Seattle Still Rocks

A city of youthful vigor, Seattle never fails to put a bounce in my step. Sure, the place has suffered hits: a magnitude 6.8 earthquake, the dot-com bust, the departure of Boeing aircraft, anti-globalization riots. But none of this--at least that I could detect--seems to have shaken its self-reliant spirit, perhaps a heritage of its not-so-distant pioneer past. I returned recently for a long weekend, and the mood seemed as upbeat and full of fun as ever.

I’m an urban dweller, and I love big cities. I keep coming back to Seattle for its unique blend of cultural riches and rugged outdoorsiness. As hip as any American metropolis, it reaps the good fortune of a near-wilderness setting, blessed by both a beautiful seascape and snow-tipped mountain ranges east and west. Gleaming skyscrapers soar above its busy streets, but the views from almost anywhere are so magnificent that I keep thinking I’m in a national park.

Its residents must feel the same way. Seattle’s uniform, most days of the year, is the parka, the kind experienced hikers don for mountain treks. I wore mine, as did (or so it seemed) every other person I saw. Guidebook writers have called Seattle “a base camp for outdoor recreationists,” a jumping-off place for sea and mountain adventures, which perhaps accounts for the prevailing attire. Note, too, that North Face, Eddie Bauer, REI and Patagonia all operate cavernous outdoor-wear marts here.

One city center shop called Coldwater Creek, at 1511 5th Ave., has managed to bring the outdoors in. Meandering across the floor from one end to the other is a rushing stream (covered by clear plastic to prevent customers from falling in). It bubbles up from below like a fresh spring, and at the end of its course it spills back through the floor, forming a splashing waterfall for shoppers on the basement level. It’s a happy little boost--Mother Nature style--to anyone’s mood.

I walk in a national park, so I walk in Seattle, a compact city that rewards those who explore on foot. Like San Francisco, the city is draped across high hills that here drop steeply down to the waterfront on Elliott Bay and Puget Sound beyond. On the far shore, the 7,000-foot peaks of the Olympic Mountains thrust above the clouds. In the forefront, ferries scurry in and out of the bay, and behind them oceangoing freighters rest at anchor.

The hills add challenge to any sightseeing outing. I tackled them as I would any mountain trail--slowly and steadily. The air here has a crispness to it, a mix of tangy sea and icy mountain, that encourages activity. Not too hot in the summer. Not too cold in the winter. (Snow is infrequent.) True, overcast days are common; the sky dripped part of every day of my October stay. Parka-clad, I ignored the drizzle like almost everyone else and continued walking.

My wife, Sandy, was sent here to moderate a panel of insurance executives reflecting on the terrorist events of Sept. 11. I was eager to keep her company on our first post-tragedy flight and to help her check out some of the innovative restaurants earning rave reviews in the food magazines to which she subscribes.

For four nights we dined exquisitely on Northwest-style seafood. Interestingly, despite the terrorism-caused drop-off in business and leisure traffic, each of the restaurants was packed. My favorite was Etta’s Seafood, where decor, clientele and menu are contemporary. Sandy ordered the black sea bass, served with fingerling potatoes and a four-mushroom sauce ($25). I went for the baked ling cod on a bed of savoy cabbage and lentils ($21). For dessert we shared a slice of cranberry upside-down cake, made with newly harvested Washington state berries and topped with white chocolate ice cream and an orange sauce ($7).

I also was eager to see the dramatic new Frank Gehry-designed building housing the city’s rock ‘n’ roll museum, which opened in June 2000 as the Experience Music Project. It celebrates rock icon Jimi Hendrix, a Seattle native, and grunge, another local phenomenon. The museum, built by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, sprawls at the foot of the soaring Space Needle. When I asked for directions, a street vendor pointed toward the Needle and told me to look for “the big blue blob beneath.” Uh-oh, somebody was not happy with Gehry’s work. Would I be?

As I discovered on earlier trips, the city has become a center for fine handcrafts of all kinds--contemporary pieces by local artisans, traditional Northwest Native American woodcarvings and international folk art--displayed in a profusion of galleries. This is the sort of art that interests me most, so gallery gazing was high on my list of activities while Sandy attended her meetings.

What I hadn’t realized until I started exploring is that art glass has become Seattle’s latest crafts craze. The city reputedly ranks second only to Venice, Italy, in its number of glass-blowing studios. Block after block, galleries filled with colorful abstract glass creations form a sort of extended museum. One must-see shop is the Glasshouse Studio, which doubles as a glass-blowing workshop. Another was the Foster/White Gallery, which displays the work of Dale Chihuly, the city’s leading glass artist. Both are in historic Pioneer Square in a cluster of galleries.

The first all-glass artwork to catch my eye was a cylindrical tower of scrambled tubes in a vibrant rainbow of hues. It dominates the lobby of the Alexis, the boutique hotel we first enjoyed on a prior trip. While Sandy registered us, I circled the glass tower, a bit baffled but delighted by the odd, whimsical beauty of the giant sculpture. Before the day was out, I learned it was created by Tacoma-born Chihuly, who is credited with inaugurating Seattle’s love affair with glass when he opened a glass-art school in 1971. Down the street, Chihuly’s spectacular cascading chandeliers, two 25-foot sculptures all in white, adorn Benaroya Hall, home of the Seattle Symphony.

