We really were sleepless in Seattle mainly because I was allergic to the feather pillows on our bed! Our 'complimentary' breakfast was ok but we didn't eat much as we were going to have brunch in the Space Needle restaurant.

We walked the short distance from our Travelodge to Seattle Centre & discovered that our Brunch reservation, courtesy of the girls, allowed us entry to the observation deck so we didn't need to book that separately.

As our booking wasn't til 1pm we took a walk around the area, went into the Centre Hall for a coffee & happened upon a French festival, complete with live music - wonderful! An excellent way to spend an hour or so before 'checking in' for our meal in the revolving restaurant 500 feet up at the top of the Space Needle, which was built in 1962 for the World's Fair.

Well, what a memorable experience! We were escorted into the lift, then greeted at the restaurant by a lovely waitress who gave us cards to celebrate our 'special day'. We had a raised table facing the windows with an ever changing uninterrupted view of the city spread out before us, the Cascades, Olympic mountains & Mt Rainier towering behind. As the restaurant revolves very slowly we were able to see in every direction without moving from our seats! The meal was wonderful, really delicious & plenty of it! Les will be talking about the chowder for many years to come!

After the main course the waitress brought us a huge dish of icecream topped with sparkling candles, over a bowl of dry ice, which created a vapour to make a smoke like effect. There was so much that we were almost completely engulfed in it! It seems that this was organised by our girls - when they booked the brunch they had told the staff that this trip was our celebration of our 70th birthdays! We were left to take our time over our meal & thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. Afterwards we went up to the observation deck & walked right round it, then went down to the gift shop & looked at all the Space Needle souvenirs made in China!

After that we hopped on the monorail which was also built for the 1962 World's Fair & went to the Westlake Centre downtown. We walked towards the waterfront & went into the famous Pike Place Market - a really quirky farmers market that covers a huge area over about five different levels. It's the oldest continuously operating farmers market in the USA, & first opened in 1907. It's not just food, there are endless small shops & stalls selling clothes, both old & new, art, antiques, books, jewellery, flowers; a huge range of different things. We had a great time browsing then found an Irish tea shop & had a cuppa before going back to the station to catch the monorail to Seattle Centre.

After such a lovely, memorable day we were ready to relax, assured of a good night's sleep in a bed that was now complete with a new set of anti-allergy pillows!