Day 21: The Ghost Freeway, the Hula Hoop Contest, and the City in the Sky

This hotel wasn't worth the money. At about 3 in the morning I started hearing an intense pounding from out in the hall. It didn't stop. A half hour later I went out to examine. Down the stairs and across the hall there was a shady looking, older black man banging on one of the room doors. I didn't want to risk a confrontation and returned to bed. A half hour later the pounding still hadn't stopped... hiding a knife I brought with me (just in case of a situation like this, where I had to confront a potentially dangerous individual) in my pants, I inquired as to the purpose of the knocking. "I left my key inside... and he's asleep in there... don't have my car keys neither... no one at the front desk..." was the answer. No explanation as to why this friend of his inside hadn't been woken yet... The noise continued until nearly 6 o'clock, at which point one of the purposes of staying in a motel (a good night's sleep) had been totally negated.

In the morning I found that the bathtub didn't have working hot water, and that the television hadn't worked, meaning that this motel had given me *none* of the things I sought it out for (sleep, cleanliness, and cheap entertainment). I tried to get a refund, and the desk clerk rudely walked me back to the room to show me that the tub and TV were in fact working fine. I was increasingly irritated when, after I was of course proven correct, he still denied me a refund. When I complained about the "banging man" (and the fact that no one had been at the desk to report it to) he told me I should have called the police... somehow I doubt that the motel would have been happy if I *had* called the police - I'm sure they would have then given me shit about blowing a mild situation out of proportion.

Seattle's road system is almost as bad as their parking shit-uation. You can get on a freeway without meaning to and be taken three miles until the next exit - this is right outside of downtown, too. The city has apparently tried many times to solve this problem, and as a result there are abandoned freeway projects (which I suppose they thought twice about and ceased before completion) strewn about the outskirts of the city. Here are some below:













I left Seattle for the northern town of Bellingham, sort of a greener version of my hometown. I had a friend there, or at any rate someone I had met before. Jaime was an early (and successful) expiriment in "talking to strangers" - I met her in Santa Monica about a year ago and struck up a conversation. As it turned out she was an avid hula hooper, which struck me as an interesting eccentricity. It turned out that it wasn't *too* eccentric, as she told me that hooping has a bigger cult following than I ever would have dreamed. I visited her at the clothing store she runs (cool spot, and she hooked me up with my favorite new shirt), and we decided to have a hoop-off:











We saw a Rolls Royce and decided we wanted to hula hoop next to it.





If this had been a competition, Jaime would have won. She knew all sorts of tricks that would have taken me a long time to master. Still, it had been a lot easier than I had expected... the basic hoop motion (something I could never do as a kid) is extremely easy once you get it down.


This carnival was in a mall parking lot. I wish that we had events like this in North County, although I guess we do have an enormous annual fair, meaning I shouldn't complain.


I was looking for a good view of the Puget Sound when I saw this gentleman in his strange yellow vehicle. I already had taken photos of a Rolls Royce, I decided to follow them up with a picture of him and his pimp ride.

I have very fond childhood memories of riding a ferry across the Sound and into Victoria. I would have liked to have done it again on this trip. However I suppose that I should save a few experiences for the *next* massive trip, and besides it might have been difficult to book a border-crossing boat trip without a passport (it was hard enough to get across the border without one - I had to answer questions for about an hour). Canada itself is a pretty magical country. The gas is measured in litres rather than gallons, and as a result I have no clue if it's more or less expensive there than in the states. Likewise, distances are measured in kilometers, which confuses one's sense of "how long it takes to get places." Many signs are in English and French, as opposed to SoCal's standard of English and Spanish. While driving towards Vancouver I saw what I could only describe as a city in the sky - it may have been a series of houses on hilltop, but the way the lights were surrounded by nothing on all sides (even below) gave the distinct impression of some floating metropolis. Laputa, Tiphares, Zalem, whatever you want to call it. Whatever your preferred name, the fact remains that it didn't photograph well at all - unfortunately.

I entered Vancouver not long after that, at which point I almost immediately parked and passed out. The city looked like: