• Seattle Tours is a three hour, 50 mile tour of Seattle. Door to door service from SeaTac, Tukwila, Bellevue and downtown Seattle.
 • Ride the Ducks Seattle is an hour or so ride on an amphibious World War II vehicle (yes, part of the ride is on Lake Union), not cheap ($23 adult) and not for those with a limited sense of humor (the style is a bit over-the-top). Definitely unique.
 • Gray Line offers the standard big-city set of tours, including $21 for two and a quarter hours on a double-decker; $29 for a three-hour bus tour, and $49 for seven hours of combined bus and boat touring.
 • Beeline Tours offers a $38, three-hour tour similar to Gray Line, but in a smaller vehicle (that is, with fewer people).

 • For a more intimate and quirky tour try Show Me Seattle Tours . Their mini-bus holds a maximum of 14 people. Highlights of their tour are the Troll in Fremont, salmon ladder at the Locks, and the Sleepless in Seattle houseboat.
 • Argosy Cruises offers a harbor cruise, two lake cruises, a locks cruise, and dinner cruises.
 • Seattle Underground Tour will take you underground in Pioneer Square. The city was built on a swamp, and there was a fire, and there was no proper sewage system, so the city built up the roads and buried the first floor, now the basement level, of much of the original Pioneer Sq. area. One can also get married underground.

 • It's a bit outside Seattle, but the Boeing Everett airplane factory tour is a fascinating look at the world's largest building, as measured in cubic volume.

 • Anacortes Kayak Tours- Not in Seattle, but an easy driving distance (90 minutes), and folks can be sea kayaking in the San Juan Islands with Anacortes Kayak Tours . Unlike other kayak tours in the San Juans, this company does not require an expensive ferry ride.

Museums

 • Seattle Art Museum (Downtown)
 • Seattle Asian Art Museum (Capitol Hill) is closed for now and will reopen on January 14, 2006.
 • Museum of Flight, near Boeing Field. The name tells you right away whether you personally will find this interesting; at minimum, it will get you inside on a rainy day. The collection includes 131 aircraft and spacecraft ranging from wood and fabric crates to the SR-71 and, parked right in the front (car) parking lot, sleek Concorde. Don't bonk the landing gear with your car door!
 • Experience Music Project (EMP) EMP is the rock and roll museum, designed by Frank Gehry, and which has the Jimi Hendrix special exhibit.
 • Frye Art Museum is a small private collection, free admission, on First Hill, always has parking and worth a visit.

Indoors

 • Pike Place Market (Downtown) Pike Place Market is not entirely indoors. It is comprised of a few square blocks downtown, and it is a market, although most sidewalks are covered and there are entirely indoor areas. If you hate shopping you still might like this place.
 • The Seattle Public Library's Central Library (Downtown) An impressive and uniquely designed building.
 • Smith Tower (Downtown)
 • Space Needle - the most expensive elevator ride in America. You can get a comparably good view for free from Bhy Kracke Park (pronounced "By Crackie") atop Queen Anne Hill. If you are going to eat at the (also expensive) revolving restaurant near the top, the elevator ride is free. The restaurant completes one revolution per hour as you eat. The sensation of looking up to discover a different view than when you looked down a few minutes ago doesn't nauseate most people.
 • Monorail - Not as expensive as the trip to the top of the Space Needle. If you need to get between downtown and Seattle Center, the 1962 vintage Alweg monorail is perfectly good transportation and kind of cool, but it doesn't go anywhere else.

Outdoors

 • Hiram M. Chittenden Locks (a.k.a. Ballard Locks) in Ballard
 • Woodland Park Zoo (South Gate at N 50th St and Fremont Ave N, on Phinney Ridge), $10 for adults, is open 9:30am to four p.m. in the winter, five p.m. in the spring/fall, and six p.m. in the summer. It has mostly realistic and spacious habitats for the animals, unlike the animal jails in some zoos. The Raptor Show at 3pm on non-rainy weekends is particularly entertaining if you get the bird handler with the Bronx accent: "If dis boid's head were da same size as youses, its eyes would be da size of sawftbawls."

Parks

 • Golden Gardens Park in Ballard is one of two places in Seattle that still allows bonfires on the beach. Set on the Puget Sound, it offers spectacular views of the sun setting over the Olympic mountain range on clear days.
 • Volunteer Park on Capitol Hill
 • Ravenna Park in the Ravenna area is a good park for baseball or soccer.
 • Cowen Park has a play structure for children and a backstop for baseball/softball. Cowen is connected to Ravenna Park via a wooded ravine that makes for good jogging and walking. It is a particularly nice walk in the (rare) snow.
 • Greenlake, north of the University District, has side-by-side 4km (2.75 mile) asphalt and gravel trails for walking, jogging and rollerblading around the circumference of the algae-infested "lake" (really a big pond), plus several sports fields. On the East side there are areas of grass where you can often find pick-up soccer, volleyball as well as basketball on outdoor courts. There's also an indoor swimming pool, which is much cleaner than the lake. If the signs warn that the lake is closed, don't ignore them or risk getting "swimmer's itch" from the plentiful parasites spread through duck feces. The surrounding neighborhood is vibrant and fun in good weather, with rental roller-skates, bikes, restaurants, etc.
 • Gasworks Park in Wallingford is built on the former site of the city gas facility, and a few hulking tanks and pipes are preserved, giving it a slightly eerie feel. The hill at the center has a sundial on top, and offers a spectacular view of downtown across Union Bay, as well as gusts of wind great for kite-flying. Don't eat the carcinogenic dirt!
 • Myrtle Edwards Park on Elliott Bay has a nice view of Puget Sound and the Olympic Mountains.
 • Discovery Park in Magnolia is great for kite-flying.
 • The University of Washington Arboretum is 230 acres of urban greenery with collections of oaks, conifers, camellias, Japanese maples and hollies. Often filled with people going for walks on sunny summer days, especially weekends.