An old friend visits

My good ole' friend Mike Carson paid us a visit back in July. He arrived here in Seattle just in time to stay at our new apartment. Which worked out great because the new apartment has 2 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms. Where as our former apartment in Fremont just had one each and was much much smaller and more expensive (that pay more for less attitude).

Well, Jenn and I gave Mike the full Seattle tour. First off we went to Pike place market, saw some flying fish, ate a good lunch and then had to rush home to meet up with the cable guy. Aahh, but the next day Mike got to experience the Seattle bus system, Top Pot donuts (yummmy), ride the ducks, tour the Sci Fi musuem (EMP(they had the Jim Hensen's muppet show up, very cool)), and then see a movie on the imax screen. Man that was a long day.

So to slow the pace down a little Jenn and I took it easy on Mike. First up was a nice walk down to breakfast. Where we then tried to take Mike out with a heartattack by making him walk back to the apartment up the seriously steep hill (Mike lives in flat land Woodland, CA, but that hill is steep). After letting Mike catch his breath Jenn gave Mike the grand city tour. We drove all over Seattle showing him the different neighborhoods. We then ended up at Volunteer Park. This lovely park designed by Olmstead, houses the Asian Art Museum. This museum is a great 1930' piece of architecture and even has some interior gates made by Samuel Yellin. Mike and I spent most of our time checking out the gates in the museum. Also in Volunteer Park is a green house, where I snapped a couple of photos from.

The next day we all went to see the Harry Potter Movie (good flick). After the movie we got some lunch in Ballard and headed over to Golden Gardens. It was a nice windy day and luckily I brought the kites to fly. Murphy's Law reared its ugly head causing one of the kites strings to be a huge knot ball. I got that ball untangled, after about an hour or so and we were up and flying. After we all dive bombed each other with the kites we headed out to the beach for a bit and then drove on over to the Ballard Locks. One of the locks was working and we saw some boats go on through. There were even some salmon running, very cool to see. After that we drove on home and did some BBQ'ing.

On Mike's last day we were able to go on the Seattle underground tour. I hadn't done that yet and was looking forward to it. It was a blast. Both Mike and I enjoyed it immensely. I will have to take Jenn on the tour, hopefully the adult version, where you get all the dirty stories along with some alcoholic drinks.

All in all Mike had a great time and we both enjoyed having him visit.