NORTH BY NORTHWEST

There is so much to see and do in Seattle. The city is named after an old Native American chief and the people seem very aware that the land belonged to someone else before the palefaces moved in. We parked next to Lumen Stadium, where the Seahawks play football and the Sounders play soccer. Right next door is T-Mobile Park, where the Mariners play baseball. The park has a retractable roof which is pretty bad-ass looking. Both parks are very accessible by light rail. We enjoyed Seattle’s transit system, which is light rail, a monorail, streetcars, and buses.

We walked all over downtown, which included a visit to historic King Street Station and Pike’s Place Public Market. Right across the street from the Public Market is the original location of Starbuck’s. I’m all about visiting the original of most things, but there was a line of people halfway down the block waiting to get into the Starbuck’s. No. It’s a cup of coffee.

We took the monorail to Seattle Center, which is a big park that is home to several places of interest. For instance, the Space Needle. We went to the top of the Needle and took in the view. Right around us we could see the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation building, the arena where the Seattle Storm and Seattle Kraken play, the Dale Chihuly Museum, and the Museum of Pop. The park is beautiful.

We took the monorail back toward downtown. Once there, we enjoyed a cup of joe at Monorail Espresso Coffee. Wow! That cup ranks right up there with other 4.5 cups we’ve had. Then, we took the streetcar to South Union Lake Park, where we saw the Wooden Boats Center. This is an exhibit space and a shop where artisans really make wooden boats. It was very interesting. On the way back to town, we saw the Spheres, which is Amazon’s office building. By the way, the Seattle area has taken on the nickname of “the silicon forest,” which is their way of competing with Silicon Valley in the SF Bay area. It’s a pretty good nickname, because there are a lot of tech companies here like Microsoft, Expedia, Amazon, Zillow, Redfin, and T-Mobile US. Also, by the way, Seattle is also home to some of well-known companies like Costco, UPS (although it moved to Atlanta), Starbucks, REI, Boeing, Eddie Bauer, Beechers Homemade Cheese, Safeco (later bought by Liberty Mutual), and Filson.

We drove east and went to Snoqualmie and North Bend. Why? First, it’s a beautiful area. Second, we continued our Twin Peaks tour. In North Bend, we stopped at Twede’s Diner. This is the location where the show filmed for the Double R Diner. The Double R diner was famous for a “Damn Fine Cup of Coffee” and its pie. We sat in a booth and had a damn fine cup of coffee (coffee sucked), but we turned down the offer for pie.

Then, we traveled to Snoqualmie Falls. It is a gorgeous state park with some challenging trails. We walked down to the falls and enjoyed a little of mother nature. The falls are used for producing electricity. The Lodge is a very ritzy hotel and spa destination. The photo of the outside of the Lodge above the falls was prominently featured in the opening to Twin Peaks. I think we’re officially done with the tour!

Our house was located in Issaquah, which is a beautiful town with plenty of trails for walking, nice shopping areas downtown and also at Gilman Village, which is a small commercial district made from reclaimed houses. Yes, some thinking people decided to buy old houses which were set to be razed by the city. Then, they moved the houses to an area on Gilman Road and refurbished them. Now, the cute factor is very high and the village is home to professionals, coffee houses, antique dealers, restaurants, etc. Nice.

I always liked Alfred Hitchcock’s movies. I’ve heard that he was not the greatest example of a human being, but I love his creativity and the suspense of his movies. Seattle is definitely North by Northwest.

More later,

Betty

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