Pike Street & Space Needle

As promised, we visited the infamous gum wall this morning. Here's Grandpa contributing. Aunt Nancy was disgusted by the whole thing.

We happened upon this gorgeous Disney flowers. I call them that because I don't know what they are truly called (anyone know?) and they look like the kind of flowers that only exist in Disney movies.

Here they are under the Pike Place Market sign...you can't see it because I'm not fantastic at photo composition. To see both them and the sign, you wouldn't really be able to see them. They'd be itty bitty at the bottom of the photo.

After Pike Place Market they went to Seattle Center and actually went up in the Space Needle and Grandpa got some amazing shots of Seattle and Puget Sound.

Tomorrow they're heading to Renton...we'll see what they find there.

Ballard Locks

Grandpa Bob and Aunt Nancy are visiting Ranee in Seattle this week. Today they visited Ballard Locks. Above is a railroad drawbridge that is up to allow boats to pass.

Aunt Nancy is walking by the Salmon Fish Ladder that allows the fish to aclimate from the salt water of Puget Sound to the fresh water of Lake Washington.

The above tree was thought to be extinct with the dinosaurs. Scholars found an existing tree in China in 1941 and shipped the seeds to a university in the States. The University provided the seeds for this tree. The tree looks like a bunch of trunks growing together but it is actually one tree. Similar to trees Grandpa has seen in the bayous of Louisiana.

At the entrance to the botanical gardens we thought these were thistles but they are actually very beautiful flowers.

For dinner tonight we went to a Lebanese restaurant in Bellevue called Mediterranean Kitchen and had delicious food. Ranee had Shishtawook, which is chicken with a garlic sauce served over some lemon rice with a side of yummy hummus. Dad and Aunt Nancy had some prawn dish that contained tiger prawns (so big it took you 3 bites to get to the tail), artichokes, carrots and HUGE okra which Aunt Nancy diligently fished out of her dish and gave to Grandpa, cause he likes gross food like that. Aunt Nancy says it was a wonderful flavor explosion of taste. The portions were so huge we all came home with leftovers for 2 days. Hooray!

Tomorrow we're off to Pike Place Market in the morning...watch this space for fotos of Grandpa and Aunt Nancy adding to the Gum Wall!