Hi Seattle! It’s the 1st of July, happy Blink 182 Day AKA the 182nd day of the year. This month, the days are as long as they’re gonna be, we’re at the peak of Seattle Summer™️, and we’ve got our curated recommendations for the month right here for ya.
Places To Be & Things To Do
Has anyone ever actually looked at the photos they take of fireworks? (Ashley Smith / City Cast Seattle)
Liam: I want to check out the Ballard Seafood Festival the weekend of the 10th. SIFF, in the later half of July, is starting a series called Cold War Summer. They're showing movies like Austin Powers, Atomic Blonde, Golden Eye, Manchurian Candidate, etc. It’s just a very cool and fun series!
Jane: There’s the Dolly Parton 4th of July Drag Brunch on the 5th at Emerald City Comedy Club. Tour De Dog is also on the 5th, you can ride to nine different Costcos and eat a hot dog at each one! STP (Seattle to Portland) is on the 11th and it’ll be my first year riding my bike all 200+ miles.
Sam:Hot Rat Summer is having their closing reception in Pioneer Square on the 2nd. Then, on the 7th, it’ll be your last chance to see their newest mosaic. While you’re there go check out their collaboration with the Children of Shelley's Leg, which was a historic gay disco, and is now an art project highlighting the LGBTQ+ legacy of Pioneer Square. And then on the 25th, a group runway show on decommissioned railroad tracks and Georgetown Pride!
Ashley: There’s another Paddle Rave on Lake Union for the 4th. The World Cup's gotten me into soccer and now I kind of want more of it even when the World Cup is over. Luckily there’s gonna be a Reign game on the 12th and a Sounders game on the 16th! And for my fellow Swifties, Taylor Fest is happening on the 31st at Chop Suey.
Day Trips To Take
Camped near Diablo Lake last summer and it was sooooo pretty! (Ashley Smith / City Cast Seattle)
Ashley recommends driving to the North Cascades: I could not recommend more going up to the North Cascades. It's a two-hour drive to the National Park, and you have to go to Diablo or Ross Lake, probably both. Bring a paddleboard and brave the chilly, turquoise waters. It’s worth it!
Liam says take a ferry to Whidbey Island: As we've talked about before, I love a ferry. Love getting on a boat, love having a little snack and a little drink while you're going from one port to another. And I've done the Whidbey Island one-day trip and it’s great.
Sam thinks you should hop on the train to Portland: Go to King Street Station and take the train to Portland. While you’re waiting for the train check out the ARTS Gallery. The train ride itself is lovely: bring a book, go to the dining car and get a coffee, maybe play some cards. I'll leave what to do in Portland up to our friends at City Cast Portland.
Jane recommends a hike in the Teanaway: My little day trip that I would recommend is the Teanaway. I feel like it is an underloved area to go hiking. It's just slightly further in terms of driving than going anywhere along the I-90 corridor directly, but if you get off after the pass, it's a really beautiful area to go hiking, and it's a lot less crowded than most of the I-90 hikes.
Seafair History
The origin of Seafair is actually really cool! (Wikimedia / Seattle Municipal Archives, CC BY 2.0)
Seafair was created before we had any of the things that people think of as the big Seattle tourist draws. The World's Fair hadn't happened yet, so we didn't have the Space Needle or Seattle Center. People in Seattle were looking for a way to bring tourists post-World War II. And they came up with the idea of Seafair.
We have our friends at City Cast Twin Cities to thank for Seafair actually! The organizers were inspired by the St. Paul Winter Carnival and they offered its director, Walter Van Camp, a position to run the Seattle festival. In March 1950, they started planning for an August event, and it involved everything from a 25-mile bicycle race around Lake Sammamish to a boat parade on Lake Washington. There was a police pistol contest, a steamboat race on Elliott Bay, a husband-calling contest at Seward Park, and this operetta called The Desert Song at Volunteer Park that was attended by 10,000 people!
The thing that I thought was the coolest in learning about all of this was the Aqua Follies: synchronized swimming, dancing, gymnastics, and acrobatics at Green Lake. They built a theater to seat 5,200 people on the shore of Green Lake in 9 weeks! They finished it four days before Seafair was supposed to start. And somehow had zero cost overruns according to HistoryLink. Should we start a petition to start doing cool stuff at Green Lake again?!
If you think the Blue Angels are bad in terms of noise and pollution, wait until you hear about the original penultimate day of the festival. They would tow an old wooden ship from Lake Union and anchor it in Elliott Bay, and they would put smoke bombs and fireworks and explosives and a bunch of fuel oil in the belly of the ship. King Neptune's flags flew from the ship's mast and six life-like dummies, the crew, were on deck. The Puget Sound Maritime Historical Society would get on, set the ship on fire, get off, and let it explode. After the fireworks went off, the flames would be put out and the ship would be towed out even further (by Alki) and sunk. This happened until the 1960s when there were, quote, "No more ships left to burn." If you want to read more about Seafair history check out this incredible History Link article.
Modern day Seafair weekend starts on July 31st.
Want more? Listen to our July Guide episode of the podcast!
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