Seattle

Most people who know me well will tell you that I tend to give people the benefit of the doubt. I generally believe that people are inherently good, and I think the majority of people are more likely to help you than hurt you. Our experiences in Seattle have reaffirmed my thoughts and taught me that regardless of your expectations, people will always find some way to surprise you.

With that said, let me explain our relationship to our hosts in Seattle. Sam’s mom set us up with a place to stay at her ex-coworker’s cousin’s house. Jaime is the cousin, and we stayed with her, her husband Mark, and their two adorable girls Peyton and Katherine (9 and 6?). So this family took in three recent college grads without knowing any of us, knowing Sam’s mom, or having any idea what to expect or who would should up on their doorstep.

As you can probably tell by now, they welcomed us with open arms and treated us far better than we deserved (this has definitely been a theme on our trip). When we arrived Thursday night we sat around and chatted for a little while and got to know each other, and then they all went to bed and left us to “help ourselves and make ourselves at home.” Mark left us with an email address and contact info for a friend of his who works at Safeco Field (Mariners’ stadium). So Sam emailed Mark’s friend to set up a tour for us the next day!

Before we get to that, let me tell you what we did to entertain ourselves on Friday afternoon. We drove into downtown Seattle to see the Pike Place Market. It is a world famous open/outdoor market and one of the largest farmers/artisans markets in the country. You may recognize it from seeing clips of Pike Place Fish Co. employees throwing huge raw fish across the market when customers place an order. You may also recognize the giant pig/piggy bank that sits out front. Anyways, we spent most of the day walking around and exploring the market. We checked out different artists’ work – and realized we couldn’t afford most of it – and also browsed through all the fresh produce farmers were selling. We also got to see the world’s first Starbucks, which is right in the heart of Pike Place Market where it all began…before they started trying to take over the world. It’s such a cool atmosphere there and I think if I lived in the area I would probably be there three or four times a week (I’ll get back to that later).

From the market we walked to the game and got there incredibly early. Why, you might ask, would we be at a 7:05 game before 5 o’clock? Well, because it was Ken Griffey Jr. bobblehead night of course! There were only 20,000 bobbleheads available for giveaway, and I swear at least 10-15,000 people were standing outside the stadium in line waiting to get in and grab their piece of history. The other reason we arrived early was to meet up with Mark’s friend for an all access tour of Safeco Field! In a word, it was phenomenal! She took us to the press box, owner’s suite, diamond seats, etc. We got to see all the ins and outs of the stadium, which coincidentally really makes you fall in love with it.

Needless to say, after seeing all the different great views in the stadium, it was really tough to take our actual seats and watch from the nosebleeds. But, we managed to get by of course. The game was really exciting too. The Mariners were losing the entire game until the 7th inning when they scored four runs to tie the score at 5 a piece. The game went to 11 innings when the Mariners finally won 6-5. Unfortunately, we weren’t there to see the ending because we had to leave the game early to get the car, which was parked in a lot with a time limit! Seems like bad luck, but after the stadium tour and our incredible hosts, nothing could have gone wrong in Seattle.

After the game we drove back to Mark and Jaime’s to find that they had baked cookies for us to take on the road! How unbelievably nice are these people??? But wait, it gets better. This morning at 5:30am we were just about to take off for Yellowstone National Park to camp for the night. Jaime wakes up to say goodbye to us and GIVES us one of their sleeping bags because we only have one and she wants our night of camping to be comfortable! If you ever have doubts about the inherent goodness of people, please remember our wonderful Seattle hosts.

Now, back my comment before about visiting the Pike Place Market all the time if I lived in Seattle. Seattle is an amazing city and I would love to live there someday. However, it is the one place that I really want to live, but I KNOW I never would. Why? Because in our two day stay there I didn’t see a single ray of sunlight. It is perpetually overcast in Seattle, and although it didn’t rain at all (which I thought it would), it was constantly gloomy and somewhat depressing. STILL A GREAT PLACE TO VISIT THOUGH!

So like I said, we’re on our way to Yellowstone National Park to camp for the evening. We’ll be in Denver on Sunday, which is when I’ll end up posting this entry…and probably another since I’ll have lots to say about YNP. Until Denver…