{"id":33322,"date":"2022-08-01T10:17:00","date_gmt":"2022-08-01T10:17:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/hrefna.com\/blog\/?p=33322"},"modified":"2023-03-25T12:16:21","modified_gmt":"2023-03-25T12:16:21","slug":"usa-2022-seattle-day-1-glass-pop-needle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hrefna.com\/blog\/2022\/08\/usa-2022-seattle-day-1-glass-pop-needle\/","title":{"rendered":"USA 2022 – Seattle Day 1 – Glass, Pop & Needle"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

[Photos taken 01 August 2022, posted online 25 March 2023. It’s still freezing outside, it’s a bit unusual.<\/em>]<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

For our stay in Seattle<\/a>, I settled on buying the Seattle City Pass<\/a>, and using it at five attractions. The first day we thus visited 1) Chihuly Garden and Glass<\/a>, 2) Museum of Pop Culture (MoPOP)<\/a>, and 3) Space Needle<\/a>. (70-ish images total)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Monday 01 August 2022<\/h3>\n\n\n
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The view from the Seattle Space Needle.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n\n\n
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The plan for day 1 in Seattle, breakfast at Mr. West Cafe Bar<\/a> and then hanging out in the area around the Space Needle.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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The day began by waiting in line outside Mr. West<\/a> for breakfast. We decided that since there was a line, the food was probably pretty good.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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We were downtown, as evidenced by the tall buildings all around.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Finally, we caught a glimpse of the counter. It was all very hipster.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Entertaining ourselves while in line.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Finally, we got food!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Bjarki’s sandwich was ginormous!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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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.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Turns out the train to the Space Needle<\/a> 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!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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It was a sky-train! (“Monorail<\/a>“)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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We found it!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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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.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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At our first stop of the day, the Chihuly garden and glass museum<\/a>. Dale Chihuly<\/a> is a famous glass artist that now employs an army of glass blowers to fulfill his visions.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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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.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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With family members.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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It was surrounded by other smaller sea-ish works. <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Sisters enjoying the colorful sea-shaped-item ceiling. I remembered that I’d seen something like this before many years ago when it transpired that Marissa Mayer of Google-then-Yahoo fame had something similar in her home<\/a>.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Next up was this ridiculously colorful and remarkably dust-free forest of glass.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Finnur’s photo, from the other side.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Finnur photo-ing another section.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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The section. Baubles on steroids!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Family photo courtesy of the staff photographer. That’s actually taken in the room, not in front of a green screen.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Next up were two boats filled with colorful spheres, and other odd items.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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From the other side.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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In the chandelier room, with some of the sketches in the background. <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Finnur trying on a new hair-do!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Mad-scientist look!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Next up, these ginormous “shells”.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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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.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Kids got a bit hungry, so we sat down and ate some snacks. They had an air purifying gadget.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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So many pieces, making a large whole.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Outside, the Space Needle loomed.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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A tree? A sun?<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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We found a glass-blowing lady that was prepping stuff for her formal demo.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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The cafe menu was underwhelming.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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We watched a bunch of short videos about the creation of the pieces, you can find them on YouTube<\/a>. 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.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Bjarki contemplating the shell-like objects, now knowing how they were made.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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We’d learned that the chandeliers are constructed of thematic pieces that are put together by wire and eye (“need more bulk there”).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Heading towards the exit, and avoiding buying something in the gift shop.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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It turned out the lower floor of this nearby old armory is a food hall<\/a>. I was however too hungry to document the insides. It was spacious, had meh food, and was not very pretty.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Next up… The Museum of Pop Culture<\/a> Ironically, the photo is of the exit-side.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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By our next stop (this was around 2pm), the weird buildings, aka Museum of Pop Culture.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Must be fun to clean!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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We found a statue.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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After the magnificence of the Chihuly glass, this was much more subdued and almost boring. More hands-on stuff would have been appreciated.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Finnur took a better photo of the instrument tornado.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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The suit of a legend, Bjarki for reference.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Sent this legendary photo<\/a> to my hip-hop loving brother.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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In the Hendrix room<\/a>.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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There was a huuuuge Pearl Jam room<\/a>, with tons of their memorabilia.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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My old nightmare fuel in the basement.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Coffin testing.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Spooky things hanging.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Anna found a dragon.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Two hours later we’d seen enough, and escaped.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Next stop!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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We found some more sugary food, and then showed up for our entry slot of 5 pm at the Space Needle<\/a>.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Nice view to the north-ish!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Looking south-ish. We would be sailing along that coastline the following day.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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The glass walls lean outwards. It’s a little freaky to lean on them.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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The MoPop from above.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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On the lower level of the Needle, parts of the floor are see-through, and move!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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The five of us.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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By 6 pm a tired crew approached the hotel (somewhere in front of me).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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After resting a bit, we found a hotel nearby with a decent restaurant. There weren’t a whole lot of restaurants close by.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Anna showing off her pasta.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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The view at 9 pm, as we stumbled to the hotel, somewhat desperate for sleep.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Green-screen photo courtesy of the Space Needle photographer. <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[Photos taken 01 August 2022, posted online 25 March 2023. It’s still freezing outside, it’s a bit unusual.<\/em>]<\/p>\n

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. <\/p>\n

For our stay in Seattle<\/a>, I settled on buying the Seattle City Pass<\/a>, and using it at five attractions. The first day we thus visited 1) Chihuly Garden and Glass<\/a>, 2) Museum of Pop Culture (MoPOP)<\/a>, and 3) Space Needle<\/a>. (70-ish images total)<\/p>\n

Monday 01 August 2022<\/h3>\n
\n
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The view from the Seattle Space Needle.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,102],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-33322","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-us","category-usa","post-container col-md-12"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hrefna.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33322","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hrefna.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hrefna.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hrefna.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hrefna.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33322"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/hrefna.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33322\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":33406,"href":"https:\/\/hrefna.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33322\/revisions\/33406"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hrefna.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33322"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hrefna.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33322"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hrefna.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33322"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}