Wonderful Washington Day 13

Mt. Rainer day!

Now I can finally say that I have been to he mountain that is on my license plate. For those of you who don't know, Mt. Rainer is a HUGE active volcano that looms up out of the clouds and can be seen from miles and miles away in all directions. If you've seen a Washington state license plate, that mountain is Mt. Rainer.

Carol was so excited about seeing Mt. Rainer, that she was literally bouncing off the walls for days, and needless to say, she was pretty happy when we finally arrived. The drive took us about 2 hours from Elizabeth's house, which was actually longer than I had expected.

Once we got there, there's really not a whole lot to say. Mt. Rainer is HUGE! Its covered in snow and glaciers, and it has the unique ability to appear like you are never getting close to it. It seems like as you walk closer to it, it just gets farther away (a tourist brochure actually said this too). We walked on a short trail at the base of the mountain which was beautiful. There were just endless fields of wildflowers and patches of snow. The snow fascinated us, especially since we had spent the last few days sweating like you wouldn't believe. It was still really hot while we were here, but the snow was still there, so that was interesting to me. I understand why there was snow on the mountain itself, but I didn't really understand why there was snow on the ground at the bottom. If you actually walk to hike ON Mt. Rainer, they recommend that you go with a guide and have a lot of climbing experience. According to another brochure, people who climb Mt. Everest typically "practice" by climbing other large mountains first - Mt. Rainer being one of those mountains. So for non-skilled climbers like us, the base of the mountain was the only place we walked.

The towns outside of the National Park were adorable. Directly outside one of the entrance gates was a town called Alpine. Or what used to be town called Alpine. 2 people, an older man and woman still live there, and they have painted their own sign that says "Welcome to Alpine - Population 2". Right by the sign is a house/store, so we went in and met the woman, and she told us that the town doesn't actually exist anymore, and her and her husband are the only ones who still live there. I was fascinated by that.

A few more miles down the road is an old train, that has been turned into a restaurant in another town that can't have more than 200 people in it, so thats where we ate dinner.

I'll let the pictures do the rest of the talking:

(I'm sorry, but this sign is just too funny to me.)

(Mt. Rainer)

(Glaciers on Mt. Rainer)

(more glaciers)

(Wildflowers and other mountains in the Cascades)

(the Paradise Inn - I want to stay here one day)

(all of us)

(This is written on the stairs leading to the most popular trail at the park.)

(Jan and me - We're pointing just in case you can't see the giant mountain behind us.)

(Mt. Rainer with no people in the picture)

(wildflowers, snow, and a giant volcano - all in one picture)

(waterfall that's being fed by the melting glaciers)

(another picture of the waterfall)

(all of us by the waterfall - we really liked the waterfall if you can't tell)

(playing in the snow)

(the former town of Alpine, Washington)

(the restaurant we ate dinner at)

Wonderful Washington Days 11 and 12

Still working my way through my vacation...

Day 11, Wednesday, July 29: This day will always be remembered as the hottest day in Seattle's history. I don't just mean the hottest summer day, or the hottest day in July. I mean the hottest day EVER in recorded history. As interesting as it can be to be a part of history, this is one day that I could have lived without.

Just to make things clear for people who don't live here. No one has air conditioning here. Seattle city buses are also lacking air conditioning. Restaurants, apartments, dorm rooms, houses, etc...none have air conditioning, except for a few very rare situations.

We had tickets to see Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince in IMAX 3-D at the Pacific Science Center, and I have to say it was the best choice ever to see it on this day. Our tickets were for 11:00am. It was opening day in IMAX 3-D and this was the first showing. By the time we got in line, I think it was already close to 100 degrees. At 11am. Thankfully, while 99% of the city lacks air conditioning, the Pacific Science Center is well equipped to keep people cold. Thank God for museums - they have to have climate control! Needless to say, this was a very big deal. Once everyone was seated in the IMAX theatre, an employee stood up at the front to welcome us to the opening of the movie in IMAX theatres. He said something along the lines of "Are you all happy to be here? Its opening day of Harry Potter in IMAX 3-D AND you guys are in one of the very few places in the city with air conditioning!" People clapped and cheered a little bit, but apparently, not loud enough. When the guy didn't get a good enough reaction, he said "I'm sorry people, but did you hear me? I said that this is one of the few places in Seattle that has air conditioning!" That got a bigger cheer that time. We still didn't know that the day was going to break records.

