Last week, Olivia and I made the move up to Seattle. We had movers (highly recommend), but it was still an exhausting ordeal. And while we’ve made good unpacking progress, we are definitely short on places to store books and other odds and ends in the new place, so it’s been slow going. So rather than address the piles of boxes filed with books, today was spent riding new buses and generally exploring our new surroundings.

Of course, the day got off to a ridiculously late start – we didn’t leave for breakfast until well after 10 AM on account of a late night last night – but that’s part of a classic Saturday in my book.

Breakfast at Geraldine’s

We took the Metro route 60 to the Beacon Hill light rail station, and the light rail to Columbia City for a breakfast at what is shaping up to be our go-to place. If you know me, you know I’m a sucker for a breakfast diner, and regrettably, breakfast diners are in short supply in Seattle. I wouldn’t call Geraldine’s Counter a true diner, but the coffee is good and the food is excellent.

Maybe on account of Seattle’s lack of good breakfast diners, or maybe because it really is great, it’s generally bustling on a weekend around brunch time. By some miracle of fate, or because the hostess recognized me as someone who really needed a cup of coffee, we got a seat at the counter right away. I got a skillet, had a little too much coffee, and then Olivia and I went off on a little walk around Columbia City.

I’m fond of Columbia City, and was considering living down there, it’s just a bit far away from the kinds of places we go on a regular basis (Mark & Shelby’s and the co-op), so it was nice to mosey around the neighborhood and check out the lovely Genesee Park. It’s on the former site of the Wetmore slough – an arm of Lake Washington that dried up after the ship canal lowered the lake level by 9 feet that was also previously a municipal dump.

For whatever reason, after this we decided to go out to West Seattle to check out an antique mall, since we are in need of more storage for the apartment.

Out to West Seattle

Lucky for us, the Metro route 50 is a nice little bus that picks up in the middle of Genesee Park and heads out to West Seattle. It was my first time riding it, and I wasn’t expecting much in the way of fellow riders on a half-hourly bus with a fairly circuitous route on a Saturday, but it was quite busy. Maybe I’m still used to Portland levels of bus ridership, but it seems like they could throw any bus service down in Seattle and it would get pretty good ridership.

I’ve been toying with the idea of making a map of Seattle if it were Portland, but have been struggling to identify similarities other than the following:

• West Seattle is Sellwood (feels isolated and far away, but isn’t actually that far away, and I like it, but not enough to live there)
• The entire East Side is Lake Oswego (yes, this is probably unfair but it just gives me that Kerr Parkway vibe when I rode through Factoria from Issaquah)
• Ballard is Slabtown/NW (it’s so far away and cute but also I dunno not for me)
• Uptown is Goose Hollow (self explanatory)
• Fremont/Wallingford/Green Lake is SE Portland (also self explanatory)
• Central District is North Portland (former Black neighborhoods, pretty gentrified now)
• Laurelhurst is Laurelhurst
• South Lake Union is the Pearl (but this feels like I’m short changing the Pearl, which I don’t mind)
• Magnolia is Southwest Portland (I have no idea what goes on there)

But there’s so many places in Seattle that really can’t be compared to Portland. South Seattle is probably most like East Portland demographically (diverse, working class), but it’s also got pockets of really ritzy places that you don’t really find in the same kinds of places in Portland.

Anyways, the point here is that since West Seattle is Sellwood, the West Seattle Antique Mall was a natural choice. And our stop on the #50 was at Oregon and California – which was fun. The mall was slightly disappointing – lots of cool stuff, but also mostly things we really don’t need. I guess that’s the general experience of going to an antique mall anywhere though.

Back to Beacon Hill

To get back home, we took the Metro Rapid Ride C line, followed by a transfer to everyone’s favorite route (the 36). I was keen to get a ride in on the C, and while it was easy and fast, I find the Rapid Ride buses (outside the G – we love her) to be generally lackluster. At one point, we were stuck in traffic on Avalon Way (below), where they chose street parking over a bus lane.

But the views of the Duwamish valley and downtown from the West Seattle Bridge were great, even if it is sort of terrifying to consider the extent of change that the development of Seattle has caused the Duwamish estuary.

Something that’s been great about living on Beacon Hill, is that the bus service is really excellent. Unlike in other parts of town, where light rail expansion has severed or severely reduced some historic bus routes (more on that later), the 36 is a true workhorse. It comes every ten minutes from 6 AM to 8:30 PM, every 15 minutes until 12:30, and hourly or so the rest of the night. 24 hour service! Ten minute headways! I’m obviously obsessed.

I know I’m trending into geeking out about a bus, but it’s hard to emphasize how nice 10 minute service is. Every transfer feels easy, and since it’s only ten minutes to Chinatown/International District from our apartment, we basically have access to every part of town with just one transfer. I knew it would be nice to be in Seattle for better transit, but I didn’t realize just how good it could be.

Back to Basics: A Long Walk

After our breakfast and West Seattle adventures, I decided to get back to the roots of this blog: a long meandering walk with no particular destination in mind. Well, I had to stop by the co-op for a few things, so I was heading north, but that was the extent of the structure. At first, I thought maybe I’d head over to Discovery Park, but wanting to keep myself ignorant of what’s going on in Magnolia, I decided on Green Lake-ish instead.

On the way, I ended up following the route of the 49. It’s an interesting route, and one that has recently become much less frequent (an unfortunate result of the Rapid Ride G restructure).

Interestingly, the 49 used to be one of the most important routes in the entire system – as the most direct connection between Capitol Hill and UW – but has since declined in importance with the opening of the light rail. The northern reaches of Capitol Hill aren’t really my jam – too many mansions – but the route of the 49 down 10th is pretty nice until the jog to Harvard. Being directly next to I5 makes for an unfortunate walking experience.

Of course, the light rail from Capitol Hill to UW and U District is a pretty clear upgrade from the 49. It’s faster, more frequent, more reliable, and more comfortable. But as someone who enjoys transit in part for the historic through line, the de-prioritization of historic routes does bum me out a bit. I get it, a fast train is better than a relatively slow trolley, but damn it if I don’t love a trolley. And I love being able to take a ride on a service that has existed, in one form or another, for about as long as the street itself.

The stability that provides is useful, both as a way to understand the place, but I think it also helps neighborhoods maintain a cohesive identity. That’s part of why I’m so fond of the humble trolleybus – it’s got the upsides of buses (lower capital and maintenance costs, able to avoid blockages in the road), but still has the sense permanence that the overhead wires provide.

The rest of the walk was lovely, albeit uneventful. I caught the Metro route 62 to the Roosevelt light rail station, and then transferred in Chinatown/International District to the tried and true #36.

Looking Forward: More Seattle Exploring

Despite my deep sadness about leaving Portland, being in a new city offers so many opportunities. I want to walk every bus route, I want to poke around every little park, and most of all I want to find little spots where I can go and become a regular. There’s nothing quite as nice as having a cafe, bar, store, or other place you can go to and just have idle chatter. And right now, I’ve got a People’s Food Co-op sized hole in my heart to go with my Junior’s and Worker’s Tap holes in the stomach and liver.

But for now, I’m content to be excited about riding new buses and checking out new parts of town. Tomorrow, Olivia and I are going to ride a ferry (!!!) for a little old growth forest hike too. I’m sure if you keep your eyes on the blog, I’ll have something to say about ferries in the greater Seattle region. I think they are so cool, but haven’t done enough ferry riding to have strong opinions about them other than that.

Thanks for reading, ’til next time.