On our way to Vancouver for some caching, we decided we did want to go and we ordered our free tickets while driving down I-5. We were official and now we just had to wait for the day to get here.
That afternoon I went and grabbed Bev around 2:00 and we headed north to Seattle. I had to stop by the ATM for some money for parking. We got to Seattle without any trouble or bad traffic. I've been this way so many times in the last year I didn't even need to use my GPS. We parked at the parking lot closest to EMP just because I know how to get in and out of there fairly easy. I paid for parking and we started looking for caches in the area. I took her to the one at PBS first. It was part of the Dinosaur Train series which is a kids show played on PBS. We had no trouble finding this one. It did change since I was here last.
I took her to the next one, Under the Needle, near the fountain in front of the Key Arena. I was hoping it was still there because it is a tricky one to grab and put back with all the people wandering around nearby. I couldn't remember which bench it was exactly but we found it quickly. We took a few pictures before we walked to the next cache.
We walked around Key Arena and grabbed Stormy Normy, a micro cache on the side of the building roughly shoulder height. We found it quickly and we were not seen by any muggles.
One Degree: Sciuchetti was the next available traditional cache a few blocks from where we were. We had a nice pleasant walk to the parking garage. This wasn't the first time we've found one on the top floor of the parking structure. This one was underneath a lamp skirt and it had a great view of the Sound to the southwest. We walked back down and we both decided that it was dinner time. I told Bev about Dick's, which is just down the street, on Queen Anne, from where we were. She was like, sure, let's go for it.
She couldn't believe how cheap everything was. I told her there were many locations near Seattle and one in Spokane, we frequented that one a lot while we were in high school, she wondered why she's never been to one before. I ordered two cheeseburgers, she got one, we shared the french fries and she had a root-beer and I had a coke. It hit the spot. She was very excited that the fries were homemade. We finished up and walked back to the Seattle Center. I took her inside the Armory, to look at a piece of the Berlin Wall and to just hang out until it was time to get in line. We figured it would be okay to jump in line around 5, just because we didn't know how many people are actually coming to the event.
We made our way over to the Science Center and instantly we saw a couple that we've seen before. It was the Dutchgoers. I haven't interacted with them since the Ring of Fire cache event in Montesano May 2012. We chatted with them for a while since they wouldn't let us in until 6 p.m. sharp. A Magellan rep joined us a while later. While hanging out by the entrance, when the Magellan guy, Jeff's phone went off. He asks, you all wanna go for the FTF that just published? We followed him and made it to GZ and saw a group of people hanging out signing the log. I don't know if it's a co-FTF or not but it was fun to find a new one in Seattle at the coolest event in town! On the return, we noticed a group of people on our way to the FTF, by the rock wall. I wondered if this was one of the puzzle caches. Sure enough it was, we grabbed Word Freak to add to our collection of found caches for the evening. We got back in line and we were at the front. We told more stories until it was time to be let into the Science Center.
We walked through the outside part of the center and into the laser dome area. I reminisced about all the times I came here while in Girl Scouts. We would come here every year and spend the night inside for our Camp-In. The one thing I remembered were the chicken sandwiches and Ding Dongs they gave us for dinner and camping in sleeping bags near the Planetarium. We walked into the building and immediately signed the logbook and saw the caching in space patches. I didn't have anymore cash on me so Bev bought me a patch along with hers.
We wandered the area and noticed a coloring station. We sat down and colored a signal hat. Many other people joined in. We ended up talking to Ohjoy for a bit while we waited for the laser show to begin.
Picture from Jim_Carson's log.
We talked to a few more people we knew, used the restroom and made our way to the laser dome to watch the show. We found some seats and that's where we remained through the entire thing. The guy sitting next to Bev started singing the songs from the laser show, hilarious!
The itinerary for the evening:
6:00-Social time and exhibits
6:40-Event welcome
6:45-Google hangout with the owner of the TB going into space
6:55-Space themed laser show
7:25- Intermission
7:35-Geocaching videos in laser dome
7:50-Geocaching Co-Founder, Jeremy Irish
8:00-Google hangout with world wide events
8:10-Prepare for rocket launch with play by play
8:25-Q&A
The laser show was pretty cool. It showed some Star Wars stuff, lots of fun music from Top Gun and Elton John's Rocket Man rocked the laser dome.
Picture from Moun10Bike's log.
Afterwards, they had us on Google hangout with other events going on in the world simultaneously. There were events in Australia, Canada, Germany and other parts of the US. It was pretty cool until the feed stopped working. Then we moved onto videos and chatting with our neighbors.
Then it was time for the launch. I have actually seen a launch on TV or in real life. This was pretty cool. Before, during and after the launch we had a person tell us what was happening and why.
It didn't take long for the rocket to leave our atmosphere and enter space. It was pretty awesome to watch. This has been the event of the year so far. They thanked us for attending and we made our way back to the car but decided to grab a hot chocolate and warmed flavored milk before actually walking back to the car. It hit the spot.
It didn't take us long to get home, a little more than an hour. I dropped off Bev and went home. I logged our finds from earlier in the day and then went to bed. It was an awesome day.
Next Adventure: An Eatonville "Traveling" Cache
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