Took the Astoria bridge (four miles plus in length) across the Columbia River into Washington. Then it was a half-day pretty drive up to Seattle. We are parked at Lake Pleasant Campground in Bothell (near Redmond), in the nicest RV park so far. There is a nice man-made lake with a bridge across it, a little water wheel, grass for every campsite, and many back up to the lake, but ours is even better--it backs up to the nicest campground playground yet. Katie spent hours there tonight and met another 3-year-old, a little boy named Spencer, who was there with his grandpa. We chatted about Grandpa's life: he and his wife travel between Phoenix in the winter and Seattle here for summers. Spencer lives in Seattle with his folks. Katie took to them both. Maybe she's getting less picky now that the pickins are gettin slim.

Rode our bikes around to check out the neighborhood and saw the cutest 20-foot Class A motorhome (a Trek, forgot who makes them). Wish I'd had my camera. Then, after dinner, Mark & Katie went to Safeway to get some supplies. I took advantage and ate the last of the Hershey bars (I'd snuck a record three of them for the day, finishing off our stash). Wouldn't you know it--Mr.-Not-interested-in-sweets asks me in pig latin where the last bars are. busted! I may never get such a chance again; I'll just have to remember how yummers they were.

September 13

Had a full and expensive day today. Started out at Seattle Center, going up to the top of the Space Needle (650 feet) for a look around. The winds were 40mph, and one woman's long hair stood totally On End as she tried taking a picture of her son on the outside balcony. We pretty much stayed inside, after trying going out and almost losing Pig-Bear to the winds. Had a Yummy iced mocha so I could be as caffeinated as the rest of the Seattlites. I love the Space Needle's cool retro (1962) design. They should have some shirts and memorobilia printed in retro 1962 style to go along with it, but they're not as cool as their building.

Came down from the top and we wanted to see the children's museum but it was a Monday so the museums were closed. Also the monorail isn't running--they're thinking about tearing it down it seems. So instead we figured out how to take a bus to Pike's Place Market. By the way, there is a Very Cool Looking museum there at Seattle Center--it is enormous with bulging sides and strangely colored curves and odd shapes. It's a museum for science fiction. If you're interested in science fiction, it looks from the outside like it would be extremely cool. It was so big, though, that I couldn't get a picture of it that showed its shape and size.

So we took Katie on maybe her first city bus ride, and people tried to talk to her and she was shy. So they waved at her and PigBear. Very nice people here. Pike's Place market was Amazing. It was built in 1907 and almost torn down a few times when folks had better ideas about what to put there on the waterfront, but somehow it has persevered and is So cool and fun to wander through. It has hundreds of stores, markets, places to eat... I found a quilting shop and bought some fun-looking retro prints. They were selling old quilt tops (no better than the one I recently repaired) for $150 and up--my gawd!

After Pike's Place, we headed over to the flagship store of REI (for those of you who don't live on the West Coast, that's Recreational Equipment, Inc. I think). It was a candy store for Mark. The place was huge: they had a 2-story climbing wall, an outside mountain bike trail to test your $1000 bike on, a waterfall, etc. Inside they had a 2-story rock fireplace (no signs, but I don't think we're supposed to climb it) with big granite rocks to sit on while you warm up. Katie and I sat on them and she got her ankle stuck between two of them...Just like in the real woods! Then upstairs (the place was designed like an old lodge) there was a playground area in the kids department. Mark could have spent the night in that place, but he exhibited great restraint and only bought one shirt. As we were walking back to our car, we noticed a lot of glass on the sidewalk where at least two cars had had broken winshields. Good thing we Didn't spend the night there.

Tonight we visited with our friends Angie, Sanjay, Maya (6) and Millan (3) Shenoy, who live outside Seattle in Redmond. We got to see their amazingly beautiful house that they built using many things that they found in India and had shipped here by container. That sounds so fun that I hope I'll be able to do it someday. We took a few pictures but they can't do justice to how wonderful this home feels. It has views of Lake Washington to boot, and the Shenoys built a long verandah to enjoy them. Katie loves Maya and Millan, and it was fun reminiscing with Angie and Sanjay, who I've known since college. BTW, Katie ate all her green beans AND asked for more (old advertising thought bubble: "hmm... Joe never asks for a second cup at home...")

September 14

What a day. This morning we took a tour of Seattle's Underground. Not the cool, seamy side of town, but actually the stuff Under the Ground. Apparently, Seattle's oldest section was once 10-30 feet lower, and there was this problem with the potties when the tide was high. The guide said that flushers got geysers as high as 6 feet if they flushed during high tide. Folks tried going to the bathroom according to the tidal schedule, or even raising their toilets higher in their houses to minimize the problem (I took a picture of one of these). Then, around 1900, the streets were raised up 10-30 feet higher than they had been (making it very hard to cross the streets, actually), and 3 years later, the city had enough money to raise the sidewalks too, so then the 2nd floors became the entry-level floors, and the old lobbies were now in the basement level. So you can take a tour and see the old storefronts underground and hear some pretty funny stories.

So after our tour, we decided to have a little adventure, so we headed for the docks and took the first ferry going anywhere, which was to Bainbridge Island. It was fun walking around the ferry and watching Seattle drift away, and then we went down to the car to drive it off the ferry and noticed that our car's front tire was flat! Thank god it wasn't the RV. Anyway, too bad we hadn't noticed it when we first got out of the car on the ferry, because Mark would've had time to fix it before we got to Bainbridge Island. As it was, he was super fast fixing it as soon as we got there (I forgot to time him like the family in A Christmas Story). Tomorrow we'll get it fixed. It was a big piece of glass embedded in the tread.

Tomorrow we're off to Canada. We might not have Internet coverage so it may be a few days before we update this.

Here are pictures from our drive to Seattle, and while in Seattle

Katie chewing her first gum, Trident regular (Mark's flavor--I prefer Big Red).

the bridge back to Oregon.

Katie on her totally outfitted bike, in the Pleasant Lake Campground. Pig-Bear is in the basket in front.

the playground here at Pleasant Lake.

all of us at the top of the Space Needle

Katie with smoothie

Mark trying not to let me take a picture of him making faces at Katie

So far he's still avoiding getting his picture taken making funny faces.

Katie doesn't mind though

got him--pretended to take her picture and swivelled fast. This is what he'd been doing all along.

Katie on a bike rack

Pike's Place Market sign

The Shenoy's wonderful home

Katie eating with Millan (left) and Maya (rt)

this is the glass installed in 1900 above the underground walkways to let in light. It lets in a lot! Over the years, most of it has been removed as sidewalks get repaired, and what is left has slowly turned purple.

Here's that glass from below

here it is again. Pretty huh?

This was once an outdoor bank teller's area.

Here's a column that got preserved in an underground hall.

Here's one of the elevated potties. No one on the tour felt the need to "go."

This bike and its rider were just outside where we took the underground tour. The bike looked odd, and Mark noted that it didn't have any brakes and had only one gear. I asked the owner--he seemed to be a courier. He said it is a track bike (for racing I guess). I can't imagine not being able to coast or to brake in the city. He said he likes it. He looked very intense.

Mark and Katie with Bainbridge Is. in the back. We didn't know about our leaking tire at that point.

darn.

After dinner, Angie and her kids came by to see our RV, and Angie got lots of requests to read stories.