Category: US Travel

Seeing Seattle

After all my international trips, I took some time to explore a little closer to home. Filling in time between my return from Malta and my next adventure in Europe, I headed for the Left Coast. Two pet/house sitting events, one in Tacoma and the other in Sammamish, outside of Seattle, occupied most of my time. I started doing these pet sits last year, and it has been a great way to go places, thanks to Trusted Housesitters. They have a community of pet owners and sitters around the world, and it benefits both the pet parents and the sitters. I also get the joy of pets, since I can’t have one until I settle down in one place again.

In between my two pet sits (one with dogs, one with kitties) I had a few days on my own. I decided to be a tourist and see the Seattle sights. I’ve lived in Seattle briefly (a lifetime ago,) and have visited many times for both work and family events. In some ways this visit was a walk down memory lane.

I spent one semester of high school in Seattle in 1962, the year of the Seattle World’s Fair. The official name was Century 21, with many companies trying to show how their progress would change our lives. Interestingly, Ma Bell, as ATT was known at the time, demonstrated only that touch-tone phones would make our lives easier by streamlining the dialing process. Not one word about having a telephone in our pocket that would also replace the encyclopedia! I spent my 16th birthday with a group of girlfriends at the Fair. I shared a birthday with a friend who was in a wheelchair, and we all took turns steering her along with the gaggle of girls. We giggled as a group of sailors paid attention to us, and won us all stuffed animals at the midway.

My friend’s Dad treated us all to lunch at the top of the Space Needle (with cake, of course), and we shamelessly took advantage of having the wheelchair get us priority into the elevators to the top.

I’m so glad that Seattle has preserved the site of the World’s Fair, and turned it into museums and a science center and other venues. Some of the iconic architecture has been preserved, and it brought back memories.

This is a typical view from the top of the Space Needle, given the amount of rain Seattle gets every year. Hey, that’s why the call it the Emerald City! The top of the Needle has been refurbished recently, so I wasn’t sure what to expect. Taking the elevator to the top, you get a view from the glass walls as you rise. As you step out, you have a 360 degree walkway around the top. You can go outside, but it isn’t covered and it was raining. And chilly. I opted to catch the view from inside. There’s a bar and a snack bar, with seating so you can sit and enjoy the view. The hand-held pies in the snack bar are great. And I now have a pink stain on my tan pants from the huckleberries.

Then you go down one flight to the revolving floor. There’s a restaurant there, which usually requires a reservation. I did check it out, but their menu is clearly set up for groups of people, and I was traveling on my own. However, the revolving floor is interesting. It’s glass. Look down, and you see all the way down the 500+ feet to the ground. I admit it took me some time to convince myself to step on the floor so I could look out the windows. I found the glass floor just unnerving, and the only way I could finally step out was by looking straight ahead. I kept thinking of Indiana Jones following the steps to find the chalice in The Last Crusade. You just have to take the step of faith.

Remnants of the original World’s Fair.
Space Needle from the Chihuli Garden.

Next to the Space Needle, the Chihuli Gardens and Glass was my next stop. There are no words. Only pictures. Other than to mention that I was so happy I did a glass blowing class the previous day (see below), giving my a greater appreciation and understanding of the process.

This glass flower made me think of Seymour in “Little Shop of Horrors”!

I also made the requisite trek to Pike Place Market. It was easy to get lost wandering around the main building, as well as the surrounding neighborhood. There are food vendors, several great fish mongers, craft vendors and restaurants. If you park in the building, bring your wallet! It was ridiculously expensive. It brought to mind my old boss at Citibank, who called the people who charged us $16 to park in downtown Los Angeles (in 1994) “gold merchants.”

The original Starbuck’s store is here, and the line waiting to get into the store required a wait on the sidewalk as an employee controlled the number of people who could enter the building. Everybody wants to go to the coffee temple.

If you go to Seattle, bring a raincoat. Maybe an umbrella. And take time to enjoy how amazing the rain makes the area look.

As I mentioned above, on my first day in Seattle I took a glass blowing class. I found the studio through my Airbnb, and they were great! Motoko and Joshua of Kobo Art Garden have a small studio in a garage behind their home, and the entire experience was set up to help me understand the process and be successful. They were helpful while also allowing me to actually do my project, helping me learn the skills needed. I did three pieces: a paperweight, an ornament (my first attempt as actually blowing glass), and finally a glass. I would highly recommend this activity if you go to Seattle. It’s very personal, and at no point did I feel treated as “just another tourist.” If I wasn’t moving into an apartment, I’d probably want to get more involved with this amazing craft. When I mentioned I was planning to go to the Chihuly Glass Garden the next day, Joshua told me he worked for Chihuli before starting his own business.

Next I head back to Montana, and I’m excited to finally move into an apartment. I’ve been without a permanent address for nearly a year, and while it has been exciting and fascinating, I’m ready to stop living out of a suitcase and a storage unit.

Thanks for following my travels Dear Reader. While they are winding down they are not at an end. I’ll only have six days to accomplish the move before heading to Europe for a river cruise and then a tour of Ireland. And then there’s the month in Jersey in December. That’s the one in the UK, not the state in the USA. Stay tuned.

A River Runs Through It

Yes, a river literally runs through it.

There’s something mystical about coming home, no matter where it might be. In this case, as I arrived back in my home state I drove along the Blackfoot River, the one Norman Maclean paid homage to in his book. As I drove along I learned of Robert Redford’s passing , so I stopped to pay a silent thanks for creating one of my favorite movies and for getting the heart of Montana right.

The best line in the movie: “The world is full of bastards, the number increasing rapidly the further one gets from Missoula, Montana.”

