Southward Bound 2014

We leave this year with mixed feelings: excited to be off on new adventures but sad to leave our family.
We left Oct. 14/2014 heading south down Hiway 36, a stress free route seeing horses ,cows, antelope & geese. We spent our first night in Hanna & got our first look at sugar beets & the Rogers sugar plant.

 Crossing the border was incident free, just confiscated my grapes as I could not prove country of origin. Beautiful fall colors, good hiway & we arrived at another Walmart "camping spot" in Butte, Montana. Butte was the site of a huge copper mine earning it the title "richest hill on earth" as 20 billion tons of copper were removed from several mines. The old part of the city, built on the hill is full of old brick homes & businesses, quite the sight.

Onwards to Ennis, Montana, our base for exploring the area. This time a full service RV park, much appreciated as the temp. was -5 in the morning. We drove to nearby Virginia City & Nevada City, two old "almost" ghost towns from the gold & silver mining days of the late 1800's. More old building, wood this time & of course more pictures.

The highlight of this area, of course, is Yellowstone National Park. We headed out at sun-up & spent the day in awe of the beauty of the place. This is definitely a "bucket list" destination!
We toured the Old Faithful & Norris Geyser basins (caught 2 eruptions of Old Faithful) and the Mammoth Hotsprings & terraces. Each unique & amazing - geysers, hot springs, mudpots & fumaroles. Colorful, noisy (bubbling, hissing, gurgling), & sometimes smelly. We restrained ourselves & only took 300 pictures! We also saw wildlife - bison, elk, antelope & Canada geese. There were more tourists than we expected, but better I'm sure than summertime. We stayed so long that we had to drive back to the RV in the dark, breaking one of our "rules" but it was worth every minute!

We are off to Idaho today, meandering along the way & always enjoying life.
Still Living the Dream!

Alaskan Cruise Adventure

Our Alaskan cruise adventure was a great one, we are no longer cruise virgins!
We sailed from Vancouver with Holland America on the Zuiderdam - 1916 guests & 823 crew, a "mid-sized" ship. Eleven passenger decks, eight bars, five places to eat, an art gallery, a movie theater, shops, etc!

Overall a good time - our cabin was sufficiently spacious - a king bed, lots of closets, a mini fridge, plus a full bathroom with tub/shower & a cute little balcony. We ate in the buffet for most breakfasts & lunches, so many choices & great food. Dinners were in the dining room with full menus, sitting with different folks each time. Lots of variety & tried several new foods. We even went to Afternoon Tea one day. Entertainment was varied, from a hilarious comedian to a "dated" ventriloquist to singers & dancers in a large production. We didn't love the fact they there was always an "opportunity" to spend more money on the ship - jewelry, art, souvenirs, spa, etc. We did check out one art auction, truly just for the free champagne, didn't splurge on anything. We worried about Robin getting seasick, he was fine, I felt woozy in the head on a couple of days - we actually had to hang on while in the shower one morning & people walking in the corridors that day looked like staggering drunks! Generally you knew that there was motion but it wasn't an issue.

We cruised thru the Inside Passage both directions, quite close to shore, looked in vain for wildlife, did see beautiful scenery.

Our first port was Juneau, Alaska where we went gold panning at a creek - lots of fun & yes we brought home over a dozen flakes each. Our best shore excursion was a float plane trip over 5 glaciers, amazing views, so blue & vast! Everyone had a window seat, maybe 10 people with commentary over headphones. Another first for us.

Next stop was Skagway, an old gold mining town on the trip north to Dawson City. We took a bus up & over the White Pass, where miners carried (on their backs) a full years worth of supplies, 2000 lbs. over the pass taking many, many trips. Amazing stories. We traveled from Alaska, thru BC & into the Yukon where we stopped for a barbecue, checked out a museum that included a full size wooly mammoth & met sled dog puppies. For the trip back down we boarded the White Pass & Yukon train, riding in restored coaches, pulled by vintage Diesel engines. We stood on the platform between the cars taking photos & enjoying the spectacular scenery!

We then spent a full day cruising around Glacier Bay National park watching huge chunks of ice crash into the sea, listening to the rumbling & cracking & being amazed by the waves they created. Being that close to glaciers was fabulous!

