After watching this Expedia travel video, we had high expectations of Seattle. 

Unfortunately we got quite disappointed by this seaport city.

It is true, that Seattle has a beautiful location; it lies on the Puget Sound, is surrounded by water, forests and mountains, but the city itself is ugly and lacks a nice vibe.

First of all the waterfront is completely ruined by a 3 level highway; it is noisy, unappealing and dirty.

And there is a huge smoking chimney in the middle of the skyline. Why???

The city center is nothing special, and there are no parks what so ever. The small green patches, the residents call parks, are dirty and very unpleasant. These "parks" are gathering places for the homeless and crazy people. Sadly we have seen a lot of homeless people in all the big cities, we have visited so far. It is obvious that US has a huge problem, that they choose to ignore completely. 

Seattle's top attractions are not that interesting either, one of them is indeed disgusting; the Market Theater Gum Wall, which is an alleyway covered in used chewing gums. Maybe I am not hip enough, but I do not see what the big deal is with some brick walls covered in chewing gums.

Another overrated tourist attraction is the Pike Market, which is known for the fishmongers' tradition of throwing fish to each other rather than passing them by hand. When I first heard of Pike Market, I thought it was a huge fish market, where every fish stand has this "flying fish" tradition. It turned out, that there is only one fish stand, where the customers are entertained this way, the rest of it is just a usual market. This fish stand was ok, nothing special, however, the crowd at the market was terrible, and we could not wait to get the hell out of there.

The best known landmark of Seattle is the Space Needle, which was built for the 1962 World's Fair. On pictures it looks like the Space Needle is part of the city's skyline, but in reality it stands alone away from the waterfront. Furthermore, it is quite small, only 184m high, so we were not that keen on paying 25 bucks each to get up to the observation deck. We did not regret it at all afterwards.

The only nice place in downtown Seattle is the Olympic Sculpture Park. The park is a former industrial site, which has been transformed to an outdoor sculpture museum by Seattle Art Museum. The entrance is free and there is a gorgeous view of Puget Sound, which can be enjoyed from one of the many red chairs spread around in the park.

Luckily we stayed outside of downtown Seattle, in Ballard. Ballard is a really pleasant neighborhood located in the northwestern part of Seattle. It is close to the Green Lake, which is a beautiful green oasis; it serves as a natural preserve and a perfect recreational spot for the locals.

Ballard has another interesting place to visit, the Ballard locks; a complex of locks that connects Puget Sound and Seattle's fresh water lakes. The locks move boats from the water level of the lakes to the water level of Puget Sound, and vice versa. It was interesting to see how the locks work, but the best part was the fish ladder, which was constructed to allow salmon to pass around the locks. At the fish ladder there is a viewing room and a small exhibition, where one can learn about the lifecycle of salmon; they hatch in lakes, rivers, and streams, then migrate to sea, and at the end of their life return to fresh water to spawn. We have also seen how seals take an advantage of the fish ladder to get an easy meal.

Even though Seattle did not turn out to be the lush and ever green city as promised by Expedia travel video, we had a nice time there thanks to the pleasant Ballard neighborhood. However, I am pretty sure, I will not visit Seattle again.