neal family adventures: Lunch in Seattle

Monday, July 21, 2014

Lunch in Seattle

Don't mind us. We're just passing through Seattle. We didn't plan well enough to have lunch at the top of the Space Needle, but we did get there right about noon. But before the Space Needle Dan had another Speed Bump: the troll under the bridge.

There's sculpture under a bridge. The city seems to have embraced it and by the looks of plaques and notes there will be a park developed around it. But for now its just a big sculpture with no parking. Loads of tourists though. Thanks to Dan's eagle eye we found a geo-cache or letterbox. It had a stamp and a book to sign. We tried to be discreet and jotted our name in the book.

Then off to the Space Needle. There was a 4 day wait for the restaurant and an hour and a half wait to go to the top of the Space Needle. We needed lunch so we went across the street to what appeared to be a french cafe, but was an asian fast food spot. They had Bulgogi, but it was not as good as Dan's in Portland. So not all Bulgogi is created equal. Lea insisted on hot tea, but it took longer to cool than she expected.

After a less than stellar lunch we headed to stand in line with our tickets to go to the top. Dan called them Disney lines because they would hide half the line, thinking you were close but though a door and there is an entire new line. We encountered multiple "Disney lines" along our trip. Lots of traffic, lots of lines, poor lunch — the Neal family was not at its most patient. But once we got in the elevator for a glass paneled 21 second ride to the top it was no longer about being patient, it was about keeping Mommy calm.

I'm not at my best in glass elevators. Fortunately the operator told us it would be 21 seconds. Gripping the bar and standing at the back, I quietly counted to 21. When we were at the top we walked all the way round, taking in the sites. We saw a sea plane land and in the distance we could see Mt. Rainier. We even had a Mt. Rainier sundae! Ice cream in a waffle bowl with toffee chips, chocolate sauce, plus few marshmallows that Lea quickly claimed.

Then we hit the gift store, passing on the $17 plastic replica of the Space Needle filled with $3 of M&Ms. We did get a water ring game and the trick to getting the rings on is to swirl it, that was taught to us by the register clerk (who used to live in Duncanville and told us more than any other register clerk on the whole trip).

We headed out just in time for rush hour and had to make our way through downtown. Lea had to make a potty stop so Dan parked behind an ambulance (he couldn't get around them anyway so I suggested we just stay there). There had been a sign for a McDonald's but I couldn't find it. I saw a mom with 3 kids and McDonald's cups so I asked. The McD's was across the street and around the corner, but when I asked about a closer bathroom, she took us to the 18th floor where she must have worked. With three kids she must have sympathized. So that was the tallest potty stop we had on the trip. We were back before the ambulance moved so no one even noticed Dan was questionably parked.

Such a late start getting out of Seattle made for a really long drive, but we headed to Spokane.