Tossed Salads and Scrambled Eggs, pt 3

Last part!

We woke up early Saturday morning to head down to Pike's Place Market. Tony, going without a map again, managed tro take us like a milem further down the main street, but we did spot a couple of cool restaurants. Tony was perplexed as to why there was a hot dog stand on the pier. I understood completely.

We started on the ground floor of the market, went up probably 5 or 6 floors, and found ourselves back on the ground floor. That's how steep Seattle is at some points. We saw all the different shops they had, including the iconic fish throwers. Some stores we saw on the pier said that they had salmon so fresh that a well trained vet could bring them back to life. That would be interesting to see.

After that, we went to take another tour called the Argosy Cruise. It's a short 1-hour drive around Elliot Bay which digs right inbetween East Seaatle and West Seattle. Tony and I stayed on the top of the boat and got really good views of more buildings and Mount Rainier. Unfortunately, we got a bit sunburned. Oh well. People were complaining that it was like almost 80 degrees that day. Wimps. Of course, I'm a wimp in the opposite direction. I think anything below 60 is cold.

The next stop was to the local aquarium just a couple of piers down. It was pretty cool looking, though in all honesty I liked the one in Monterrey, CA a lot more. All the kids were trying to find Nemo and Dorie. We saw some weird fuzzy-like fish that Tony mentioned looked like those elephant things from Star Wars. Then this guy shows us a tattoo he has of that particular Star Wars creature. So Seattle definitely has its nerd population, which was comforting. The otters were cute, and we somehow missed the octopus, but it was an interesting excursion.

I should mention that most of the stuff we saw was part of this CityPass that we bought. Saved us like 50% versus seeing the Space Needle, Aquarium, EMP/SFM, Argosy Cruise, and the Science Center separately. There were also a few things we discovered but didn't have time for like the Seattle Underground or Alki Beach. But for only three days of exploring, we got a lot done.

We got dinner at an expensive seafood restaurant on the pier (our total, with tip, was 100 bucks. I cringed when I saw the bill. We brought enough vacation money for this kind of stuff, but it still hurts.) and bought some souvenirs. We went back to crash at the hotel for a bit, and we headed out for our final venture. We walked back up to the Space Needle that evening and used our CityPass for a free trip up. We had to wait a while cause some prom kids were being rowdy. But we got to see the skyline at night. It was pretty massive, and yet it made me long for Tucson. Tony and I talked for a bit on top of the Space Needle, and then went down for the last time.

We went next door to the Science Center. We had wanted to check out some of their regular exhibits, but we instead used our coupons to get into the IMAX theater at the center. Normally they just have educational-type. field trip flicks, but they had Night at the Museum 2 on Special Engagement, as well as, by popular demand, a reprisal of Star Trek IMAX. We were both surprised to see so many people there for the 11:30 pm showing of Star Trek, and I'm not a Trekkie by any means but Tony had never seen an IMAX movie, and we were already there and had tickets. From a movie standpoint, it was really good. I knew enough to keep track of everyone, and I like recognizing cast members from their other stints. But we didn't get back to our hotel until like 3 in the morning. The taxi driver was saying something in Hindu about a degree in Mechanical Engineering.

On Sunday morning all we did was have a brunch at the hotel. It was actually a deluxe brunch that cost 30 bucks per person. We had prime rib, sushi, pancakes, and omlettes. I was afraid to ask them for ketchup, thinking it was too low-class. Maybe I could've asked for fancy ketchup. I still definitely feel out of place in upper crust society, and I know I'm gonna be heading towards it when I get my PhD, but the last thing I want to do is forget how to clean my own sh*t.

We wrote out some postcards we had, and checked out of our hotel. No limo from the shuttle service on the way back, but the van ride was pleasant enough. The clouds were starting to return, and it was our cue to head back to AZ. The line at the airport was just a little longer than TIA, and we were there with like a half hour to spare. We then flew back through Sky Harbor. Nothing too eventful, but boy was I happy to buy food that cost less than 10 dollars.

So Seattle was an awesome trip. It would be cool to go back someday, check out some other stuff and nearby cities, but it felt good to be back home.