A Capitol day

The Washington State Capitol 

Olympia

We drove to Olympia Saturday morning to see our friend Mark from Ohio. He's visiting his family in Portland this week and we decided to meet up somewhere in the middle. Olympia is about 60 miles south of Seattle.

Olympia still feels like a small town. I guess that's typical of many states where the original Capitol has become somewhat of a backwater compared to other larger cities.  I liked the old-fashioned and friendly downtown.  We had a delicious lunch at the 5th Avenue Sandwich Shop.  Thanks, Mark.

We pass through Olympia fairly often, always on the way to someplace else. We haven't really stopped there since Amanda was a college student back in the 1990's.

I dug around for my favorite photo of Amanda on the campus of Evergreen State College.  This notorious hotbed of "left wing extremism" has been in the news lately.  In reality, it's just a laid back little liberal arts college.

It was a perfect school for our sweet Amanda, who went on to do such wonderful and unselfish things with her life-- like joining the Peace Corps and now a nursing career. 

After lunch we drove a few blocks to the Olympia Farmer's Market. Free parking? Are you kidding me?  (We're not in Kansas anymore.)

Old friends

The market was larger than we we expected, with both inside and outdoor stalls selling flowers, vegetables, baked goods, crafts of all kinds, you name it.

After an hour of light shopping (bread, scones, fruit tart, lavender eye pillow for me) we drove a few blocks up to the Capitol building.

 

Our legislators don't work weekends of course, so we drove up and parked practically at the front door.  Except for a few tourists and a smattering of protestors on the front steps, we had the place almost to ourselves. Luckily we were just in time for a behind-the-scenes tour.

Our tour guide.

 

The front portico.

The House of Representatives public viewing gallery.

The State Ballroom.

No expense was spared when they built the Capitol in 1924. I'm cynical enough about politics, but this building is truly inspiring, built with tons of beautiful imported marble, columns, classical ornamentation and symbolism.  Our claim to fame in Washington is having one of the highest masonry domes in the world.  It was a nice day.