Seattle Centre Monorail & Space Needle

We booked a 10am time slot to go up into the Space Needle so we had about an hour to kill. Fortunately, the Seattle Centre Monorail was open at 9 so we hopped on for the short ride down to the Downtown Area and back. 

The Monorail was constructed in 1962 for the Seattle World's Fair and the Alweg rail cars carry the 1950s diner look that was in fashion in those times.

My experience is that monorails are a bit boring and lame. This was no exception. There wasn't much to see and the trip didn't last long. Nice to photograph, but a bit of a waste of time & money otherwise.

Right! 10am and time to get serious!
The 184m high Space Needle was also built for the World Fair, and is a much more iconic tourist attraction than the monorail.

Once you reach the viewing deck, you are treated to 360 degree views of Seattle and beyond. The needle is perched on a hill enhancing the aspect.

Some of us had more trust in the engineering than others.

We saw a few of these Kenmore Air Turbo Otters cruising past at eye level on final approach onto Lake Union below.

Mounted in the ground floor gift shop is a minifig scale (1:40) Lego recreation of the Space Needle. An extremely well presented model.

Olympic Scupture Park

 

We were out & about early this morning because we have a lot of things to do. The weather is clear with pleasant temperatures, so we need to make the most of it. Many of the attractions don't open until mid morning so we started with the Olympic Scupture Park.

Olympic Scuplture Park is a greenspace on the banks of Elliot Bay, and just on the outsirts of Seattle's downtown area. It contains a diverse array of outdoor sculptures that are rotated in and out from time to time. At the time of our visit the following sculpures were there. 'Father and Son' (above).

One of the more striking art works was 'Echo' which has some echos of the Easter Island Moai.

This abstract one is called 'Incredible Bench'. The name is almost more abstract....

My personal favourite was 'The Eagle', that looks like a completely different sculpture depending on viewing aspect.

A large part of the charm of the park, is the setting. There is a great network of pathways to walk run or ride, and the views across Puget Sound as far as the Olympic Peninsular or magnificent.

There's no shortage of wildlife around the park. We saw a couple of grey gulls searching for their breakfast.

We were lucky to see a small pod of Harbour Porpoise.

And a noisy flock of Canada Geese were on the move.

The park is spilt in two by a rail line that is a corridor for both BNSF freight trains and the Sounder commuter train.