Dan & I took a few days off to visit his brother and family in Seattle. This was our first trip via airline since February 2020 and first trip to the Pacific Northwest. More on the specifics of getting from here to there and back later in this post.
I’ve long
been interested in visiting Seattle. The
area has a marked Native American influence; indeed, the city’s name derives
from Chief Si'ahl
of the Squamish and Duwamish tribes.
Seattle’s reputation took something of a hit over the past year in the
wake of protests over the murder of George Floyd – but the area has a long
history of civic involvement and protests so the events last year should have
come as no surprise.
The weather
was cooperative although somewhat hotter than is common for the area. During our first day, there was a pronounced
haze over the local skyline from wildfires in British Columbia. Over the following two days the haze mostly
cleared but remained noticeable, and the temperature cooled.
Dan’s
brother and sister-in-law were working the first day. So, Dan’s nephew and niece were our tour
guides as we headed to Snoqualmie
Falls. The area was
prominently featured in Twin Peaks, but I never watched. Like much of Washington State, the hills and
sheer number of trees is breathtaking and make for an interesting drive, and
the vistas are impressive to say the least.
The following day, Dan’s brother guided us around Seattle proper. We found the area to be vibrant, with crowds tending to be younger than we would have seen in New York or London, to say nothing of Cleveland.
On an
unrelated note, I’ve never seen so many man buns
in one place as in Seattle. They seem to
have gone out of fashion everywhere else, but here it appeared every second
male under 40 had one.
Nearly 60
years old, the Space Needle remains an
impressive sight. Despite my vertigo, we
went to the top and enjoyed the panoramic view of Seattle’s skyline, Puget
Sound, and the snow-capped Mt. Rainier beyond.
From there, we walked to Pike place Market where I found the ritual fish-throwing to be in questionable taste. But accustomed to seeing ancient looking Gloucester fishermen, I was again impressed with how young the fish throwers were.
By then we were a bit tired from walking and took a Lyft with the nicest driver back to our rental car.
The next
day was rather a sad one as we had to say our goodbyes and make our way to the
airport. We look forward to visiting
Seattle again once the travel situation has stabilized.
A Tale of Four Airports
Clevelanders
love to complain about our main
airport, Hopkins, but I’d rate it highly based on our experiences at
the four airports we visited. As
advised, we arrived three hours before flight time and were checked-in and
through security within a half-hour. With
plenty of time to kill before our flight and not having had lunch, we stopped
at Bar Symon where I enjoyed a fine burger that reminded me how much I miss B-Spot. The main problem with Hopkins is that it is
underutilized, with one terminal completely closed since United closed its hub
here in 2014. Moving
Burke’s traffic to Hopkins and redeveloping that airport into
something more suitable for valuable lakefront property would solve both
problems at once. But I’ve already
discussed that in 2015
and 2016
and won’t belabor the point here.
The nadir
of our airport experiences was, of course, O’Hare in
Chicago. The problems with
that airport are well known and I won’t go into excruciating detail. Although there are places to eat aplenty, the
quality of those “restaurants” is low and indistinct compared with Hopkins’
small but superior selection. (It’s
worth noting many of O’Hare’s food vendors were closed due to the
pandemic.) The men’s room I used was
filthy. The lack of attention extended
to a rude Jersey Shore
type couple who pawed each other while walking around unmasked. Our experience in O’Hare is encapsulated by
what I saw while waiting for our Alaska Airlines flight to leave the gate: the
baggage handler was roughly throwing tagged baggage from the plane onto a
ramp. Small wonder our bag arrived
damaged with the TSA approved lock broken.
Seattle-Tacoma Airport is far more user
friendly than Chicago. Despite being
spread over six concourses (two of them accessed by train), signage makes it easy
to navigate, and the airport is very clean.
I was able to retrieve my bag (wherein I discovered the damage) and grab
a bus to the car rental facility in short order. For our return flight, we again arrived well
in advance of boarding (which turned out to be delayed), went through security
in about a half-hour despite a long line, and relaxed at Dungeness Bay Seafood
House in the South Terminal.
Our
original plan was to return to Cleveland via Las Vegas with Spirit Airlines
(the tickets were purchased well before the cancellation
meltdown that crippled Spirit the first week in August). Unfortunately, the second leg of that trip
was cancelled, but we opted to keep our reservation with Spirit for the first
leg. Despite the widely reported
problems with Spirit, our experience with the flight crew was excellent – and
they had a thankless job dealing with the improperly and unmasked along with a
child’s temper tantrum.
Our layover
in Las Vegas was hectic. As in Seattle, McCarran International Airport is spread
over a large area – having grown from a much smaller airport since it was
originally built in 1942. Naturally,
there are casinos in the airport. Since
we were going from Spirit to another airline, we had to go to another terminal
and go through security - again. What
little security there was had to concentrate on processing passengers. Mask mandates were not enforced, and we were
relieved to board our next plane.
The rebooked
second leg of our return flight was on Delta with a further connection at Minneapolis-Saint Paul. (While there, I did not have time to visit
the Larry Craig
toe-tapping restroom.) Delta
is not a huge player in the Cleveland market, but the few times I’ve flown
them, I’ve been impressed with their unflashy competence. Delta got us home to Cleveland in one piece
and I plan to use them more often when feasible. Once we were safely in Cleveland and at the
parking facility, I realized I had mislaid our parking ticket, which I should
have left in the car. The parking
attendant was able to resolve the issue by getting my outgoing flight information,
which I still had on my phone. So a big
shout-out to Park Place on
Snow Road.
We were home by noon, Monday. Dan had to work that night so I sent him to bed. After a quick trip to the post office to retrieve our held mail, I passed out on the family room sofa.
