Seattle, WA

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June 27th 2014

Published: July 8th 2014

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kathyv

Space Needle

from below

We spent the day in Seattle before embarking on a ship to Alaska. Two things that must be seen, that are not part of the normal sight-seeing adventures, are the Bubblegum Wall and the Troll Under the Bridge, aka the Freemont Troll. After landing, we took the Light Link to our hotel. That, in itself, is very different than anything I have ever experienced. First, you have to prepay you trip, then we got off, had to walk about a block to catch a bus, and that dropped us off about 1 block from the hotel. After all was said and done, it cost only $5 for both of us, as opposed to $40 for each to catch a shuttle bus. After that, we were off to see some sights. First stop, the Space Needle. It was only a 5 minute walk from our hotel. We did not go in there or up there. Everywhere you went in Seattle, you can see the Space Needle, which came in handy, since our hotel was near there. If you get lost, just look for the Needle.

We found Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Visitor Center; I needed to get some information about

Lumberjack Kathy

Picture taken at the wharf.

Seattle. This is not your typical visitor center. We went looking for city information, but this was not a visitor center where one can acquire maps. It was about their foundation. I don't mean to diminish what they've done, I thought that it was your typical, big city, tour-destined visitor center, but it wasn't. Even though it wasn't, the young man there did help us out. We were looking for the bus to take us to Freemont so we can see the Troll. The bus stop he sent us to was no longer there, due to construction. After trying to find this bus stop, with no luck, we decided to head for the wharf. That was about 10 minutes from hotel. We walked and walked and walked. Then we went to the alley where you can find the Bubblegum Wall. It's fascinating, but at the same time, disgusting. However, I did buy a 35¢ pack of gum and, yes, we did contribute to the wall. We stuck our gum at the bottom so we wouldn't touch anyone else's gum. After that, we walked up the rest of the alley and there's Pike's Market Place. We saw the fish shop where

Lumberjack Dean

Taken at the wharf.

they throw the purchased fish and we happened to be there when they were throwing the fish. It's a very energetic place. After walking around the market, we started to head back to the hotel. However, around the corner from the Market Place was the original Starbucks store. It had a long line that was out the door. Needless to say, we did not go in; I just took a picture of the facade and kept walking to the hotel.

The next morning, we took the bus, which we found a stop right by our hotel, to the Troll. That was, in my opinion, the coolest. Bubblegum Wall ~ the grossest, the Troll ~ the coolest. It's situated on the top of a small hill, so walking up the street, the troll becomes more and more apparent. I took pictures from the bottom of the street, walking up towards the troll, and in front of the troll. It was enormous. If you look closely, under his left hand,there is a VW Bug car. It's an ACTUAL VW Bug. It's fingers were as tall as me. You can climb it. It was only about ½ hour, round trip. It was