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allie's second birthday

2006-03-26T09:35:00.000-08:00

( this entry by Vicki)
Allie had her second birthday party saturday march 25 though her birthday was march 24. She had her party at the Mountlake Terrace swimming pool. This picture is of us in the swimming pool's jungle room.

Allie fell and hurt her arm wile opening presents. She still had lots of fun blowing out the candles on her jungle thymed birthday cake.
Here is Allie playing with her new toys. Special thanks to Sara, Naud, and Annabelle. She loves the toy shopping cart.

2006-02-27T22:49:00.000-08:00

Hoffbrauhaus http://www.hofbraeuhaus.de/ - a 400 year old beer hall in Munich, is home to Octoberfest and I must say some damn fine beer. The kind of beer that can make even a weary traveller smile. This is what you look like after travelling through 16 time zones in 3 days. Earlier this day we flew 13.5 hours from Tokyo to Munich (by way of the arctic circle believe it or not).

I highly recommend renting a Mercedes and driving the Autobahn to Fussen to see Schloss Neushwanstein - the princess castle.

2006-02-27T22:28:00.000-08:00

Downtown Tokyo at night

I recently spent some time in Tokyo during a round-the-world-in-11-days trip. This was the highlight of the trip, and probably the coolest place on the planet I have ever been to.

Tokyo is ridiculously urban. In the neighborhood where I stayed there was no green space to be found - no parks, not even parking lots. Most streets were too narrow for anything but bikes and scooters. Cars were scarce except along the major route pictured to the left.

If you have ever seen the movie Lost in Translation you'll recognize the intersection in this picture. This is where the scene was shot with the dinosaur walking across a giant building TV screen in the background. This is Shibuya. Times square on steroids.

Things I learned about Tokyo:

30 million peole can actually live in a single city, and keep it clean
the Japanese don't walk and eat or walk and drink coffee so there are no garbage cans on city streets
this is not a multicultural city (at least not the parts I visited) - it is mostly Japanese residents.
women spend a LOT of money on boots and handbags.
there is virtually no crime - this is one of the safest cities on the planet
you need to eat every 2 hours because the local food never leaves you full (but the sushi is awesome)
the movie "lost in translation" is an extremely accurate depiction of what it's like to go to Tokyo....
the information desk clerks in the subway can't speak english - you are on your own and good luck.
it's fun to ride the subway, get lost, and not be able to read the signs
you can't use addresses or maps to navigate in Tokyo - it's easier to go by landmarks. There are virtually no street names or signs and the numbering system makes no sense

The new old boat

2005-09-19T19:56:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow we will close the purchase of this lovely craft with our partner. She's a 1968 Fairliner Sedan Express. Though it's advertised as a 28 foot it's actually closer to 31' because Fairliner measured the lengh from where the water comes on the bow through to the props.

The twin big block 350 Chris Craft engines make this boat very fast compared to the other comparable cabin cruisers from this era - they are not original to the boat and her past owner had a thing for speed....

It sleeps 4 and is fully equiped with fridge, stove, oven, bathroom, and a fiberglass dingy with a 6 horse engine - or for the nautically inclined, she has a head, galley, 2 berths, and a tender with a 6 horse kicker ;-). The previous owner passed away 2 months back, and has owned this boat since the 80's. We were amazed by the meticulous attention to detail he had. Everything is fully documented from the new engines through speed trials. It cruises comfotably at 18 knots (2200 RPM) - I have no idea what top speed is but we were running her at 3500RPMs.

Everthing on board is in great shape. New paint, new wood trim, fresh varnish on the finish, well maintained fresh water cooled engines, hot water heater, 5 new marine batteries, and a full array of tools, polishes and spare parts - including 2 spare props! Other extras include Halon automatic fire extinguisher, fuel smell sensors, feul gagues (a novelty on these old boats), and did I mention the tender and kicker???? That little boat itself is worth $2500.

Now we just need to find somewhere to park her in the city. Old wooden boats need a cover, and covered moorage in Seattle comes at a premium price, but I hope to earn it back in the weekly poker game - on the boat of course ;-)

2005-09-19T19:55:00.000-07:00

Boat 1

Horse Back Riding

2005-06-01T22:54:00.000-07:00

Kaitlyn's school horse camp was on Fri May 20th. Everyone rode a horse that day except for Allie and I. This is one of the cool things about the girls school - Kaitlyn's kindergarten class had a day trip to go horse back riding, and in June Vicki's class goes for an overnight trip (2 days)!

Kaitlyn, Vicki and Melanie were naturals on horseback. I on the other hand got the job of trudging on foot through 6-8 inch deep mud and other crap (literally) holding the reins with Allie strapped to my chest in the baby Bjorn (they failed to mention in advance that a parent had to walk the pony for the little ones). Thus, I didn't ride. Luckily Vicki was able to ride solo on a full size horse.