We were lucky to sea a variety of ocean creatures - many humpback whales, orcas, sea otters, seals & bald eagles. Between our camera & the iPad we have hundreds of pictures & video.
Our last port was Ketchikan, we wandered around in the pouring rain, checking out the shops & Creek Street - built on stilts over a river, once home to the red light district.

We celebrated Robin's birthday on board, complete with cake & a song from the waiters in ?? Indonesian.

We met some wonderful people on board the ship, enjoyed being pampered & will definitely book another cruise in the future.
Our trip driving to Vancouver was great as we stopped to visit with old friends in Penticton & snuck a peak thru the fence at our old house ( the rhubarb was 4 ft tall).
Our trip home along Hiway 3 was very scenic, but a bit slow as it's very windy. Once we turned east it was another case of " the horse to the barn" & we were home in 2 days. Good to be back, busy gardening & still getting settled as we seem to not have been home much since we moved!
Still living the dream, thinking about our next adventure.

Home, Sweet Home

Firstly I must apologize for my tardiness at posting the final episode of our winter adventure - I can blame camera/computer troubles, but mainly I just got lazy!
We are home, safe & sound, but I will outline our last couple of weeks.

We crossed into the U.S. March 22, a painless process, but sad to leave Mexico. One final Mexican novelty - a "Mexican zebra" - a genuine entrepreneur had painted his burro, hoping for tips from visitors wishing a photo, of course we contributed!

We spent a couple of days in Yuma, ran into old friends from our hockey parent days, shopped at the huge Arizona Market, did some much needed cleaning of the RV. Next stop Quartzite for some rock hounding & unfortunately a bit of a fall for me. A sprained thumb & a good scar on my arm, but we consider ourselves lucky as nothing broken & otherwise no injuries, scorpion or snake bites the rest of the trip!

We stopped in Parker, Arizona for the first time, a beautiful area along the Colorado River, surrounded by interesting mountainous terrain. We did a scenic drive across the Parker Dam dodging burros (dozens of them everywhere), saw a unique golf course with gravel fairways, & marveled at the houses perched on the river banks.

Onward to Bullhead City, Az. which is right across the river from Laughlin, Nevada. We set up in a lovely RV park for a week, using a handy coupon - cost of only $90 for the week! Still green grass, flowers blooming & warm & we both enjoyed the pool & the hot tub. We had a good visit with old friends Mary & Gary, of course a few buffets, some gambling ( my best "jackpot" was $80) & an interesting tour of the Riverside Casinos car museum.

We did a day trip to Grapevine Canyon, site of native Indian petroglyphs set amongst huge rock piles. The road into the area was called Christmas Tree Pass & lo & behold there were many, many trees along the way decorated with Christmas ornaments & tinsel!

A new bird for our list - the roadrunner, we had a friendly one come & visit in the RV park. We purchased our own "bird" a wind spinner that we will set up at home & on our travels.

We left Bullhead City April 4, drove straight thru Vegas & headed for home. We ran into snow flurries here & there, but never any on the road, thankfully. We crossed the Snake River in Twin Falls, Idaho, enjoyed the "big sky" in Montana & at a rest stop chased 4 wild turkeys until one started chasing Robin! At the same rest stop we read the plaque about the Montana missile field - 50 minuteman missiles underground clustered near the Canadian border, presumably aimed at Russia & only removed 8 years ago. A bit  frightening!

We crossed the border into Canada, took less than 10 minutes, then stopped in Vulcan. This is the site of the SS Enterprise & the Trek Station, pretty cool since I am a bit of a Star Trek fan. We made it home, sweet, home from Great Falls in one day - the horse to the barn thing!

We were home only 2 days, a visit with Shane & Sarah, then off to see Adam, Jen, Emma & Ty. The little ones have grown & are so much fun, it was sad to head home. We caught up with Scott & are now settling in to our new life here. You know it's Alberta because Robin has been shovelling snow, in long pants for only a few days though, back in shorts today.

Our next adventure will take us on an Alaskan cruise - already booked for May - still Living the Dream!