With Washington State's vaccination rates steadily rising, this Memorial Day weekend is looking a whole lot better than last year's. That said, our picks for things to do through Monday stay within the bounds of CDC guidelines, from an outdoor concert Past Event Like List in a Sodo parking lot to an outdoor comedy show Past Event Like List at Bad Jimmy's, and from places to get last-minute Memorial Day meals (like Smokestack Lightning BBQ Like List ) to Asian-owned restaurants to visit to close out AAPI Heritage Month (like Toyoda Sushi Like List ). For even more options, read our guides to the best online events this week Like List , the best movies to watch this week Like List , upcoming events going on sale this week Like List , this season's drive-in movies Like List , and our complete guide to in-person things to do in Seattle.

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Jump to: Day Trips | Food & Drink | Arts & Performance | Other Picks & Happenings

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DAY TRIPS

Hit up some drive-thrus. There’s no time like a long weekend to head out for an impromptu road trip. Don't forget the best part of every vehicular jaunt: stopping for snacks. If Sodo is on the way to your destination (or even if it isn't), hit up the delightfully retro Pick-Quick Drive-In Like List for delicious burgers, chili cheese fries, hot dogs, and milkshakes in flavors like Almond Roca and mountain blackberry. Of course, Burgermaster and Dick's Drive-In are also reliable drive-in staples. If you're headed south, plot a stop at Tacoma's glowing red-and-yellow beacon Frisko Freeze Like List . The historic Gold Bar restaurant Zeke's Drive-In Like List and the local chain Zip's Drive-In Like List are other nostalgic favorites worth adding to your itinerary.

Visit a phone booth in a forest. Back in October, local travel journalist Corey Dembeck heard about a disconnected rotary phone on a grassy hill in Otsuchi, Japan, which was installed in 2010 after a massive earthquake and tsunami swept thousands of people out to sea. Dubbed Telephone of the Wind, grieving people still line up to talk to their departed loved ones through the empty receiver. Having recently lost his grandfather, both of his parents, and the daughter of a family friend, Dembeck decided to build his own version of the installation in Olympia's Priest Point Park Like List , fixed to a piece of plywood and nailed to a western red cedar. If you've been meaning to leave a message for someone beyond the grave (or otherwise unreachable) and you're headed south for the weekend, make a detour through the forest (you can find the coordination here) and check it out. 

Go the extra mile for Memorial Day. There's something to be said for spending a long weekend doing as little as possible, but if you want to take advantage of the extra 24 hours of leisure time afforded by Memorial Day (Mon May 31), there's still time to plan. We've cherry-picked Like List a few noteworthy events in Seattle (like Northwest Folklife Past Event Like List , plus out-of-town fun to seek out in Port Townsend, Leavenworth, and Vashon Island. 

FOOD & DRINK

Celebrate Mint Julep Day. This Sunday is Mint Julep Day, a prime time for leisurely sipping the refreshing bourbon-based beverage on your porch (or a patio) and watching the world go by. We suggest tracking down a version at Navy Strength Like List , Witness Like List , Knee High Stocking Company Like List , King's Hardware Like List , Bottle & Bull Like List , or Little Red Hen Past Event Like List .

Grab a last-minute Memorial Day meal. Did the three-day weekend sneak up on you before you had the chance to secure some type of festive meal? We’ve got you covered. Capitol Hill's endearingly weird watering hole/sandwich shop Honeyhole Like List is opening its new Central District location on Memorial Day weekend and has a patio for you to soak up the sun while enjoying a hearty Fast Eddie, Waverider, or Buford T. Justice. If smoked meats are more your speed, the barbecue trailer Smokestack Lightning BBQ Like List will be parked at Urban Family Brewing Like List beginning at noon on Memorial Day and will be slinging classic barbecue platters for two—all veterans will also receive a 10% discount that day.

Visit AAPI-owned restaurants. There are just a few days left in Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month. Finish the month strong by paying a visit to some AAPI-owned restaurants and businesses around town. Some of our favorites include Atulea Like List , Hello Em, Hood Famous Bakeshop, Kamonegi Like List , Maneki Like List , Musang, Phnom Penh Noodle House Like List , Pho Bac, Ping’s Dumpling House Like List , Revel Like List , Szechuan Noodle Bowl Like List , Tai Tung Like List , Toyoda Sushi Like List , and Young Tea Like List . For more ideas, check out our directory of AAPI-owned restaurants and our list of ways to support AAPI-owned communities and businesses in Seattle Like List .

