Sleeping in Seattle

Sleeping at SEA-TAC/Photo by Patricia Leslie

On the floor at 4 a.m. at SEA-TAC , but at least they had pillows.  If they had taken a right turn off Concourse C, they would have found sleeping pads (sans armrests) on couches. They missed the website/Photo by Patricia Leslie

Sleeping at SEA-TAC with what looks like a baby blanket, but where's the baby?/Photo by Patricia Leslie

Remind you of anything?  These were sea lions we saw (later, after the airport) from a catamaran on our way to Muir Glacier in Glacier Bay Basin, Alaska. The National Park Service Ranger on board the ship said the big one with his nose in the air was the King of the Lions. Thank goodness there were none of those at the Seattle airport (nor snorers) because from the boat we could hear this fellow bellowing.  I must say he was louder that all the security noise at check-in/Photo by Patricia Leslie

Remind you of ...us? We are all one big happy family anyway, just a bunch of mammals getting necessary rejuvenation. These are sea lions in Glacier Bay Basin, Alaska/Photo by Patricia Leslie

Day breaks at SEA-TAC/Photo by Patricia Leslie

From the airport, the Seattle landmark known as the Great Pyramid of the West?/Photo by Patricia Leslie

Day break is so purdy at SEA-TAC, I had to throw in this one, too/Photo by Patricia Leslie

To sleep or not to sleep in the Seattle airport?

I had a six-hour layover and rather than go to a motel and spend all that money and time, I thought I'd check it out, sleeping at the airport.

Was that possible?  Would "they" let me sleep at their airport?

I went online and found a handy site for sleeping at airports, called (strangely enough) "Sleeping in Airports" with SEA-TAC included, and off I went! 

Saving money?

Yup.

The website listed the best places for shuteye at SEA-TAC with sleeping “couches” and places to eat which stay open 24/7. 

I followed its suggestions for Concourse C but actually found more comfortable sleeping pads beyond C (exiting to the right at the end of the concourse) which wasn’t the quietest place to sleep (right beyond a 24/7 Security check-in) but given “security,” I figured I was pretty well covered and didn't have to worry about "security" all night with the cameras everywhere, and the passengers and crews checking in all night, darn them. 

(And nearby was a 24/7 restaurant.)

Bang! Bang! Clang! Clang! Thud! Thud!  Like at a train station, it was hard to sleep with all the security racket.

But now I lay me down to sleep and did cat-nap a while, waking every hour or so to check on my surroundings and to make sure I didn't oversleep (hardly) and miss my connection to Sitka.

Throughout the night, other sleepers joined me (where room permitted on the couches), and the population continued to change.

My worst complaint was my “pillow” made of my carry-on book bag and let me tell you, hard edges and corners of books do not make good bedfellows.  

To replace the travel pillow I lost last year (grrrr....Finn Air), I bought an American Tourister travel pillow this year, and it was so bad, I didn't care if I lost it, too, and so I did. ("Travel" pillows are not pillow pillows, if you catch my drift.)


The noise around me rose considerably around 4 a.m. when I made my final rising, feeling a little bit "scrunchy," but considering all that money I saved, "scrunchy" quickly disappeared. 

As I ambled down the concourse to my connection, I found sleepers on the floor, hugging the walls of the walkway in crooked positions, who, obviously, had not found the website, but they had pillows, at least, and there lay a person covered head to toe by a sheet and a pillow stretched out on one of those curving padded couches, I declare.

To my new friends on a tour of Alaska, sleeping in Seattle was a subject I mentioned more than once since I spent the “saved” hotel money about ten times over, chirping with every purchase:  “I’m buying this with the money I saved at SEA-TAC!” 

Before you know it, SEA-TAC may start a “sleeping fee” but, sshhhhh…not to mention ....

But, how about some pillow rentals? I'd pay for that!

Thank you, SEA-TAC, for letting me stay over!  

patricialesli@gmail.com