Monday/ at the roastery ☕️

Here’s the scene at the Starbucks Reserve Roastery on Pike street.
We didn’t get to see the roasted coffee beans spill from the roasting barrel into the giant cooling pan, but the place was packed with tourists and locals (a guy wearing a shirt with an Amazon Web Services logo on, for example).

Coffees from Sumatra, Malawi and Viet Nam were being brewed, and we picked Malawi. (My friends that are visiting Seattle, are from South Africa).

Saturday/ setting sail 🛳️

Here’s the Norwegian Bliss just leaving the pier in Seattle and setting sail for Sitka, Alaska, shortly after 5 pm this afternoon.
She will go as far as Juneau and then to Icy Straight Point 30 miles across the Alaskan Inside Passage, before turning back to Seattle.

The Norwegian Bliss was built in 2018 and can accommodate 4,900 passengers.

Wednesday/ Mowich Lake 🏞

This morning, I dropped off the hiking party of two (my friends visiting from South Africa) at the Mowich Lake campground on the slopes of Mount Rainier.

Mowich Lake is where they will start out on Thursday morning, on the Wonderland Trail/ Northern Loop Trail for an eight-day hike.

Monday/ ferries 🚢

Happy Labor Day.

My friends and I made a round trip across Puget Sound today:
crossing with the Seattle-Bainbridge Island ferry, driving to Silverdale REI* to pick up a tent, and returning on the Bremerton-Seattle ferry.

*Outdoor recreation gear and equipment store

There’s the Space Needle and the Seattle skyline in the distance, seen from MV Walla Walla ferry that departed out of Bremerton. We made the 1.30 pm ferry— early enough and not too crowded with holiday weekend traffic returning to Seattle.

Saturday/ gearing up 🧗‍♀️

My friends are gearing up for hiking on Mount Rainier’s Wonderland Trail— and so a visit the the flagship REI store in Seattle’s South Lake Union was in order for today.

Some of the purchases: water bag and microfilter system, powdered eggs, shredded beef with beef broth in a pouch, energy bars, Mount Rainier Wonderland Trail map, waterproof compression bag (keeps clothes dry), pressure-regulated pocket-sized gas stove, isobutane fuel cartridges.

Friday/ last gasp for summer travel 🛬

Happy Friday.
This weekend is the last hurrah of summer travel for many families.
Kids in California are back in school already, and kids in Washington State go back next Wednesday.

Here’s my vantage point from a filled-to-capacity Cell Phone Parking Lot at Seattle-Tacoma International airport this afternoon. (There goes the Light Rail train, departing from the airport station).
I am wedged in between a big old Dodge Ram Off Road truck and another truck to my right, waiting for my two friends from South Africa to call from the airport.
It took longer than an hour for their luggage to appear on the baggage claim carousel, and it was TWO hours after they had landed, when I finally picked them up at the curb outside the arrivals hall.

Friday/ summer’s winding down ⛵️

Happy Friday.
The weather forecasters say this weekend will be the last of this summer’s warm weather—  88 °F/ 31 °C in Seattle on Sunday.

Sailboaters participate in the weekly Duck Dodge on Lake Union in Seattle on Tuesday.
The Duck Dodge is a loosely organized regatta (held on Tuesdays in summer) where sailboats of every size, speed, and soundness gather to raise their sails, and a few adult beverages too. [Photo by Luke Johnson / The Seattle Times]

Wednesday/ at the museum ⚔️

The National Nordic Museum is a museum in the Ballard neighborhood of Seattle, dedicated to the Nordic history, art, culture, and the heritage of the area’s Nordic immigrants.

Here are a few pictures that I had taken inside of the museum, and of items on display.

Monday/ clear enough 🌝

The surface smoke from the wildfires in Canada and the Pacific Northwest that hung over the city on Sunday, had cleared enough by Monday morning so that the amigos could go out and play a little pickle ball.

Sunday/ at the zoo 🐻

These creatures are all from Seattle’s Woodland Park Zoo.
The zoo opened 124 years ago, in 1899.

Top to bottom: Grizzly bears, Langur, Gray wolf, Canadian lynx, Kookaburra, Asian small-clawed otter, Western Low-land gorilla, Jaguar, Toco toucan, White-naped crane, Reticulated giraffe, Hippopotamus, African lion, River otter.

Saturday/ Seattle Center ✨

Here is a smattering of pictures that I took at Seattle Center: from the Space Needle, from inside the Chihuly Garden and Glass and from inside the Museum of Pop Culture.

Happy Friday ☀️

Happy Friday.
Cool marine air pushed in from the Pacific Ocean this morning, and made for a beautiful day (78 °F/ 26 °C).

Picture posted by Chris Daniels@ChrisDaniels_TV on X.

Sunday/ sunny and warm ☀️

It was warm today, and it will remain warm until Thursday (highs up to 92 °F/ 33 °C).
Granted: residents of the South or places like Phoenix or Las Vegas are allowed to say ‘Yeah— that’s not warm’.
Phoenix had seen highs of 110 °F/ 43 °C for 18 days straight, this summer.

Black-eyed Susans (Rudbeckia hirta ‘Irish Eyes’) from a P-patch here on 20th Avenue in Seattle’s Capitol Hill neighborhood.

Wednesday/ fire truck lights 🚒

It was Seattle Night Out last night— an annual event that encourages neighbors to meet each other, and to increase neighborhood support in anti-crime efforts.

Young admirers (and a few older ones) checking out a fire truck from the Seattle Fire Department that had stopped by in the block next to mine, for Seattle Night Out.