Locks and Rocks (as in the tiny ones that make up a beach)

There honestly wasn't a whole lot to report on this week, but after Marinda came back on Tuesday we did have a couple adventures.  Well, we actually had several dozen but we can't tell you about those.  Otherwise the CIA will come after us.

On Thursday we went to the beach for a picnic.  We made our best attempt at mimicking Chipotle burritos.  We're getting better but our burritos are still no match.  So we wrapped up our baby burritos, grabbed some chips and homemade guacamole, brought way too much lemonade and were on our way.  We went to Matthew's Beach, which is really just an area where land smoothly transitions to water and they happened to have built a park nearby. There is totally five feet worth of sand between the grass and water.  We found a picnic table with a good view and talked about our "Dreams, hopes and perspirations" or something like that.  Marinda is always bringing up these stereotypical things on all of our dates.  Dinner was great, and then we walked around the park, marveling at the people who were actually going swimming in the frigidly cold waters.  We were able to interview some of them.  "The sun was out, the high was 65.  This is perfect beach weather.  When else am I going to be able to wear my bikini in this town?" said a teenage girl who seemed to be turning blue from hypothermia.  "This place is awesome!  Wanna see me walk on my hands?" was the comment from a local meathead whose primary purpose in life was to show the fruits of his workout routine to his disinterested friend.

Amit in front of some funky modern art at the locks

On Friday we went to the Ballard Locks, where you can see boats and salmon moving from the fresh water to the east to the saltware Puget Sound to the west.  We got to see a few boats go through, and there were actually boats from as far as Santa Barbara, CA!  Clearly next time we go down to CA taking a boat would be a much better option.

One of the two locks closing up after letting some boats through.

A section of the Salmon Ladder

You can also see salmon going through the fish ladder, which is more like a staircase than a ladder.  We did in fact see salmon (as in more than one).  Yup, we saw two.  Interesting facts - when a salmon goes from salt water to fresh water it actually stops eating.  For the rest of its life.  Its goal at that point is to get to fresh water where it can spawn.  It doesn't matter if that fish has a bite taken out of it (one of the salmon we saw did actually have a chunk of its back missing) it will do whatever it takes to get to where it needs to go.  In conclusion, people have a lot to learn from salmon.  When salmon say they're going to do something, they do it, no matter what.

Well unfortunately that's all we can share with you this week.  Next week we will be in Idaho at Bear Lake for the start of our month long travels!  So enjoy your last sights of Seattle with this picture of the sunset from a few nights ago.