10 Days In Spokane: Here’s What We Did

Spokane, WA is one of my new favorite cities. Highly walkable, beautiful outdoor areas, amazing waterfalls, excellent breweries, wineries and cideries, good food and much more.

We spent 10 days there recently and had a fantastic time, so much so that we’re planning a quick overnight stop there on our way back through Washington state later this year.

Here’s where we stayed, what we got up to and where we ate and drank.

Where We Stayed In Spokane

Shae and I stayed all 10 nights at The Historic Davenport in downtown Spokane. It’s an older hotel that was lovingly restored about 20 years ago. It’s a classically elegant hotel without being ostentatious.

It’s part of Marriott’s Autograph Collection which means that you can redeem Marriott points and/or free night certificates there, as well as enjoying elite benefits if you have status in the Marriott Bonvoy loyalty program.

The hotel is also in a central location, making everything downtown very walkable. Check out our full review here.

What We Did In Spokane

Spokane Falls

Downtown Spokane has several sets of waterfalls and they’re the most impressive waterfalls I’ve seen in a downtown area (other than Niagara).

The most incredible set of cascades are the Lower Falls. These falls are apparently at their strongest from March-June due to snowmelt further up the Spokane River, so with our visit being in April it seemed like we were there for peak waterfall season.

Riverfront Park

You can view the falls in Riverfront Park, but there’s so much more to the park than that. There’s the Spokane Pavilion which holds concerts throughout the summer and which looks even more beautiful at night.

There’s miles of trails, water features, sculptures, information boards about the city’s history and even a carousel dating back to 1909.

Numerica SkyRide

Also to be found in Riverfront Park is the Numerica SkyRide – a gondola that takes you over the Spokane River and gives you awesome views of Spokane’s Lower Falls. Read more about that experience here.

Riverside State Park

Not to be confused with Riverfront Park, Riverside State Park is a large park to the northwest of downtown Spokane. Covering almost 10,000 acres with more than 50 miles of trails, it’s a stunning setting to go for a hike.

The park is pet-friendly, so Truffles enjoyed getting to join us on the hike.

Even if you don’t feel like going for a longer hike, it’s a lovely place to go for a picnic, as well as there being overlooks where you can enjoy the views without having to do anything strenuous.

Turnbull National Wildlife Refuge

On a couple of mornings Shae got up bright and early to visit Turnbull National Wildlife Refuge to give herself the best chance of seeing all the critters. Here’s her thoughts:

When we were at Whistle Punk Brewing, we met Alabama Tim and English Jon (shout out to Coventry Vince too!) and they, along with Chris the bartender, suggested trying to see the smaller breed of moose that live in the region at Turnbull National Wildlife Refuge. There’s a herd of about 20 that live throughout the refuge and surrounding area.

I was hopeful that I’d finally be able to see a moose, especially a male moose (bull), with a full rack of antlers. Sadly, I was too early in the season, so their antlers hadn’t grown back in after falling off during the winter season. It was also calving season, which mean all the moose and particularly the females (cows) were more scarce than usual. I did manage to see several though over my two days and it was wonderful. The first two I spent at least 45 minutes watching as they ate, then on the second day I saw several throughout the auto trail as I completed two loops to increase my chances.

Here’s a few of the images I was able to capture.

Manito Park

A couple of miles south of downtown Spokane is Manito Park. At only 90 acres, it’s about 1% of the size of Riverside State Park. It’s free to visit though, is dog-friendly and has all kinds of different garden areas including roses, lilacs and a Japanese Garden, as well as a playground, miles of trails and more.

Keep an eye out for wildlife in the park too as we spotted a marmot while we were there.

Where We Ate & Drank In Spokane

Lots Of Breweries, Cideries & Wineries!

We discovered that Spokane is home to dozens and dozens of breweries, wineries and cideries. As much as we’d have liked to visit them all, we simply didn’t have enough time or liver capacity to be able to do that.

Shae and I did manage to visit eight of them though, as did Truffles as we picked ones that were dog-friendly. We wrote this separate post all about those that you can find here, but as a quick recap this is where we went:

• Whistle Punk Brewing
• Iron Goat Brewing
• Barrister Winery
• Brick West Brewing
• The Grain Shed Taproom
• Locust Cider
• Humble Abode Brewing
• No-Li Brewhouse & Bier Hall

Heritage Bar & Kitchen

Our favorite of all those drinking establishments was Whistle Punk Brewing which we ended up visiting four times. Attached to the brewery was Heritage Bar & Kitchen and one of those evenings we grabbed dinner from there.

I ordered their chipotle meatloaf dinner which came on two hash brown patties and was delicious.

Shae ordered the Heritage Smash Burger with a side of Dr Pepper chili and she loved her meal too.

Tavolàta

Tavolàta is an Italian restaurant opposite Riverfront Park. It’s available in the inKind app and I still had a load of inKind credits to use up, so we headed there for dinner on our penultimate night in the city.

We got a few appetizers to kick things off – olives, focaccia and Wagyu beef carpaccio. The carpaccio came topped with kumquat, jalapeno and marcona almonds which isn’t a combination I’d have thought would go together, but it was very tasty.

For my entrée I got ‘Rigatoni “The King”‘ which was rigatoni with spicy sausage, tomato, chili and marjoram, while Shae ordered the Lumache which came in tomato vodka sauce, chili and whipped burrata. Both of us really liked our dishes.

Outlaw BBQ

Next to Brick West Brewing was Outlaw BBQ. We were getting very hungry at Brick West one night, so we ordered a tray of Outlaw Nachos to share and man, did it hit the spot! It came in a massive tray with tortilla chips, pico de gallo, onions, cilantro, scallions, etc., as well as a generous helping of brisket with BBQ sauce.

Peacock Room Lounge

Our hotel had a highly regarded bar called the Peacock Room Lounge, so on our final night in Spokane we stopped in for a quick drink. The lounge gets its name from the ceiling which features a peacock design made with 5,000 pieces of stained glass.