Visit one of the best bars in America (according to Esquire). After a year of drinking at home, we’re more excited than ever to return to dimly lit bars filled with the sounds of music, conversation, and rattling cocktail shakers. And Seattle is lucky enough to lay claim to one of the best places to drink in America for 2021, according to Esquire: the romantic French-inspired cocktail bar Roquette Like List (which incidentally snagged the peculiar honor of being deemed home to one of Seattle’s best bathrooms for fucking by The Stranger in January 2020). Culture and lifestyle director Kevin Sintumuang writes, “Sometimes you just want to disappear into a moody drink, in a place with a mural of palm trees at twilight, listening to Latin jazz with sprinkles of conversations poking over the walls of your leather banquette, occasionally interrupted by the distinct sound of big blocks of ice shaken in a metal tin. Don’t bother asking for something that’s not too sweet at Roquette, a Belltown bar from Erik Hakkinen, a longtime bartender at legendary Zig Zag Café; that does not exist in this corner of the universe. The cocktails, like the place itself, tilt toward the brooding, with mezcals, overproof rums, and a multitude of French spirits—even the mai tai has cognac. But there are glimmers of levity: caviar with Bugles, anyone?”

Visit Saint Bread. Chase Burns writes, "I’m not religious, but I hear the lord has answered Seattle’s prayers and extended Saint Bread Like List ’s hours. Initially serving only Tuesday through Friday from 8 am to 2 pm, this newly opened Portage Bay-adjacent bakery is now churning out its “grab & go” menu until 6 pm. Located near the almost-just-as-new Fritz Hedges Waterway Park, this spot is also open on Saturdays as of this week. The past few weeks, devotees have swarmed Saint Bread for their breads and toasts and pastries, crafted by the saintly Yasuaki Saito, Randi Rachlow, and Michael Sanders, who are all connected to Pioneer Square’s London Plane. The team will now feed you into the early evening inside their petite Graham Baba Architects-designed boathouse, a firm that’s worked on Melrose Market, Chophouse Row, and that penthouse on top of Smith Tower—which I believe is still available to rent. I recommend arriving early if you’re trying to snag one of their popular Japanese melonpans since you’re competing with quickly moving lines of nearby University of Washington students and employees. I visited on Tuesday and bought a plate of chocolate chip cookies, which were righteously messy and miraculously flexible; an okonomiyaki tortilla, featuring savory, razor-thin cuts of bonito; and a star from the menu, the smoked trout toast. I don’t think I’ve ever had toast that was simultaneously so sturdy and soft. Make sure to take some extra time to admire the custom stained glass window of The Saint Bread as you order or while you sit in the Saint’s covered and heated patio."

Other notable weekend events:

Camp Canlis Past Event Like List
Seattle's premier fine-dining establishment Canlis Like List is at it again: The adaptable, branding-savvy restaurant has unveiled its plans for Camp Canlis, the latest (and hopefully final) in a line of pandemic-borne concepts that have included a burger drive-thru, a bagel shack, "Canlis Community College," and a winter yurt village. Camp Canlis will feature a treehouse hanging from the restaurant's roof with a single-party table for dine-in with upscale service sponsored by Dom Perignon, a retooled version of their yurt village with a summer-friendly camp theme, a "Canlis Canteen" in their lower parking lot with a barbecue menu by new chef de cuisine Celeste Peralez as well as beer and bourbon cocktails, and camp-inspired care packages with local goods that you can send to a friend you miss. 
Canlis, Queen Anne (Friday-Saturday)

ARTS & PERFORMANCE

Buy tickets to the Seattle Asian Art Museum. Like List While they're sold out for their grand reopening this Saturday (and throughout the weekend), the Volunteer Park museum is finally back for good Past Event Like List after a year-long closure, and they plan to release new batches of tickets every Thursday at 10 am. Those who didn't see the museum's impressive renovations—or its new permanent exhibitions Be/longing: Contemporary Asian Art Remind Like List and Boundless: Stories of Asian Art Remind Like List —during its brief blue-sky period before lockdown are in for quite a treat. If you need some guidance, The Stranger's Jasmyne Keimig has the scoop on the three best objects on view.

Check out Roq La Rue's new gallery space. The original location Like List on E Pike, which was founded in 1998 as a pop surrealism gallery and now serves as a general contemporary art showcase space, will continue to hold down the fort on Capitol Hill while Roq La Rue soft-opens its second spot Like List in nearby Madison Valley this Saturday, showcasing work Past Event Like List by an as-yet-unannounced group of local artists from 12-4 pm. Meanwhile, the Capitol Hill location has dreamy monochrome scenes by Adam Alaniz Past Event Like List on view all weekend. 

