Shortly after we moved to Belltown, we noticed a hubaloo near the Space Needle. We walked over to see what all the fuss was about and learned that everyone was there to climb the Space Needle! Turns out there’s an annual event called Base to Space that is a fundraiser for Fred Hutch Cancer Center.
Obviously, this became a bucket list item for me because how many people can say they took the stairs to the top of the Space Needle?! Okay. Fine. A lot of them. I’m not special. But I wanted to do it anyway.
We missed it last year as we were out of town for something or other, but I made it a priority this year. We signed up during the Early Bird access and I’ve been counting down and training off and on since then.
It’s so worth it!
The event is incredibly well organized plus they had coffee and donuts from Top Pot near packet pickup. I’m sure there were other vendors but I couldn’t see past the pumpkin spice donuts… Delish.
We were in the Top Pot wave. There are 2 primary wave sponsors for this event: Top Pot and the Seattle Seahawks. There are special shirts for each and either donuts or 12th man flags for race finishers. I’d like to say that I intentionally signed us up for the Top Pot wave and free donut but the reality is I just selected the earliest race slot so I could climb the stairs and get on with my day.
Wave is a bit of a misnomer. If you’ve ever participated in or spectated a 5K, 10K, half, or full marathon, you’ll know that when a wave releases, it’s a huge swarm of people. It turns out that the wave for this was just a long, slow line, and then we were released up the stairwell 1 at a time.
The first few steps? Down. No joke. We went down 3 steps before entering the main stairwell! After that, it was up up and away!
You go round and round and round some more. The team keeps you entertained with various facts about Fred Hutch and the Space Needle. They have 2 interwoven stairwells! We were on the red line but we were always in sight of the blue line. The blue line was for all the runners. I’m not that dedicated.
832 steps later, we made it to the top. We got fancy medals and a much more important bottle of water, followed by a classic Homer Simpson donut. Life is good.
and cat approved
Amazing job!!! Congratulations!! Is it a new tradition??
Probably not. It’s a bit too expensive for my taste, as you have to reach a minimum fundraising goal. I won’t ask people for money, which means we paid it out of pocket. It’s a good cause and worth it, but there are a lot of other good causes too.
Well done! But..89 Floors?! It would take WAY MORE than one donut at the top. Maybe a dozen and a Mimosa to wash it all down.
Ha! You’re absolutely right! Booze really would have been an excellent way to cap it all off!