[Photos taken 01 August 2022, posted online 25 March 2023. It’s still freezing outside, it’s a bit unusual.]
Our 2-week-long vacation to the US was a complicated one. We began by spending two whole days in Seattle to get over the worst of the jetlag. Then we spent a day traveling east to Idaho to meet up with my Stanford advisor and his wife at their second home, where we spent three whole days. We spent a day traveling to Colorado, where we spent a further five whole days with old friends, before flying back home to Iceland.
The plan for day 1 in Seattle, breakfast at Mr. West Cafe Bar and then hanging out in the area around the Space Needle.
The day began by waiting in line outside Mr. West for breakfast. We decided that since there was a line, the food was probably pretty good.
We were downtown, as evidenced by the tall buildings all around.
Finally, we caught a glimpse of the counter. It was all very hipster.
Entertaining ourselves while in line.
Finally, we got food!
Bjarki’s sandwich was ginormous!
Next we needed to travel to the Space Needle. We walked to what I thought was the local train station, i.e. where we’d arrived, which was underground.
Turns out the train to the Space Needle was is a monorail-ic skytrain! The entrance to it was on the fourth floor (not underground!), and the elevator was broken! But, we got there in the end!
We had entrance tickets for 11 am. Thankfully there didn’t seem to many people there. But I will admit that planning the entrance timings weeks in advance was daunting.
I did worry that the kids would be hopelessly bored in a glass museum, but it was just so surreal and pretty, we were all awed! This huge monster glass thing really set the tone that this was something you don’t see every day.
Next up was this ridiculously colorful and remarkably dust-free forest of glass.
Finnur’s photo, from the other side.
Finnur photo-ing another section.
The section. Baubles on steroids!
Family photo courtesy of the staff photographer. That’s actually taken in the room, not in front of a green screen.
Next up were two boats filled with colorful spheres, and other odd items.
From the other side.
In the chandelier room, with some of the sketches in the background.
Finnur trying on a new hair-do!
Mad-scientist look!
Next up, these ginormous “shells”.
What a pretty blue! You need a lot of skill to have the inside and outside colors be different, and to just keep it in one piece as it’s made, and cools.
Kids got a bit hungry, so we sat down and ate some snacks. They had an air purifying gadget.
So many pieces, making a large whole.
Outside, the Space Needle loomed.
A tree? A sun?
We found a glass-blowing lady that was prepping stuff for her formal demo.
The cafe menu was underwhelming.
We watched a bunch of short videos about the creation of the pieces, you can find them on YouTube. Afterwards, with renewed appreciation for the technical difficulties and skill involved, we went back inside to revisit the works. Emma still really enjoyed the rainbow ceiling, and wanted to document some posing.
Bjarki contemplating the shell-like objects, now knowing how they were made.
We’d learned that the chandeliers are constructed of thematic pieces that are put together by wire and eye (“need more bulk there”).
Heading towards the exit, and avoiding buying something in the gift shop.
It turned out the lower floor of this nearby old armory is a food hall. I was however too hungry to document the insides. It was spacious, had meh food, and was not very pretty.