Complementing the city’s creative spirit is its support of the performing arts. Local officials claim the Puget Sound region ranks third in the nation in its number of professional theaters, behind New York and Chicago. When I was here, the hot ticket was an acclaimed production of “Macbeth” by the Seattle Shakespeare Company. Night owls might want to catch the popular Market Theater at Pike Place Market, which features improvisational comedy. The Seattle Opera is one of only a few opera companies that produce Richard Wagner’s complete “Ring of the Nibelungen,” a part of its annual summer season.

And Seattle knows, and enjoys, the little pleasures of life. Years ago, on a first visit, I was amazed at the number of espresso bars and fine pastry shops. Even department stores featured sidewalk coffee bars in front of their display windows, a charmingly civilized gesture, I thought at the time. I still do, even though Seattle by now has dispatched its coffee culture to seemingly every corner of the country.

Municipal overseers who decide these things have rated Seattle as one of America’s most livable cities, and I don’t doubt it. Take a stroll up Broadway toward the Capitol Hill neighborhood (a misnomer, since Olympia, not Seattle, became the state capital). It’s an interesting mix of ethnic cafes, cozy pubs, delis, bookstores and boutiques in an area of fine homes. But as you approach East Harrison Street, keep your eyes on the sidewalk. Embedded in the pavement, as quirky works of art, are bronze dance-step charts. Place your feet over the footsteps, hum a proper tune and you will be dancing in the streets. On the west side of Broadway it’s the mambo; on the east, a foxtrot. A city indulging in whimsy like this is a livable city.

Seattle’s first settlers, numbering 22, arrived in 1851 by coastal schooner from Portland, Ore. Acquiring land from friendly Puget Sound Indian tribes (whose chief, Seathl, gave Seattle its name), the early entrepreneurs established a flourishing lumber trade, selling to a rapidly growing San Francisco.

A wood pathway down which fallen trees were skidded from hilltop forest to sawmill became what is thought to be the original “Skid Road,” a name later corrupted to “Skid Row” when the neighborhood went on the skids. Gallery-dotted Yesler Way in Pioneer Square approximates the original log slide.

The Klondike gold rush of 1897-98, sparked by the arrival in port of a ship carrying a legendary “ton of gold,” gave Seattle its first big boost. Thousands of gold seekers poured into the frontier town to be outfitted for the trip north to Skagway, Alaska, and onward to the Yukon Territory in Canada. The story is well told in Pioneer Square’s Klondike Gold Rush National Park, a small museum presenting “Dreams of Gold,” a thoughtful film detailing the event.

Seattle thrust itself again into national attention when it staged the successful World’s Fair of 1962, which bequeathed the city the 607-foot-high Space Needle. The fair is also credited with spurring action to rescue the business center from the decline that afflicted many American cites. Today the downtown, a cluster of upscale department stores and malls around Pine Street and 5th Avenue, ranks as one of the country’s most exciting urban shopping complexes. In a compact area, shoppers have a choice of department stores--Nordstrom, the Bon Marche, Barneys--plus a large supporting cast of trendy boutiques, chain clothing stores, galleries and cafes. All are invitingly displayed in a couple of atrium malls rising above tree-lined streets and squares adorned with fountains and outdoor artworks.

After our midday arrival, Sandy had the rest of the afternoon off. So we set off quickly--on foot, of course--to see some of the highlights she would otherwise miss. For four days we walked everywhere, day and night. As the tourist, I found plenty of good restaurants, shops, museums and other attractions to keep me entertained within comfortable walking distance of the Alexis and most other major downtown hotels. The Legacy, a first-rate gallery of local Native American art, is next door to the Alexis.

First stop for us was Pike Place Market. Sprawling, crowded, friendly and aromatic, it is a welcome relic from a less packaged age. Roughly two square blocks in size, it is packed with stalls selling fresh fish, produce and flowers, as well as inexpensive crafts. Street musicians serenade with Mozart airs, and out front a life-sized bronze pig, called Rachel, is a sample of Seattle’s rich trove of public art.

On the way to the rock museum, we first took a quick look inside the neighboring Pacific Science Center (adults $8). Sandy enjoyed the Tropical Butterfly House; I got a kick out of playing a video soccer game in which I jumped, darted and crouched to defend my goal. Kids seemed fascinated by the giant tic-tac-toe game. The X’s and O’s are so heavy that they have to be moved by a giant robotic arm. Each player gets a lever to operate the device.

In contrast to the Science Center’s hands-on fun, the rock music exhibits at the Experience Music Project (adults $19.95; discounts for seniors, military and children) seemed tedious, and I sort of slogged through Seattle’s rock heritage halfheartedly. Dim lighting, small, tightly packed rooms and ear-blasting sound effects eventually proved too claustrophobic, and we escaped back to the welcome outdoors. As for architect Gehry’s free-flowing metallic structure--a multicolored, yes, “blob” of swirls and whirls--I have my doubts. Though his abstract museum designs win raves in the architecture world and I’m open to the new and unusual, this one already seems outdated and tacky.

