Well I haven't been too good at updating here so i'm backdating a little and you could probably quite fairly say, cheating, but it won't flow unless I do such a thing. Enough with the rambling anyway.

My first 2 weeks out here has been the all American experience. I went to the Seafair torchlight parade which was a lot of fun, very American, sort of like being on a movie set. Also went out of a boat for a Seafair party on Lake Washington and Lake Union. I saw the house from Sleepless in Seattle and watched the Blue Angels (like the Red Arrows) fly over the lake. I ate a large amount of junk food in the process and nearly sank the boat from the excess weight I was carrying by the end of the trip. The houses on Lake Washington are nothing short of enormous and as such I felt compelled to sing the line from Nicklebacks' Rockstar about wanting a brand new house on an episode of cribs, fro the majority of the afternoon. I think it would cost the debt of a developing country to purchase one of the said houses. It also appears to be semi normal to own a seaplane and park it up outside your house on the lake like you or I might tie up a rubber dinghy. One house took this idea a little further and built a garage for their plane for them to fly in to. I mean to park it not to crash it.

In terms of the tourist trail, I have also taken a boat to Bainbridge island accross the Puget Sound (the area that none American's tend to think of as ocean if you just see a picture of the skyline, its not). The boat ride was nice, if a little cold outside and I got some pictures of me in front of the skyline on the way back accross to Seattle. In the pictures it is hard to see where I am as the nice man who took my photo was less than gifted at photography and despite standing there for what I think might have been a period of days taking pictures the most he succeeded in capturing was a bit of me and the floor of the boat.

I took the obligatory trip up the Space Needle and was actually a little disappointed. I circumnavigated the viewing deck looked down and thought oh wow they have a lot of football stadiums here, only to realise I had in fact walked past the same thing twice.

Off the beaten track a little I took a hike up Tiger Mountain, in the pouring rain. Owing to said rain, on my reaching the summit of the mountain I had a beautiful view....of the clouds. Actually I make that sound bad, it was in fact beautifull and slightly eerie seeing the trees with the mist on them so it was nicer than if I had seen the view. Sadly what goes up most come down and where before the rain had sort of been a fun addition to my experience I was now, well some what wet and not so full of excitement at the prospect of slipping my way down a mountain with my back being watered from my hair.

On my last day before embarking on a trip to Canada for a week I seized on the nice weather to take a bus into downtown (so American) Seattle for the day. Met a pleasent stranger on the bus who talked and told me of the delights of Seattle. I have met a lot of sweet people here willing to help and chat and I have found that to be one of the nicest parts of my experience. Down in the city I wandered a long by the Puget Sound watching the boats. I got my camera out to take some shots of the distant mountains and a fisherman who I had presumed to be asleep (owing to his horizontal position on the bench and having his eyes closed) made me jump when he approached and asked whether I would like to have a photo holding his crab. I thought for a minute this was a warped euphemism and made to run, but I stuck my head in the bucket he was holding and it turned out he actually did have a crab (the size of a dinner plate). I couldn't be certain I wouldn't freak and drop the beast so I declined his offer and headed down to Pike Place Market to see the deceased edible marine dwellers which were less likely to pinch me. The market had a wonderful atmosphere, tonnes of free samples of food (which natually excited me) a lot of people bustling around and the occassional cod or haddock being thrown (a world famous trademark of the fish aspect of the market). I took in the worlds oldest Starbucks (and thus fed my newfound addiction to their banana choc smoothies) then headed back to the bus stop via the shops. It never stops alarming me how friendly people are in American shops, they want to give you their name and jump you on entrance to the store. Its a bit unnerving for a Brummie used to being ignored by Sainsburys cashiers. I caught the bus back to Issaquah and succeeded in getting of at the wrong stop and getting myself stuck. It doesn't bear a good omen for my taking a bus solo almost a 900 miles to Canada :-/