I’m in the middle of my first visit to Seattle, Washington (I don’t count going up in the Space Needle as a six-year-old) and today was an afternoon pilgrimage to Pike Place Market in the company of friend, writer and wonderful photographer Pam Mandel.

What a delightful spot, especially without the summer crowds, which Pam says are fairly insane.

A city on the water, with mountains in the background, has such a running head start on being beautiful that it’s almost unfair. Seattle is like that.

OK, so it rained for about 40 minutes this afternoon. Big whoop. Carry an umbrella (er, don’t leave it in your hotel room like me, the Doofus Tourist, who said, “But, the sun’s out right now! I won’t need this thing.”)

Pike Place had $10-15 fresh flower arrangements that were huge works of art.

It had a pasta place that sold noodles with names like Lemon Chive Angel Hair.

The fresh seafood looked absolutely divine.

The street musicians were well worth a generous tip.

And the photo you see was my lunch inside the Market at Lowell’s (one of Pam’s favorite places) with views of the bay to die for, a nice chilled bottle of local beer and salmon tacos with freshly-made tortillas.

More than once I contemplated how fast I could load up my household goods and move here to the “Emerald City.”

Related posts:

1. See the original Starbucks in Seattle’s Pike Place Market
2. The melting pot still stirs
3. Highlights of the Pacific Coast Highway: natural beauty and driving bliss
4. Summer in the city: street chess

This entry was posted on Friday, October 16th, 2009 at 12:32 am and is filed under City or urban travel, Sheila projects, US travel, food & drink. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.