I’m sharing my ultimate travel guide for Seattle City. If you’re thinking about visiting Seattle, I’ve written down what to do in Seattle and some of the places to eat, drink, and shop for you, and also some tips on getting around, when to visit, and everything like for those of you who aren’t familiar.
Seattle is located in the upper left corner of the U.S. and is part of the greater Pacific Northwest (PNW), also known as the land of water, mountains, and trees.
Table of Contents
Travel guide for Things to do in Seattle city
1 Space Needle
It is one of the most iconic landmarks here in Seattle. The Space Needle is located in the Seattle Center. You can see it and take a picture in front of it, but I also highly recommend going up the Space Needle because you will see a 360-degree view of the city from up. There is also a section with a rotating glass floor, which is stunning.
2 Pike Place Market
It is another iconic Seattle spot. It’s a farmer’s market with local vendors that sell fresh produce, flowers, and seafood, and there are a bunch of little shops in there. So it’s a fun place to know and explore to get some breakfast. I highly recommend going there. Also nearby is the Gum Wall. So you can combine Pike Place with the Gum Wall. It’s just a little alleyway with gum all over the walls.
3 Chihuly Garden and Glass Museum
It showcases all the studio glass of the artist Dale Chihuly. It’s cool seeing a whole museum of just glass art.
4 The Waterfront
This is just a kind of little stretch of shops and restaurants that’s right by Puget Sound. There is also a Great Wheel and Aquarium.
5 The Spheres
It’s a workspace for Amazon employees, where they work in these glass spheres and are surrounded by plants. But it is open to the public only for the first and third Saturday of the month, so for time and reservation, please check their website. It’s cool going in there and seeing all the plants and everything just right in the middle of the city.
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Travel Guide for Seattle City Viewpoints
1 Pier 62
It is one of my favorite spots to see in the city on a clear day. You can see the Olympics across the sound, and they also have a floating dock where you can go if you turn around you see the beautiful city with the water below it, you can see the Ferris wheel, a lumen field, a T-mobile park, and then also if it’s clear you get a peek of Mount Rainier.
2 Gasworks Park
Located north of Lake Union you get to see the whole city skyline and the Space Needle. Over Lake Union during sunset, it’s so pretty, just seeing the colors of the sky and just the water, and it’s cool to go in the summer too because there are so many boats that are out there kayakers, seaplanes landing in the water, it’s just like everybody is out and enjoying the sun.
3 Kerry Park
This is located in the Queen Anne neighborhood. It’s up on a hill from where you can see the view of the city, with the Space Needle, kind of like right in the center. I have heard that, on a sunny day, you can see Mount Rainier, but I have yet to see it from Kerry Park.
4 Water Taxi and Fairy Ride to Bainbridge Island or Bremerton
Another great way to see the city is over Puget Sound. One way is you could take a water taxi to West Seattle. The other way to see the city over the sound is if you take a ferry to Bainbridge Island or Bremerton. It is a longer ferry ride, so you could drive onto the ferry to take your rented car around Bainbridge Island or Bremerton.
Travel Guide for Places to Eat, Drink, and Shop
Food
1 Pike Place Chowder
This is an iconic Seattle spot to go. You gotta, try the clam chowder over there. It’s perfect for most of the cold days in Seattle. But even on a nice summer day, the clam chowder is good.
2 Ivers
It’s kind of like a little fast-food and seafood joint. You get some fish and chips or shrimp and chips, and they also have chowder there. They have a lot of locations around, and one of them is located on the waterfront. So it’s nice to combine with your little waterfront walk. There is another one by Gasworks Park.
3 Dick’s Drive-in
It is another iconic Seattle spot where you can have a delicious burger at a reasonable price. They’re open till 2 am. So many people like getting it as a late-night meal after some drinks.
4 Piroshky Piroshky
They are located at Pike Place Market. So Piroshky’s are Russian and Ukrainian baked or fried yeast-leavened boat-shaped buns with several different fillings. It’s just a little handheld bun, so you can walk around and eat it at the nearby park.
Desserts and Sweet
1 Salt and Straw
They have ice creams with ribbons of caramel and fudge and things like that. They do an excellent job with their flavors. They also have monthly flavors that are only available for that month.
2 Pie Bar
They have a little window where you can exclusively walk up and order a slice of pie. They’re open late at night, so it’s nice to go after you get dinner in the city.
3 Hood Famous Cafe + Bar
They have some delicious Filipino pastries. They’ll have ube cheesecake, like a longanisa quiche, and then they also sell coffee drinks with ube. It’s a nice place to visit.
Drinks (both coffee and alcohol)
1 Starbucks Reserve Roastery
This is so nice inside you can see how they roast all the beans, and they have some baked food. You can eat breakfast, and they have a little bar area where you can try alcoholic drinks. And one of my favorite drinks from there is the whiskey barrel-aged cold brew. different
2 Rachel’s Ginger Beer
It is an admirable place to go. They have a lot of ginger beer to try with different and unique flavors. They also serve various types of mules, which I love. So they have Moscow mules and Irish mules. I think you can make your mule with your choice of ginger beer. The decor in that place is so cute. I’ve only been to the one in Capitol Hill, but they have multiple locations around the city. It is my favorite in this Seattle travel guide.
3 Fremont Brewery
It is located in Fremont, and it’s close to Gasworks Park. It’s a good spot with a lot of seating. They have outdoor seating, and their beers are good.
4 Mbar
Mbar in South Lake Union. It’s a worthy place because you can enjoy your drinks and food on the rooftop with a beautiful view of Lake Union.
5 Unicorn
It was featured in Macklemore’s thrift shop video. They got a lot of fun and unique drinks over there. I think it’s just like a fun place to go because it is so unique.
