74 hours in Seattle

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.

Snoqualmie Falls.  The small flow at the right is from an overflow tunnel.

Dan with his niece and nephew.

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.

Our rental car with the Space Needle in the background.

The Space Needle (photo by Dan's nephew).

Dan with his nephew at the Space Needle - note the reflected spire.

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.