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After breakfast in the hotel, we made the short drive to the Seattle
REI. It's the flagship store, and boy is it impressive. It's at
least 4-5 times bigger than the Saratoga REI, which is big in
its own right. Included are a chamber where you can test gear
against rain, an outdoor mountain bike course including a pretty
waterfall, an art gallery housing work by photographer Art Wolfe,
a sizable auditorium for their free lecture series, a World Wrapps
restaurant, and of course huge sections for tents, kayaks, ski/snowboard
gear, biking, etc., etc. Suffice it to say, next time I'm in Seattle
I'll be revisiting the REI store there.
My PowerMax fuel canister was still half full after two days and
nights of use, and we only had two days and nights left of car
camping, so I decided to return all the other fuel at REI. I also
picked up a hiking map of Mt. Rainier National Park.
One of the most frustrating things about driving in downtown Seattle
is the lack of left turns. Many streets prohibit left turns, and
where they're not prohibited the drivers stuck behind you are
ticked off. There are also too many one-way streets for my taste.
Wild Ginger restaurant
We had lunch at Wild Ginger, a unique restaurant which features
Southeast Asian food and a satay bar. It was so good we ended
up eating lunch here again the next day. Highly recommended.
Teddybear sunflowers at Pike Place Market
After lunch we shopped and walked around Pike Place Market. It's something like Fisherman's wharf in San Francisco -- very
touristy. There are lots of little shops selling artsy things,
and a great food market with lots of vendors selling everything
from flowers to fruit to mushrooms to seafood. The seafood is
the main attraction, with lots of yelling, flying fish (thrown
by employees), and lots of tourists taking. pictures. They also
ship ( http://www.pikeplacefish.com and http://www.purefoodfish.com).
More flowers at Pike Place Market
Jean wanted some coffee so we stopped at a Starbucks across the
street. While I was waiting inside, I noticed that this wasn't
just any Starbucks -- it was the very first Starbucks. Nothing
special about it, other than the sign denoting it as the first
one, and the huge stack of mugs saying so, too.
The very first Starbucks store
The market grew increasingly crowded in the afternoon. Soon it
was a mass of humanity. We escaped and drove to the Pacific Science Center. We were just in time for a viewing of "Into The Deep" in the
3D IMAX theater there. The science center is similar to the Tech
Museum in San Jose, or the Exploratorium in San Francisco. After
the movie, we went outside and walked around. There are actually
working displays among the pools and fountains. Fun ones, too.
There are giant squirt guns which you can aim at rotating wheels
and targets. Jean and I spent several minutes playing with these.
Unfortunately they have a limited turning radius, so you can't
actually aim them at other people (this is probably a good thing,
considering how powerful they are).
I was hoping to visit the nearby Space Needle, but it was a cloudy
day with not much to be seen. I decided we'd wait for another
time. Instead, we retreated to our hotel before going to dinner
at Serafina, a great little Italian restaurant in a quaint neighborhood
next to Lake Union.
After dinner we went through the mundane task of doing our laundry
at the hotel and preparing for our trip to Mt. Rainier.
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