We left bright and early in the morning [well, for us that was :-)] at 9:30. As we crossed the Canadian border, we were the only ones there. We just sailed right through the checkpoint station, answered a few quick questions, and we were on our way, to the land of the free. Unbeknownest to us, that was just the start to our streak of luck we had that day.

The drive down Interstate 5 was beatiful. The particular section over Chuckanut Pass is my favourite stretch of freeway, the part just south of Bellingham. We stopped at Harrahs Casino, located at Exit #236, for a quick restroom break. We could've stopped at a typical rest area, however the thought of going to a lush casino was more appealing. Not to mention the possibility of raking in a few extra American bucks :-) It was obvious that we were knee deep in rural America, as we were approached by a classic "redneck" guy in his truck. He said, "Sorry, gentleman, but the casino don't open till 'nother 6 minutes (It was 10:54 at the time). Dissapointed, we headed back to the car, but then our new friend chimed in with "However, you can still go round the side to the Bingo section. It's open now. And while you're at it, why don't you share some of 'dem winnings with me!!" Laughing politely, we wandered off to the casino. We didn't play Bingo, mainly because we were pressed for time, but we did venture into the arcade. Much to my surprise, the token machine took Canadian quarters, so we got rid of all that useless change and played games for a few minutes. Then it was back to the freeway.

The traffic thickened near Everett and got really congested near Greater Seattle. I thought Vancouver B.C. traffic was bad, but it's nothing compared to Seattle traffic. We stopped for an exquisite bite to eat at Burger King, and I had another unexpected surprise. I ordered a Big King Meal, but they screwed it up and charged me a Big King Sandwich PLUS the meal. I got my money back for that unwanted extra sandwich, but when I got the order, they forgot to take the sandwich off the tray! So I got a Big King Meal and Sandwich, for the price of just the meal!!

Then it was off to visit the Space Needle. On Taylor Ave., nearest to the Space Needle, we were the only ones who parked on the pay parking side of the street. We didn't know that one could park for free on the other side, so there was us, a lonely car with Canadian license plates parked on the PAY side. I'm sure a bunch of passerby had a laugh over that one :-) The Space Needle itself was spectacular.

For $9 U.S. (almost $13 Canadian with our lousy dollar right now) we got an elevator ride to the observation deck, and looked around. From the top of the needle, one can see for miles in any direction. The most picturesque views look west over Elliot Bay, and Northeast towards Lake Washington. We had a visit from "Sneedle", some overpaid man in a cheesy clown costume who gave us high-fives. Although he only had four fingers. We stayed for about an hour on top, then went back to the car.

After the needle, we decided a trip to Mercer Island was in order. There was some info. about Mercer Island written on a brochure, saying that it contained some of the most expensive real estate in Greater Seattle, and it was well worth the drive over. A true first-class suburb on an island of its own. We just had to check it out :-) To get to the island, we took Intersate 90 East of the Kingdome. This is quite a freeway. It starts with an extremely complex interchange (where it connects with I-5). I've never seen a series of on/off ramps so complex before! Then I-90 goes through a long tunnel, over a floating bridge, and through another tunnel before the exit(s) to Mercer Island. The island itself was very suburban. Nice houses, windy streets, expensive cars, yes... we liked it all right :-). We ventured further east along I-90 into Issaquah and Lake Sammamish, but quickly turned around when we realized that only one of us had roller blades. We had originally planned to go blading around the lake, but we'll save that for the next time we go to Seattle.

We headed downtown next, and managed to find a parking spot in Pioneer Square. Yes, you head right folks. We found a parking spot in Downtown Seattle! Hold the phones, this is a joke right? No, we actually found a LEGAL parking spot in the heart of downtown. Talk about luck! We immediately fed the meter full of coins, right to the time limit, realizing that we wanted to maximize this opportunity. After gallavanting around for a bit, we wanted to go to a record shop to get the latest "FatBoy Slims" album. For those who haven't heard of this rather esoteric band, FatBoy Slim is a spinoff of the latest music craze, known as "Chemical" techno music. In a nutshell, chemical music is futuristic sound effects, mixed with hip-hop beats with little vocals. The Chemical Brothers basically pionerred this type of music (hence the name chemical) and other bands such as Prodigy, Crystal Method, Fluke, Underwurld, and Orbital are also part of this music scene. Seattle is right up there with vibrant, new, eclectic music, so it was no surpirse that they had the FatBoy Slims CD in stock.

However, getting the CD was an adventure in itself. We had to get from Pioneer Square to about 3 miles north where Tower Records was located. We didn't know it was that far at the time, so we just hopped on a bus, hoping it would get us close to the store. It didn't. We had to run another half-mile, and even then we couldn't find Tower Records. We went into Tower Books, and the clerk said the record store was 5 blocks east. Screw that, we didn't have enough time left on our parking meter! So we went into Blockbuster Music, which was closer. We then hopped on a bus back, and arrived at our car 15 minutes after the meter expired. Very luckily (again), we never got a parking ticket!

Then we toured around the streets of Magnolia, known for its steep bluffs and beautiful views of the ocean. To get there we had to drive over a draw bridge. Just as we approached it happened to be up, and we couldn't go through. We could tell it was going to be a long wait because some people turned their engines off. Apparently, last year there was a landslide right after the post-Christmas snowstorm which wiped out a few houses as well as another bridge which connected Magnolia with the rest of the city.

After having had a very full day, we hit the freeway north and booted it back to the Canadian border. The funny thing was, we stopped at a rest area, where I found a half-full bottle of Vodka, as luck would have it. I didn't take the Vodka, because Jamie didn't take too well to the idea, which made sense because we didn't know where the bottle had been. Then we crossed the line, and couldn't believe our eyes when we saw cut, green grass in the median strip, and clean freeway overpasses. Sorry Americans, while I really like your culture, your freeway cleanliness just doesn't cut it :-)

Well, we immensely enjoyed going to Seattle!! So much so, that we're planning another trip next week. We'll bring a camera, tons of film, and rollerblades. We're also planning to tour the Doc Maynards underground tunnels, located in the heart of Pioneer Square. Look forward to more details next time!
--by Steve Ruelle

Some links...

• Read About Our Second Trip to Seattle
• USA Vacations - Order FREE Brochure!
• Seattle-King County Convention & Visitors Bureau
• TheLinks.com
• More sites...