Other notable weekend events:

Carol Summers: The Woodblock Reinvented Past Event Like List
See a selection of work by the late woodblock artist. 
Davidson Galleries, Pioneer Square (Friday-Saturday; closing)

The Campfire Festival Past Event Like List
Commissioned by Ryan Guzzo Purcell's local theater ensemble The Williams Project, this festival embraces old-timey storytelling with half-hour original works presented in pairs (to audiences of 10 or fewer) by resident playwrights, followed by talkbacks with the artists. The program includes Justin Huertas's acoustic musical "Hell Here" (performed by Rheanna Atendid), Aaron Martin Davis Norman's "Storytime: Good Grief" (also a musical!), Dedra D. Woods's "30 Minutes," which explores "life, loss, Blackness, joy, and family," and Maggie L. Rogers's autobiographical "Untitled."
Rainier Arts Center, Columbia City (Friday-Sunday)

The Church of Soft Rock Past Event Like List
Mark Siano and his band the Enablers will post up in the Orca Bay parking lot for a nondenominational concert/comedy show/sermon of sorts.
Orca Bay Foods, Sodo (Friday-Sunday)

Crossing Boundaries Portraits of A Transgender West Past Event Like List
Focusing on four themes (visibility, identity, acceptance, and history), the Washington State Historical Society's latest exhibition explores influential transgender people in the West from 1860 to 1940, all of whom lived in a time when the term "transgender" didn't exist. 
Washington State History Museum, Tacoma (Saturday-Sunday; opening)

Drie Chapek: Churning Past Event Like List
"If there are gods, I think they may be hiding inside Drie Chapek's paintings," The Stranger's Chase Burns once wrote. This new collection of oil works and dreamy collages hold up that standard.
Greg Kucera Gallery (Friday-Saturday; closing)

Good Comedy at Bad Jimmy's Past Event Like List
Bo Johnson and Chris Mejia will co-host this outdoor comedy show featuring Jesse Warren (a StandUp NBC semi-finalist), Mary Lou Gamba, Erin Ingle, and a surprise guest.
Bad Jimmy's Brewing Co., Fremont (Sunday)

Mark Hurwitz and Gin Creek Past Event Like List
A two-time Washington Blues Society winner for Best Band, Mark Hurwitz and Gin Creek play jumpy blues with a little swing, jazz, and roots-rock here and there.
McMenamins Anderson School, Bothell (Saturday)

Marshall Law Band with Tres Leches Past Event Like List
Bombastically blending the tenets of funk and hip-hop, Marshall Law Band strives to play across all genres, resulting in a kaleidoscopic explosion of taste and color. They'll head up this outdoor concert bill with support from local power trio Tres Leches.
Museum of Flight, Tukwila (Saturday)

Pickled Okra Past Event Like List
Get your banjo fix from husband-and-wife bluegrass duo Pickled Okra.
McMenamins Anderson School, Bothell (Friday)

Piano O'Clock at Chophouse Row Past Event Like List
Local piano virtuosos, including the likes of Tim Kennedy, Evan Flory-Barnes, Chris DiStefano, and Darrius Willrich will liven up the Chophouse Row courtyard every weekend.
Chophouse Row, Capitol Hill (Friday-Saturday)

Saya Moriyasu, spooky actions at a distance Past Event Like List
Saya Moriyasu's works are often monumental ceramics, adapting folk art, myth, and visual humor. These sculptures and oil works on porcelain canvases "open eyes, mouths, doors, and portals bridging distance between time and space." 
J. Rinehart Gallery, Pioneer Square (Friday-Saturday; opening)

This Land Is My Land Past Event Like List
Solo works by Rodrigo Valenzuela and Marina Camargo explore the significance of redefining physical and digital borders in land and labor.
Interloper (Seattle) Textboard, Ravenna (Saturday; opening)

Tony Scherman: The Rape of Leda Past Event Like List
Rather than focusing on the two core subjects of "Leda and the Swan," the Greek myth in which the god Zeus transforms himself into a swan and rapes the Aetolian princess Leda, Tony Scherman’s exhibition turns the spotlight to the silent onlookers: Venus, Persephone, Diana as a stag, and Cerberus among them. 
Winston Wächter Fine Art, Pioneer Square (Friday-Saturday)

2021 University of Washington MFA + MDes Thesis Exhibition Past Event Like List
This year's University of Washington School of Art + Art History + Design MFA and MDes graduates exhibit their best pieces.
Henry Art Gallery, University District (Saturday-Sunday; opening)

OTHER PICKS & HAPPENINGS

Visit the newly opened Capitol Thrill. Like List After cutting his teeth in the screen-printing game at Choke Print Shop, Jeff Gonzales has opened a colorful new clothing and gift emporium on 11th and Pike in the former space of Throwbacks Northwest. Stop by (they're open every day but Monday) to pick up locally sourced whosits and whatsits you didn't know you needed, like My Vag: A Rhyming Coloring Book, a mini planter in the likeness of a dinosaur, or a DIY weed pipe book.  

Other notable weekend events:

Free Veterinary Care for our Unhoused Neighbors Past Event Like List
Houseless and low-income pet owners can take their furry companions to the University District Food Bank for free veterinary care, including general exams, vaccines, nail trims, flea protection, microchipping, and deworming.
University District Food Bank (Friday)

Seattle Bike 'n' Brews Past Event Like List
Pedal along the Duwamish and Green River trails from Georgetown to Tukwila with cold microbrew incentives waiting for you at various brewery pit stops along the way. 
Two Beers Brewing, Georgetown (Friday-Monday)