I ❤️ Seattle And Beyond

After a very very long exile from travel (except for two trips to Florida and a spring ski trip to Colorado) I had to scratch my wanderlust itch.

My niece and I set off on an adventure across the US and up to Alaska. We flew out of Cleveland.

I drove the “Z” and parked it at my brothers house.

We had to go thru Dallas. I was impressed with the high tech bathrooms that showed attendance and occupancy. I guess because I haven’t been out and about .

We spent three days in Seattle—Uber-ing here, there and everywhere.

We started our tourist excursion with a boat tour of Elliott Bay. Had great views of Seattle and we got to be “up close and personal” with a giant container ship that was unloading.

We ended the day with chilli, meat and mushroom pies at a restaurant on the pier.

Saturday was another bright and sunny day with no rain and warm temperatures. We had reservations for the Space Needle and Chihuly Gardens and Glass.

The space needle was fun and views were excellent.

The glass art of Chihuly are magnificent and filled me with wonder and calm.

We did the MoPop in the afternoon and explored a fine exhibit on Pearl Jam.

Going into tourist overload we walked thru Pike Place Public Market, saw the Gum Wall and the original Starbucks.

Our hotel was by Lake Union and we found a Sushi restaurant and seafood on the docks.

Sunday morning started with a trip to the Starbucks Reserve. This is the place for everything coffee and treats. I savoured my coffee malt and Jen went for the nitro brew and sweets.

We found the Amazon Spheres and made it a photo op.

We had to have negatives COVID tests within 72 hours of boarding our cruise so we spent some time researching for a testing center and then getting the test. Everyone in Seattle were wearing masks and hand sanitiser was available everywhere but we could find only one rapid testing site and had to pay $165 (ouch). We turned out negative and had our results in an hour.

To celebrate our immunity we walked to the Pier area and had lunch at Elliott’s Oyster bar.

After a less than impressed visit to the Aquarium we headed back to Lake Union and dinner on the marina dock.

Tomorrow we board our cruise to Alaska…..