After Anacortes, our next stop was Seattle and a 5-week house sit on Lake Washington, the state’s largest lake. We walked into an authentic midcentury home to find expansive lake views and two beautiful Siamese cats.

After settling in with our new feline companions, we were ready to go downtown for our first look-see and true taste of what Seattle is all about. Going full-out tourist, we headed for the famous Pike Place Market, where we spent a beautiful sunny morning looking at flowers, art, crafts, lots of food vendors, and great waterfront views overlooking Elliot Bay.

I had to pressure Joe to do the tourist-thing and take the traditional pics for the blog we had at the time. As you can probably guess, doing anything straight-up conventional was not his thing :)

Seattle is a city of many neighborhoods. We met my cousin Carole for lunch at Long Provincial Vietnamese restaurant in Belltown. Carole and I hadn’t seen each other since 1981, so we had a bit of catching up to do! Regrettably, we were so busy talking we forgot to get a picture together. The company and pho both were great, and Carole also gave us a tip for how to end our day…a visit to the nearby free sculpture park operated by the Seattle Art Museum before heading back to our home in south Seattle.

The afternoon was too warm to walk from the market, so we drove the short distance to the park. Carole was right. It was a not-to-be-missed sight to catch while we were in the neighborhood, and a great way to the end the day!

Japanese Garden

One morning we decided to visit the nearby Kabutu Gardens. When I researched directions, I saw some comments on the website about recent car break-ins in the parking lot. The site admins had responded by saying that there had been a few incidents but they had increased security.

So we went and enjoyed a long stroll through the peaceful Japanese gardens. When we came back to the parking lot, two young women approached us and asked if we’d seen a black Honda drive past. We didn’t, but the alert duo had witnessed two men breaking the window of a car in the lot and wrote down the license plate as the car sped away. There was no office or employee on the grounds, so they left the information for the owners on the windshield of the vandalized car, and we went on our way. It was an unfortunate way to end an otherwise pleasant outing. I started paying more attention to feedback on sites after that!

Columbia City

We were really fond of short day trips to explore the area around the cities we visited. Another vibrant Seattle neighborhood just outside downtown is Columbia City. We had a great afternoon strolling the main street visiting local shops, “Green Eileen” (an Eileen Fisher resale store, who knew? I got a top for $9!), and a fab bakery. A colorful, interesting afternoon!

During our five weeks in Seattle, we explored many neighborhoods in the downtown area: Capital Hill, Queen Anne, and more. One Sunday, we attended a presentation on zero waste at The Riveter, a really cool co-working space in Capital Hill. We were so inspired by the information and environment, I’m going to share it in a separate post at a later date. 

Coming next week! The fourth and final post of this series. Our last week in the Seattle area and Washington state was spent in nearby Ballard and then a surprise housesit to end our time here on a perfect note. Can you guess where? No? Be sure to check out our final destination next Friday in Part 4!

In case you missed the previous posts, here are the links

Part 1: Issaquah

Part 2: Anacortes

Until next time… my best, Shelley

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