Seattle - The Pre-Cruise, Day Two

 

Our second full day in Seattle began with the realization that, this morning, we could see Mount Rainier from the hotel lobby. Rainer hadn't been visible yesterday, at least not that I recall.  Nor had the Olympia Mountains to our northwest.  Mount Rainer is, to me, fascinating because it always seems so close, but it's a bit of a drive to get there. What a beautiful view to have so much of the time!

I took this picture while Katy and I waited for Zac so we could head off to breakfast. As we have found so far, finding breakfast involves a little bit of a trek and a lot of luck. So many of the places have lines out the door and very long waits, regardless of time of day or meal. One place I wanted Katy and Zac to try, Piroshky Piroshky, was essentially inaccessible without a very long wait. I don't do long lines, so we haven't even tried. Maybe some other time we will get here when it's not the summer, not tourist season. I was previously in Seattle during April, and I have to say that, as a visitor, that is a much better time to come. Things are pretty jam-packed in July. :)

We did eventually find breakfast this morning and continued on to Pike Place Market in our continued quest to find Katy a hat she can wear on the cruise. We were not successful, but we did find a bakery inside and decided to have a treat. This is the first donut I've had in a few months, and it was pretty good. The exciting part of eating our donut was listening to the guy about 30 feet to our left have entire conversations with himself. There was quite a bit of detail, but from what we could tell, he seemed to be discussing that he had the documentation to prove his innocence...about something. Hey, at least he wasn't yelling profanities for no apparent reason and at apparently no one in particular. That happened outside a Target a little before this near the Pike Place Market.  Ah, yes, downtown areas are fun...

After our donut adventure we headed back down to the pier and decided to visit the Seattle Aquarium. I have never been to a dedicated aquarium before, so I have no real point of reference. I have been to the aquarium inside the Henry Doorly Zoo in Omaha, which is pretty great, and I think perhaps more impressive, but this was interesting. The best parts were seeing the orcas and sea lions and sea otters swimming around. I'd love to insert a video here, but I don't know that I can make that work inside the blog. Instead, you get a picture of a very cute sea otter, who was resting and then decided to wake up and start stretching, which was hilarious.

We then headed to lunch, where Zac decided the only thing he wanted, or needed at that

point was bread. So he ate bread while I ate salmon and Katy had a salad with chicken. The food was decent, though certainly not worth the price, as we have found most things to be so far here in the area. I don't know if they jack up the prices during tourist season or not, though it's definitely possible. It's a different world from Nebraska, to be sure.  :)  Having said that, it doesn't take away from the experience at all. We are really enjoying our time here.  After lunch we headed back to our room to rest for a bit, then Katy and I decided to take a walk north to the Olympic Sculpture Park. I'd share a picture from here, but to be honest, I just don't get sculpture at all. Paintings, I'm interested in, but sculptures, maybe not so much.  So instead, you get a view of the Space Needle from within the park that's not so bad. I didn't get up to check the plaque for the red sculpture you see here, but to me it looks like dolphins. Let's just go with dolphins. As for the Space Needle, we haven't visited it and won't on this trip, but maybe in the future. I think Seattle is a pretty cool place to visit, but maybe not in the summer when it's over-run with tourists. A little too busy for my liking.  :)

So let's move on to dinner. We had dinner at Anthony's Pier 66 (https://www.anthonys.com/restaurant/anthonys-pier-66/), which was REALLY, REALLY good. I had salmon at lunch. I had it again at supper, along with halibut, and a cornbread pudding. This fish was cooked PERFECTLY. You know when you walk in some restaurants just how good it will be, and Anthony's did not disappoint. The food was just right and, from what I saw around the table, everyone was quite pleased with what they had. Zac had Alaskan Crab Legs that were huge. He'd never had them before, but he had watched videos of how to eat them and really enjoyed the process. I was impressed at how easily he figured out how to get the meat and pleased with his willingness to be a little bit adventurous.  I probably should add here that several of the kids decided to have coffee with their dessert. Yes, coffee.  OK, we are in Seattle, right? But the fact they all like this already is either a little bit worrisome or fairly impressive. I guess I'll go with impressive. I mean heck, I've even had a latte of some sort each day we have been here so far, as I work to teach myself to like coffee more. I don't know why I do it, except I can tell you I am now wanting it nightly, and that has never happened before.

Tomorrow, we leave on our cruise. We will board the ship early afternoon for check-in and we are slated to leave about 5 p.m. I have learned that, by the next morning, we will be yet another hour earlier than we are now. I don't know what that time zone is called, but it's three hours earlier than eastern Nebraska, I know that.  :)  I leave you with a pic of the family at Anthony's tonight for dinner. It was a wonderful time, and I would be remiss if I didn't thank Katy's parents, Gary and Nell, for treating us all to this experience. So much fun!