Aloha

Aloha from Hawaii. We've been in Waikiki for a few days as our last experience before we fly home. It's been really humid here with a few days of great sun and one of heavy tropical rain all day. As it's the end of our trip we haven't felt like travelling far from the beach, there's not that much to do here it seems apart from beach activities, lots of Aussies here, it's like the Kuta of the Pacific, but has made a good stop-over for us. Tonight we had dinner at one of those 'just for tourists probably not very authentic' luau, but it was an easy way to spend the evening and Ruby thought the hula and the fire dancers were fantastic, she even got up and had a go at some hula herself.

We're setting off tomorrow, looking forward to getting home and to seeing you all soon. What an amazing trip we've had, great memories, great people and wonderful sights.

Yosemite

As it's nearly the end of our trip, the four hour drive to Yosmite was almost putting us off but we're glad we stuck to our plan to visit this amazing National Park. As those of you who have been there will know, it's spectacular and jaw dropping. We loved cycling and walking around the trails marvelling each time we came around a bend to face yet another huge granite cliff.

We saw squirrels, chickadee, raccoons, chipmunks, mule deer and even a coyote but thankfully not a bear or mountain lion. In fact this is as close Ruby got to a bear which was just fine by me.

 It's too late into summer for the waterfalls to flow which was a shame so we'll have to return one spring in the future, even a winter there would be great to see. On our second day plumes of smoke came up over the ridge from another fire just over the rim of the park which doubled in size overnight. The upper trails were closed but it was still ok for us to be on the valley floor, we watched the helicopters and water carrying planes circle for the next two days then drove back to San Jose to return the car and catch up again with Charlie and Erica.

Sacramento

As we head towards the last weeks of our holiday I've fallen behind on my posts. From Crater Lake we headed back to our second family, the Whalleys (Ashland branch of the family having sadly left the Portland branch behind). We spent a day with Ruby senior and Emmalisa in the beautiful hills just outside town. The drought is really effecting the landscape here, some lakes almost dry and businesses suffering as a result. Not the cafe where we stopped for lunch though which boasted the best fries, beef and pies in the world. I'm not sure if this claim would stand up to scrutiny but it seems customary here, the day before we drove past a car dealership in Medford which claimed to be world famous. Either way our food was indeed pretty tasty, trumped only by my first ever taste of pumpkin pie courtesy of Emmalisa. Back in town we spotted some more deer just trotting along the street as you would see a dog do, still can't get used to that sight.

From Ashland we stopped overnight in Sacramento and Ruby and I did a fun run in support of a local youth centre. Oscar even got in on the act when they called for a volunteer to run ahead of the kids to  keep them on track, literally, running around the baseball field. You'll be shocked I'm sure to hear that Oscar couldn't resist pacing the front runner, a pretty impressive girl of about 10 years, stepping off the track before the finish line to let her break the tape bringing back memories of pacing 800m runners, and of course he was a very proud dad when Ruby came third.

Crater Lake Oregon

Another lake, this time one inside a crater. Unfortunately it was a cloudy day on our visit which meant the water wasn't as strikingly blue as it appears most days apparently, but still beautiful. The rim is 8000 feet up so when we got out of the car in our shorts we were cold for the first time on this trip, really cold. Crater Lake is the deepest lake in the States at almost 600 metres at the deepest point. The depth was first measured in 1886 as 608m using piano wire and a lead weight and when the measurement was taken again in 2000 using the latest scientific testing equipment it was 592m. Pretty impressive effort by the piano guys.

Here's our photo but I'll add one I found online so you can see the lake's normal appearance.

Odell Lake Oregon

Another day in Oregon and another beautiful lake, this time Odell Lake. We stayed in a lovely little log cabin beside this almost deserted lake as it seems most of the summer holiday crowd have headed back to work and school.

NYC

We've had a great week in New York visiting all the usual sites: Statue of Liberty, Hudson River, Broadway, Times Square, Wall St, Chelsea market, Greenwich Village, galleries, museums, parks and we each managed to tick off our individual wish lists. I spent a day at the MET, Ruby saw Grand Central Station ( Madagascar) and the Museum of Natural History (Night at the museum) and Oscar went on a tour of Seinfeld sites including to the soup Nazi's kitchen for lunch lead by the comedian who the character Kramer was based on.

We loved NYC especially once we got the hang of the subway, and found people really friendly and helpful, but at times it was pretty hard work, especially after the slow pace of the lakes and mountains we've spent time at recently. An early flight back to Portland to Deb and Dan's house again, almost feels like coming home!