So after spending close to 3 hours in a nice cool theatre, enjoying Harry Potter for the 2nd time (for me and Carol...It was the first time Alice and Jan were seeing it), we decided to explore the museum for a while and take advantage of the coolness. The PSC was interesting, but honestly, not all that impressive to me. I love the Franklin Institute Science Museum back home in Philadelphia, and the PSC just didn't really compare to it. We used to have Girl Scout camp-ins at the Franklin Institute, which was the most popular trip that we ever took, so I guess I was expecting something a little more up to par with it. But for what its worth, it was an interesting place. After a few hours exploring around, we went outside and we were greeted with a blast of stagnant hot air. Walking just 2 blocks up the street had all of us covered in sweat. It was pretty gross.

We went to meet Elizabeth at a bridal shop. She just got engaged shortly before this trip and she wanted everyone to help her look at wedding gowns. The bridal shop also had air conditioning, so we got lucky twice in a row. However, before we went to meet her, we stopped at a Rite Aid to pick up some random stuff, and we were greeted by an angry woman talking to the cashier, who was pretty irritated with Rite Aid because she couldn't find a fan. Apparently, all fans, all over the entire city had sold out and the people who didn't buy one were just out of luck. I think thats when it hit us that this heat was actually a serious problem. Alice and Carol had come from Texas where they were used to weather like this. But we realized that there is a difference between being used to weather over 100 degrees and having a/c to cope with it, and not being used to weather like this and NOT having a/c to cope. The city was pretty much in a panic which we witnessed more as the day went on.

After watching Elizabeth model and try out various different dresses, we went to eat dinner at an Indian restaurant. We chose to sit outside because even though it was still insanely hot, even though night was setting in, this place was one of the unlucky restaurants without air conditioning, so it was even hotter inside the small building. I've never eaten Indian food in my life, so I was a little apprehensive, especially since I'm a really picky eater. Apparently, Elizabeth is known for getting people (like Alice) to try new things, so she was very helpful when it came to trying to figure out what would taste good and what didn't have any onions in it (I hate onions). We ended up ordering a bunch of stuff that we all shared, and I have to say that coconut curry chicken is AMAZING. I'm a little bit shocked to admit that I liked something new, but I did, and I'd happily eat it again.

As a random side note, Elizabeth had been carrying a fan around with her all afternoon. She got it from someone at work to cool us all down in her apartment. On our way to the bus stop, some random guy a few stories up in a building yelled down to her and started asking questions and talking about her fan. Apparently, he was also an angry person who was greeted with the lack of fans in the city when he went to buy one earlier.

Day 12, Thursday, July 30: We woke up to the news that the day before Seattle had reached its highest temperature ever. 103 degrees. First of all, I'm a little surprised that 103 is the hottest its ever been. I've definitely been in hotter temperatures than that before, but I guess when its not expected, and very unusual, and in a city with no a/c, then its a really big deal. A nearby town - Puyallup - reached record temperatures of 107 degrees that day. So while it was hot in Seattle, it was even hotter in some surrounding areas.

It was still pretty hot on this day, although news articles were happy to reassure us that the heat wave was going away (which translates into - "today its only 101 degrees. See? Its cooler!") We decided to go to the Seattle aquarium. A nice air conditioned building (yay for buildings that are required to keep things cool inside!), was just what we needed. We spent quite a bit of time at the aquarium, which is fairly large and packed with all kinds of sea creatures. Our favorite part was the otters. We all wanted to take one home with us.

