UPDATED: January 27, 2021
This is the fifth of a
series of posts dealing my fifth trip to Seattle and second of two trips that
year. I’ve made minor corrections to these reports. Also, I’ve added additional
thoughts with the hindsight of three years later or to add further
clarification.
Feeling a little
better though still far from 100%. Was
able to down some cherries and bananas chunks.
Today is going to be a pretty quiet day.
A woman mentioned she
needed to get to the airport in an hour this morning. Hopefully that factors in check-in time. Even at that and even with a cab, on a
Saturday on the day of a major parade getting from Ballard to Seatac on time's
going to be tricky.
[NOW: The parade in
question being the Torchlight Parade discussed below].
KIRO will be covering
the event tonight if you want to see roughly where I am tonight.
[NOW: The above was
written in the morning; the rest I wrote early the next morning.]
Computer was in use
last night and found out I couldn't type an e-mail from my laptop because you
can't scroll the screen if there's too many names in the Bcc field. From some reason I was able to do it once
from home but not here. So catching up
this morning.
Yesterday I took a bus
to close to Seattle Center, where I saw the same dog though not at the
fountain. From Seattle Center walked
along the parade route downtown and back taking pics of the early parade
set-up. On the downtown direction saw
some of the floats getting a police escort.
[NOW: The bus was a
King County Metro Transit one.]
I visited Olympic
Sculpture Park (in the statue of the naked man and boy facing each other a
fountain spray obscured the boy. I
walked back to Kerry Park Viewpoint hoping to see some of the parade set-up
there but could only see park of the Seafair flag pole on top of the Space
Needle.
[NOW: The sculpture described above is called
Father and Son.]
Back near Seattle
Center I took pics of parked floats on the Mercer side, got some more memory
cards at OfficeMax, then walked partly along the parade route once more to Pike
Place Market. There, at Golden Age
Collectibles I found the two comics needed to complete my Y the Last Man comic
collection but decided against them because they wanted $6 each. Also at the Market got a DVD at Holy Cow
Records. I visited Swerve and then
walked down to the Pioneer Square District, where I visited Pioneer Video and
Elliott Bay Book Company before taking the King County Water Taxi to West
Seattle.
[NOW: That OfficeMax
is now closed, as is Swerve. Pioneer
Video moved to First Hill as Third Man Video before closing. The water taxi (Metro
Transit) has been replaced with a newer model at a different downtown dock.]
I walked to Alki Beach
where aside from the Statue of Liberty and Birthplace of Seattle statues I saw
an art fair and ate "lunch' of water and crackers. I was going to visit SW California Ave but
there was some confusion there (apparently a bus that ran on Sat in May doesn't
in July). So a little while after
getting a pop from a local grocery store took an express bus back to the
Pioneer Square District.
[NOW: I no longer
think the bus was express per se. It was a King County Metro Transit bus.]
I visited Smith Tower
where I took pics from above of the parade set-up (unfortunately could only see
a little from Smith Tower; I'd have been able to see more at Columbia Center
but it's closed on weekends). I also took
pics of a car accident, which I also sneaked in a few pics of after returning
to ground level.
I made it back to the
parade route for more pics, stopping at FYE at Westlake Center and getting a
set with the first few Dr Who eps. I
went upstairs to snap shots of the parade route from top level but couldn't see
as much as I'd hoped once again. I briefly deviated from the route again to
visit Zanadu Comics, then walked along the parade route (getting a hot dog
along the way, a strong sign that I was beginning to feel a lot better).
[NOW: That FYE and Zanadu Comics are now closed.]
I made it back to the
International Fountain at Seattle and had more crackers and water. I walked to
Silver Platters, snapping more float pics, and got a couple more DVDs
there. I took more float pics on the way
back downtown (they were starting to move into position.
[NOW: That Silver Platters has moved to 1st Ave S.]
The joggers before the
parade proper started sooner than expected so snapped shots of them as I walked
downtown.
The place I picked to
watch the parade kept getting shifted because it was designated a fire lane
this time (wasn't in previous years I don't think). A fireman dressed as a
pirate was talking on a cell phone discussing the logistics. Between the fire lane bit and it starting to
rain I finally took shelter nearby, which actually worked well from a photo
perspective: no chance of rain, a few steps up so I could still see most of the
parade except sometimes at foot level, and most importantly the shelter was
well lit so I was still able to get decent shots as it got darker.
There was some overlap
with Greenwood Parade (e.g. motorcycle cops, clowns, pirates) but also a number
of differences such as the usual elaborate Sikh and New Westminster floats. Unfortunately for the first year since I've
been watching this no Vernon representation.
I took a bus back to
Ballard and walked back to the hostel, taking pics of the Seafoodfest stands
Sat-Sun along the way. They were closed
but still largely set up. I finally made
it back around 11:25.
[NOW: The bus to
Ballard was also King County Metro Transit.]
No comments:
Post a Comment