In July our family was able to go on our first big family vacation in about 5 years, although it has been 10 years since we have flown anywhere. Our oldest daughter graduated in 2020 and we were supposed to take a trip to Disney and Universal at that time, but we all know how that story went. When we started to plan a trip for this summer, we asked her if she still wanted to go to Florida and she said she would rather go to Seattle and potentially meet up with a friend of hers. So, Seattle it was. And it was a marvelous trip full of many, many new experiences. I am happy to report she also got to meet her friend, although I will not really be covering that in the blog. 😉

Our first day there we did a walking tour and got our bearings, but our second day started our first real adventure: Seattle Center. Seattle has this really cool area which was originally created for the 1962 Seattle World’s Fair. In fact, we got to ride there on a monorail that was created for that fair. It was pretty cool – not quite as smooth of a ride as you get at the Disney Parks, but still fun.

We had bought timed tickets to the Space Needle (also from the Seattle World’s Fair) and Chihuly Gardens and Glass, so we had time to walk around and explore before that. We did not realize that we would be sharing Seattle Center with the Pokemon Go Fest 2022 crowd, which was mostly fascinating and only a little bit annoying. Mainly because the number of people caused places to run out of things quickly and close hours early. The people were very nice and we actually downloaded the app again to get a few things from the Pokestops – you know, as souvenirs. We also had awesome strawberry shortcake from a little stand by the Space Needle – so yummy! Here are some photos of other things in Seattle Center – Museum of Pop Culture, Olympic Iliad Sculpture, and Pokemon Go Oasis area,

We were very excited when it was our turn to go up in the Space Needle in the glass elevators. On the way up, we got a nice view of Seattle Center and on the way down we got to look out over Puget Sound. We enjoyed seeing Seattle and it’s surrounding area from up so high – we even got our first views of Mount Rainier. We were very brave and even stood on a bench in front of the glass for photos. And looked straight town through the glass floor in the rotating lower floor (there are only three pairs of feet because our oldest is not a fan of heights). It was a pretty cool experience.

After a brief stop in the gift shop, we headed to the Chihuly Gardens and Glass. It is the 4th place we have seen Chihuly’s work on display, so we knew that we are going to love it. And we did! I think my favorite is the ceiling sculpture in the glass house. We also loved the large blue sculpture that looks like water and the boats. Here are some favorite shots.

After another gift shop visit, we were on our way to dinner. Our tour guide on our first day had recommended a sushi place, so we headed to Umi Sake House for the best happy hour in Seattle. We really did enjoy it immensely – we also had some dumplings and tempura shrimp and veggies, but we were really hungry…

After that, we just did some walking back to our hotel. I am going to leave you with a few photos from around Seattle – it really has some beautiful views. Here is the view of the city from the ferry pier, the ferry arriving with our daughter’s friend, Pike Place Market, Daily Dozen Donuts (so yummy!!), Chief Seattle (not really his name, but as close as the early settlers could get), and the sunset from the ferry pier.

I have 5 more Seattle adventures to write about here, so stay tuned! Have you ever been to Seattle Center? Which museums/sites did you visit? Let me know in the comments. 🙂