04 .05.2010

As this was our last day in Seattle, and we had to wait for notification that our motorbikes were ready to be picked up, we stayed mainly around the motel. It's on a main road, like most motels, and we’ve heard quite a few sirens going up and down the street. Yesterday two fire engines and a medic aid vehicle (ambulance) came to the Taco Bell food outlet next door to us to administer to a person who had an incident in the store. No fire on the premises but the person was taken away by the ambulance. Late this morning a fire engine and ambulance (they always seem to come together,) came to the Motel we were staying in, we’re on the third floor overlooking the whole complex and all the roads left, right and centre of our rooms. A fireman brought an axe to the motel door, but the motel receptionist opened it with a card (luckily!) The barouche was brought out of the ambulance and we were afraid that it must be very serious, and because the medicos were taking their time we thought they might have been too late .

Ultimately, an older lady was wheeled into the ambulance and we could see some movement from her, (nosey neighbours we are, obviously had time on our hands). Apparently she’d not been well the previous day and when she didn’t come for breakfast two days running, and the motel staff got no reply from calling the lady’s room, they called 911. We were told the lady suffered a heart attack. We believe all worked out well for the lady, thanks to the motel staff.

Late in the afternoon we received a text message from Lynn to say our bikes were ready. Lou and Lynn had gone back to Ride West Motorcycles for a look around and asked how our bikes' services were progressing. We’d had all four tyres replaced and a full service on the bikes. I can notice that the tyres are a different type and tread, and pumped to a greater pressure, as the bike seems a little higher when I stop at the lights. Not too much of a difference though.

Keith Thye, Ride West's owner has anther motorcycle shop in Tacoma, 30 miles down the road, so Des and Lou decided to go and check that one out on their bikes too . Apparently it’s bigger than the one in Seattle. It was peak hour traffic on the i 5, and raining persistently, but they arrived home safely at 7pm, and we needn’t have been worried. Des purchased a heated vest, similar to the one I purchased in the Seattle store.

Lynn and I bought some Taco Bell 'food' (from next door) for the four of us, but it was just not filling enough so we went to the Chinese restaurant across the road and waited for our take-away order. During that time, a soaking wet drunk with a bottle of, what looked like sparkling wine in his hand, staggered through the restaurant. The tiny, weenie owner went up to him and told him in a loud, high-pitched voice to get out. She wasn’t going to let him take another step into her restaurant and looked really funny challenging this sizable, swaggering guy. She didn’t need to tackle him physically, as he'd already started retreating towards the door, but I think she would have taken him on. It was a cold night and he only had a tee shirt and trousers on and it was pouring rain outside . The incident was a bit of a harsh reality to witness, and I couldn’t help but feel sorry for the guy and his situation.



For desert we had jelly beans. That came about because yesterday Lynn bought me a box of 420 jelly beans, that's 40 varieties, as a belated birthday gift, thoughtful of her! She knows I have a sweet tooth. The box is huge, I think it's the biggest you can buy, so I may have to bag them all up into one bag when it comes time to move on. Unless they're all gone by then.

05.05.2010

In the morning we were packed and on our way by 8:30 with an ominous dark cloud hanging over us. Would we make it to our next destination before it burst? Des and I plugged in our new heated jackets, the wiring of which Des had connected to the battery, in the rain, the previous night. Mmmmm, they were toasty warm, especially across the shoulders .

A mammoth 16.8 miles, or 27 kilometers down the road, we pulled up at the Hilton Garden Inn in Everett. I think that takes the record for the shortest distance travelled by us in one day, from one motel to the next! Actually, that was our planned stop for the day, as we had something to do in Everett

We got a good rate at the Hilton, for the extra large room as we were all sharing. Actually it was the handicapped room, so everything was big, particularly the bathroom. There were two queen sized beds with delicious white linen and down quilts. We no sooner had our luggage off the bikes and scattered about the room when the cloud burst. Unfortunately, we hadn’t yet covered the bikes, but that would have to wait now, we were already on our next mission.

With coats and hats on, we walked across the road, under the Hilton walkway, to the Boeing aircraft manufacturing factory. I think the Boeing factory is the reason the Hilton was built where it is . The Boeing factory tour is immensely popular and it’s so convenient to be staying across the road from the factory and its museum. We paid for our entry and everybody was stripped of their electronic equipment, namely: phones, cameras, pagers, notebooks, iPods and Pads, and had to purchase a locker to put all that stuff into. It made the tour quite relaxing really, we didn’t have to worry about taking loads of snaps or listening to others carrying on conversations on their phones, and it kept the group together for the same reasons. Mike was our tour guide, and an excellent one at that. He was full of facts and figures and wanted to share every one of them with us. He was a good speaker, but had this funny drawl to his voice and ended his sentences like Reverend Lovejoy from The Simpsons. He was easy to listen to but you couldn’t help wanting his sentences to end, to catch that little baritone drop off that was so peculiar.

The Boeing factory was enormous, Mike did tell me how enormous, but the only figure I can remember was the circumference of the manufacturing building being 3.5 kilometers. Another interesting fact: one must work for the company for 25 years before getting a car park. (Unless one is management, of course) Others have to park in the lot three quarters of a mile away and catch a shuttle in to the factory, shuttles come around every 20 minutes. One of the staff had recently retired after 66 years working for Boeing.

All in all, it was an interesting day and an excellent way to keep dry.