They also learned how to groom, saddle, and sit side saddle on a horse. This was a great day in the Montana-like environment north of Seattle in the foothills of the western Cascade mountain range.

More pictures can be found at http://al.lindsays.ca/horse/index.html

The San Juan Islands

2005-06-01T22:20:00.000-07:00

This picture is the view from atop Mount Constitution on Orcas Island. We spent the weekend vacationing in Moran State park. If you're not sure where the San Juan's are situated click here http://maps.google.com/maps?q=friday+harbor+washington&ll=48.685547,-122.932874&spn=1.197266,2.141383&hl=en

The islands are situated east of Victoria BC, in the straight of Juan de Fuca. We stayed on Orcas island, one of the larger islands, at Moran state park. This was also the first use of our pop-up camper. Another family came with us - they had a daughter Kaitlyn's age as well as a younger son so the little girls had a lot of fun together.

This was Memorial day weekend down here in the US of A. On thursday when I arrived back home from frigid Montreal I got a birds eye view of the islands from a Dash 8 connecting Vancouver to Seattle. The weather in Seattle was 91 degrees and sunny from thursday through saturday, and then cooled off into the low 80's for the rest of the weekend. In short - it was perfect weather.

Friday was a busy day with Vicki having a class field trip to the beach to beach comb, then Vicki putting on a concert at school (she plays an instrument who's name eludes me at the moment - it has four bells on it and you play it with a drum stick). Friday was also Vicki's 10th Birthday! So, we didn't hit the highway until 3:10pm. The ferry to Orcas island is only 1.5 hours north of Seattle on a normal day but this day we arrived at 6:15. It was stop and go traffic pretty much the whole way. It reminded me of the 400 north bound to Muskoka on the May 2-4 weekend. We were lucky enough to get onto the 6:35 ferry - we were not nearly as lucky coming home (we had a 6 hour wait on Orcas island and watched 3 ferrys come and go before we got onto one.)

The ferry ride was fantastic. There are pictures of the whole weekend in chronological order on my website at http://al.lindsays.ca/Orcas/index.html We weren't lucky enough to see whales though there are 2 pods of them in the area. We passed on the whale watching excursions due to the gouging prices.

The island itself feels like a rural community. There is a small business area near the ferry (6 buildings or so;-) and another small town in the middle of the island (I'm guessing the population is <100). The park is large in acreage but didn't have many camp sites (<100) so we never felt crowded. In fact on most of our excursions we didn't see many people at all.

On Saturday we climbed ( in our car ;-) mount Constitution - the highest point in the San Juans, and only 5 miles from our camp site. From the top we could see Vancouver, Mount Baker, the Olympic mountain range and many islands. Check the pictures in the link above - it was really amazing. We also went swimming in Cascade lake. I was surprised to find swimmable water in Washington because of what the locals had told me. Vicki also managed to squeeze in some fishing though she didn't catch anything (the lake is stocked with trout).

Sunday we hiked into Obstruction Pass State Park which is also on Orcas. The is very rustic with only a hand full of hike in camp sites. We hiked .5 miles through what felt like a rain forest to an ocean inlet beach where we did some beach-combing. This was the coolest! We saw many Sea stars, crabs, jelly organisms and Sea Anemones. Check out the pictures!

Despite having to wait so long for the ferry we enjoyed ourselves hanging out in the sun overlooking the ocean and islands on Monday. The ferry ride back was just as beautiful as the ride out. If you are ever in the area I highly recommend heading out to the islands. This is the kind of vacation that would have been worth flying out for - but it is nice to be local. I wonder how expensive land is out there.......

2005-05-02T21:57:00.000-07:00

If you've never been to Vancouver you don't know what you are missing.....
We've been 3 times so far, and I think we'll be going there a lot in the future. I just applied for the canpass express pass so we can avoid the lineups at the border. As is customary, I have posted the pictures on my website at http://al.lindsays.ca/Vancouver/index.html This is a mix of pictures from January and March.

2005-04-17T20:45:00.000-07:00

Hockey - at last!

After 6 long months hockey has re-entered our lives with a vengence. Vicki is taking power skating classes once a week until June. Her instructor is amazing, and she seems to be at exactly the right level to play with the 9 and 10 year old boys. She has to play with the boys because there is no girls league. There is a girls team, but it is ages 10-18 and is made up of the only 20 girls playing hockey in the region :-( There are 4 girls in her power skating class though!

I started back with a team of men playing once a week, soon to be twice a week for the summer. Friday was my first game in 6 months - 1.5 hours at that.... very painful. I'm still looking for my lung. After the game one of the guys in gave me his season ticket seats for the Seattle Thunderbirds game tonight. I took Vicki. It is round two of the playoffs - Seattle leads Kelowna BC 3 games to 2. We lost, but from the photo yo can see that Vicki still had fun, and we just experienced more hockey than back in Canada with no NHL season. I must admit, the crowd sounded an awful lot like the Charleston Chiefs Booster club. Only the die-hard hockey fans go to games here. There are none of those clean cut, white collar fans. It was a very physical game, and as it turns out the tickets were right behind the penalty box, front row. It was great! We'll definitely go back.