And then, of course, we all had to get our individual picture taken on the cute wood carved otter bench.
The rest of the day was spent enjoying the local surroundings. We wandered around Pike Place Market for a while, and then checked out the first Starbucks across the street from the market. The last time I went to Pike Place, my friend, Mrs. M, introduced me to an amazing Russian bakery called Piroshky's. Since Mrs. M is from Poland, I took her word on the fact that this place was delicious (not that Poland = Russia, but its close enough!). So I dragged everyone to Piroshky's and they were all very impressed. I bought a delicious apple cinnamon roll, and imagine my surprise and delight when I realized that they also sell marzipan rolls! (If you've read my past blogs, I love marzipan, even though everyone around me seems to find it disgusting.) So I bought a marzipan roll too, which was absolutely delicious! Everyone else was very happy with the choices they made (apparently the potato, onion and cheese thing is really good, but since I hate onions, I can't imagine that I would agree), so I highly recommend checking this place out if you're ever in Seattle.

We then set off on a long hot walk. Actually, it wasn't that long, but it was so hot, that it felt long, to Elliot Bay Bookstore, which is apparently pretty famous, although I had never heard of it. Sadly, the bookstore was one of the many places in the city that did NOT have air conditioning so it was pretty uncomfortable. But its a huge bookstore and I could have spent hours in there. I ended up buying a Weird Washington book (great series that started with the original Weird New Jersey magazine), and a used hardcover copy of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. I have the first 4 Harry Potter books in softcover, and I want to get them all in hardcover before they stop publishing this particular edition, so they all match. So I was pretty excited to find an almost perfect condition, used, hardcover book for only $10. Now I just need the first 3 in hardcover and my collection will be complete.

We set off back to the area of Pike Place Market to start heading home, and this walk was even worse than the one to the bookstore. I didn't realize we had walked downhill to get to the bookstore, so walking uphill for 10 blocks or so, in 100 degree weather, was not a very fun walk. The end was ok though because we ended up getting ice cream, and if you know me, ice cream can always make things all better :-). After ice cream we checked out some local cheesy tourist shops where we all purchased various magnets, sweatshirts, t-shirts and postcards. This was also when I bought the newspaper with the headline about the prior day being the hottest day ever in Seattle history. I thought that headline would be a good souvenir to keep.

Finally, it was back on to the hot, no a/c bus and back to Elizabeth's house for the night to rest up for a long, fun day at Mt. Rainer the next day!

(All of us at Pike Place Market)

(Jan and Alice with their drinks from the first Starbucks, and yes they are iced drinks since no one in their right mind would be drinking hot coffee on this day.)

Whidbey Weirdness (Its been a while since I ran into any...)

Dear Lady in the Dollar Store,

Yes, I am aware of the fact that I am wearing a shirt that says "Hard Rock Cafe Paris". Yes, I've been to Paris. I may have completely misjudged your words and intentions, but you seemed to think it was odd that I have been to Paris, yet I was shopping in the dollar store.

First, I have a house full of cats. 10 of them at the moment, along with 4 small foster kittens. They tear through certain toys like you wouldn't believe. I refuse to pay $15 for a stick with a string attached to it, with a toy dangling off the end. These types of toys are favorites of my cats (and probably all cats), but they really like to pull that toy off the string, therefore breaking the toy. Its much cheaper for me to buy 2 of them at the dollar store (and oddly, the string on the dollar store one is much thicker than the expensive ones), because in about a week, when they pull the toy off of it, I will have lost $2 instead of $15. That seems perfectly logical to me.

Second, everyone can benefit from saving money, so please take your weirdness and go ask other people questions about the places they have visited and give them weird looks. Actually, don't do that. They'll probably be just as annoyed as I was.

