Pike Street Market and the Space Needle - Seattle

Friday started off as a rainy day...welcome to Seattle!

We took the bus from the north end to downtown. It was about a forty minute ride and the bus stop was right out front of where we're staying. Pretty convenient, and priced at $2.25 ($2.55 CAN) per person.

The one bus brought us right downtown.

We went to the Seattle Tourism office and picked up some maps and other information. From there, we wandered straight towards the waterfront, and the famous Pike Place Market.

Pike Place Market.

Lots of people at Pike Place Market.

It's a bit of a touristy place, but it's lots of fun to explore. And although we wouldn't do any of our grocery shopping here, it's definitely worth a visit just to wander around, talk to the vendors, and try some of the many free samples being offered. Plus, it's the perfect place to spend an hour and a half or so indoors and out of the drizzle!

They have a public seating area and viewpoint where you can sit and eat if you brought a homemade lunch like we did.

Make sure that you stop in at the Market Magic Shop where the owner will do a magic trick for you. But make sure you say please!

And, we came across a Korean restaurant.

Have to say, it was pretty funny to come across this Korean restaurant the day after arriving back in North America from Seoul. The lady was pretty impressed that we said hello in Korean, and when we told her we had just come back from there, she said "I'm jealous!"

Lots of fruits and veggies!

This is a type of cauliflower. Never seen anything like it before.

Looks almost as good as Mexican produce markets.

The flower bouquets were really well done, and most were a reasonable $10.

Decorations made with different peppers!

By 1:30pm or so, it had stopped raining and we walked to the library. It's an interesting building, about 10 stories high, but missing every second floor in areas. Very different design, but also very difficult to photograph. We're doing an architectural tour tomorrow, so maybe we'll learn a little more about it then.

On the 3rd floor of the downtown Seattle Public Library.

From downtown, we decided to walk to the Space Needle. It's about a mile, so about a 20 minute walk. Or, you can take the monorail that was built in 1962 for the World's Fair and pay $2.25 ($2.55 CAN) for the two minute ride.

We chose to walk. There is no better way to get to know a city than by walking it! Besides, by this time it had started to clear up, and we even had a few glimpses of the sun.

View of the Space Needle zoomed in from a distance.

The Space Needle, looking up from the bottom.

View of downtown Seattle from the top of the Space Needle.

And, looking out towards Puget Sound.

The Space Needle is an interesting attraction. Built in 1962 in time for the Seattle World's Fair, it has become a very well known Seattle landmark. But although it's a fun trip to get to the top and look around, we can't see a lot of value in the $21 adult ticket price. 

Instead, if you want a view of Seattle, we'd recommend a visit to the Skyview Observatory on the 73rd floor of the Columbia Center. There, you only pay $12.50 for a trip to the top.

Of course if you did that, you wouldn't get the free cheesy photo of yourself and the Space Needle!

By the time we were ready to leave downtown, it was into Friday rush hour traffic. The bus route out of downtown was just crawling, so we decided to walk. And we ended up walking the entire four and a half miles (7 kms) back home! It took a little over an hour and a half, so not bad. And, we saved $4.50 in bus fare. :-)

We took our host Lauren out to a nearby taco place for dinner. The tacos were almost as good as the ones we'll be eating in Mexico in less than two weeks! Very authentic tacos at the TNT Taqueria on 45th St.! Three of us ate for $24 ($27.12), so not bad.