Immediately after Christmas we continued our frenetic stampede of experiences, many of which were enthralling. On the 27th we attended the Woodland Park zoo, a lovely facility given the high quality animal and bird displays, but cut our visit short because of the inclement weather... it was c-c-cold. On the 28th we visited the Pike Place markets - buzzing with huge throngs of visitors in the morning and early afternoon and, towards evening, headed off for an Ice-Hockey match at the ShoWare Center in the suburb of Kent where the Seattle Thunderbirds played the Spokane Chiefs - Spokane being in the east of Washington State. If you've never seen a live match should try to sample the experience and, strangely, I've been to two games now over the last 4 years. The previous game was in Dallas where the Texan side played a team from Chicago.
This post focuses on the first two of these destinations. I love this zoo and made a post on it when we first visited it in mid-2016. But this time we could share our experiences with Bec and Max in tow. So, here we are at the markets and one of the most amusing episodes was fish throwing! Someone buys say a salmon and the assistant then throws the fish to a colleague who wraps it and collects the doh.
Max was transfixed by the gum wall and augmented it along with Bec after spending a while chewng on the stuff. No this is not Max, it's me.
Sticking gum to he wall for posterity as a party of segway riders cruises by.
Typical picture of the markets, but - since I'm a member of Rotary - I was interested in the red sign in the middle.
And, on the fringe one could be converted to Judaism!
And so to the ice-hockey mentioned earlier. It was an evening game at some distance from Kirkland but we got there in time despite heavy traffic and had time for a meal at Panera, one of Emily's favourite fast-food joints. Despite on 3 x 20 minute play sessions, the game went on for two and half hours, with numerous interruptions to change team members, face-off against opponents, smoothing out the ice, self congratulation after scoring a goal, for competitions involving the crowd and so on. Seattle players were treated like royalty, especially as they won the game. Scores, times and replays were provided on the overhead contraption - sorry, I don't know its real name - shown here.
Greg, Ella and Flynn riveted by the play.
Trying to win a car by chucking a puck in the buckets shown.
Into an interval, with Greg lifting Ella.
Dot, Em and Bec ... along with a restless Flynn ... during an interval.
Re-surfacing the ice.
The winning team. An enjoyable night out. By the way, the game is very very fast and the grinding collisions between well-padded players make soccer-players look a bit fragile! Judging by info provided on the screen shown earlier, nearly all the players in both teams seemed to be Canadian!!
AS
This post focuses on the first two of these destinations. I love this zoo and made a post on it when we first visited it in mid-2016. But this time we could share our experiences with Bec and Max in tow. So, here we are at the markets and one of the most amusing episodes was fish throwing! Someone buys say a salmon and the assistant then throws the fish to a colleague who wraps it and collects the doh.
Max was transfixed by the gum wall and augmented it along with Bec after spending a while chewng on the stuff. No this is not Max, it's me.
Sticking gum to he wall for posterity as a party of segway riders cruises by.
Typical picture of the markets, but - since I'm a member of Rotary - I was interested in the red sign in the middle.
And, on the fringe one could be converted to Judaism!
And so to the ice-hockey mentioned earlier. It was an evening game at some distance from Kirkland but we got there in time despite heavy traffic and had time for a meal at Panera, one of Emily's favourite fast-food joints. Despite on 3 x 20 minute play sessions, the game went on for two and half hours, with numerous interruptions to change team members, face-off against opponents, smoothing out the ice, self congratulation after scoring a goal, for competitions involving the crowd and so on. Seattle players were treated like royalty, especially as they won the game. Scores, times and replays were provided on the overhead contraption - sorry, I don't know its real name - shown here.
Greg, Ella and Flynn riveted by the play.
Trying to win a car by chucking a puck in the buckets shown.
Into an interval, with Greg lifting Ella.
Dot, Em and Bec ... along with a restless Flynn ... during an interval.
Re-surfacing the ice.
The winning team. An enjoyable night out. By the way, the game is very very fast and the grinding collisions between well-padded players make soccer-players look a bit fragile! Judging by info provided on the screen shown earlier, nearly all the players in both teams seemed to be Canadian!!
AS
