It was time to do the city again, in pictures:
G was curious. So was I. Curious enough to wander through the thick Saturday morning crowd to see what was in the back of the store.
Seattle is spooky. Spooky Seattle. It doesn't try hard to be, it just is....
And in the back of the store, there is not one, but two dead people. G said she wasn't scared, but could not stop staring, and holding our hands tight. Stare, squeeze, stare some more......squeeze some more.
Time to leave the spookiness behind for a bit, and do a little cruising.
On the Good time 2 to Tillicum Village on Blake Island. There, they have a traditional Native American Longhouse, and serve a Salmon dinner with a performance. Seattle Spooky, but with different kinds of spirits. Spirits with stories to be told. I had been there twice as a child, and it was time to expose G to the history, and put a memory in her head of something very Seattle.
The ride was choppy in the strong April wind as we left the city behind. It was going to be a stark contrast, trading the energy of the streets for a 50 minute boat ride to a lonely little Island.
After we docked, as we disembarked, we were each handed a steaming hot mug full of clams. G had never had clams right off the shell before, and she was excited to try, so we sat and dug in.
Slurp, slurp.
She likes it. So much, that she downed the broth it sat in. Mmmm. Clam breath. : )
We are told to get rid of the clam shells by throwing them on the ground. The paths that wind through the front lawn of the Longhouse are littered with years and years of shell remains. Somewhere in that pathway are the shards of mine and my brothers clam remains, where we did the same as children, and now G 's are mixed in there with them. That makes me smile.
G and her new buddy, Frank.
The grounds of the village house works of art. Blake Island is but a stones throw away from the Island we live on, a sister Island, yet they are worlds apart. It flies under the radar. You'd almost never know it's there.
Beautiful Longhouse.
Inside, our meal was cooking.
We were ushered into the Longhouse and treated to a large buffet. I have to say, the food was delish. Usually, when I hear the word "buffet", I am instantly disappointed since I have very rarely been to a tasty buffet.
The star of the food show. What a show off.
G waiting for her hunk.
Tasty dish. And the service was very friendly, too.
And then it was time for dessert and the show. It was different than I remember, but we all enjoyed it very much.
After the show, G had a little conversation with Bird. "Do you like Justin Bieber?" she asked. "Who is your favorite girl singer? Taylor Swift? Selena Gomez? Taylor Swift is mine, I like Taylor Swift." she says. Bird just shrugs his shoulders.
Then we have about 40 minutes to go explore the Island before being sent back to the city.
There is a hunter hiding on the beach. Just like Where's Waldo, he wears stripes but is much, much meaner.......
And just like that, the tour is over, and it's time to go.
Thank you, Tillicum Village, I am sure we will be back. Maybe I will be holding my grand children's hands by then, keeping tradition, we'll see. One can hope.
And then it was back to the city. We asked Dwight where we should go. He totally ignored us. Rude.
We couldn't talk ourselves onto the great wheel, so off to the market we went.
I was in need of four things: A soy sauce dispenser, ground chili pasilla pepper, these guava or lychee hard candies in a green wrapper I couldn't pronounce, but wanted a boat load of, and a large loaf of braided Challah. We were on a mission.
One thing about Pike Place and Seattlelites. Rain stops no one. A rainy Seattle Saturday was no different than a bright sunny Saturday. It was packed inside.
So, first things first: Pasilla pepper. We went to four different spice stores before we found some very overpriced powder that barely passed my inspection. Done.
We tried some other stores to track down those hard candies, but couldn't find them, and no one knew what they were as I could only describe the packaging. We did find a soy sauce dispenser, though. Check, check. As G sat and worked on an ice cream cone, I wandered a bit and lo and behold my eye spied that little lime green packaging poking out of a strange iron bin off to one side of one of the vendors counters. On closer inspection it was a bag full of those crazy little candies I lusted after. Word. I bought the whole bag and now I have 350 pieces of sweetness for my office candy. And, I found out they were Guava, and I don't even like Guava. It's amazing what a little artificial sweetening can do. ; )
After we passed hula hooping, harmonica playing, backwards guitar strumming, singing guy, the grey sky turned brown, then storm blue, and opened up it's late Saturday revenge. A hail of all hail storms. It made a lovely memory of hiding under the eaves of Seattle amongst strangers with smiling faces.
And, that braided Challah was found at that gorgeous very French bakery. It was made into this mornings french toast with cherry compote. A fine way to savor the city the day after.
And our city adventure ends, but not without the city pushing itself a little farther into G's country girl heart.
That country girl may not be a country girl after all.
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