My aunt took me into the city for me to spend a weekend with my friends whom were staying in the dorms at Cornish. The morning was rather gloomy and was not looking promising whatsoever but began to clear up after noon. After brunch with everyone, we all seemed to have a different idea of what we wanted to do with our day. Luckily my friend, Sam (one of three of us) and I were on the same page and just decided to walk around the city and see where the day took us. It certainly was a spontaneous, fly-by-the-seat-of-our-pants kind of day, no doubt.
A few blocks into our walk, we stumbled upon a circus-like group just doing their thing on the corner of the street. Turns out, the last time I was in Seattle, my aunt took my mom and I to see this circus dinner theater, Teatro ZinZani--a three course meal along with hours of phenomenal entertainment which involved the audience randomly, even if it was while they were mid-bite. Sam and I caught the end of their street performance, which was a lady hula hooping with about fifteen hoops..absolutely nuts. From there, we ventured down to Pike's Market and walked by the waterfront. There were a ton of venders along the pier right next to the fabulously new ferris wheel right there on the water, which unfortunately was out of our budget to take a little ride on. We walked into various hilariously random stores, particularly one which distinctively organized their inventory of unicorn, zombie, mustache, and other awesome themed souvenirs.
We continued our adventure by walking further into the city around the Pioneer Square area. A sign caught our eyes stating, "Spooked in Seattle" and we couldn't resist to see what it was all about. It ended up being a tour of the underground Seattle--the old sidewalks that used to be a block lower than they are now but had to make the sidewalks higher due to flooding from the Puget Sound back in the early 20th century. It was super cheap considering this tour business had been open for two months and were competing with the ever so popular (and most likely significantly more expensive) original underground tours that have been going on for a while. So we said what the hell and went for it; definitely not what I expected it to be, but we learned a ton of interesting facts about the history of Seattle and got to see the sidewalks of Seattle that were one floor under the sidewalks that people walk on now.
After the tour, we (you guessed it) walked some more and wandered around the streets--today's streets, not underneath anymore. We journeyed back to Pike's Market and stopped in and out of the lobbies of buildings to see if we could get to the top floor for cheap. By this point, we were looking for a place to eat dinner but didn't have much luck. We ended up walking back along the waterfront again and just enjoying the beautiful waters of the Puget Sound, watching the ferries depart and arrive along the pier.
Later in the evening of this jam-packed day, we stumbled upon the Columbia Center (the tallest building in Seattle) and decided why not go to the top? The elevators traveled so quickly that our ears popped and we were suddenly from the lobby o the 77th-ish floor in a matter of seconds. The view was breathtaking, I could've stayed and observed the city from above for hours. Sam and I discussed how small everything looks from so far up and how amazing it is to view the world from a different perspective in general. It's baffling to think about how small we are in comparison to everything else in a city, but even more so in comparison to the world, and to the universe. Wow. That's something I seriously miss about this guy: the awesome conversation and discussions about dance and about life. It was so neat though to put the city together, in terms of where everything is geographically.
At the end of our beyond busy and ridiculously fun day, we ate a Whole Foods buffet salad dinner along with some much deserved PBR. A couple of other dancers staying in the dorms ended up joining us on our random trek to find ice cream that we were craving. We ventured to McDonald's for sundaes, then to the liquor store for a bottle of wine. We played card games and later on dance improvisation games outside of the dorm, by the light of the city and the up-close Space Needle for the rest of the night.
All in all, the day was without a doubt a success. One that I will never forget.
One of the only decent photos that turned out from the under the streets of Seattle tour. This is a skylight that provides light to the underground sidewalk.
The famous "Gum Wall" in Pike's Market.
We were curious why there was such a crowd outside of a single coffee shop, and soon came to realize that it was the original Starbucks with a constant line almost half a block out the door.
