Seattle, Day 1

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Our flight from Portland, ME took twelve hours door to door.
There were two plane rides:
1.5 hours from Portland, ME to Washington, D.C.
5.5 hours from Washington, D.C. to Seattle, WA

There is a three hour time difference between Portland, ME and Seattle, WA. Although my daughter, Aedin and I got up before 7 AM here, it was really like getting up at 10 AM.

This morning was our first full day in Seattle. And it has been a pretty full day so far!

We started our day at Seattle’s Best Coffee, where we had the best hot chocolate that we’ve ever had. It was made with cocoa powder, soy milk (of course!), and had shaved white chocolate sprinkled on top, with a dark chocolate stick stirred in to melt. Doesn’t that sound fabulous?

We picked up our Conference registration materials this morning. Our hotel is only 8 blocks from the Seattle Convention and Trade Center. (It is also right across from the local public library, which I have not visited yet, but I do plan to visit.)

Then we walked 15 blocks from the convention center to the Space Needle. Although I am not fond of heights, Aedin and I went up the Needle. The Observation Deck is 520 feet straight up. It was a little freaky for me.

Here is an interesting fact about the Space Needle: when it opened, there was going to be a special ceremony where a local baseball player was going to pitch a baseball from the Needle’s Observation Deck. They cancelled the event when they learned that the ball was going to be traveling 130 MPH when it was caught on the ground 6.1 seconds after being pitched. It is a crime to throw any object from the Observation Deck.

Then we went to the Science Fiction Museum and Hall of Fame and the Experience Music Project. These two “museums” are in the most interesting looking building that I have ever seen. It was designed by architect Frank Gehry.

There was so much super cool stuff at the SciFi Museum …

We saw
• Darth Vader’s actual helmet
• a real model of R2D2 that was used in the original Star Wars
• Yoda
• ET
• the actual costume worn by Charlton Heston in the original (196 Planet of the Apes
• one of the robots from I, Robot
• the Alien and the equipment moving device worn by Sigourney Weaver in Aliens
• the only physical model ever made of the Death Star

In the SciFi Museum gift shop I bought my son a t-shirt that says, “Vader was Framed.”

Last, we went to the Experience Music Project, where we saw a variety of special exhibits:
• history of the electric guitar - Mr. O’D I saw a Dobro guitar!
• clothing and instruments from famous historical and contemporary musicians
• a studio where you can record yourself on a variety of tracks, then mix and burn a CD of yourself
• a special exhibit about the music of Disney, which was very interesting and especially fun for my daughter.

It was a 15 block walk back to our hotel, so we stopped and had lunch at a small French bakery, Boulangerie Nantaise. We each had soup in a bowl made of bread, so that when we were done, we had eaten everything but the spoons!

This afternoon/evening, we are going to hear a talk by some scifi/fantasy authors, R.A. Salvatore and Mercedes Lackey. And our final event of the day is the Young Adult Video Gaming Night (Tess!)

We’re having a great time.

Ms McDaniel

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