6 Neumos
Usually, they’ll have a DJ perform or have like-themed nights. My favorite night going out around here was a boy band night. So they were playing like factory boys and in sync in one direction. I had a great time in general.
If you go out around Capitol Hill, Ballard, Fremont, U-district, and Belltown. There are just a lot of restaurants and bars as long as you’re walking around there. A lot of options you can pick from.
Shopping and Thrifting
1 Fremont Vintage Mall
Located in Fremont, this was also featured in Macklemore’s thrift shop video. They have a bunch of different vendors, but just all kinds of in this giant space. They have everything from good clothes to hats, furniture, records, and art pieces, and a lot you can find there. Highly recommend going there.
2 Capitol Hill Goodwill
They do a fine job of organizing all their stuff. It’s also a nice big store. I don’t have trouble moving the hangers in that Goodwill because sometimes they’re jam-packed.
3 Seattle Antiques Market
It is right by the waterfront where one has fun like knick-knacks and just like old things that your parents might enjoy. They also have a little clothing section. They have a lot of furniture, so I highly recommend going there.
4 Pike St. Press
If you want some cute local souvenirs. Then, you can visit the Pike St. Press for some Seattle-themed or Pacific Northwest-themed notebooks, Art prints, and postcards.
5 Standard Goods
It is another good place to go. They have stickers and fresheners, and they also have clothes. They have jewelry, and their candles are so cute. They’re made in the Pacific Northwest, and they’re all named after national parks, and they’re 100 soy candles.
6 REI
It was founded here in Seattle. The store here is big, it has two stories. There’s an indoor rock wall and an outdoor biking path. It’s pretty fun just going there, even if you don’t mean to buy anything, but you’ll probably end up walking out with something. It’s my another favorite place in Seattle travel guide.
Venues
I have a list of venues. When traveling, sometimes it is fun to see the local sports team, a concert, or a show.
1 Lumen Field
Which was formerly known as CenturyLink Field, home of the Seattle Seahawks and the Sounders. You can watch a soccer game or a football game there, and you can watch a concert there. You might notice one thing when you visit Seattle, a lot of flags with the number 12 hanging off, and that is for the 12th man or the 12th player because the Seahawks fans are so loud they act as another player on the field, which I think is pretty cool.
2 T-mobile Park
This is the home of the Seattle Mariners. It’s one of the few baseball fields with a retractable roof, which is very helpful when playing baseball games in Seattle, where it rains a lot.
Seasonal Activities
1 Hot Tub Boat
It was made famous by TikTok, and it lives up to the hype we went during the nighttime in the first week of March, it was cold that time, but it was still a great experience just being out on Lake Union. There weren’t any other boats around, and watching the skyline at night in a hot tub on the lake was a unique experience.
2 Rent a Duffy boat, kayak, paddleboard in Lake Union
You can also rent a Duffy boat, kayaks, or paddle boards in Lake Union. That’s fun to do in the summer on a sunny day.
3 Visit the University of Washington
In the spring, visit the University of Washington, and if you go to the quad you see all of the cherry blossoms over there. They’re very mature trees, and their trunks are windy. There are a lot of people that go there, so you might have to get creative to get a shot without people in it, and if it’s a clear day, there’s a part on campus where you basically like walk down a hill towards a fountain from there you get the perfect view of Mount Rainier.
When to Visit
1 Springtime
Springtime is beautiful in the city because it’s starting to warm up. The flowers are blooming, and the trees are getting their leaves back. You know there are rainy days, but the flowers and the color they bring to the city make you forget that it’s gray outside. And the days are starting to get longer because of daylight savings time.
2 Summer
In summer, the days are super long and super beautiful. You have the best chance of a warm sunny day. You want to enjoy outdoor activities without dying of heat. You will see the trees are fully green. There are still flowers and hydrangeas, and vegetable gardens.
Everyone is just out enjoying the weather, which I think is part of the fun of summer here in Seattle. You can see that everyone is enjoying themselves, just like being outside and taking advantage of the sunny weather. The sun rises at 5 am, and then it won’t get dark until 10 pm at peak summer. June to August is the best month to visit Seattle.
3 Fall
Fall is nice because the trees change colors, so you’ll see a bunch of yellow and red leaf trees and then the evergreen trees that remain green. The city is just another set of beautiful colors. So far, I’ve noticed that the peak-like fall foliage season is towards the end of October.
4 Winter
Then, of course, we have winter, which is very gray and very wet. There is a low chance of seeing the sun during the winter but on the days that you do see it makes you appreciate the sun even more, but something nice is in the surrounding area, there’s a lot of snow in the mountains. They are so close by that you can go there and do snowboarding, snowshoeing, skiing, or any of the snow activities.
Getting around the Seattle city
In the city, some ways to get around are the Light Rail, you can take the bus or the street car. There’s also the Monorail, which takes you from the main downtown shopping area to The Seattle Center. There are also options for apps where you can rent rides, like Uber and Lyft.
You also have jump bikes and scooters that you can rent, like Lime scooters and Wheels. And there are also Gig cars.
Walking Around
Seattle is a very walkable city. It’s nice because there are just so many plants and flowers to look at, and there are a lot of small businesses, restaurants, and everything. It’s very nice, what makes the city unique is the balance of nature and city, you know just the natural beauty of the surrounding area is so beautiful, and if you get a chance to visit the surrounding area. I highly recommend you rent a car to explore the surroundings of Seattle.
So, if you are looking for a good city slash nature kind of trip. Seattle is the place for you to visit. If you have any other suggestions for other places to visit in Seattle, please let me know in the comments below. I would love to know some more good spots to visit. Your comments will also help other people find some new places to visit.
I hope this article helps you plan your trip around Seattle and make it one that you never forget.