Greetings from Washington State and the home of Starbucks, Boeing Aircraft and Microsoft! I landed here on 17 October from New York.

Seattle is a very cultured city - the locals tell me Seattle (for the Arts) is the New York of the west... I concur with this statement!.

On my first night I was extremely fortunate to score the last ticket to hear Seattle Symphony with Itszak Perlman (violin). Maestro Perlman really made his violin sing...it was a truly beautiful and an incredible performance. There were four standing ovations and his final encore was the theme from Schindlers List.

Dale Chihuly, Glass Artist, is also from Seattle area and today I went to Tacoma (his home town) and visited the Glass Museum. I was in awe of the glass bridge which consisted of about 50 glass boxes forming a wall on the bridge. Each box held a beautiful work of art in coloured glass. Lots of flowers and vases which appealed to my senses! Another section of the bridge incorporated a roof of coloured glass seashells, sponges, starfish, seaweed and fish... a much smaller section of this roof was incorporated in the Dale Chihuly exhibition held at the National Art Gallery in Canberra many years ago. I felt that I had gone to heaven. The colours and shapes were wonderful!

There was also an exhibition by Ginny Ruffner (an American Glass artist) called Flowering Tornado at the Glass Museum. The description of one of her pieces really captured my attention: "Creativity is everywhere and everything is connected. Creative thought and creative action are a part of this living web of relationships. Creativity is an awesome, beautiful, unstoppable force. To get it flowing, believe in it, dont ignore it, recognise the connections. It's always there, waiting to flower. The opportunity for creative experience exists in every situation, in every response, in every person".

The installation for this description consisted of 6 very large gilded picture frames (no canvas). The two most meaningful frames for me were titled "Heart: have courage with your imagination" and Chains: don't get tied up in the small stuff". The first frame had a large silver heart suspended in the frame with spiralling wire in front stretching beyond the frame. The second frame consisted of large chain links draped through the frame. The other frames were titled "Head: avoid self judgement" "Arrow: put your will into action" "Flower: be aware of beauty" and "Trap: avoid trap of fear". Simple but very effective messages.

Keeping in the theme of glass... The Seattle Art Museum (SAM as it is known here i Seattle) is showing an exhibition of Tiffany Glass.. another real treat for the eyes, heart and soul!

Tomorrow I am travelling to Vancouver and will be making my way across to Toronto and then Chicago before flying down to Lima for the next big trek... the Inca Trail.