The T-Birds play at the Key Arena - same place the Sonics play, and right next to the Space needle. While we waited for our ride we ventured up to the top of the space needle and got a good look first hand at just how beautiful this part of the world is. Unfortunately all my pictures are out of focus! I guess it's time to read the instruction manual for my new Sony DSC-T1.

Before the game we went to the Science center again, because it's all in the same Seattle Center complex http://www.seattlecenter.com/ Here we saw Valentine's Performing Pigs http://valentinesperformingpigs.com/ A very impressive display. They have been on Letterman, Oprah, Leno, etc. check out the link - there's a video of the show. The pigs play sports, and do pretty cool stunts.

Also of note this week is that Kaitlyn learned to ride her bike without training wheels. This is in large part thanks to mom's back-breaking efforts running up and down the sidewalk holding the seat, and Vicki's great big-sister teaching how to get started from a standstill. A short Video of Kaitlyn's accomplishment is at http://al.lindsays.ca/bike.MPG

2005-04-01T16:06:00.000-08:00

Let's go Hunting!

The girls on Easter morning.

2005-03-27T08:46:00.000-08:00

Thursday was Allie's 1st Birthday. We had a small party for her, with our neighbours and Jim and Di. Unfortunately Allie's friend Annabelle - who turned one earlier in the month - was sick and unable to come, so they joined us by phone (you will notice the phone appears in many of the pictures at http://al.lindsays.ca/Allies1stBDay/index.html )

2005-03-23T20:49:00.000-08:00

At Christmas Cory, Terri and Family were down from Peterborough. We went to the Seattle aquarium, one of our favourite spots (we're members and we've been at least 5 times). Of course we are now also members at the Vancouver aquarium as well...... there something fishy about all this.

I'll post pictures of the Van Aquarium later. Pictures from Seattle are here http://al.lindsays.ca/Aquarium The Orange beast in this picture is the giant Pacific Octopus - indiginous to our region. We could actually come across one when boating or beach combing! There is also a female in this tank with a few thousand eggs. When we went back 3 weeks later the eggs had hatched and we saw tiny, translucent baby octopi in the tank. Apparently the tank is connected to the Puget Sound directly (the aquarium is on a pier) and the babys just swam off into the Pacific Ocean! We think this is pretty cool.

Al

House Pics

2005-03-22T21:01:00.000-08:00

We found a home in a good neighbourhood only 3 miles from downtown. We are only renting, but the house is great, as are many of the neighbours. We found a family up the street with 3 girls age - twins Kaitlyn's age and the 3rd is Vicki's age.

Our next-door neighbours have a 2 year old daughter and they often drop in when out for a walk. Oddly enough our friends Jim and Diana from Ottawa live less than a mile away.

Some pre-move-in shots of the house can be seen here. http://al.lindsays.ca/House/index.html

Al

2005-03-22T20:23:00.000-08:00

Aloha! First week of January Mel and Allie went to Kona, Big Island, Hawaii. Pictures are available at http://al.lindsays.ca/Hawaii/index.html Paul also has a few hundred shots from this week on http://www.lindsays.ca/website/hawaii/index.htm

2005-03-22T19:51:00.000-08:00

In early March I took the girls skiing at Crystal Mountain. As you can see there is hardly any snow - this is the worst year on record. The hills closed for good the next weekend. Even Whistler is only partially open this year.

Vicki and Kaitlyn were awesome for first timers. Crystal has an amazing full day ski school for kids where they feed them lunch and keep them on the hill for most of the time. More pictures and a few short videos can been seen at http://al.lindsays.ca/Crystal/index.html

Al

Pictures from the Pacific Science Center

2005-03-21T21:57:00.000-08:00

In November 2004 we went to the Pacific Science Center, located at the Seattle Center (by the Space Needle). The Seattle Center has a Children's Museum, Arena (NBA and WHL), Experience Music Project, Midway, Science Center, Monorail and probably more stuff we haven't discovered (2 IMAX theatres as well).

Pictures of our trip can be found at http://al.lindsays.ca/ScienceCenter/index.html

Watch for more postings to pictures on the al.lindsays.ca website as I get caught up on 5 months of travels on the west and east coasts.....

2005-03-21T20:44:00.000-08:00

I heard a rumour that it doesn't snow in Seattle. Well.... it's just NOT TRUE!!!! This is a shot of the girls sledding at the end of the street (the roads here resemble San francisco). Of course this was the only snow we saw this winter and it melted by noon....

2005-03-21T19:15:00.000-08:00

Seattle!

In the beginning there was darkness.....

2005-03-21T15:50:00.000-08:00

OK, I've finally broken through the inertia and created a blog. The next challenge is teaching Mel and Vicki how to post here.