Seattle=Rain? 85 and Sunny two days in a Row!!!

Today was my first full day in Seattle and being that it was the first Thursday of the month, all the museums in Seattle were free, so I decided to take advantage of the free admission and visited a few.

The hostel provided free breakfast this morning which was nice because it was one less meal that I had to buy. The hostel is right in the center of downtown at the intersection of Pike St. and 1st Ave., directly across from public market center, home of the first Starbucks and world famous Pure Food Fish Market packed fish to go.

I started my day with a Venti Caramel Macchiato(compliments of my Aunt Kristen) from the Starbucks that started it all, it might just have been the atmosphere but it tasted better than usual.

Seattle Art Museum

I then headed to SAM (Seattle Art Museum) to begin my Seattle museum tour. I easily could have spent all day in the Museum with 2,600 art pieces and 35 galleries but choose to do the "Less is More Tour" suggested by the Museum highlighting pieces they felt were necessary to see. my two favorite exhibits included Corin Hewitt, a New York artist who used 4x5 in. format camera, 35 mm., and Polaroids to capture images of inoragnic and organic materials combined; and Titus Kaphar's, History in the Making exhibit which were oil on canvas paintings. Unfortunately no photographs were allowed in the galleries.

I ate lunch at "Piroshky Piroshky" a popular Russian restaurant in Pike Place market and then went down the road to Elliot Bay Cycles and met world renowned frame Builder Bill Davidson, of Davidson Cycles. It was a great opportunity to speak with a frame builder who's been building frames for over 35 years and he had some pointers for beginning frame building. His shop was incredible with a large stock of handbuilt and custom bicycles, this was a real treat.

The EMP (Experience Music Project) museum and Science Fiction museum had free admission between the hours of 5-8 so I decided to go to Seattle most famous landmark, the Seattle Space Needle. The view from the top was incredible and today was a perfect day to go up since the skies were clear.

520' up (forgive the overexposed, its a point and shoot)

The Space Needle

A new Jim Henson (creator of the Muppets) exhibit opened at the EMP last week so it was packed tonight and again they wouldn't let me take photos, but I did get to see the original Kermit. They also had a really neat Jimi Hendrix exhibit which had some of his guitars and a lot of his personal history including old napkins from hotels that he scribbled lyrics on.

The EMP Museum

2 more days until I meet the rest of the Trans-America team, and then the real fun begins!