Thank you for your time,
Brooklet


Dear Weird Creepy Man in the Dollar Store Parking lot,

Yes, I am aware of the fact that there is a Florida license plate on my car. Yes, I am also aware of the fact that there is a United States Navy sticker on the back of the car. Yes, I am aware of the fact that I am VERY far from home.

In case you haven't noticed, the vast majority of this town is in the military. Therefore, its not odd to see Florida license plates on people's cars, or any other state for that matter. Its not weird. Really, its not. The simple fact that I have Florida plates and a Navy sticker on my car does not give you enough reason to stand in the parking lot talking to me while I load bags into my car (yes lady from inside the dollar store, I bought more than just cat toys). I'm really not sure why it was so amazing to you that I am far away from Florida. Perhaps you've never left Whidbey Island. That could possible explain your weirdness and creepiness.

Brooklet



Wow...so apparently it starts to rain, and the weirdos come out in full force! I have to admit that while these people are annoying, I kind of missed some of the weirdness :-).

Wonderful Washington Day 8, 9 and 10

One of these days I will get to the end of my 2 week vacation. So where was I? Day 8, 9 and 10 of Alice's visit.

Day 8, Sunday, July 26: This was Alice and Carol's last day on Whidbey Island. To my surprise (OK, I do have to admit that its beautiful out here), they were a little upset about leaving because they loved the area, and the easy access to places like the Olympic National Park. Not to worry though. They still had a week left of a Washington vacation. Alice's friend Elizabeth recently moved to Seattle. So after visiting me for a week, she had made plans to go visit Elizabeth. Another friend (of both Alice and Elizabeth), Jan, flew in from Kentucky for the week. Since I've lived in Washington for a year and still had never really seen Seattle, I invited myself along for the Seattle portion of the vacation (OK...I didn't technically invite myself. I was told I was welcome to join them, but I did feel a little bad crashing Elizabeth's apartment when I lived just 2 hours north.)

We left Whidbey on Sunday, and headed down to Seattle. Upon arriving in Seattle, I decided that I will never live in Seattle. Elizabeth lives in a cute neighborhood, but the streets go in 2 directions, yet they are large enough for only one car, AND people park their cars all along the sides of them. I was convinced I was going to hit another car head on, or hit one of the parked cars in my attempt to not have a head on collision. Not to mention the fact that I can't parallel park. So after finding Elizabeth's place, I had to switch seats with Carol, while Carol parallel parked my car. If she hadn't been there, we would have had a problem.

Carol and I were introduced to Jan and Elizabeth, and the 5 of us set off to find a place to eat dinner. We ended up at a small bar and grill called the Pig and Whistle. The food was great and so was the service. Elizabeth used to be a waitress, so she clued us into the "tricks" of being a good server. Basically if we call our waiter by name, and act friendly and flirty towards him (and this can work on both male and females, regardless of what sex you are), then he will treat us well. She was right. Our server was Michael, who sat and talked with us, professed his love to Elizabeth, and gave us a list of other restaurants to check out around the city. Elizabeth swears this is because of how we interacted with him. So I highly recommend the Pig and Whistle and if you go there, ask for Michael ;-).

We stayed at the Pig and Whistle for a few hours, just talking, eating and having a few drinks. Afterwards we walked back to Elizabeth's house and crashed for the night.

