I'm planning on seeing the Space Needle, The Experience Music Project, and The Museum of Flight. I've been thinking of checking out The Spirit of Washington Dinner train (Hey, Jeffrey, care to join me for this one?). Does any one have any other suggestions?

Seattle is my homwtown - here are a couple of ideas.

Yep - Safeco is great. Also, don't miss the Blue Angels. They are in town and performing every day from Thurs-Sun at about 11:30am over Lake Washington (very accessible from just about anywhere) for free. Its a summer staple. If you need an idea on a where to watch from let me know. Dusty Strings in Fremont is one of the best spots for nice guitars - knowledgable and friendly. Classy place. You might also want to walk-on to the ferry from Downtown and visit one of the islands for lunch.

Seattle is my hometown - here are a couple of ideas.

Yep - Safeco is great. Also, don't miss the Blue Angels. They are in town and performing every day from Thurs-Sun at about 11:30am over Lake Washington (very accessible from just about anywhere) for free. Its a summer staple. If you need an idea on a where to watch from let me know. Dusty Strings in Fremont is one of the best spots for nice guitars - knowledgable and friendly. Classy place. You might also want to walk-on to the ferry from Downtown and visit one of the islands for lunch.

Seattle is my hometown - here are a couple of ideas.

Yep - Safeco is great. Also, don't miss the Blue Angels. They are in town and performing every day from Thurs-Sun (July 31-Aug 3) at about 11:30am over Lake Washington (very accessible from just about anywhere) for free. Its a summer staple. If you need an idea on a where to watch from let me know. Dusty Strings in Fremont is one of the best spots for nice guitars - knowledgable and friendly. Classy place. You might also want to walk-on to the ferry from Downtown and visit one of the islands for lunch.

Check out the local papers for jams when you arrive. You may recall from my post last summer that I found a fun one down at Charlie's Bar & Grill (360) 786-8181), 620 Fourth Avenue in Olympia (about an hour south). I also had a blast at the Experience Music Project. There were some other recommendations in that thread ( Corn Dog's 2002 Tacoma Thread ).

We caught a game at SafeCo as well. Great place. We bought scalped tickets because the game was sold out. We did it after the game started and paid lots less than the printed price for seats a row off of the 3rd base line. In fact, we sat behind the guy that released the tickets. He turned to my older son and asked him if he liked the seats.

If you're into health food, Julia's 14 Carrot Cafe has good nutburgers. It's on Eastlake Avenue.

A jaunt via ferry out to Bainbridge, the San Juans, or Port Townsend might be fun if the weather is good. We ventured all the way out to Ozette on the Olympic pennisula and hiked out to Cape Alava ( Ozette Info ). Really beautiful rain forest and beach! These activities will probably eat up a whole day though.

Safeco Field is worth a visit, and a ferry ride to Bremerton is really scenic -- particularly at dusk.

(Oops ... I sent this before I was finished. Where was I?)

You can get a great view of the city and Puget Sound from Volunteer Park on Capitol Hill. The EMP is definitely worth the price, even if you only make it to the Guitar Gallery.

the Port Townsend Blues Festival is August 1st and 2nd -- the town itself is worth a visit even if there isn't a festival..

There is a decent music scene in the Ballard neighborhood, along the aptly named Ballard Avenue. You might see Orville Johnson playing in the Tractor Tavern or one of the other clubs. (I never do -- I'm about 5-for-5 at being out of town when he's doing a gig.)

As for guitar shops, Robb Eagle at Guitar Emporium is a nice guy ... and his shop is on Ballard Ave. I'll second the comment about Dusty Strings , although they don't have many vintage guitars. Emerald City Guitars is a downhill walk from Seattle U., and you'll find a lot more guitars than you see on their web site. They're also right in the heart of the Pioneer Square district, which has lots of clubs but very little good music (IMHO).

August is the best time of the year to be in Seattle -- on many days you can see snow-capped peaks to the west (the Olympics) and the east (the Cascades). Enjoy yourselves --

[This message has been edited by Russ Young (edited May 17, 2003).]

some nice info in this thread!! I think it would be great fun to visit the Port Townsend Blues Festival on August 1 (John Cephas, Robert Lowery, ...) as a great prelude to the subsequent IGS week!
Perhaps we can go there with a whole group of people!
A question to the experts: Is it possible to get tickets on the day of the festival itself or is it necessary to order earlier!?

