5 days in Seattle area...Best place for us to base ourselves
 

We will be flying into Seattle ( our first visit) in a few weeks and want to see as much as possible.We are hopiong to spend a day in the city , a drive along the coast, visit San Juans (whale watching), Olympic National Park......I need to book hotels and would love suggestions. Stay in one place and drive or ferry or split outselves between 2 hotels ? Thanks for any help !

Five days is not enough time to visit Seattle, the Olympic Natonal Park, and the San Juan Islands.

Also, I don't know what you have in mind when you say "drive along the coast," because there is very little opportunity for such a drive in Washington State. It is Oregon that has the spectacular coastal drive.

Nonetheless, I suggest you divide your time between Seattle and ONP. I always suggest my guests stay at a hotel downtown near the center of the shopping, restaurant, and entertainment district (5th and Pine). Some hotels in the neighborhood are the Hyatt, Westing, Sheraton, Andra, and Mayflower.

In ONP, we stay at the Crescent Lake Lodge. It has a beautiful setting, a good location for sightseeing, and a good resturant.

The best way to squeeze in the San Juans would be to book a whale watching tour that leaves from and returns to Seattle.

I think you'll need to prioritize your to-do list and go one direction or the other. That might determine the answer to your hotel question.

You would need at least 2 days to go to the San Juans, 2 days to ONP, 2 days for the coast imo... none of these work easily as day trips from Seattle because of distance, all are 3+ hours drive one-way to reach from the city.

Maybe someone can suggest a loop? One would be to include Seattle, ONP, and the coast in 5 days. The other Seattle and the San Juans.

We just spent five days in Seattle and ONP in May. Just to give you an idea of what can be done with five days, here's what we did:

Day 1 - Drove from SEATAC to Tacoma; had dinner and spent the night.

Day 2 - Took leisurely and scenic Hwy 101 drive up along Hood Canal. Stopped and explored along the way. Had lunch in Port Townsend and explored the town a little. Checked into our B&B in Sequim. Explored Dungeness area.

Day 3 - Drove up to Hurricane Ridge and then out to Lake Crescent. Had lunch in lodge and hiked the Marymere Falls trail.

Day 4 - Drove out to Sol Duc area and did a lot of hiking.

Day 5 - Drove to Bainbridge Island and took ferry over to Seattle. Went to Pike Place Market, had great dinner at Etta's and then drove back to the airport. Spent the night and flew back home the next day.

I don't think you can do everything you want to in five days. If you want to see ONP, I would base yourselves in Port Angeles. From what I've heard, it may be really difficult to find lodging inside the park during the summer.

I second the last poster, and I live here. If you position yourself on the Seattle waterfront, then you can get a 1/2 day cruise, or a day in Victoria, or a day at Pike Market. the acquarium, art museum, etc. and can walk on a ferry for Banbridge and a nice day in a small town, lots of water views, etc. OR you cn do the Penn. but would seem hard to do both. I think the one single mistake travelers make is to disallow the time one needs to get there and back,complications of traffic, ferry schedules, etc. (bear in mind that if you want to get on the ferry during peak season, you must get in line early! As for me, I feel cities are much the same round the world, but there is only one Olympic Penn...and lots to see, but the roads are winding, and sometimes you get behind a logging truck, then it's slow.
Just hope you have a wonderful time. We have homes both in the city and in the country, and there is no place on earth I would rather live (and I have been most places.)

It would be possible, with 5 full days, to spend 1 day in the city, one day on a day long whale watch cruise from Seattle or Everett, and the other 3 on the OP, including a stop on the coast. You could do this by staying part of the time in Seattle and part on the OP. You won't actually be able to explore the San Juans, and you may miss a lot of the scenery depending if they just take you to see the whales on the edge of the archipelago in Haro Strait, but if whales are your main goal that would work. Otherwise, in general, you need to pick either the OP or San Juans with only 5 days.