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Archive for November 13th, 2009

eric on Nov 13th 2009 Around Seattle

A Morning at the Ballard Locks: just a bunch of stupid boats

Yesterday morning, Smartz and I took a little trip to the Ballard Locks. She had read that there was a penny press on the premises and we decided to check it out for ourselves.

The locks’ main purpose is to facilitate boats going from Puget Sound to Lake Washington (which is higher in elevation). It also serves as a fish ladder for Salmon swimming upstream.

We parked the car and walked into the park. There was a bit of construction going on farther up and as we got about halfway there, a strange looking fellow came up to us and said in a sad voice [bad language ahead]:

I don’t mean to burst your bubble, but all that shit them mean fuckin’ faggots are doing – you won’t see no fish. Just a bunch of stupid boats.

He really did seem upset about this. I felt bad for him. He clearly wandered in here to see some fish swimming upstream, but instead just saw a bunch of stupid boats.

I’m not sure if he made it past the construction (which was easy enough to do), but we did. As we crossed the canal, we saw a harbor seal. Cute little devil. He was swimming around and sneezing. I saw a harbor seal sneeze! A lot! Adorable.

On the other side, we visited the fish ladder and saw a couple of fish doing their best against the current. Our friend was somewhat mistaken. it wasn’t the “fuckin’ faggots” doing things that caused the lack of fish. It simply wasn’t time for their migration. That was in August (mostly). I wanted to go find him and tell him that.

But whatever. We found the museum and gift shop, which were pretty ok. There was a short audio/visual program with some rocking 60s/70s documentary music being played over it and a few nice models. It did have a great explanation of the locks and of their construction.