Photos: Seattle A bunch of random stuff

The rhinoceros from the previous post was used to identify one section of the parking lot at Butchart Gardens. That visit was at the tail end of my final Pacific weekend, in which I tried completing the last of my personal West Coast goals. I wasn't able to cross every item off the list, but I did come close.

The first segment of my weekend journey was a road trip to Seattle. I've always had a slanted perception of Americans, thinking they were impolite and crass. My last couple of visits to Chicago only reaffirmed those perceptions. But Seattle was different; it reminded me that in spite of the ridiculous, imperialist policies of the nation to the south, the average American is not that different from us. The few people of Seattle that I interacted with had a very Canadian personality, and the city itself felt no different than Vancouver.


Of course, I didn't anticipate getting stuck in traffic for over two hours before the border, allowing me just shy of three hours to explore the city itself. Fortunately, the border itself was uneventful, with my interrogation limited to two simple questions about my Middle Eastern travels.

On reaching Seattle, I had only a few precious hours to explore the city. All alone and with only a few handwritten notes on driving directions, I found myself lost quite quickly. After driving around in circles for twenty minutes, I finally found myself approaching downtown.



I wouldn't recommend attempting photography while driving 120km/h, but it was the only opportunity I had. Nearly all of my Seattle pictures were taken from the car.



The sky took an almost alien hue on my return. Being stuck at the border another ninety minutes allowed me to watch the full sunset against the Pacific ocean, which was an absolutely incredible sight.


Though my American sojourn was extremely short, seeing this sign was comforting; there's no place like home.


More pictures here.

I'll try to get the Victoria pictures up for tomorrow, with my closing thoughts on Vancouver and the journey thus far. I don't expect to post anything through all of Ramadhan.

Update 2007.09.15: I'm not going to write anything about the rest of the weekend, I'll just post links to my public photo galleries.
Victoria

From 2007-09-02 Do...

Wax Museum - warning: some disturbing pictures here

From 2007-09-02 Wa...

Butchart Gardens - very nice pictures here!

From 2007-09-02 Bu...