Day 9, Monday, July 27: Elizabeth had to work, so that left me, Carol, Alice and Jan alone to explore Seattle, a city that none of us had ever visited before. The most I had ever seen was Pike Place Market. We decided to make it an easy, yet fun day. We didn't know it yet, but this week was about to be the hottest week EVER in Seattle's recorded history, and we were already starting to feel that heat. We decided to go to Pioneer Square, which is the oldest neighborhood in Seattle, and go on an Underground tour. The tour was a lot of fun, but if you aren't a history buff then you'd probably be bored, although the tour guides are entertaining with their endless bad jokes and inappropriate sense of humor (the brochure advertises this fact). Apparently, the people who originally built Seattle weren't that bright for various reasons. But lucky for them, the original city burned down, and the current city was built on top of the old city (kind of like Underground Atlanta, although lacking the Civil War aspect). The old city still exists underground and that's where the tour took us. We got to see the old doorways of businesses long gone, the old sidewalks, a piece of the original water system (a hollowed out log), and other stuff like that, along with learning the history of the city. Some businesses that sit on top of the old city, use the underground for storage and garbage, so there were a few random things down there, like rusty old bedframes and a claw foot bathtub, but that made the whole thing even more interesting to me. I've been a bit grumpy about the history of the west since moving out here because its not my specialty. I majored in history and concentrated in southern American history. The Civil War is my specialty and my favorite historic time period. Since I was already in a crappy mood regarding our move out here in the first place, I was also a little bitter that it was taking me COMPLETELY away from what I earned my college degree in. As much as I'd like it to, Civil War history simply does not extend this far west. Thats ok though, because after this tour, I learned that Seattle does actually have a pretty interesting history. Not quite as interesting as the Civil War in my opinion, but interesting enough that it kept my attention enough for me to buy a book about it (the book was written by the guy who started the Underground tour).

After the tour we stopped at a candy store in the area, and we were quite pleased to see that they sold these incredible gourmet candy apples, and we were given a discount for wearing wristbands from the tour. Good candy and discounts make me happy :-).

Then we met Elizabeth, who had just gotten off work and set off to visit the Ballard Locks, which I had never heard of, but its apparently an interesting tourist attraction. However, we were taking public transportation and the bus we were on got stuck in some crazy, abnormal traffic so by the time we got out of it the locks were about to close. Thankfully we realized this before we got anywhere near them, so we just went home with plans to visit them the next day.

However, I had already scheduled a babysitting job for the next day, so after getting back to Elizabeth's, I got in my car and drove home, in order to make some money, and left the 4 others to have fun without me for a day :-(.

Day 10, Tuesday, July 28: This was the day I babysat all day, so I don't really have much to write about. Alice, Carol, Jan and Elizabeth went to see the Ballard Locks, and I babysat. I would have prefered to be in Seattle, but I'll just have to put that on my list of things to do another time. I did head back down there late that night though, and settled into Elizabeth's basement apartment for the duration of the trip.

More interesting vacation news to follow....I still have 5 days left to talk about!

Halfway There!

Last night was our Officer Spouse's Club "Over the Hump" party. To be honest, I've been avoiding doing things with the OSC lately for a variety of reasons, but a huge one being that I'm just sick and tired of dealing with the Navy and this deployment. When my friend was here visiting, it was wonderful because for the first time in a long time I didn't have to eat, sleep and breathe Navy. However, I pulled myself out of my bad mood and put the bad attitude aside for the evening and surprisingly, I had a lot of fun!

I will admit that the main reason I decided to go, wasn't to have fun (although, I had hoped that I would have fun). Apparently, its tradition here that other squadrons (our "sister" squadrons), pool a lot of money from their own OSCs to throw an Over the Hump party for whichever squadron is deployed. And by pooling money, I mean that each squadron donates $200-$300 to the party, which makes a pretty large chunk of cash when you add it all up. Since every OSC event I have been to in the past involved eating dinner at someone's house, I couldn't imagine what kind of party they would throw with all of that money. We knew that the theme of the party was "The Amazing Race", but that was all we knew. The ladies putting the whole thing together kept everything a secret until we arrived last night.

Once we arrived we were greeted with drinks (including bottled water with special labels printed up with the squadron name and "Over the Hump" on them. I'm telling you, they really went all out for this.), and we were divided into teams of 4-5. We had to draw numbers from a bag and whatever number we had was the team we were on. I lucked out and got to be on a team with one of my good friends, which made me happy :-). Our first task was to decipher a clue that told us which car we had to get into. Once we figured out the the letters and numbers were a scrambled license plate number, we found our car, and hopped in. One of the ladies from one of the other squadrons was our driver, and another lady came along to take pictures of us as proof that we completed our tasks.