We hurried off to dinner at Etta’s, which rescued us from this modest disappointment

On subsequent days I roamed on foot alone from museum to gallery to offbeat neighborhood. At the Seattle Art Museum ($5) I got a lesson in the Native American art of the Northwest Coast. On display were historic hand-carved wood totem poles, masks and canoes. The most curious object was an 1880s ermine hide shirt, made of 100 skins and once worn by a Tlingit Indian named Chilkoot Jack. On the waterfront, the Seattle Aquarium ($9) features Pacific Northwest sea life, including an adorable community of sea otters performing a playful underwater ballet.

In the International District I wandered the aisles of Uwajimaya, a massive Japanese food market stocked with exotic Asian vegetables. On the way to Capitol Hill I paused at REI’s flagship store (222 Yale Ave. N.), dubbed the “Disneyland of outdoor gear” by local folks. There I watched climbers inching to the top of one of the world’s tallest indoor climbing walls. One afternoon I browsed the shelves of the Elliott Bay Book Co. (101 S. Main St.), a cozy bookstore with easy chairs tucked into a dozen nooks and crannies. To escape a brief squall, I stepped inside Fado, an Irish pub (801 1st Ave.), where a trio of musicians played folk tunes before a warming fire.

At the end of each day Sandy joined me for dinner. After Etta’s, we tried the Dahlia Lounge, also a favorite. We both ordered the grilled king salmon, served with sweet-and-sour pumpkin ($24), which proved the place hasn’t lost its touch. The next night we dined on grilled mahi-mahi with a soy and ginger butter sauce ($17.80) at the Flying Fish. Our final night, we invited a couple of Sandy’s convention colleagues to join us at the Painted Table at the Alexis. Here the hit dish was herb-basted salmon on a bed of roasted artichokes ($25.50).

The meal would have been a fine ending to a most satisfactory visit, but one more Seattle treat awaited us. I picked up a rental car, and we boarded a Puget Sound ferry en route to a drive down the Washington and Oregon coasts. For four days we had admired the Olympic Mountain views across the sound. On the Bremerton ferry, we caught sight of the similarly thrilling Seattle skyline disappearing in our wake.

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Guidebook: A City to Savor

Getting there: Alaska and United airlines have nonstop flights (about 21/2 hours) from LAX to Sea-Tac (for Seattle and Tacoma) International Airport, and Southwest and America West offer direct (no plane change) and connecting service, respectively. Round-trip fares start at about $180. A rental car is not necessary if you are staying in the city center. You can walk most places, and taxi and bus services are good. The one-way taxi fare from the airport to most downtown hotels is about $35 with tip. The Airport Express Bus, (206) 626-6088, www.graylineofseattle.com, charges $8.50 one way, $14 round trip.

Where to stay: On our two most recent visits, we checked into the charming 109-room Alexis Hotel, 1007 1st Ave. (at Madison Street in downtown Seattle), (800) 426-7033 or (206) 624-4844, fax (206) 621-9009, www.alexishotel.com; double rooms $160-$335.

Other excellent choices in smaller hotels include the 189-room Hotel Monaco Seattle, 1101 4th Ave. at Spring Street, (888) 454-8397 or (206) 621-1770, fax (206) 621-7779, www.monaco-seattle.com, from $315 double; the 70-room Inn at the Market, 86 Pine St., (800) 446-4484 or (206) 443-3600, fax (206) 728-1955, www.innatthemarket.com, doubles $190-$265; and the 76-room Hotel Vintage Park, 1100 5th Ave., (800) 624-4433 or (206) 624-8000, fax (206) 623-

0568, www.hotelvintagepark.com, $235-$285 double.

For less expensive lodgings, try the well-kept Sixth Avenue Inn, a downtown motel at 2000 6th Ave., (800) 648-6440 or (206) 441-8300, fax (206) 441-9903, www.sixthavenueinn.com; doubles $99-$159 depending on season.

Where to dine: We try to seek out restaurants serving innovative American menus, and Seattle offers plenty from which to choose. Four that we enjoyed, featuring Pacific Northwest entrees at $17-$25, are Etta’s Seafood, 2020 Western Ave., (206) 443-6000; Dahlia Lounge Restaurant, 2001 4th Ave., (206) 682-4142; Flying Fish, 2234 1st Ave., (206) 728-8595 (entrees about $15-$20); and the Painted Table, 92 Madison St. at the Alexis Hotel, (206) 624-3646.

For more information: Seattle Convention and Visitors Bureau, 800 Convention Place (Washington Convention Center), (206) 461-5840, www.seeseattle .org. Also, Washington State Tourism, P.O. Box 42500, Olympia, WA 98504-2500; (800) 544-1800, fax (360) 753-4470, www.experiencewashington.com.

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James T. Yenckel is a freelance writer based in Washington, D.C.