SEATTLE TOP TEN
What are the top 10 best Seattle sights and places to visit?  Opinions differ, and it depends on how you define "Seattle"--some top 10 lists include destinations that are wonderful, but are not actually in the city itself.  This particular list begins with venues that are within walking distance of the Convention Center and then branches out to sites where you'll need to take a bus or drive.

Here is the "must see and do" that makes the top of almost every list for Seattle:

1.  Pike Place Market    
It's an easy walk down Pike Street from the Convention Center, and begins approximately at First Avenue.  The Market is a fabulous place seven days a week for shopping, eating, people watching, and exploring, and it just celebrated its centennial in 2007.  Generally the Market is open M-Sat 10-6 and Sun 11-5 but hours vary according to merchant, with some restaurants staying open later for dinner and many farmers' stands opening at 8am in the summer.  The Market's web site features shopping and dining guides plus an interactive tour at http://www.pikeplacemarket.org/.  Enjoy!

Beyond the Market, reasonable people disagree as to the content and order of remaining destinations on a Seattle Top Ten list, but many would place Seattle's icon next:

2.  Space Needle          
A vision of the future when it was built for the 1962 World's Fair, the beloved Needle seems a vision from the Jetsons now, delightfully retro.  Take a ride up to the Observation Deckand enjoy a wonderful view of city, water, and mountains (including Mount Rainier, unless it is obscured by clouds).  You can also visit other sights at Seattle Center, such as the Experience Music Project and Science Fiction Museumand the Pacific Science Center.  It's easy to get there: just take the Monorail from Westlake Centerat Fifth Avenue and Pine Street, or for a less "futuristic" but free ride take a bus up 6th Avenue (free to the edge of the downtown Ride Free Areaat Battery Street).  You can also walk if the weather is good (and it very well might be beautiful outside; it is about half the time in June in Seattle).

And for librarians, this is certainly a "must":

3.  Central Library, Seattle Public Library
Walk south down Fifth Avenue to the famous Rem Koolhaas-designed Central Libraryof the Seattle Public Library system.  It's a spectacular and controversial glass and steel structure featuring numerous interior innovations such as the Book Spiral.  The Library occupies the block bordered by Fifth and Fourth Avenues and by Spring and Madison Streets, and is open seven days a week (M-Thu 10-8, F-Sat 10-6, Sun 12-6).   Love it or not, you've just got to see it!

4-7.  A Potpourri of Walks
This next grouping of recommendations is in alphabetical order.  You can select from it according to your tastes.

• Chinatown-International District--according to the District's web site, this is "...the only neighborhood in America where Chinese, Filipino, Japanese, Vietnamese and Southeast Asians live and work together, side-by-side."  Find the Asian food court to end all food courts at Uwajimaya, and learn about Asian Pacific American history at the Wing Luke Museum (slated to re-open in an expanded space just in time for SLA, in May, 2008).
• Pioneer Square--this was the heart of Seattle in the mid-1800's, and many of the buildings you see date back to the rebuiling after Seattle's Great Fire of 1899. You'll find historic buildings, parks, and gardens here, along  with galleries and the famous Underground Tour.
• Shopping Downtown--you want stores?  Seattle's downtown has them, very close to the Convention Center.  Beyond the big department stores, Nordstrom's and Macy's, there is a lot to find by just strolling along the streets and avenues.  The Seattle Shoppingweb site puts it well: "Seattle's downtown shopping district is a compact square of several blocks with brand names like Urban Outfitters, Gap and Nordstorm. Fashion boutiques like Betsy Johnson and Isadora's Antique Clothing dot the urban landscape and offer Seattle shoppers more eclectic options. Downtown Seattle shopping can feel like Fifth Avenue, especially as you stroll by fashion stars like Banana Republic or Nike occupying their own buildings..."
• Waterfront--*a great collection of sights and shops, including the Aquarium, the Olympic Sculpture Park, and the Pier 52 Terminal,from which the ferries depart for Bainbridge Island and Bremerton.  It's true, a ferry ride is not, technically, a walk.  You can get to them by walking, though, so they count, and a ferry ride is relaxing, scenic, and an iconic Seattle experience.

8.  Ballard Locks
Officially the Hiram M. Chittendon Locks,here's the place where you can watch luxury yachts, vacationers' motorboats and sailboats, working fishing boats, barges, and kayaks en route from the ocean to Lake Washington enter the Lake Washington Ship Canal.  You can also view the fish ladder and wander through the Carl M. English Botanical Garden.  By bus, one way would be to take the #17at Pike Street and Third Avenue, get off at NW 54th St & 32nd Ave NW, and walk a tenth of a mile.  The bus driver will help you--they'll all know where the Locks are.

9.  Woodland Park Zoo
With its 92 beautifully landscaped acres divided into bioclimatic zones, the Zoo"...manages the larges live animal collection in Washington state, with approximately 1,098 specimens representing 300 species plus 64 groups of inertebrates, one group of fish and one group of Partula snails."  Get there by #5 bus from Pine Street and Third Avenue to N 55th St. and Phinney Ave N.

10.  Washington Park Arboretum
Speaking of gardens, June can be glorious at the Arboretum, on the shore of Lake Washington and near the Museum of History and Industry and the University of WashingtonSeattle campus.   The Arboretum web site recommends the 11, 43, or 48 buses, get off at the McGraw Street stop.  Check the MetroOnline Trip Planner for details.

Other Seattle Top Ten lists:

• Seattle's Convention and Visitor's Bureau 
• Citysearch Seattle
• About.com
• 10best.com

Here's the City of Seattle's Official Visiting Seattle site.  For a wonderfully detailed, eclectic history of Seattle, visit the Historylink.org web site.