Day 16: Washington to Vancouver, BC

It was slow-going north of Seattle. Lots of traffic, some road detours and big distances between stuff. I went to see a lot of mid-century stuff that I had on my list from various sources but most of them were not quite appealing enough for me so I didn't shoot them. I hope I don't regret it some day.

One such place was the Bellevue Botanical Gardens Visitor Center (aka the Shorts House) which was built in 1956. While it doesn't look like much from the outside, I really liked the inside which had a lot of skylights and glass.



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While I was at the Gardens, I came upon some other things including these odd rock sculptures:



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and this neat flowing fountain:



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I forgot to include this photo yesterday of a postcard that I bought. It shows the packing label for Snookum. See my agilitynut Flickr photo & video to the Wenatchee sign:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/agilitynut/2764075253/



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I went to Snohomish (though the signs say Maltby) to shoot a giant coffee cup. Just behind it was a complex with a restaurant and antique/gift shops. There were some really neat signs including this killer Colonel Sanders weathervane:







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Here's a fun sign for a store in Lynnwood called "Wide Shoes Only". My feet are a little on the wide side so I'm sympathetic. They called them "surfer feet" where I grew up in Southern California. Seems going around barefoot all the time encourages the feet to grow wider.



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I've never heard of or seen a Gull gas station before. I assume this was a very small local chain (or maybe it was just this one station in Burlington for all I know):




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I had heard that there was a restored Shell gas station in Langley, BC. I asked around quite a bit when I got to town and no one had heard of it. Then I spotted a bunch of restored English sports cars and figured someone there might know. Sure enough, one guy drew me a map and I was on my way. Turns out, it wasn't a restored station at all but rather a replica of one in a residential neighborhood. I couldn't really get close enough to "Memory Lane" to take more photos of it without walking right up the driveway and I was already arousing the suspicions of neighbors. So I left it at this since it was getting dark anyway and I had a lot of other stops to make. I couldn't tell if this building was used as a house or just a massive garage for the guy's collection.