Star-struck in Seattle: a cruise down the 'celebrity' lane

Lake Union's skyline is tinselled with celebrity. On Queen Anne hill sits the imaginary high-rise where Frasier (of the eponymous sitcom) lived with his father Marty, therapist Daphne and the lovable Jack Russell, Eddie. Nearby is the home of Dr Meredith Grey of the long-running TV show Grey's Anatomy. On the opposite shore, Capitol Hill ascends towards a more sorrowful memorial: Lake View Cemetery, where Bruce Lee and his son Brandon Lee lie buried. The departed often have the best view, in this case a freshwater lake contained entirely within Seattle's city limits. Tributaries connect it to the mighty Lake Washington and the legendary Puget Sound.

"Do you recognise that house?" asks Argosy Cruises guide Casey Smith, pointing to a floating home at Westlake Marina.

I swivel my head portside. The clapboard house rings a bell: it was home to Tom Hanks' character in Sleepless in Seattle. Set during a characteristically rainy winter, the movie was filmed in spring; water had to be trucked in for the simulation of rainfall.

"I think it's the only time anyone's had to fake rain in Seattle," Smith says.

There's not a speck of cloud in today's sky either; the sun washes a shoreline garlanded with houseboats. Originally occupied by fishermen and loggers, they were a popular choice of accommodation during the Great Depression. Many fell into disrepair; today their number is capped at 500 and they sell for eye-watering sums.

It's a price worth paying: the lake buzzes with float planes and yachts; it's cupped by hills from which dwellings ogle the placid view. Even the old gasworks are stylish: their gasometers rise like steampunk artefacts from the manicured slopes of Gas Works Park. Long gone are the paint splotches from Ten Things I Hate about You, when Heath Ledger and Julia Styles' characters painted the town red (blue, yellow and green) during a raucous game of paintball.

Celebrity dissolves in the glare as we sail beneath Aurora Bridge into the Fremont Cut, a canal connecting Union and Washington lakes with Puget Sound.

"You really can't get fish any fresher than here at Fishermen's Terminal," Smith says as we approach trawler-dotted Salmon Bay.

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This former tidal inlet is bisected by the Hiram M. Chittenden Locks, constructed in 1917 to maintain the lakes' level and prevent salty inflow from sullying their freshness.

"I want you all to know it's a tight fit, we eke in with maybe a foot either side," says Captain Kristi Schooley. "Soon you'll smell the sea. You'll get the beautiful scent of Puget Sound."

It's a seamless fit; our boat, the Good Times II, sinks below the shoreline as the chamber empties. Level now with Puget Sound, we sail into her salty embrace. Sea lions doze on pylons in Shilshole Bay; bluffs and parkland wreathe the seaboard. Celebrity of a different sort festoons Elliott Bay's skyline: the Space Needle rising monumentally from the city; the Olympic Mountains domed in snow and dazzled by the sun.

The Seattle CityPass includes admission to an Argosy Cruises harbour tour, with the option of upgrading to the Locks Cruise. See argosycruises.com and CityPASS.com.

The writer was a guest of Visit Seattle.