Tuesday, March 26, 2013

Seattle- Day 2

Today we stopped by our favorite smoothie place for breakfast again, then headed down to Pikes Place Fish market.

We passed this really cool clothing store that had an amazing display of sewing machines in the windows.  "Hi Granny!"  It would have been an even better tribute to her had I noticed at the time that I was taking the picture that the sign for Nordstrom Rack was being reflected in the window and if I had scooted over a little bit, I could have captured the whole thing.  Oh well.
 
We made it!


At the famous Fish Market

The famous fish mongers throwing fish

Let's see that again...

 

Although the fish are fun (and everywhere) Pikes Place Market has way more than just fish!

These flowers were an amazing deal!  Huge bouquets like this were only $10.00

Cheese :)!!!

Hi Granny!!!


The original Starbucks


This place was awesome!!! We bought our fair share of stuff, and could have stayed there all day, but we had other stuff to do.

There's a place for everyone at Pikes Place.



As we left we passed this place.  What's so special about an alley?  We went to check it out.


Ahh... the famous gum wall!

 
Yumm....



I love this place!!


 
Yeah!  We made it to our destination!  The Aquarium (with a little tribute to last night's ride on the big wheel in the background :)).


The underwater show.


I was amazed at how much I loved watching the octopus.


Maybe I should become one :).


Ooohhhh!!! Felt!!!!!








Pretty scenery in the dome aquarium.


we got to watch the feeding time.




Look!  I'm riding an orca!


Cute baby otters sleeping.


This is for Catherine


We had a little time to kill between the aquarium and our dinner reservations so we headed over to a yummy little shop right next to our hotel.
  
Wow!  Look at all the flavors of popcorn deliciousness!!

We bought just a few flavors :).


After another ride on the monorail, we reached our dinner destination

 

Awesome!
 
The views were amazing!

Looking down on the Experience Music Project from the top of the Space Needle.  It was designed to look like a smashed guitar, but I'm not sure I see it.  It's still a very cool building though.

Chillin' on the observation deck before dinner



The circular part of the Space Needle is a restaurant that rotates 360*.  We timed our dinner reservations so that we'd be sitting (at a window seat) at sunset.

The spinning took a little getting used to, but dinner was amazing and the view was even better.  We both agreed that this was not a bad ending for a Tuesday night.
Bucket list counter:
9- Watch fish mongers throw fish at Pikes Place
10- See the original Starbucks
11- Play at the famous Seattle Aquarium
12- Ride the elevator to the top of the Space Needle and enjoy the view
13- Have dinner at the first rotating restaurant at sunset

Monday, March 25, 2013

Seattle- Day 1

We were super excited to head out for our fist day of playing in Seattle with our matching purple "Cancer Sucks" sweaters in honor of Granny :).
 


Our hotel was right next to this awesome Low Carb Café that sold these really yummy protein shakes.  We each grabbed one for breakfast on our way to ride the Monorail.

Nordstrom is headquartered in Seattle and my seat on the Monorail had this great backdrop.  Hi Granny!


Our first view of the Space Needle on the Monorial.
As excited as we were to play at the Space Needle, that wasn't exactly our first destination.  This is where we were going.

What is it you ask?  It's an "amphibious vehicle" which means it can drive on the road AND float in the water.  We were going to take a "Duck Tour" for an overview of the city.


Gettin' on the Duck!

Our tour guide was this totally wacky guy who made jokes and told stories the entire time.  He had about 20 different hats that he changed every few minutes to match where he was taking us next.
 Sites from our tour included:

The Seattle Wheel

Famous Stadium

"The Hammering Man" moving statue outside the Seattle Art Museum

Gas Works Park

Beautiful skyline

Boats in the marina (with the "Sleepless in Seattle" house visible on the far left)

House boats

We loved spending the morning out on the water.

The Duck Tour got two thumbs up from us.  It was totally fun way to start our trip!
One of the things that I wanted to see most in Seattle was the Chihuly Gardens.  Dale Chihuly got added to my list of favorite artists back in 2002 when he had some pieces of his blown glass on display in Salt Lake for the Olympics.  That was the first time that I got to see any of his work up close and personal.  It is amazing!  Our first stop before going into the museum was to have lunch at the Collections Café, which was completely decorated with things Chihuly collected.  He was a totally random guy!


The ceiling was decorated in accordions



This was our table.  Each table in the restaurant had glass covering a different collection.  This one was old lady, floral, ceramic pieces.

Retro Radios?  Why would you collect this stuff?
His glass exhibits were so much more amazing in person than can possibly be captured in these pictures.  It was awesome!



This was the ceiling in one of the rooms.


Cool selfie in the Chihuly glass house with the Space Needle visible through the ceiling.

I attempted to put my own artistic spin on the exhibit with this photograph that I carefully laid out.  You can see the silhouettes of me and Kristin standing in front of the Space Needle perfectly centered in this black sphere of blown glass.  Cool!
One of Kristin's co-workers insisted that Ivars Fish Bar was the best fish and chips EVER and that it was a Seattle requirement to eat there, so... here we are.


The food was yummy, but the best part was the beautiful and eating outside on the pier next to the water.

The view from our table

The seagulls were so funny and polite.  They would patiently wait in a line for someone to toss them some food, and when you did, they'd all dive for it.  It was kind of fun. 

The evening ended with a ride on the Great Wheel.  This Ferris wheel is GIANT and was a little scary, but the view can't be beat (even though we opted out of paying a bunch of extra cash to ride in a unit that had a glass bottom...yikes!).

Looking out over Puget Sound.

It was amazing watching the sunset on the water from the top of the Ferris Wheel.  It was the perfect end to our first day in Seattle.
Bucket list counter:
3- Ride the oldest Monorail still working
4- Take a Seattle boat ride
5- See the Space Needle
6- Look at awesome Chihuly art
7- Eat at Ivars
8- Ride the Great Wheel