Yesterday the Galtex's took an elevator ride in Seattle's tallest building, the Columbia Center, to the Sky View observation deck.
The clouds parted, giving the Galtex's a rare March look at The Mountain known as Rainier.
In downtown Fort Worth, no matter how high you are, you can see no mountains.
Mr. Galtex has a blog called Glimpses on which he documents the Galtex Travel Adventures. Currently Mr. Galtex is documenting their Seattle visit.
I like Mr. Galtex's blog profile description of himself, "I am retired and do pretty much what I damn well please." I have no idea why Mr. Galtex uses a pseudonym on his blog, calling himself Mike Wegner.
A couple paragraphs I liked from Mr. Galtex's "Gone Seattle-ing" blogging....
We spent our first afternoon as we always spend our first afternoon in a new place, walking around the neighborhood. My first impressions are all good: we are in the middle of downtown, and within three or four blocks we've found a Belgian waffle shop, a gelateria, several Thai restaurants, three supermarkets, twelvety-seven coffee shops, and more fresh seafood than I could eat in a lifetime. People actually live here.
The train from SeaTac airport to downtown costs only $2.50, and it took us to within a block of our hotel. Buses and trains converge in the downtown area in a large underground tunnel, making it very easy to transfer from one line to another. A public transportation system that is logically designed and efficiently run -- it's enough to make an old Texan like me weep with joy.
I have no idea what number twelvety-seven is. But it sounds like a lot.
In the photo with the Space Needle in the background you are looking at the Alexander Calder sculpture, "The Eagle" in the Seattle Art Museum's Olympic Sculpture Park.
As you can also see, when the forecast is for clouds and rain in Seattle it does not mean for certain that is what is going to happen.
The Alexander Calder Eagle sculpture resided in downtown Fort Worth when I moved to Texas. It was displayed in front of the Fort Worth National Bank until 1999. I thought it was in front of the Bank One building, but Google tells me otherwise.
The Eagle was purchased by the Seattle Art Museum and spirited away in the middle of the night, to some local consternation, if I remember right.
Please don't tell Mr. Galtex I swiped a couple of his photos from his Flickr account where it says the photos are copyrighted with all rights reserved.
