Seattle: Pike Place Market Area & the Space Needle

Recently, we visited Washington for a long weekend.

We dedicated an entire day to Seattle, primarily the Pike Place Market area. This trip was about leisure, exploration, and good food, and we were able to get all of that from this area.

Pike Place Market

Coffee & Breakfast

To start your day, wake up and get in line for the first Starbucks or for one of the many delicious pastry shops as there are too many to choose from. We got to the market around 8:30AM and got in the already very long line for La Panier. We waited for about 45 minutes , which sounds like a long wait but it went by quickly as we watched all of the market start to bustle. We got a sampling of assorted French pastries, excellent lattes, and a couple of boxes of macarons to take home.

We wandered over to a bench overlooking Elliot Bay, which connects to Puget Sound. Here we enjoyed our breakfast and watching the growing crowds of people on the outer edge of the Public Market Center.

The entire Market is constantly busy and yields an amazing people-watching venue, and by 10:00 AM on a Saturday, it is definitely crowded. Even though the area is busy, there is so much to enjoy and experience and most of the time, you won’t wait very long to do something. We definitely recommend taking your time to weave around the shop vendors and enjoy the scent and spectacular colors of fresh cut flowers.

Lunch, Cocktail Hour, Fun in the Market, & Dinner

Beecher’s Cheese is a fun way to enjoy amazing cheese and to watch it being made. We had the macaroni and cheese and it was excellent.

For cocktail hour, we definitely recommend Rachel’s Ginger Beer. They have a ton of amazing cocktails and an excellent seating area.

Fun in the Market

The Gum Wall

Before the lunch crowd arrives, wander to the other side of the Market and feast your eyes on the Gum Wall. Here, you can enjoy a different set of scents and colors as the sticky, sweet smell of thousands of pieces of chewed up gum cover every centimeter of the walls of a tucked away alley. If you are planning ahead, be sure to bring gum for each person, an instant camera, and a sharpie to leave your mark.

Bronze Pig Statues

As you’re wandering around the Market area, notice the bronze pig hoof tracks on the ground. Be sure to take a photo with the famous Rachel the Piggy Bank and any other bronze pigs you see around!

While you’re there, take time to admire the showmanship of the fishmongers, admire eclectic and handmade wares, and buy some fresh produce.

Dinner

If you like sourdough, you will LOVE Von's 1000 Spirits. It is definitely an excellent, huge bar and the cocktails are to die for, but the food blew our minds! We had the Burrata Spread with Sourdough Baguette, Spiced Fig, Prosciutto and Arugula Pizza, and the Tellicherry Chicken and Smoked Gouda Pasta. We couldn’t finish it all but enjoyed every amazing bite.

The Seattle Great Wheel

The Seattle Great Wheel is definitely a tourist attraction that’s worth it and even more so at sunset! We recommend both the Needle and the Wheel at sunset, so you’ll have to choose if you’ve only got one day, but we chose the Wheel and it was a lot of fun and the views of Elliot Bay were spectacular.

The Wheel lights up in the evenings on the weekends, but we enjoyed watching the sunset and enjoying the calm, serene view.

Seattle Space Needle

No trip to Seattle is complete without a visit to the Space Needle. It opens at 11:00 every day, so we scheduled this then, but in hindsight, we probably would have scheduled this for the sunset. You can purchase a City Pass, which gives you access to 5 different Seattle attractions including the Space Needle and the Aquarium and then your choice of 3 of the following: the Museum of Pop Culture, a Harbor Tour, the Chihuly Glass Garden, and the Woodland Park Zoo. If we were traveling with children, we might have opted for this option.

If you aren’t interested in all of those attractions, you can buy tickets (which are time-sensitive at the time of our visit) to just the Space Needle or to the Space Needle + the Chihuly Glass Gardens. You really can’t go wrong with any of these selections and if you have never seen Chihuly’s work are interested in intricately designed blown-glass art, definitely add this to your visit.

Our Space Needle experience included COVID precautions (mandatory masks and social distancing), but nothing was detracted from the experience and the precautions were done in a way that made us feel safe and was not cumbersome.