Our first stop (which was REALLY hard to figure out - they put a lot of time and thought into these clues) was at a local building, that looks like a log cabin, with several companies inside of it. We were given cowboy hats (the kind little kids wear) and bandanas, told to put them on, stand in front of the building for a picture, and then we were off again. The next hour or so consisted of us running in and out of Walmart, Safeway, and some sketchy local bars, doing a Chinese fire drill, making a crayon rubbing of a manhole and begging every single person we ran into for a blue rubber band. Basically, we had 2 tasks. The first was to answer a bunch of questions that were given to us. Some were easy (What is the follow on plane for the P3 called? P8), and some were pretty hard (Whats the capital of Qatar and Djibouti? For the record, I didn't even know how to spell Djibouti. And if you're interested, the capital is simply...Djibouti. Maybe that should have been an easy question.) Our second task was a scavenger hunt where we had to do certain things and find certain things. Now somewhere out there, someone in another squadron has a video of us doing the Can-Can on the corner of the 2 main streets in town.

We had a lot of fun though. The people in Walmart and Safeway seemed to think we were slightly insane. We came in with our cowboy hats and bandanas, but we didn't realize until we ran into another team, that everyone had different costumes. One team was in hula skirts, leis and coconut bras. Another had a shiny pink cape and mask. The third team had princess tiaras, cheap plastic clip on diamond earrings and feather boas. And the final team had pimp hats, a money necklace, and a blacked out tooth. I'm sure the locals were highly amused by us all.

Some things we learned from the night:
~Oak Harbor has some VERY sketchy bars. One task was to go into a certain bar, where a shot had already been paid for, and one person on the team had to drink the shot. We got to the bar at the same time as another team, and while the bartender was getting the drinks, and someone was explaining that we were on a scavenger hunt, a creepy man told us that we should each sit on his lap, take a picture and send it to our husbands. Right.

~Safeway gives out free cookies at the bakery. Getting one of those cookies was one of the tasks.

~Safeway also sells buffalo meat (take a picture of a bison was on the list).

~For anyone wondering where to find a picture of a bison if you didn't take a picture of the meat, there is apparently a bison statue in Ft. Nugent park.

~You can drive over part of the lawn and curb of the base CO's house, without ruining your husband's career, although I don't recommend doing this. (Take a picture of a COW aka Commanding Officer's Wife house was on the list, and this particular COW just had her house decorated with cows the night before.) We weren't the only group who knew this though, so while we were there taking a picture, another group arrived, and proceeded to block us into the driveway to prevent us from getting ahead. While one of our team members talked to the CO and his wife to get answers to some of our questions (How many squadrons are here on Whidbey?), our driver proceeded to play chicken with the other driver, until the opposing team moved out of the way just enough so we could squeeze around them, by driving over the lawn and curb. Thankfully, these people had a sense of humor (and it probably helped that our CO's wife was on that opposing team).

~You can also steal on base without ruining your husband's career, although I also don't recommend doing this. Get a copy of the Navigator, the base newspaper, was one thing we had to do. Instead of going into the commissary or NEX, we simply stole one from someone's driveway. We did have a short discussion about whether or not stealing the newspaper and driving over the CO's lawn would be career killers (we decided we didn't care - sorry Mr. V). However, we did send out the wife of the highest ranking guy to be the thief. We figured that her husband was the least likely to get in trouble.

~People in foreign countries eat some really disgusting food. Our dinner was also Amazing Race themed so we had food from all over the world, and I have to be honest and say that most of it was pretty disgusting. I'm a picky eater though, so I'm sure some people loved it. Dessert was great though. Tiramisu that was swimming in alcohol, and some banana coconut thing that was delicious. We were all very happy when we were presented with gift bags (and by gift bag, I mean a canvas bag with the squadron logo sewed onto it, a nice little sentiment written to the wives, and our first initial in rhinestones - did I mention they really went all out for this party?) full of candy from around the world, and a recipe book with the recipes for everything we ate. I'll have to attempt to make the desserts one of these days.

