Seattle Attractions Part II

The second day of our Seattle trip took us on a longer exploration of the famous Pike Place Market. We got coffee at the original Starbucks store, which still has the more risqué original Starbucks logo sporting a much more nude mermaid than what is seen on most of the other store logos. The open market on the ground floor is an awesome experience. Nearly every type of store is there, from fresh flowers to clothes and jewelry and all kinds of seafood and fresh vegetables. I acquired a flashy new tye dye shirt and munched on coconut covered fruit rolls while we moved on to exploring the lower floors, which have even more variety, including book stores and novelty shops. There was an out of print CD store, which I was very excited about as I was looking for an out of print CD of a band called Krux. Frederik Akesson, the person I had come to Seattle to interview at the concert, was in this band so I wanted to have the CD there for him to sign. Unfortunately the CD store was closed for some reason, so no such luck there. On the way back upstairs there were numerous street performers playing guitar and singing songs, and we saw the famous fish mart where the employees throw fish to the customers.

Later on we took the 1 hour Argosy harbor cruise of Elliot Bay, which was included with our Seattle City Pass. It was a little overcast with a light sprinkling, which was perfect weather for the hot rum cider we bought from the bar. The tour guide was funny and informative, and we got a great view of the city skyline. The cruise ship passed by a hotel right on the waterfront where they used to allow fishing from the bedroom windows, a practice which was nixed when broken windows and fish hidden under mattresses and in bath tubs became a serious problem. The guide mentioned the history of a seafood restaurant called Ivers, which supposedly started as an aquarium but switched to a restaurant when it was losing too much money so the owner decided to cook up all the fish and hope to make a profit. When we got off the tour we headed to Ivers to check it out for ourselves. Ivers is very interesting for a "fast food" style restaurant because the front half is open air, giving it a unique flavor not found in many other similar restaurants. Their crowning achievement is the clam chowder served in a bread bowl, which is highly regarded by all the locals, and the halibut and fries wasn't too bad either. They also have a connected sit down restaurant with a different menu, but because we were strapped for time we had to pass on it.

After Ivers it was time to head to our main reason for coming to Seattle - the Progressive Nation concert and my interview with Opeth. That is a post all its own, so we'll skip that and move on. We sampled the delivery fare again after the concert, and I had the first and only thing that wasn't as good in Seattle as it was at home. We ordered from a pizzeria and got calzones. I chose the Greek calzone, which was essentially a gyro but baked in a pizza crust. It was a decent enough meal, but they used beef instead of the traditional lamb, which was a bit of let down because we have a great Greek place at home that makes a much better gyro and uses the more flavorful lamb.