It’s good to be home, even for a short while.

Driving the Alcan

There are some moments that take your breath away.

I began the long drive home from Anchorage at the end of my season as a tour director in late September

. I was tired, I was sick. REALLY sick. And I had forgotten how magnificent the drive is in the fall. The last time I drove this road was in 2019, and I was with my husband. This drive brought back those bittersweet memories, but I could still hear his amazement at the beauty of this area with the changing colors. I spent a lot of time on this trip pulling over and napping, since I wasn’t sleeping very well. Just imagine opening your eyes after a nap and finding Mount Drum staring back at you.

Bozeman Fun?

Our last two days in Bozeman were an eclectic mixture of Montana discoveries. First, we went out to the Rhyolite Canyon to hike to the waterfall. We went there last year with Lydia, and the walk was much more leisurely. This year we really felt the effects of the altitude and a week of travel, since we were moving much faster.

There must be some unwritten law that if you are a young male and there are rocks to climb, you are driven to travel upward. First I turned around to find Josh up on the ledge, and then Thomas’ head appeared behind him.

In the afternoon Thomas, Josh, and Richard went to the Museum of the Rockies to see the dinosaur exhibits while I stayed behind to do laundry and nurse an upset tummy.

On Sunday Thomas and I went to the Gallatin County Fair. I’ve been to many Montana fairs and knew they aren’t exactly a Disney experience, but this one was exceptionally low-key. First we visited the chicken and bunny exhibit (really!).

We wandered through the horse barns and then over to the arena where some young girls were barrel racing. Sort of.

Not  really a race, these young ladies were dropping a flag in a barrel and picking one up from another. Some did well, and others were obviously just getting started. The horses were beautiful to watch though.

 

 

After wandering a bit more we heard something going on with an announcer and people cheering. We decided to investigate. It was a wiener dog race. Seriously. In Bozeman. Montana.

First Time Adventures

This was our big adventure day and Thomas and Grandma Billie both did something that we hadn’t tried before. First we did a 3 1/2 hour trail ride that  took us into the mountains above the Gallatin River.  This was Thomas’ first time on horseback and he did really well. We both ended up on great sure-footed mules named Sis and Rhonda. Other than the guy from Kansas who started whining 15 minutes into the ride about how his backside hurt, it was a wonderful experience. I expected to be sore the next day, but that wasn’t the case. Thank heaven for Zumba!

Next we headed down the road apiece (Montana term for a quarter mile…or any other distance) to go ziplining. The hardest part of the adventure was getting  to the platforms! First there was this ramp, then  an 18-foot ladder, and finally a rope bridge that was the scariest of all. Fortunately we were hooked to safety lines the entire time so there wasn’t any real danger. Otherwise I might have had second thoughts!

The ziplining itself was great fun.  We had one mishap thanks to the weather turning mean while we were on the course. A storm rolled in and it got windy first and then rained on us. As Thomas was crossing the second line he got slowed down by a gust of wind and his lighter weight and got stuck in the middle of the line. We saw it happen to the group ahead of us so we knew it wasn’t too bad, but it did mean one of our guides rode the line out to hook up to Thomas and bring him over the rest of the way. In the end, he got more time on the line (hanging over the Gallatin River) so he really got his money’s worth!

The last zip was back over the river and that one went without any problems. All in all it was great fun and I’m glad we got a chance to do both adventures. In the end we agreed that we liked the trail ride best-being out on the mountains with the horses was beautiful and relaxing, and the horses and mules were fun to be around.

By the time we got back to Josh’s house in Blegrade we were famished, so a trip to McKenzie River Pizza was a welcome finish to the day!

Day Three of the Adventure

We started off early this morning to try to avoid the crowds we encountered at Old Faithful the day we entered the park. We did avoid the crowds. We also froze since it was not only cold but windy. I hate wind. But we did experience Old Faithful, which was a treat. Later in the day I asked Thomas what he thought were the highlights of the day. One was the hot chocolate we had after we watched Old Faithful!

 

A stop near at the geyser field near Yellowstone Lake gave us an opportunity to see geysers and scenery together.

 

We stopped at the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone to look at the fall from Artist Point. While it looks sunny and bright, the wind was blowing and it was still cold.

We decided to picnic after buying lunch in one of the Park’s many stores. It sounded like a good idea-a nice lunch outside in the sun near a river. Well. we picked a spot off the map near a waterfall…but the picnic area was nowhere near the water. However, it WAS windy (what a shock after all the other wind we experienced during the day) and so cold that I could barely get my salad on the fork because I was shivering so hard!

One thing you look forward to in the park is a traffic jam-it usually means wildllife nearby. Sometimes it means a slow moving vehicle in the roadway….like a bison! In this case the bison was in the oncoming lane and the traffic was backed up behind him and following him. He was all wet, and probably coming back from his bath in the nearby river.

National Parks So Far

The first day of our adventure was….long. But the second day landed us in Jackson Hole (see post below) and then on to Grand Teton National Park. Where the first thing we ran into was a moose mama and her baby.

That wasn’t the only moose family we found. This baby was just cute.

We finally found our way up to Yellowstone, where Grandson Thomas did the requisite pose in front of the entrance sign.

Day Three

Waterfalls were a focus along with the continual search for wildlife. Lots of elk, what looked like a coyote, some antelope, and lots of geysers. The one below is Mammoth Geyser field.

The one mishap occurred near the end of the day. There was this buffalo….and…well….

He didn’t bleed too much, Mom.

Actually what happened was that we got out of the car to take a picture and Thomas slipped on the gravel by the side of the road. It was some really mean gravel, since it scratched his leg up pretty good. We’re pretty sure he will live, though. Really.