So all in all it was a fun night. Deployment is now MORE than halfway over, and we've all survived so far so things are looking good :-).

Wonderful Washington Day 7

For our 7th day of Washington fun, I'm not going to write a lot. Instead I am going to direct you to Alice's blog, and her post about our day in Vancouver, British Columbia.

Our Day of Randomness - by Alice

I think Alice covered our day pretty well, so I'm not sure that there is much more that I can say. In summary, we decided to go to Vancouver for the day so that Alice and Carol could say they went to Canada. My friend Amber Lynn also joined us so she could say she lost her "Canadaginity". She lives here in Washington too, but had never been to Canada before this day. There's not a whole lot to do in Vancouver that would be a huge tourist draw, but there are still fun things to do.

Our day consisted of a Canadian border guard who told us not to drown....a random University of Texas guy who Carol had to shout "Hook 'em" to out of the car window on the Canadian border.... Amber Lynn's fascination by the "Welcome to the United States of America" sign, that she pointed out looked like an amusement park sign....lots and lots of traffic due to a group of Iranians standing in solidarity (it went on for blocks and blocks), asking for democracy, as they supported the recent protesters in Iran....a 2 hour lunch because our waitress seemed to forget about us, even though we were right smack in the middle of the restaurant and she walked past us numerous times....a mama raccoon and her babies (Alice didn't write about these guys) who were out in broad daylight begging for food...a seagull that swallowed a giant starfish in one VERY slow gulp....a random Canadian, who saw the pilot wings on the front of my car (I was driving Mr. V's car), and made a whole line of cars back up so we could take his parking spot (amazing since I was under the impression that Canadians didn't like the United States military)....a wedding party dressed in gothic clothing, having wedding pictures taken by a tombstone-like structure....another wedding party on the Canada/United States border....a cruise ship that dragged a dead whale into the Vancouver harbor....a thunderstorm that we tried hard to not be afraid of, only to find out the next day that 4 people were struck by lightening just a few miles from where we were...a real rescue of a stupid person who seemed to think it was a good idea to leave a clearly marked trail and end up in freezing waterfall water/rapids...an adorable Canadian park ranger who became even more adorable when he talked to us with his French-Canadian accent....a suspension bridge that terrified all of us except Carol, although we still walked across it...a United States border guard who was waaaayyyy too excited that Carol and Alice were visiting from Texas (although he was 10 times friendlier than the Canadian border guard)...and finally, a beautiful sunset.

So go ahead and read Alice's blog, and then come back here to see pictures of our day. Or just look at the pictures first and then read Alice's blog. I figure she can do the explaining about the day, and I can provide the pictures :-).

Alice's blog about Vancouver

(Peach Arch State Park - on the border of Washington,USA and British Columbia, Canada)

(Amber Lynn by her "amusement park" sign)

(Amber Lynn losing her Canadaginity)

(Iranian protesters)

(baby raccoons)

(Mama raccoon)

(Canadian geese in Canada - this was really amusing to us for some reason)

(seagull starting to eat a starfish)

(still eating)

(stopping for a rest)

(yep, the whole starfish is in his mouth)

(all done!)

(A Princess Cruise ship going under the Lion's Gate Bridge. We found out the next morning that this same cruise ship dragged a dead whale into this harbor when it arrived.)

(One of many, many warning signs in Lynn Canyon park)

(Another of the many, many warning signs in Lynn Canyon)

(This is what happens when you ignore the many warning signs in Lynn Canyon. They are rescuing a guy who somehow ended up in the water below.)

(a horrible picture, but the only clear one of us on the suspension bridge - we're a little frightened because some kids decided to run past us right at this moment, making the bridge move)

So again - the link to Alice's blog: Alice's Vancouver Blog

Wonderful Washington Day 5 and 6

After spending 4 days riding the ferries back and forth to various locations, we decided that we needed some time to see the local sights, and relax at the same time. So we spent the next 2 days exploring Whidbey Island.

