J_K9 @ Linux

Day 4: Exploring Seattle

March 25, 2007 on 10:55 am | In Seattle 2007 |

The lie-in this morning allowed us to regain our energy and leave the jet-lag effects behind us. Despite the potential for a long lie-in, I was only able to sleep from midnight until 7am, at which point I could sleep no longer and so I reached for my laptop and went online for a good few hours. At 11am (I wasn’t online for ALL of that time!), we met at the reception desk and not long after set off in our two mini-vans to Seattle’s city centre. Our first stop was Pike Market.

Pike Market: Fish Throwing Frenzy

We stopped at a parking lot (I believe that is the American term) close to Pike Market, renowned for its fish-hurling, so we felt that it was a sight which could not be missed. We walked down the market which is, like most American things (please excuse the stereotype), exaggerated and enormous, but at least there was a wide selection of products! We finally came to a fish shop which many people were crowding around, so we stood and waited. We were there for at least ten minutes before the action begun, because I believe that someone has to buy a fish before it is thrown (it might be some sort of traditional celebration of the purchase?), so I took a photo of an interesting pig right next to the shop in the meantime (see below ).

However, not long after taking that photo the fish shop employees began screaming ‘Heave,’ or something to that effect, and in a flash I managed to capture the fish in mid-flight before it collided with a woman’s hand, sending her camera crashing to the ground! Something tells me the fish thrower forgot to warm up

Seattle City Centre

We were given an hour and a half to wander around, explore the local area of the Seattle city centre, go shopping and have lunch, so that is exactly what we did. We split into groups and went on our way, with little sense of direction, to discover what the typical American city is like. As you can see in the photos, one of the main differences is the architecture of many of the buildings. Each building in the centre had a unique and interesting architecture which is in a different style to the majority of buildings which one sees in the UK, in cities such as London. Apart from that, we found that we had no idea where we were going, there were plenty of shops to visit and that everyone seemed to be very kind and respectful of outsiders (the same of which, unfortunately, cannot be said of the British).

We spent most of our time wandering around the streets and shops aimlessly, chatting and joking around while I took hip-shots of the surroundings with my Canon 350D. In fact, we had so much fun walking around the city centre that we were short for time to have lunch, for we were meant to meet the others back at the parking lot at 2.15pm and there were only twenty-five minutes left. I persuaded the others in my group NOT to have crumpets and tea for lunch (they wanted to do it simply because we’re British people in America and tea and crumpets are so typical of the British!), so we wound up at a creperie instead. This creperie had a surprisingly large selection of crepes, but I just chose a simple one (lemon and powdered sugar) and sat down waiting to take it away. Ben, Michael and Ollie, the other three in my group, also ordered crepes. However, we waited and waited and our crepes still did not arrive, so when our watches hit 2.15pm I grabbed my crepe, which was the only one that had been finished and given to us, and ate it as I walked back to the meeting point with one other member of the group to let them know that the others were coming late because the creperie was being inefficient and slow On another note, the man behind the till at the creperie thought we were Australian, which is certainly an odd assumption seeing as our accent is so different from the Aussie one…

The Monorail

Once we had all congregated at the meeting point, all twelve of us students left with one teacher to the monorail while the other two drove the cars to Seattle Center. We huddled off to the monorail terminal, bought tickets (in substantial bulk), boarded the monorail and waited for the ride to start. We were slightly bored as we waited, so we ended up doing things like this…. (this is Ben, the freak I was telling you about! Just kidding, he’s a great guy)

The monorail itself was quite cool once it got moving because it allowed you to see the city from a height, which was a very entertaining sight. It wasn’t quite a rollercoaster ride, but it was good enough to have been worth the ride instead of the car journey!

Space Needle and Other Attractions

When we had all arrived, including the two teachers who had driven there, we found that we were torn between three different attractions. One was the Space Needle, which myself and seven other students wanted to visit. The other was the Experience Music Project, which a few more wanted to go to and the last was the Science Fiction Museum and Hall of Fame, which a few of us were attracted to. We therefore decided to split up and meet at a designated time: 4.30pm, giving us another hour and a half or so to check out our attraction and take a look around the area.

Eight of us got in line for the Space Needle, bought tickets and went up in the lift. One unforgettable moment was when we stopped on the first floor, the restaurant, approximately half way up the Space Needle. Two passengers were getting off at this floor because they had been invited to some sort of reception (which we did not know about). What was so hilarious was the fact that, after total silence in the lift, we were greeted by applause as the lift opened and the two passengers stepped out! Of course, they were applauding something else, but it was a comical experience which might have been pulled out of a slapstick movie and one which none of us will forget soon.

The top of the Space Needle offered a 360⁰ panoramic view of the surroundings, which was truly stunning. It’s a pity that the day was overcast, raining most of the time, because the sight would have been even more awe-inspiring if the weather had been better. However, I took a few good pictures which will serve as memories of the experience, which was enjoyable despite the lack of sunshine.

We then lingered around the area for a while because the tickets for the Sci-Fi Museum were too expensive and we did not, apparently, have enough time remaining to see the Experience Music Project. However, we had just as much fun fooling around, talking and rating girls as they walked by (never mind) as we would have had in those museums, if not more, and the minutes soon passed by.

Cinema Outing

We set off for what was supposedly the best cinema on the West coast of the USA directly after this little excursion, travelling by car to Bellevue to find the cinema. Oddly enough, the GPS showed many different cinemas in Bellevue bar the most important one – the one we were looking for – although we managed to spot the billboards from far away as it was on the main road into the town, luckily for us.

We parked the cars in a parking lot opposite the road from the cinema, walked over and entered it. Some of us wanted to watch the movie ‘300’ which was about the Battle of Thermopylae, but the showing times of all the best films (including 300) did not coincide with the time at which we had arrived and so we decided to call it a day and headed back to the hotel.

Supper

Our teachers led us out to a Thai restaurant a short walk away from the hotel, but my group decided to split off and we had pizza for the third time in three days. Blame Michael if we put on weight. Let’s ignore the mischief we then got up to and point out that we were soon back in our rooms in the hotel safe and sound