Salt Touched

I never knew that…playing hooky could be so much fun.

Neither did I.

~ Hercules

Wetdock has provided the entertainment department with a rather unusual circumstance: aside from the occasional training meeting and the coast-guard required crew drills – we have…basically nothing to do. We dutifully check our boxes every morning and usually find them empty, and then we’re sort of…on our own.

In Seattle.

Essentially we are on paid vacation. We are, for the most part, absolutely fine with that.

I was excused from my safety training this morning because I had an early morning appointment off the ship, Amras was excused because he was escorting me to said appointment. Since the appointment itself took almost an hour and a half from start to finish, it was easier to just stay out for the day then to go back ‘home’ and come back out again…so…we just started walking. The day that started with a rather dreaded doctor’s appointment (don’t worry, I’m fine), definitely improved. Breakfast was freshly made cheese & turkey croissants with chai lattes at a local bakery, it’s hard to be stressed when breakfast is that yummy.

After breakfast, Amras took my hand and walked me to the Frye Art Gallery. Free admission to five exhibits ranging from the original collection to modern day photography and 1970s social commentary style art . At first I was honestly a little concerned that this particular art gallery might not be my thing; after all I did almost flunk modern art when I was at university; but whether the particular art being displayed is really my niche or not, I will always love the feeling of an art gallery. That said, my uneasiness was put aside when the tour guide (who was lovely) turned us into the Salon, where the original collection from the founders of the museum is on display; or at least part of it. Stacked six high on the wall – the way such a collection would likely originally have been displayed – this was the art that I could talk to. Not about, it’s never really been about that for me, but to. The reason I took art history (aside from needing the credits obviously) instead of moving over to “proper” history was because it taught me about the people, not just the rulers and the battles. If you know how to read it, you can learn more from a painting than you can from a book. It’s a language that I had nearly forgotten that I know how to speak, until the tour guide walked us over to one of the paintings hanging low on the wall and asked us one basic question:

What do you see?

I didn’t speak. I’m long out of the days where I’m confident enough in my own knowledge to stick up my hand and give a solid interpretation of what a piece might be, but I did listen to the others. One girl thought it was Eve, one though that the columns on the frame were Grecian. And all the while I am looking at the painting and only one thing is going through my mind

That’s not a person, that’s not just Eve, that’s the Original Sin.

The mini-discussion went on, and suddenly I realized I was actually daring to open my mouth. Mostly in order to agree with others on things like the fact that the figure in the painting had her hair loose, which in certain styles of portraiture was a sign of sensuality especially when coupled with a direct stare at the viewer. Finally the guide pointed to the text, in German, at the bottom of the frame

This is the name of the painting: it’s simply named Sin

I blinked. I was…right? After all this time, and all the things I thought were permanently locked behind doors labeled “university” in my mind, I actually was right?

And now I just really want to go back to school…

Not the first time I’ve thought that, won’t be the last.

The other really cool thing in the gallery was an exhibit by a local artist named Stormie Webber. S/he’s a two-spirit Native American, and the photography exhibit was about the history of one of the oldest gay bars on the west coast. But it wasn’t just about that, it was about everyone who is marginalised. And it was beautiful, a mix of poetry and photography and what felt like so many other things. The stories of the stories that are left underneath when written over. And really isn’t that all we all are in the end?

From the art gallery we just…kept walking. All the way down to Pioneer Square. Despite being yummy breakfast had been light so we were somewhat on the lookout for something in the way of lunch. It was the jazz music from across the street that caught my ear, and the smell of Cajun that caught Amras’ nose. Both our heads turned to the New Orleans’ style resteraunt on the corner.

They open?

Looks like.

You’ve never had Cajun food?

I’ve never been to New Orleans! You know that!

So, this is going to be excellent

And it was. So. Good. We were the only ones in the restaurant as they were just about to close up until the evening; the owner was kind enough to let us stay without rushing us and the food was amazing. As usual, way too much for me, but amazing none the less.

Wait, are we being…normal?

Is that allowed?

I dunno!

We don’t get a lot of normal around here.