We highly recommend that you lean against the glass, face-forward, and spread out your arms when you’re outside and to watch the world below slowly spin by through the glass floor for a larger than life experience and an amazing photo-op. No matter what you do, the views are spectacular and this is truly a must-do when visiting Seattle!

Best Dive Bars in Key West

 

Key West is known for many things — sun, colorful history, and some of the best bars that someone can fit on a tiny island.

Dive bars are some of our favorite places to visit when we are looking for a drink. You get a chance to meet local people, try new activities, and feel local charm. Key West has not only amazing dives to explore but also fabulous stories that go alongside their bars. Read on for our favorites!

Capt. Tony’s Saloon

428 Greene Street

Capt. Tony’s has been many different things since it first opened in 1851 — an ice house, morgue, telegraph station, cigar factory, club, speakeasies, and the original Sloppy Joe’s. It is also home to a hanging tree, which you can check out right next to the pool tables.

In 1933, a local Key Wester, Joe Russell, turned the then vacant speakeasy into a bar. He and his friend, Ernest Hemingway, decided on the name Sloppy Joe’s and it quickly became a local favorite. In 1937, the landlord raised the rent by $1 per week and, in protest, the owner and patrons, including Hemingway, moved the entire bar to 201 Duval Street, where Sloppy Joe’s still resides today!

In 1958, Captain Tony Tarracino, a local boat captain, bought the bar and renamed it for the last time as Captain Tony’s Saloon. In the 70’s, Jimmy Buffett got his start in Key West and on the stage of Capt. Tony’s Saloon and apparently, they paid him in tips, beer, and tequila! Take a shot and hum Last Mango in Paris, the song that Buffett wrote about his experience there.

When you visit now, the ceiling is covered in bras (a mystery we did not solve, so let us know if you know why!) and stools are painted with the names of each famous person that sat on them (Truman Capote and JFK, to name a few).

If you are in Key West, you should definitely get a drink at this history-rich, quirky dive bar!

Sloppy Joe’s

201 Duval Street

Picking up where our history lesson left off… Sloppy Joe’s was reborn with the help of Hemingway and the mob of devoted patrons of Joe Russell’s bar on Duval Street and remains an incredibly popular and always busy bar today. Hemingway made the new Sloppy Joe’s his regular bar and even called himself a co-owner.

It is home to the annual Papa Look-Alike Contest, a mid-July festival of Hemingway enthusiasts crowning the person who’s appearance best resembles the great American novelist’s likeness and judged by past winners.

Sloppy Joe’s has live music, a huge bar, incredibly friendly wait staff, and walls adorned with history. It is open 365 days per year, so no matter when you visit, you will be able to come have some casual food and drinks from their huge menu!

Hog’s Breath Saloon

400 Front Street

Hog’s Breath Saloon opened in 1988 and isn’t unique to Key West, but this location definitely has its own Key West flair.

Roosters walk through the amazing outdoor seating and live music makes their incredibly tasty (and affordable!) drinks even tastier. There’s a great raw bar, a fun license plate collection, and an overall atmosphere that makes it easy to spend an entire evening here!

The Green Parrot

601 Whitehead Street

The Green Parrot is simply the quintessential Key West bar. If you are in Key West, you absolutely must dedicate an evening to this bar that boasts a music schedule that is sure to entertain anyone. It has been cited by Zagat as the Best Music/Performance Venues in South Florida, and it really is.

The walls are covered with music memorabilia, and the open-air bar lends itself to casual drinks served by no-nonsense bartenders. Take an iconic selfie next to the painting called Smirk and enjoy some fantastic music.

This bar started as a grocery store with a small space in the back for musicians to share their talent in 1890 and has become an iconic Key West watering hole that you have to experience for yourself!

The Galleon Sunset Tiki Bar

617 Front Street

Even though this isn’t truly a dive bar, I couldn’t end this post without mentioning one of the best views of Key West’s sunsets. If you want to spend an evening admiring the most beautiful sunset you will ever see and try to catch the green flash, then enjoy some drinks and live music at the Galleon Sunset Tiki Bar.

People show up hours before the sunset to stake out a great spot for viewing the final hours of the day. This is by far my favorite place to see the sunset every day, and I will bring a book and drink a few piña colavas (a twist on the original adding raspberry purée). Be sure to look up sunset times in advance and arrive early!