Seattle Surprise

I mentioned to David the other day that someday I'd like to play tourist in Seattle. Nobody really does that after they move somewhere. David planned a huge surprise day there on Tuesday. I had no idea what we were doing all day. I was COMPLETELY surprised.

We started out the morning with a doughnut from Top Pot. David got a picture of his - I ate mine too fast. It was soooooooo yummy.

Then we went to Ride the Ducks:

It was Super-De-Duper Absolutely Fantastic Best Tour Ever AMAZING!

We all got little "Quackers":

We were completely blindsided by the fact that the Lions Club was having a parade in Seattle on the SAME day. The parade infused an estimated 20,000 people into the city streets. We barely got our doughnut before they closed the street, and we had to sneak out on our Duck through parade traffic. You can see the parade on the other side of the truck/boat vehicle:

 From our vehicle, I saw these two bearded men standing in front of a shop window with two bearded men holding signs. I thought it was rather ironic.

This man reluctantly waved at me from the third story of this building:

Then we took to the water. All the "Floating Houses". I learned the difference between a "House Boat" and a "Floating House". The first is a boat that you live on. The second is a house that motors around. The difference between a "Floating House" and a "House Barge" was a little murky to me.

This is the smallest "Floating House" we have here in Seattle:

From the Duck, we toured the entire city: Stadiums, Pike Place, and all.

After our 2 hour tour (extended due to parade traffic) we watched the kids play in the fountain in Seattle Center then we went up to the top of the Space Needle for lunch. It was yummy.

We stole someone's table to get a picture next to the window:

We walked around the top for a while (The trip to the top is free when you pay for lunch. I hear Sunday brunch is the most inexpensive time to go, but alas, we won't be going there on a Sunday.) where we met a friend of mine from college - Bryce - and his family. I literally walked right into him. I haven't seen him in almost 8 years. I kicked myself for not getting a picture with him after all these years.

After lunch, we walked around the city for a while as we headed to our next destination.   

As we were crossing the street a Seattle city cop cut through the intersection on his bicycle to chase down a man in a wheelchair who apparently had a warrant out for his arrest. I didn't think it prudent to take a picture of the whole event. It was quite interesting though.

There is a lot of "Art" in the city.

We cut through Pike's Place and eventually made it to the Underground Tour in Pioneer Square. I highly recommend it. It was fascinating. Certainly not wheelchair accessible. Our tour guide was amazing. David took lots of pictures. And, we learned the history of the toilet.  

As we were walking out, David asked the tour guide the best way to catch a cab back to our car (it took us an hour to walk to Pioneer Square from the Seattle Center.). They told us about the underground bus route - that was FREE. Why had I never heard of this??? We rode the bus to the Monorail.

And then the Monorail back to the Seattle Center.

We drove down to the water front and explored for another few hours.

David saw this sign, and we decided to get ice cream before dinner. Can I say "YUM"!

We got our sunset pictures. David had a fancy filter on his lens:

I just have raw talent on my side:

And I took this one. Photos really don't do the colors justice:

We were gone for 15 hours. It was sooooooo fun. Despite the thousands of extra people in Seattle, I thought the streets should have been busier. Traffic was a breeze, even in downtown! But, I met a lot of cool people while we were out. There was the Immunologist on the pier from the UK who is working on a vaccine for Malaria. She said they are testing it out right now, and people are signing up to get infected with Malaria to see if the vaccine works! There was also a family that I met by the fountain (See above picture, minus cool family). They have 2 kids ages 5 and 6. They are from New Mexico and gave their kids the option to go ANYWHERE in the US for vacation. They even offered Disney World. The kids chose, without a fight, to come to Seattle. They read "The Wheedle on the Needle" and wanted to see the Wheedle.

I am so glad that David is still excited about hanging out with me, even after 7 years of seeing me almost every single day.