My Green Week

First of all - Happy 08-08-08! I can’t wait to watch the opening ceremony of the Olympics tonight. Beijing is 15 hours ahead of PST so I watched a news clip this morning of the opening ceremony for a few minutes at 5:08 a.m., which was 8:08 p.m. on 08-08-08 in Beijing. The number 8 means confidence and prosperity in Chinese culture making this date and time especially important. From the few minutes of coverage I saw this morning it looks to be a terrific opening ceremony. I have a list of things that I want to do before I die – see a space shuttle launch – attend a presidential inauguration - you get the point, and attending the opening ceremonies of an Olympic games is one of those things. I’ll have to blog about my must do’s - before I die list sometime!

Okay – on to my Green Week!

I started out the week with a goal to ride my bike to work three times this week and I’m glad to report that I made it! My ass is not as sore as when I first started and my legs are stronger! This is good! I’ve not used the car all week – it’s just sits in the garage – which is just fine with me, I hate driving the car downtown.

I got to thinking about the total miles that I’ve put in this week between running (25 miles), biking (72 miles) and taking the bus (140 miles) and how much I would have other wise spent on gas. With gas just over $4 a gallon and my car getting 30 miles to a gallon – that’s a weekly savings of $31.60 in gas alone. Add parking downtown daily at $15 a day and it really adds up and it does not even account for wear and tear to the car! Between parking and gas – if I were to do this every day for a year – I’d save over $5000! Obviously the term "green" applies to more than just environmentally friendly! Thanks King County for supplying me with a bus pass!

This morning as I was leaving, I decided to grab the camera and document my ride to the office. It’s a great ride with interesting things along the way.

As you can tell by the first picture – my days of being able to ride to work in day light is nearing an end. I left the house about 5:15 and it was still a bit dark out!

This picture is where I catch the Green River Trail. It’s about 2 miles from the house and it’s mostly downhill to this point. The bike trail crosses the river over this bridge. The next 14 miles follows the river.

They are doing levy repair along the river in a few spots along the way. I like watching the progress from week to week.

There are tons of beautiful scenes like this along the way – I’ll spare you the other 1000 pictures like this that I took!

This is a cool sculpture in one of the many parks that I pass along the way. I’ve always wanted to take a picture of it but never had my camera until today! The trail goes by a nature preserve and bird sanctuary. There is this tower you can climb and watch wildlife. The sign claims that this small sanctuary is home to over 200 different animals. I’ve see tons of different birds, rabbits (one day I counted 38) and a coyote along the route.

The trail goes thorough the valley where there are a lot of warehouses along the way – I thought this one was cool with the sunrise.

There was a beautiful sunrise this morning along the trail this morning.
Public art at "Three Friends Fishing Hole" I’ve always wondered why it was called three friends – I’ve made up lot’s of stories in my mind. I looked it up and now I know. If you click on "Three Friends Fishing Hole" you will find an article that tells you how it got it’s name.

I pass Kent’s office at mile 16. He works in the building to the right.

I could not help but stop off and take a picture of our truck in front of his office this morning!

Up until Kent’s office the route is on bike trails. From here I have to hit surface streets to downtown about another 8 miles. I wish they would extend the trail to downtown.

I ride past the Boeing Museum of Flight (I’ve never been but it’s on my list)!
This is the old Boeing Headquarters before they abandoned us for Chicago! Kent used to work in this building up until a few years ago.

Finally about mile 20 - a view of my final destination, downtown Seattle!

I ride past the new light rail station – services begins early 2009.

This is the old Rainer Brewery that is now the headquarters for Tully’s. Notice the big "T" where the big "R" used to be!

I ride through the international district to get to my office.

Finally just a few blocks away!

This is the office building where I work. My office is on the 4th floor.

Final resting spot for my bike for the day until I take the bus home!

Have a great weekend everyone. Thanks for continuing to visit my blog. I’ve been asked about the Traveling Rooster – he may be making an appearance soon. I have also been asked about the photo editing software that I’ve used for some of the pictures. An entire blog and link are coming soon!

Lastly - I hope you enjoy the new pictures up in the slide show! Everyone who knows me well knows that I love to do these self portraits! I’m not sure why – but I think they are hilarious!
Enjoy – I’m off to watch the Olympics!

Have a good one – Jim