Seattle Day Trip

Ron and I left Sequim for the Bremerton Elks - $15 a night, but just a ferry ride away from Seattle. Twice in one week, we took a ferry to explore a major city.

There was no comparison in the prices of the two ferry rides. It was FREE to ride as a passenger from Bremerton to Seattle. They do make you pay to leave Seattle, but even that was a bargain at $7.10 for me and $3.55 for Ron.

Leaving Bremerton, we could see the smoke in the Olympic Mountains from a wildfire.


Once in Seattle, we hopped on a FREE bus. Yes, all the buses in the downtown area are free. Amazing. We rode past some lovely old buildings like this one.


Then hopped on the monorail to go see the iconic symbol of Seattle.


When I was there years ago, I remember it costing $18 to ride to the top. Well, maybe I'm remembering wrong, but it's still $18 ($16 for Ron.) We really weren't going to do it, but we figured we could eat a cheap lunch to compensate.


Here are all the people enjoying the views at the top.


You can see the monorail track going into downtown. Both it and the Space Needle were built for the 1962 World's Fair. Ron and his brother attended it and actually ate breakfast at the top of the Needle. They paid $6 for the ride up AND breakfast!


They took our picture with the hope that we would love ourselves so much that we would buy it. BUT, you could use the kiosk at the top to send it to your email for FREE.


After a filling lunch at McDonalds (looking down from the top of the Needle, we saw the big "M" on their roof), we hopped back on the monorail. (Oh, I almost forgot - $1 for Ron and $2 for me.) That strange structure in the background was also built for the '62 Worlds Fair.


As I get older, everybody seems to look younger and younger. Here's our driver, responsible for our lives, looking about 15 years old.


And we zoomed back downtown.


Where we walked a couple of blocks to see them throw the fish at the famous Pike Place Fish Market. What a hoot! And these are not tiny fish! See it in the corner?

Next we hopped on another FREE bus and went to Pioneer Square to the FREE Klondike Gold Rush National Historic Park. What a fascinating event in our history. Such hardship the stampeders endured and most of them never made a nickel.

After a short walk back to the ferry, we said goodbye to Seattle. It was really a pleasant surprise how tourist-friendly the city was. They even have people on bicycles roaming downtown to direct visitors to their destinations. It was really a lovely day and not just because it was reasonably priced.