Seattle

Well we have just left Seattle after spending 2 days discovering the wonderful things the city has to offer a tourist - the best burgers in the world, the romance of Sleepless in Seattle and a revloving restaurant to name but a few. 

Strangely enough we did it on two seperate days. The first of those was Thursday while the RV was in the garage. First port of call was The Pike Market while our RV was in for a tune up amgonst other things. We still had the rental car so we drove into the city for the first time, an experience we won't forget too soon. The sat nav said one way and the road diverts said another!!

The Market wasn't like your typical market but is known the country (and alot of the world) over. It's a large farmers market with plenty of fresh seafood, fruit and veg and your typical markey brik-a-brak. It was both indoors and out, it ran over many levels; some of which gave great views out onto the ocean. Unfortunately we were there on a terrible day so we didn't see much. We found the orginial starbucks on one of it's corners which still has the original logo on their door. See if you can spot the difference from our gallery :-) 

We took a quick trip down to Alki Beach which is where a part of Sleepless in Seattle was shot but to be honest it was cold and wet so we left fairly quickly.

Part two of the trip took part on Saturday. A quick note on the previous evening though. We went to the mall after we picked up the RV to get some supplies. We found a Wal Mart in the "Great Northern Pacific Mall" and stocked up there. It was late evening at this stage and we found a theater (cinema to normal people) and decided to go and see a film. We went to Taken which has Liam Neeson in it. After the film we hopped into the RV in the Wal Mart car park and went to sleep. 

Until 2am when we were woken by Mall security to inform us there was no overnight parking allowed. So we got dressed and drove across the road and parked in an industrial office type place until half 7. We then went back into Wal Mart, picked up a few more supplies and headed back into Seattle.

We parked on Admiral which is one of the avenues the Downtown buses use to get in and out of. It is a good wide avenue and we (I - Mark) noticed it is a potential parking spot on our way to Alki the previous trip. It proved to be. We found another camper parked out past 58th street and parked in front of it. Right beside a bus stop that we took to go downtown.

First stop was the Underground tour. This was excellent. The streets of Seattle were between 8 and 32 feet below the streets today and we went on a tour of these and got to see the various ways these features have been implemented in modern day Seattle. Some are used as extra basement space, some are used as storage of building waste after renovations and others have just been closed off.

Next we headed towards the needle. We went into the Frank Gehry designed Science Fiction museum and Experience Music Project show, both housed in the same building. The best thing about these were that they were housed in a building designed by Frank Gehry so that should be enough. The photos will show you just how bizarre the building is. The actually museum itself was boring!

We went for food in a sports bar across the road. Luckily enough we picked the place with the "Best Burger in Seattle". It was a kobe beef burger and I tink it was the best one I ever had. And it was only $14. Also, the NCAA basketball semi finals (College basketball - absolutely massive over here) were on so there was a good crown in it watching. We saw Michigan State upset University of Conneticut to book their place in the final. We left before the second semi-final started to go up the Space Needle.

It's a nice building and is really iconic but it was like any other tall building once you got up there. It was a nice view but nothing exceptional. On the way back down the elevator (lift) stopped at the restaurant and that looked very nice. It revolves so there are great views to be had but main courses at $60 were a little pricey this early in the trip. We got the bus back to the RV and had an uniterupted sleep which was nice. I reckon that will be the plan of action going forward.

All in all I found Seattle to be a nice enough city. The area around 1st Avenue at Pioneer Square (by the underground tour) is alot nicer and has much more character than the quite drab downtown. They absolutely love their coffee - it is the place where Starbucks was founded after all. There are coffee shops absolutely everywhere. As we continue our tour we will come across places alot better than here but it was a nice start to the tour.

We hit the road around 11 to head south and tonight we are in our first RV park by Mt. St. Helen's.....