Seattle home of ...Fifty Shades of Grey and the Space Needle?

The title basically sums up my entire knowledge of Seattle prior to arriving. I am pleased to say my horizons have been solidly expanded.

We stayed at the Moore Hotel which looked rather ratty on the outside but was gorgeous inside with funky leopard print carpet! It was also the place with the worst WiFi signal - ironic I thought considering it's the founding place of Microsoft!

The afternoon was spent wandering first avenue window shopping followed by delicious tapas at Black Bottle - a restaurant recommended by a local interested in coming to NZ who we bumped into on the street.

Overgrown building that I liked on our wanders

The EMP Museum was first on the menu the next morning. It was a quite a change from its east coast counterparts focusing exclusively on pop culture. Seattle lays claim to both Jimi Hendrix and Nirvana, with a permanent exhibit for each.

I found a certain familiar throne...

Which I didn't take nearly seriously enough I'm sure

This was called the Sky Church and had videos of live performances by famous rock bands playing throughout the day, except for a short break while a local Mariachi band took over.

 It also had sci-fi, fantasy and horror exhibits while we were there. The first two I was super excited amount, the second I was morbidly fascinated by, despite being beyond pathetic when it comes to horror films.

The Fantasy exhibit!

Kristin Stewart's dress from the latest Snow White

A dragon - eek!

Sirius Black's prison clothes.

Weapons from various sci-fi movies - recognise any?

Mum conquering her childhood fear of Daleks!

There was also a musical tornado - not all guitars, there is a piano accordion and some drums if you look closely.

Shaun of the Dead

A face-hugger I believe.

Jason?

We checked out the Space Needle which is only a hop over from the museum and has to be the least functional building relative to size in existence. It has only three floors despite being 184m tall. It was built for the 1962 World's Fair and the city was planning to have it torn down afterwards, as is usual with World's Fair . However, the people of Seattle liked it so much that the architect bought it and it has since become a landmark. In fact, it has only ever been privately owned.

We did a bit of shopping in the afternoon and my trusty bag, Digby (so named after a stubborn dog which the bag mimicked in behaviour), was finally replaced at Mum's insistence after watching me struggle along.

Pike Place Market is a famous market where you can challenge the vendors to throw and catch any fish you'd like.

Unfortunately we missed that but we did manage to come across the equally, if oddly, famous chewing gum wall.

How could you say no to a proposal like that?!

We made it down to the waterfront just in time to catch the last ferry for a tour of the bay. Our guide was brilliant with great lame jokes (appealing perfectly to me of course!) The cruise took us around the harbour for an hour, so we hit the bar and watched the world go by G&T in hand.

On the boat.

The tour guide, whose name I have, sadly, forgotten

Skyline

Hard to see but there are some sea lions chilling on that buoy.

A new ferry being built in a dry dock - this photo doesn't give an accurate idea of the scale.

Seattle sculptures seemed to focus on animals - see below.

This guy was a piggy bank and you could put money in his back!

After that idyllic evening it was home to rest before travelling again the next day - phew we keep a tight schedule!