Goodbye, Pacific

We’re flying over the Rockies on our way back to Columbus. Our time in Seattle visiting Steve and meeting Esteban and his other friends was really great. And though it was unusually cold (where hasn’t it been unusually cold this winter?), every day was sunny.

We spent yesterday being tourists. We finally had a leisurely start to the day, rolling out of bed after 8 and not really getting going until 10 or 10:30. Steve took us over to the Pike Place Market, which is similar to the North Market in Columbus, but much much larger.

Mark and Steve rode the Seattle Great Wheel. I skipped that and explored a little on my own. Steve’s fear of heights got the better of him at the top of the wheel (and later at the Space Needle), but we’re proud of him for making the effort. You can see the wheel in the waterfront shot below (which, for what it’s worth, is near where Big Bertha has been stuck for more than two months after encountering trouble while digging a new highway tunnel).

I would like to have spent more time in Left Bank Books, but I know that my interest in used bookstores isn’t shared by most of my friends, so I had to settle for a passing perusal. When we come back, I’m definitely blocking out some time, though. Too bad my friend Sue wasn’t with us. She shares my passion and can probably even outlast me among dusty stacks of books.

We ate lunch at the Steelhead Diner. We tried to get into a place called “Matt’s in the Market,” but it was pretty full and was operating on a wait. While I’m on the subject of food, I’ll go ahead and admit that this trip was not my favorite in terms of food. Kevin, Jeff, and Steve are reading this, so part of me hesitates to say so for fear that they’ll feel like they weren’t good hosts, but I’m sure it’s not really a surprise to them. Lots of seafood on the West Coast (duh), and lots of healthy vegetables. I ended up eating three hamburgers and two orders of fish and chips in less than a week. Ahh to have more of that herb bread from John’s Place! And some simple French toast. (We’re going to Paul’s Fifth Avenue for lunch tomorrow so I can start to get my stomach back to normal.)

After lunch, we decided to take the monorail to the Space Needle. On the way, we stopped at Brynie Utz Hats, and I finally found the blue bucket hat that I want for my car—or a close approximation thereof, anyway. It’s been five years of looking! It looks really dumb on me, but it’s what I wanted. I also found a really great gambler-style hat, but since I don’t wear hats very often—especially dress hats—I couldn’t justify the $180 for it. (I do have the details, though, in case I have a banner year and feel like I can splurge on it later.)

The Space Needle was built for the 1962 Seattle World’s Fair, and it sits in the middle of the Seattle Center. It’s another large, lovely urban park with lots of interesting things to see.

Aside from a Chihuly Glass Garden and Museum (you can see part of one glass sculpture in the first of the two photos above), a plentitude of public art, and an arena (now empty after Oklahoma City “stole” the professional basketball team), the Seattle Center includes the Experience Music Project Museum, which focuses on Jimi Hendrix, among others, and is housed in a building by Frank O. Gehry.

It’s the first Gehry building I’ve been in. It’s very cool and dynamic. It feels almost like being in the belly of an enormous animal. I thought I had a shot of the outside, but I don’t (not sure how I missed that), so you’ll have to go to the website to check it out. It’s really quite beautiful.

After a delay due to a false fire alarm, we took the high-speed elevator to the top of the Space Needle, where I got these great shots of the skyline and of Elliott Bay. (Steve stayed inside the observation deck for most of the time; the height was just too much for him.)

We had dinner at the Palace Kitchen last night with two of Steve and Esteban’s friends, who were both interesting and fun to talk to. We did a little clubbing after dinner, but we’re all old now (except for Esteban) and headed for bed by 11 p.m.

Well, that about does it, folks. Back to real life for a few months. Thanks for following along. I do want to apologize for the superficial writing in the posts for this trip. We didn’t have a lot of down time for me to process all the things we were doing, so I had to go for plot over philosophy.

P.S. I thought I was done for this trip, but we came home to this, and I knew I had one more sentence.