Maggie Heading West: Day 34 Seattle

Cliff and I are back on track and we are once again up with the sun! We sat quietly together with the local bunnies, greeting the day. Before long, David and Liz joined us and we were off to explore downtown Seattle. Battling traffic and finding parking spots is part of the life here, like every big city I suppose. Once we manage that though, navigating from place to place is relatively easy.

Like any port city, a great deal of the action happens on the waterfront. We parked near Seattle Centre and heading to the water found ourselves in Olympic Sculpture Park. A series of very interesting works of art pepper the landscape and offers a pleasant trail to the downtown core where the numbered piers make navigation easy and the free bus service is very convenient. One interesting note, we passed several spots where random people had set up booths. One for example had posters of Obama sporting a Hitler style mustache and was advocating his political downfall?? A short time later we passed a sign that explained it. “Seattle Waterfront Public Park – This location has been set aside to exercise 1^st Amendment Rights.” Interesting…

Sculpture Park with the Seattle Space Needle in the background.

"Typewriter Eraser" heading for the Interstate ... my personal favourite.

One of several sets of eyeballs - they're chairs!

Naked man in a fountain???

Cool water sculpture that you would walk through.

Seaweed treasures.

Our first destination (if we could just stop finding interesting things to distract us) is Pike’s Market, home to the famous FISH market, countless other vendors and of course home to the original spot to sell Seattle’s finest, Starbucks! The market is a cacophony of sights and sounds. Much of Seattle’s history is evident here with displays and vendors who have been here for decades. Watching the guys in the fish market, on which the FISH business philosophy is based, is a hoot! They shout, and chant, and throw whole fish to one another from across the market as they sell to the throngs of people. I could have stayed there all day watching just them but there is so much more to do and see that the fear of what I might miss gets me moving.

Tri-leveled, vine covered freeway at the entrance to Pike's Market from the waterfront.

The huge brass piggy banks scattered throughout the market make a good meeting place should we get separated – which we did – twice. We did manage to meet up again both times without help from the pig though! There are food items galore and also interesting handmade gift items to tempt the eye and the wallet. We negotiated our way through with a reasonable number of purchases (it could have been a lot worse) to arrive at the place where it all began. This Starbucks looks like it’s been around for a long time! The antique counters have served countless customers over the years, if the line today was any indication. They throw lattes back and forth in here too … what’s with Seattle and throwing things?!! The Starbucks is a tasty treat to marry with another awesome find - The Confectional – The sign out front tempts us to “Confess Your Love for Cheesecake” that’s all David needs and before long we are on the sidewalk out front, watching the shopping tourists go by while savoring a peanut butter-chocolate cheesecake! Yummy!

One of several giant brass piggy banks throughout the market.

World famous fish market of FISH fame.

Everyone really was this happy!

The original Starbucks!

But it’s time for lunch! All that eating and drinking makes me hungry! Since the trip back down to the water indicates we are at Pier 66 and we want to be at Pier 55 (we think!) to catch a water taxi to Alki Beach, we decide to walk. Just strolling down the pier is entertainment this so much to see that it would be handy to have a head on a swivel! We soon discover though that there is a misprint and the King County Water Taxi leaves from Pier 50 … oh well! The walk is well worth the trip across Seattle harbour that offers spectacular views of the city skyline. The other treat that we surreptitiously (yet again) enjoyed was Seafair Fleet Parade of Ships. The military parade began in Pugut Sound just as we entered the harbor. The local fireboat put on a fine display to welcome the troops to Seattle as the parade, led by the USS Bonhomme Richard floated by. The ship certainly looked like an aircraft carrier with its six helicopters on deck, but it was actually an amphibious-assault ship. It had lowered a hovercraft from the stern (as is apparently the custom) to accompany it into port. Several other military vessels joined the parade so the crossing as we knew it, looks, for the world, like a game of Battleship! The air force also joined the navy parade and several helicopters and small planes (including members of the Blue Angels – think US version of Snow Birds) flew overhead, saluting the ships with the tip of a wing… all very cool, and we had a stage view!

Seattle skyline

... and again ... pretty artsy, eh?

Local fire boat on it's way to greet the military vessels.

USS Bonhomme Richard

Alki Fish and Chips on the pier on the other side of the harbor provided cold beer and tasty scallops and a million dollar view! Seattle skyline, the military parade and beautiful sunshine, what more could you want? A trip back through the parade and we were ready for a rest, so we decided to take the free bus back to our truck. Easier said than done – but with the help of some locals who noticed us poring over a map, we climbed the 4 city blocks of stairs road (!!!!!) to the northbound bus route back to our parking spot – life on a hill is fascinating!

A water fountain ran down the center of the steps. Apparently it doubled as a birdbath!

Looking down the steps ... after climbing them didn't kill us!

Wanting to sure that we had the correct bus, we asked the driver before getting on, whether he was going our way. In fact we didn’t have the correct bus, but I was shocked when the driver told me he remembered us from when we had gotten on his bus mid-morning! I was embarrassed that I hadn’t recognized him, but it was unbelievable that considering all the people who had gotten on and off his bus that day, he remembered us! After a brief hesitation, he told us to hop on and he would get us to the bus we needed. We began talking with the locals on the bus who had overheard the conversation and when he announced the last stop and everyone stood to leave he invited us to stay on. He took us to the start of his next route, way out of the drive-free zone, and left us within a few blocks of our truck, and we walked the rest of the way! Just another in a long list of friendly, helpful people we have met in our travels.

From there we tried to visit a viewing park but despite the fact that both the map and GPS indicated that we had arrived, we couldn’t find it. Apparently it is some kind of invisible viewing park so no wonder they claim the pictures from there are such a find!! Fighting through Seattle traffic once again we made our way to Volunteer Park. Renamed in 1901 to honour the volunteer services of the Spanish-American War Veterans who liberated the people of Puerto Rico, it’s a local park with a rather eclectic collection of attractions. By the time we climbed to the top of the water tower to catch another beautiful view of the Seattle skyline we were done! Exhausted we set out for the campground via a pizza place, to spend our last night with Cliff and Liz lounging in the trailer over pizza and beer.