Flying Fish and Flying Saucers

Andrea at the entrance to Pike Place Market
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Today was a full day of sightseeing in Seattle. We walked the mile from the hotel to "downtown", stopping at the "Delightful Bakery" for breakfast sandwiches and fantastic coffee. We headed straight for Pike Place market, with over 200 independantly owned shops selling everything from fresh produce to artist paintings.  One of the tourist features of the market is the fish throwing at one of the fish stalls. All the tourists gather round here waiting for someone to buy fish from the salesman, who then throws it to be packaged to the guys behind the counter. This was fun to watch.

Seattle Space Needle - View from Base
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We then headed towards the Westlake centre where we caught the monorail over to the Space Needle. A short ride up in one of the elevators gave us a full view of Seattle. The day was overcast but clear, so we got a full view of Lake Union, across the the city and out to Elliott Bay. We stopped for Starbucks coffee before wandering around the massive souvenier shop at the bottom of the down elevator. After this we visited the Science Fiction Museum which listed heaps of information and exhibits about authors and movies of this genre, then briefly wandered through the and Music Experience Centre. Here there was a sculpture of more than a hundred guitars of all types, going up on a column to the ceiling. It definitely made a statement.

Catch that fish!!!

Seattle Duck Tours Boat
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After this we walked over to the Seattle Duck company and caught the next duck 90min tour, taking us past the major attractions of the city by street then by water. Our driver "M.T. Pockets" provided an entertaining narrations of the sights of Seattle.

We caught the monorail back then walked back to our hotel just in time to be picked up by Joe's old friend Glenn. He drove us out to a favorite restaurant where we had the most delicious steaks, desserts and caught up on the passing years.

Seattle Monorail
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The sun is finally setting here, it's about 9pm and time to rest up before our trip up to Anchorage tomorrow.