Tossed salads and scrambled eggs

Oh my god. I'm back in England (Hooray) recuperating from the past month. 9 cities, numerous long train journeys, lots of walking and a lack of sleep. It's a joy to be back, it truly is. But I don't want to talk about that, I want to take you back to happier times when the weather was sunny and the days were long and fun.

The first of our stops was Seattle. On the 1st Septemeber myself, Andy and Ian set off on the bus from Vancouver (which at one point I was in danger of missing) seeking adventure and danger. We were to be joined by Gav, Liz and Keenie on the 4th and then would meet up with Simon in San Francisco. Seattle was very similar to Vancouver but a bit more American. This mainly meant that they were more obese people there, eating their fast food and wearing funny clothes.

But what is Seattle famous for? It's the home of Frasier Crane of course. So we spent our 4 days in Seattle thinking to ourselves, where does Frasier live. Lets see if we found out.


It could almost be Vancouver. Why did we have to leave, tell me someone please


Before getting stuck into our search for Frasier we had a meal to prepare ourselves. Of course Andy had a few drinks as well. This was a one off though and he rarely drank at all in the rest of the trip


Not Frasier's Coffee shop (we did see the one that inspired it) but the first ever Starbucks. Coming from Vancouver where there are millions of them this is quite interesting for us. It's also rumoured that the gates of hell lie directly underneath the building


A whole wall covered in chewing gum with a word spelt out in the middle. Just like those magic eye things


The fun we had at the giant shoe museum. I tell you, hours we spent here... giant shoes there were, huge. You wouldn't believe it


After dragging ourselves away from the giant shoes our search for Frasier took us to Bainbridge Island. Here I am on the ferry. When we got there we followed various clues and leads yet he still eluded us


Downtown Seattle, but where does Frasier live? Now by going back and watching the TV show we should be able to line up the view from his apartment window with this view of the city


We decided to take a break that evening and visit the "Gamesworks" arcade. Here's Andy getting some much needed driving practice


The penalty shootout machine. I was about as accurate as an England striker against Macedonia


The Space Needle. The first of many tall towers we would go up on the trip. The perfect viewpoint to try and find Frasier. Although myself and Ian spent half an hour trying to find the glass floor, only to realise that it was in a tower in Calgary when we got down


Damn you Frasier, where is he?


We also stopped by the Sci Fi and music museums. It wasn't recorded but we did perform the greatest song of all time in the jamming booth. Beautiful it was


The Seattle hostel was probably the nicest we stayed in. It had free pool which we took great advantage of. It also brought about the first of Andy's strange hostel room mates. More about that in San Francisco though


Our search for Frasier took us to the underground tour of Seattle. Due to sewage problems they built a new city on top of the old one. But first they only built the road higher up. This meant you had to climb up a ladder, walk across and climb down to get from one side of the street to the other. Informative but no clues to Frasier's whereabouts. Time was running out.


Are you starting on me old man?


The other three had joined us by this point, but our pursuit of Frasier led us to a trendy part of Seattle known as Fremont, just out of downtown. Here we found a giant statue of Lenin. Something I'm sure the Crane brothers would discuss over a bottle of wine


In a last ditch attemt to find Frasier's whereabouts I decided to go and ask the troll that lives under thr bridge. He told me I would have to answer 3 questions first and then perform a task. It all sounded like too much work so I just had my picture taken with him instead


Fremont was full of statues, including this one of a giant rocket. Explosive


Next time Frasier, next time


So that was Seattle, it was a 23 hour train ride to San Francisco next and that wasn't even our longest. Here we would meet Gandalf and go onto Mordor to destroy the one ring to rule them all. No, that's Lord of the Rings isn't it. We would actually go onto meet Simon and continue our epic quest to spend lots of money. Unlike Lord of the Rings though you won't have to wait a year for the next chapter.

Goodnight Seattle, Frasier has left the building.

P.S. If anyone would like to send me money for my birthday on Tuesday and don't have my address then please e-mail me. I accept cash, cheques and wire transfers.