Day 5, Thursday, July 22: We slept in to get some much needed rest, then we packed lunches of peanut butter and jelly, with a side of apples, and headed off to Fort Ebey State Park. Whidbey Island has tons of small state parks, most of which I have never seen, and Fort Ebey was one of them. We took a short trail down to the beach, where we ate our lunch and just relaxed and watched the water. This day started out in typical Washington fashion - cloudy and cool. So sitting on the beach, was actually pretty relaxing and comfortable. I'm not sure how long we stayed there, but the tide was out, so we walked around on the large rocks that are usually covered by water, and I collected more rocks to line our garden. As we were getting ready to leave, some random people on the beach asked us if we had ever been to this beach before when the tide comes in. We said no. She then informed us that if we came back at 5:00 that afternoon we would be pleasantly surprised by the ocean sized waves and the surfers that came out to surf those waves. I had no idea that we got ocean sized waves on Whidbey Island, and to be honest, it still doesn't really make sense to me as to why we get waves like that, but regardless of whether or not it makes sense to me, it turns out that we do, in fact, get ocean sized waves here.

(Fort Ebey State Park)

So we left the beach, and headed off to hike a short trail that led to an old gun battery from the World War II era, when Fort Ebey was an actual functioning fort. We explored the battery for a while, and then we headed down to Coupeville so Alice and Carol could see the cute, historic downtown.

(gun battery at Fort Ebey State Park)

Once in Coupeville, we saw the historic downtown (which takes all of 2 seconds, although it is a very cute historic downtown), got some yummy ice cream, and checked out some gift shops, and then just before 5:00, we decided to head back to Fort Ebey to check out these amazing waves that we were told about.

I have to admit, we were very impressed by the waves. We got there just a little after 5:00. The tide was in, and most of the beach that we had played around on before, was gone. There was a large group of surfers (or what I perceive to be a large group of surfers, since this is Whidbey Island - 20 people), and there were HUGE waves! Granted, I grew up on the Jersey shore, so waves don't truly excite me. I've seen some pretty big waves in my lifetime, and these waves weren't quite up to par with my normal definition of big waves, but it was still pretty amazing. We sat and watched for a while, because I think all 3 of us were in shock that waves this large actually happened on an island in the middle of the Puget Sound. We took some pictures, of course, but the pictures really didn't do it justice. If you're in this area, its definitely something worth checking out, although, if you're looking to see some hot, good looking, good surfing, surfers, this is not the place to do that. The surfers were actually pretty bad, and half of them were balding :-).

Day 6, Friday, July 23: We had planned on going back to the San Juan Islands on this day to see Orcas Island and Lopez Island, but when we woke up it was really foggy, in typical Washington fashion. Part of what we loved about the San Juan Islands was the beauty of them, but the beauty is hard to see when its covered by fog. Since we didn't have any major plans though, we decided to drive to the ferry terminal and ask if they knew what the weather was going to be like on the islands later on in the day. The ticket lady told us that she was pretty sure the fog was going to clear up, but she couldn't guarantee it. So we debated a little, but in the end, we decided to just stay on Whidbey again for the day.

Our first stop was Mt. Erie, which I believe is the highest point in this area. It offers you an amazing view of Whidbey Island and the surrounding areas and islands. We drove up to the top and took in the view for a little while, then headed down towards Coupeville to go to Fort Casey State Park. Fort Casey is an old army fort, and on the property is the Admirilty Head Lighthouse. We took a short tour through the lighthouse and then explored the fort for a while, before heading back home to get some rest. Overall, it wasn't a very eventful day, but it was a fun relaxing one.

(View from Mt. Erie)

(Carol, Alice and me on Mt. Erie)

(Admiralty Head Lighthouse)

(Fort Casey)