See you soon,

Thanks for the Safeco offer. Ever hear George Carlin's classic piece on the differences between baseball and football? Well, that's pretty much how I feel. But I did catch the Indians a few years back at Jacobs Field on a trip up to Cleveland to see Pink Floyd and had a great time.

I'm currently looking for a cool place to stay for 5 days before IGS. Another IGSer recommended the Inn At The Market for its proximity to pubs and restaurants. Any other recommendations?

I don't know, if the campus area is a place cool enough for your expectations? But through Trevor I got the chance to stay there from Tuesday 29.

I am coming to Seattle too, via Vancouver. I would really fancy that trip to the festival on the 1st. Can you get a train or bus there fom Seattle do you know?

I'm leaving for the airport in a few minutes. I've got everything packed including the Tricone (man, I really gave some thought to bringing the old Duolian), the Beltona Blue, and a good pair of running shoes for when trying out Charles' old Dobro. Of course, I've also packed my Punta Gorda Ukulele Champion belt and matching gold bikini briefs and cape for cage matches...

Who's bringing the chocolate beer?

See y'all in Seattle.

On the agenda for tomorrow: Looking to add to my used sock collection.

Try an Espresso Stout at the Pyramid Brewery, across from Safeco Field. You can drink it all night without getting sleepy ...

(Actually, it doesn't contain any coffee, nor is it the kind of beer you particularly crave when the temperature is in the mid-90s.)

Two guitar shops in sight of your hotel? You must be on the top floor!

A nice breakfast is included with my hotel stay and I was delighted to notice that they were playing Pearl Django for everyone this morning.

I visited both "Main Street Music" and "Lark In The Morning" today. I played some Tchaikovsy for the folks there on a Johnson resonator uke and jammed a little blues on a three course six stringed little greek instrument tuned to DAD. Dustin, who works at LITM, tells me that SUPA, a Seattle ukulele music society, will be meeting on sunday. I told him about IGS but he only recognized Orville Johnson's name as well as Tim Sparks.

I received a message on the cell phone from Charles Freeborn and hope to get together with him tomorrow for dinner. I'm hoping that he's got some used socks that he might want to get rid of.

DRR arrives on Thursday, which means we may or may not see him on Friday. DRR, don't know if you have internet access at "The Ranch," but on Friday we have the possiblity of seeing Toots and The Maytalls or Jorma Kaukonen and Blue Country or The Port Townsend Blues and Heritage Festival. There is a restaurant or pub on every corner and, man, its all good.

Found some great deals on some used books at Pike's market. Decided to have them shipped home. Then took the monorail over to the Experience Music Project. Cool place and worth the $14.95 (with coupon) to get in. I spent around 5 hours there and still didn't get to see it all. An hour of that was spent on lunch and another 15 minutes learning to use the mini handheld computer thingy. The guitar gallery is especially cool. You type in a number of an exhibit and you can hear narations or samples of music. For many of the National pieces you get to hear Bob Brozman no less. It looks like they did their homework. I could have spent the whole afternoon watching the "Soundies" which are basically music videos before there were "music videos." Man, Cab Calloway was so before his time! I'm sayin it here, right now: Michael Jackson ain't never done nuthin' that Cab didn't do first.

I was a little disappointed with the EMP store. I was hoping to find collections of some of the video or audio segments on CD or DVD. I only saw two examples of this. One was a CD/book on regional music and its national influence called, "The Northwest Passage." The other was a similar package involving funk music which I bought as well as a book on the history of audio recording.

I then visited The Space Needle. This city is just beautiful! I wish I had more time to visit all the cool districts and great restaurants.

Met up with Charles Freeborn for dinner at Cafe Champagne. He's picking up Trevor and Woody from the airport tomorrow. But, as we were walking back to our hotels I couldn't help but notice that he was checking out "The Lusty Lady" gentleman's club. Hey Trevor, I hope that you're prepared to take a Taxi just in case.

Myself, Jimi Kazak, and Richard Chizek will be arriving in the Seattle environs sometime Friday afternoon/evening.

