Biking Around Seattle is NOT as Easy as it Sounds!

Had a great start to the day by hitting Pikes Market for a breakfast of fruit samples and a pork how bow (pronounced hobo) at Mee Sums Pastry. It's a semi sweet bun with different fillings stuffed into them. We tried the BBQ pork, which was still warm. It had far more filling than ones I have had at the Chinese Market in Cleveland, but the same kind of flavoring. By the weekend, a line starts stretching down the sidewalk to get one.

So many different languages could be heard as we made our way through the market and back onto the streets.

Camille had a full day planned, beginning with renting bikes and heading to the Olympic Park to see the Sculpture Gardens. Biking around Seattle is not as easy as it looks. Very hilly, almost as bad as San Francisco, just longer, in some cases stretching the elevation change over a greater distance. The Sculpture Garden has some name dropping dead artists's work i.e. Alexander Calder"s The Eagle (Massive red ironwork with Needle in background) and Claes Oldenburg's Eraser (refused to take a picture of it, but think 1950s eraser with tale, this picture is from the net) to more contemporary, still living artists. Very diverse selection of artworks spanning about 50 years, including current installation and inter-active pieces. We sat and sketched the 'eye' seats, which one side is an eye facing out and the other side a sculpted seat and got a nice sunburn started. 

Next stop was the Fremont district for a little shopping/browsing and then lunch at Paseos. The Sculpture Park straddles a working railroad line and we got caught at a RR crossing to let it pass before actually getting on our way. The camera on my EVO takes great pictures, but when trying to capture moving images does some interesting re-interpretations.

After going up a couple really long hills to get to Fremont we parked our bikes and decided to walk the last long hill to Paseo's for lunch. Besides, the road was being repaved and traffic was not moving easily j Paseo's was all that it was touted to be. There was line out the door to order, with very little seating in an open air kind of set up. The line moved quickly and we were gone within 10 minutes, walking back down hill to find a place to eat it. We found a courtyard in front of a small office building and sat quite comfortably under large shady treesj, carefully unwrapping an amazing pork sandwich and a cuban black beans and rice side dish. So far, this has been the best combination of quality, taste and price. In other words, a fabulous meal. You can read more about it in Eats, Treats and Gastronomy page. 

Fremont is a self declared republic, so a statue of Lenin (NOT the musician) is not at all out of place, in a weird, (hippie???) kind of way. The sidewalks are imbedded with colorful blown/fused glass droplets, lined with an eclectic mix of local shops with a quiet, lazy afternoon atmosphere. What's not to like? We stopped at a coffee house, Fremont Coffee Company to plug in cell phones and have a cup of java. Coffee is an aesthetic experience in Seattle, including the way it is presented. Even in a paper cup,  it looks pretty.

There are over 1000 minutes in a day. One has to wonder how much is missed by the passing of a single one? Or what creates the perfect timing for any one event in life to occur? 

Camille and I were on our way back to the hostel, riding down hill on Dexter when I was nearly sideswiped by a car moving into the biking lane, obviously trying to make a right hand turn. He was close enough, that if he didn't start moving back over I was going to knock on his window. Camille's yelling may have caught his attention, because he saw me and finally moved back into his lane. I was not so lucky two blocks later. A taxi, coming in the opposite direction thought he could shoot the gap on a green light, tramped on the gas and back end flying made the cross traffic turn. Not being my bike, I could not brake fast enough, not that it would have prevented the collision. My speed of about 15 mph, coupled with his of a similar speed in opposing directions, created quite a forceful impact. My front wheel hit his front passenger door, my back wheel and frame swung around, slammed into his back passenger door and quarter panel leaving a bike shaped dent across the car. I, in the meantime, was catapulted up over the back of the car and landed on my left hip and behind. At first, I couldn't believe what happened, nor the pain in my lower body and knee. Then I felt a liquid dampening under my leg and thought OMG, am I bleeding, only to realize that a strap on my backpack had broken, slamming my water bottle into the pavement, causing it to leak. Long story short, I was able to finally get up, was taken to Harborview Trauma Center and declared bruised but not broken. You can see an indentation where my seat hit the car above the back tire.

I always have a camera with me, you never know when something really interesting will be worth photographing. This other picture is my view of the monitors and things having over my head.

Some of the thoughts passing through my mind as I waited 4 hours for other more traumatic cases to be attended to were: 

1. Is this the hospital Grey's Anatomy is based on? What can I say, McDreamy would have been a darn good sight, McSteamy too. It was definitely a more raw Grey's Anatomy. I couldn't see much with my head and body strapped to a board, but the sound affects told stories. The language flying around was not PG-13 for sure. I did catch a glimpse of a restrained, crazed young man with a mesh bag on his head. Guess he was into spitting and biting. Then there was the bloody, bare footed, incoherent young man, found wandering the streets, restrained in another bed. Every time someone would come up and do something to help him he'd scream, "YOU SUCK! YOU'RE TERRIBLE.  I could go on, but you get the picture.

2.  A cyclist was hit 2 blocks away and bled out before help could get there? There is a memorial marking the spot. One could say it's all about timing and which side of a minute you are on. 

Found that I still do not tolerate narcotics…. nausea only sleep could quiet. Did I mention we were staying at a hostel? All 23 steps up were worth the nausea to barely feel it. The bruises have bloomed and are now going away.  

Camille was riding behind me and witnessed the entire event and was pretty shaken up, too. "It's terrifying to watch your mom get hit by a car!" She couldn't believe how high I flew and was able to get up and walk . I don't quite remember that part of it, but find imagining the sight, without the trauma associated, might be kind of amusing. It all kind of seems unreal anyway.

Our day ended at about midnight, without the chance to try another one of Seattle's many diverse restaurants. Another time.