Puyallup is not a town of which I had heard before my recent trip to Washington, but there I was, alone in a 2006 Toyota Tundra, the noon raining pouring as it does in the Pacific Northwest (summer be damned), my friend Gabe inside a mansion on a hill doing something for work, one of those jobs that someone can describe to me like I am five years old and still I don’t understand what it is they do.
“This won’t take long,” he said. Great, I thought, because, as I am apt to do, I needed to pee.
The rain continued, and I was in the type of neighborhood where urinating in the bushes would have sounded multiple alarms, so, like many people in 2026, I distracted myself by searching my phone.
“Twin Peaks diner,” I entered into Google.
A name appeared: Twede’s Café, which, I soon learned, was the real name of the Double R Diner from the popular David Lynch television show.
According to Waze, we were approximately one hour from the North Bend eatery. And, even better, North Bend was on the way back to Gabe’s home.
My friend was still working, and I still needed to pee, so I searched for more Twin Peaks -related sites near Twede’s Café. The Great Northern Hotel was approximately five miles from the café — again in the direction we needed to go.
Ten minutes prior I had forgotten Twin Peaks was filmed in Washington and now I was one of those people who pays for TMZ tours through Hollywood.
“That took three minutes,” Gabe said as he entered his truck. “The rest of the time we talked about his wood flooring.”
“Let’s go to North Bend to see the diner from Twin Peaks,” I said. My friend obliged.
The goal was to pee at the eatery, but I couldn’t wait that long. “Pull over,” I told Gabe. I went in a ditch behind a bank that faced into someone’s backyard. Someone probably saw me, which means they probably saw “it,” but I had to go and the last thing I needed was to get uromysitisis poisoning and die.
The line was out the Twede’s Café door when we entered. Neon lights greeted us, as did wood-paneled walls and a checkboard floor. Is this how the Double R looked? I asked myself. Memory can be funny like that.
Selfies are not a thing I do regularly for many reasons, most of which have to do with the disgust I feel when I see pictures of myself, but I snapped a few photographs while we waited to ask the hostess if we could eat at the counter. Almost immediately, I sent one to my brother who had visited Twede’s Café years ago.
We walked to the left side of the counter, and to my left, above the kitchen window, was the Double R menu. I turned in my chair to see advertisements for a coffee, pie, and doughnut combination called the “RR2Go!” and “The ‘Double’ R” platter with two eggs, two strips of bacon, two sausage links, and two slices of toast for $10.99. I’m vegan, so I passed on those foods, but I was happy to discover a $19.99 vegan-beef burger that came with a side of fries. I don’t care much for faux-meat products, and type 1 diabetes means anything with potatoes has been nearly eliminated from my diet, but this occasion was special. Besides, none of the salads came with protein.
Insulin would be a must, so I walked to the bathroom to “shoot dope” as I jokingly like to refer to the shots I must take. Lynch-inspired graffiti was scrawled above the toilet, which was located in a red hallway with pictures from the show. My new iPhone i17 in hand, I snapped photographs.
A thought occurred: I am much more excited to be here than I would have imagined.
I’m from Los Angeles County and have visited many film locations. The only time I remember being excited was when I went bowling at the alley where The Big Lebowski was filmed.
“Can I get a lemon ginger tea?” I asked the tattooed server because I felt like I needed to drink something that resembled a damn fine cup of coffee while sitting at the Double R counter. Gabe, who has never seen Twin Peaks, ordered key lime pie, which they did not have. I was not surprised. Had he not known about the cherry?
Our next stop was at the Salish Lodge & Spa, the location for the Great Northern Hotel. The 268-foot Snoqualmie Falls behind the lodge was a pleasant surprise.
“We might as well stop at the Roadhouse,” I told Gabe as we entered his Tundra. We entered, and Gabe asked for key lime pie, which they did not have, so we left.
Visiting these locations was, to paraphrase Dale Cooper, was my way of giving myself a present that day. I had no idea where that Google search would lead us, but it was “a place both wonderful and strange.”