out-and-back
hike and enjoy the views of Coeur d’Alene below.
Though there are plenty of flowers to stop and
smell, we struggled against distance and height, the
route gaining more than 2,500 feet in elevation. My
heart pounded, but my mind was on baked goods. Somewhere down below
on Third Street in Coeur d’Alene was Strada, a top coffee shop ready to pull an
Americano and a Cubano latte.
Back at the Davenport Grand, we decided to kick back for the afternoon.
The Davenport Hotel array in Spokane is a collection of four stately properties.
Doubletree, Ruby hotels and the newly rebranded RL, or Red Lion, hotels are
also well-placed for downtown or riverfront exploration. On a summer day,
the best way to relax is to grab a book and head to the second floor terrace
for baba ghanoush and a beer. The terrace bar serves a full drink menu with a
snack food menu. If you don’t have a good book with you, skip out to Auntie’s
Bookstore on Main or Atticus Coffee & Gifts on Howard. On the Davenport
terrace and above the Riverfront Park, the world below hushed as we whiled
away the afternoon between the pages of time.
We stayed on the fine side of dining at Santé, a farm-to-table charcuterie
and restaurant with a good kitchen behind it. Executive chef Jeremy Hansen
is a culinary force, without doubt. He studied at Portland’s Le Cordon Bleu
before heading for New York and working alongside Michelin Star Chef Gray
Kunz. His farm-to-table and tip-to-tail butchery practices are on full display
at Santé. Duck prosciutto, garlic sausage and goat cheese agnolotti were on the
menu and our plates.
DAY
3
PROXIMITY TO THE Centennial Trail State Park
is a premium for any runner or hiker. The 37-mile
trail runs through town and out to the Idaho border.
Thankfully, we attempted only a short segment of
this. Out east the trail winds past the campuses and
playing fields of Washington State University-Spokane
and Gonzaga University. It is of mixed strata,
following the banks of the Spokane River. This trail
also is a good way to see the different facets of Spokane, from public art and
manicured parks to rugged industrial and high desert.
In 2015, Spokane was chosen to be one of the first ten national “Smart Cities,”
a program which leverages technology and data to improve a community’s
quality of life. Another smart addition is the UW School of Medicine,
a partnership with Gonzaga. Elson S. Floyd College of Medicine opened to
students in the fall of 2017 and has seen a boom in enrollment.
One of my safe places in town is Rocket Bakery. The coffee is outstanding,
the pastries are good and the ambience takes on the patina of the renovated
buildings they occupy. It’s also a good environment to plug in and work for a
bit or to rediscover the art of gab.
We couldn’t leave town, of course, without cruising the galleries and boutiques
of Kendall Yards before heading to the shopping mecca of River Park
Square. My wife slipped into Anthropologie and Athleta, I found a place outside
in the shadow of all of the old buildings in various stages of renovation
and produce Norwegian by Night from my back pocket to commit another act
of nostalgic rebellion—reading.
FROM TOP The Bing Crosby Theater is on the National Register of Historic Places. Santé offers
farm-to-table charcuterie. Rocket Bakery’s coffee is outstanding.
5 DESTINATION SPOKANE // JUNE | JULY 2018