Ferry Funny Fish

Thursday 15 July

Me and Jeanna, Chittenden Locks

We started the day by driving to the Ballard district of Seattle to see the Hiram M Chittenden locks which are in Salmon Bay, part of the Lake Washington Ship Canal. They sit between the freshwater lake and the salt water Puget Sound and let all sorts of vessels from big ships to kayaks pass through. The most interesting part is the fish ladder which allows the annual migration of salmon from the Pacific back up to the freshwater streams to spawn. July and August are the peak times to see them leaping up the ladder - and we saw a few doing just that!

Coffee and cupcake

We had fish and chips (where am I?) before heading into Ballard itself which is a rather quaint and pleasant area where Jeanna was keen to show me the Cupcake Royale store - no arguments from me!

We then headed for the waterfront in Downtown Seattle itself and decided to take a water taxi across to West Seattle which gave us great views of the city in the glorious sunshine (Seattle is renowned for its rain - not this week!). The ferry ticket also included a free bus trip took us past the only sandy beach in the area - sadly no time to stop, though.

Seattle

Our next stop was back in Downtown at Pioneer Square where we join the "Underground Tour" which was a walking tour showing how after the fire of 1889, buildings were just built over the top of other buildings and the roads (but not the pavements) were raised. The guide was very amusing with a brilliant dry humour - sadly lost on some of the others in our party!

Dinner was at a little Italian restaurant and we ended our day at the "Comedy Underground" club, with five comics who were all entertaining, although some more than others!