After lingering perhaps a little too long over lunch (we definitely tipped the owner for his allowing us to stay at all!) we started walking again. Eventually we ended up at the Underground tour, which I hadn’t been on since I was a kid and which Amras had never been on at all. Our tour guide – who really did look like Mr Bean – was the exact right combination of history mixed with comedian; taking a story that could have been quite dark and turning it into something that was enough to make you laugh…a lot.

The Seattle Underground came about as a result of a town that was really built in completely the wrong place. They built Seattle on a beach, with high tides, so they had huge problems with flooding, and sanitation (seriously, exploding toilets, that had to be timed with the tides or they would explode even worse!)…until in the 1880s, the entire city basically burned to the ground

We solved the problem by burning the entire city to the ground!!!

Apparently the Great Seattle Fire was really a situation where everything that could go wrong did go wrong. Someone working in a glue factory let the glue boil over, and that set that building on fire, the business above the glue factory was…a paint factory…the building next to the paint factory? Was a…hardware store

But ladies and gents this wasn’t just your modern day Home Depot…no this was a gold rush town

At this point, my mind flashes over to my tours at home that talk about this exact thing…and I mutter

How much dynamite was in it…?

That’s right! Gold rush means that the hardware store is full of dynamite, of blasting caps and black powder

So that building went up…and just in case that wasn’t enough the building next to that was a liquor store.

And of course originally all those buildings were built out of wood.

The city didn’t stand much of a chance. Eventually the fire ran out of fuel and thankfully no one was hurt but they were then stuck with having to rebuild the city. When they actually did rebuild, they raised it up using dirt from the nearby hill. The streets were raised up first and then eventually the sidewalks were built to bridge the gaps from the buildings to the streets. So almost all the sidewalks in the Pioneer Square area? They’re hollow underneath.

It’s creepy down there, and dusty and…warm. But also really interesting. Apparently certain parts of it are paranormally active, which wouldn’t surprise me considering Seattle’s history is pretty blood-stained, let’s just say I wouldn’t want to be down there on my own at night. Some of the tour was above ground, the underground isn’t completely interconnected as the streets themselves are solid; so there were so opportunities for present day references. My personal favourite?

The city of Seattle has now passed a bylaw making it illegal for Starbucks to open a Starbucks inside another Starbucks

I was one of only two people who laughed at that! Whatever, I thought it was funny!

And my other favourite:

Seriously, it was getting ridiculous. A while back there were some corners that had a Starbucks on every corner! And then two blocks away you would have a Seriously Seattle Coffee, and then a few doors down from that you’d have another coffee place WITH AN ESPRESSO CART OUTSIDE! Seattle had to legalize marijuana just to get everyone to calm the hell down!

Yup, Seattle likes its coffee.

Speaking of paranormal. We are here overnight, and Seattle does have that rather blood-soaked history, so it really isn’t any wonder that we found our way (via music stores, and book stores, and stores that displayed mummies and pin-paintings and every other thing you could think of) to Spooked in Seattle, to finish the evening off with a 90 minute ghost tour.

Yup, even away from home, you can take the girl out of the spooky town but I guess you can’t take the spooky town out of the girl…

The tour didn’t feel like over an hour. Not even close. And unlike the tours we run at home, these guys are based out of a paranormal investigation organization so the girl leading us had an ipad with her with EVP recordings and such, it was a really interesting addition. Even if the technology didn’t always do what it was supposed to do (technology and ghosts don’t’ always get along too well I’ve found). My latent sensitivity seems to have gone a bit into lockdown since I’ve had this ridiculous cold, but there was one part of the city where I was definitely not comfortable. After well over 10 years as ghost tour guide myself and a lifetime growing up in a city like Victoria, it takes a lot to shake me paranormally speaking. I have a vivid imagination but I’m not afraid of the dark (pretty sure I never really have been, though don’t’ ask me to  walk down a sketchy street at night, I call that common sense though), so sitting in a dark room, even one full of creepy dolls and mannequins shouldn’t have frightened me – but there was something about the last room we went into that had my stomach churning and my hair on end. No idea what it was, didn’t make that much known, but …something.

Having had our fill of spooks and shocks we made our weary way to the outdoor terrace of the Hard Rock Café and watched the city lights and listened to the fire crackle.

We don’t treat ourselves often, we’re both low on money and we both have much bigger things to save for…but when we do?

When we do it’s totally worth it.