Road Trip!

In addition to the previously mentioned activities for friday, the Tractor Tavern has Ray Condo And His Ricochets. I've never heard of them but they are described as "awesome rootsy rockabilly." But I suspect Dennis will instead insist upon seeing the movie, "American Mullet" at the 911 Media Arts Center at 8PM. Here's the description: "About four years too late in the clever social commentary department, the makers of the documentary American Mullet focus in on a handful of colorful characters with the titular hairstyle and edit around them to give the masses something to laugh at. Because, you know, you're always better than somebody."

They were playing some more cool music in the hotel for breakfast by a band called, "Paris Combo." I'm going to look for that CD.

I then drove over to Dusty Strings. Wow, what a cool guitar store. They had some great ukuleles as well as some nice Collings, Froggy Bottom, Huss and Dalton, and the typical boring Goodalls. Didn't see any mandolins that caught my fancy. But the CDs that they have for sale are terrific. I spent over $200.00 in CDs and books. Their gypsy jazz selection of CDs rivals Buffalo Brothers. Apparently Bireli Lagrene's hard to find "Routes To Django" and "Swing 81" have been re-released as a two package set. I ended up having most of the stuff shipped home. I did want to mention that I found a great new instructional book on gypsy jazz, that comes with CD, called, "Gypsy Picking" by Michale Horowitz. This book claims to teach plectrum technique that has become fairly standardized by Gypsy players throughout Europe. Michael is apparently a Fulbright scholar pursing his Ph.D in ethomusicology at the University of Washington. He has played as side man for Hot Club Sandwich (awesome by the way!), Pearl Django, is also an accomplished DADGAD celtic player, and is the leader of the Seattle based klezmer rock band Heavy Shtetl. No kidding! This looks to be the first publication of DjangoBooks.com with four new books on the way.

I would have bought alot more stuff at Dusty Strings but then remembered that I need to budget myself to save room for the purchase of some more used socks.

I spent the afternoon walking through Discovery Park. It was fanfukintastic! The trail leads through wooded areas, past historic buildings, along scenic high cliffs overlooking the water, down the beach, and then back through wooded hills. I love it here.

Had a late dinner with the Dennis Roger Reeds. It seems that they had a nice time at the ranch but it looks like Dennis is itching to buy some more guitars.

I spent the day in Pioneer Square. I finally found a copy of this year's Oxford American music edition at the Eliot Bay Book Store. This year's edition includes articles on Memphis Minnie, Blind Willie Johnson, R.L. Burnside, and others. Find it if you can. And Elliot Bay Book Store only charged me $4.50 instead of the normal $8.50. I love this town! They have a nice selection of books on the blues.

I stopped by Emerald City Guitars. Its an eclectic mix of stuff with mostly vintage electric stuff. I think Jeffrey will really dig this place. There's a picture of some guy named Dave Matthews playing a '31 National Triolian that he bought from the place. There were a couple of cool amplifiers made by a guy named Nielson that were made out of old suitcases. These 10-15 watt amps also include vintage car-like bumper lights that glow when plugged in. The acoustic stuff was a real mix. They had a nice Harmony archtop Tenor guitar for around $300.00. Intonation looks good although they had it tuned in fourths. I almost bought it but...well...you know.

I found a nice little pub and had a nice cup of salmon chowder for lunch. Man, I'm really enjoying Seattle. Mmmm, Salmon...

If you have kids then take 'em to Magic Mouse Toys on 1st Ave in Pioneer Square. A very cool store that kept me entertained for a good half hour.

While wandering around I stumbled across a store called "Bass Northwest" that specializes in electric bass guitars.

Of course, I did the underground tour. You get a nice lesson on Seattle's zany history to boot. It lasts around 90 minutes and it helps to buy your tickets in an hour advance.

Wow, I wish I had a few more days to spend just wandering around. Seattle is awesome and I may just have to make another trip up here sometime to enjoy even more of it. It looks like DRR and I will be arriving on campus a little early tomorrow. I look forward to seeing y'all again.

Who's ready for battle at IGS Seattle?

[This message has been edited by Doc Maynard (edited August 01, 1893).]