New York, New York

We arrived in New York after flying through the night gaining three hours and landing bleary eyed and tired. It seemed to take an inordinate amount of time and hassle to get from the airport via airport train, then subway then PATH train, with turnstile troubles reminiscent of Gellert baths in Budapest, (remember Mum and Dad?) arriving at our apartment almost three hours after landing and heading straight to bed. 

Upon waking we didn't venture far from the apartment which is a typical New York apartment three floors up. We were enthusiastic about doing our laundry the local way, on the line running outside the kitchen windows. After all we've seen this for years on T.V but discovered that the effort of dangling out the window worrying about dropping your underwear on the people below is hardly worth it when you bring the dry washing in covered in a greasy layer of pollution.

Leavenworth WA

We have at times, had difficulty remembering the date, the day of the week or where we were two days past but we really thought we'd gone into a twighlight zone when we drove into a small town in
Washington and saw a whole town that looked like this

The town of Leavenworth had a revamp in the 1960s to avoid the fate of others nearby that had become almost ghost towns. The town reinvented itself as a Bavarian village complete with Bavarian style buildings, restaurants selling schnitzel, pretzels, strudel and spaetzle, townsfolk wearing lederhosen, yodelling and blowing alpine horns. Strange, but it seemed to have worked, the town was bustling with tourists taking it all in, including us. The most bizarre thing was in the middle of town there was also an Australian store, yes, downunder, not just a misspelt Austria. I asked the guy in the shop why he was selling Vegemite, crocodile skin bags, akubras and emu jerky and he said "why not?"  which in the bigger scheme of things here is not an unreasonable response.

It was in Leavenworth that we discovered we had only just beaten the fire on the way here, most towns we past are now evacuated. The air here smoke-filled like everywhere in the state I think. The next day we stopped at a town along the Colombia River we had stopped a few weeks back and posted photos of beautiful Mt Hood. We couldn't even see it his time.

Hope you're all well, we're on the home stretch now.

Wildfires

From Kelowna we travelled south to the end of the lake and then to another, smaller lake on the U.S. border, Lake Osoyoos, apparently the hottest part of Canada and warmest lake. The skies were filled with smoke from nearby wildfires, there is one close to Osoyoos and a bigger one across the border in Washington. We were saddened to hear that three local firefighters died yesterday fighting the blaze. We're fine in Osoyoos but it felt a bit eerie. Our hotel is right on the lake with a small beach, grass and BBQ area so we bought some more salmon, we're making the most of it, and spent the evening with a lovely couple from Vancouver whose daughter spent a few years living in Port Melbourne. Ruby who continues to amaze us with her ability to amuse herself, mix with others and adapt to anything, spent her time sculpting a shark on the sand.

The next morning the skies were clear so we headed off after checking that the roads were open, crossed the border, rounded a corner to this......

just where we were heading. We travelled right past this plume you see here close enough to see the orange glow. We weren't in danger but I don't want to repeat that trip. 

Kelowna, Lake Okanagan BC

We headed to Kelowna based on a recommendation of someone we met in the street in Victoria, and what could have been a let down turned out to be one the the best spots we've stopped thus far. Lake Okanagan is huge, in a really dry part of BC, with the township of Kelowna on the banks of one small section of the lake. The town survives on tourism, beaches and beautiful hot weather in summer and snow in winter, Big White is 45 min from town. The guy we rented our apartment from has moved here from London where he was running a ski shop and finding it increasingly tough to find good snow in Europe. He told us 6m of snow here is the considered a bad day. I told him not to bother coming to Australia to ski.

Our apartment was right on the water with a promenade passing beaches, a marina and stretching the next few kilometres ending in a huge park with plenty of shade, a free water park, swimming beach, playground and floating water obstacle course. There was no litter anywhere (imagine Oscar's excitement) and it was my perfect beach, a little bit of sand but mostly lush shady lawn. There are tourists around but it didn't feel overly crowded. The town was big enough to have great cafes, shops and of course winery shopfronts, I forgot to mention the Okanagan Valley is Canada's biggest wine producer. We could live here!

Hope BC

Hope is a beautiful town surrounded by mountains, a little like Bovec Oscar claims. I took photos but they don't convey how spectacular the scenery really was.

This was where Rambo First Blood was filmed which may provide yet another explanation about Bigfoot sightings. There was a very amusing brochure with a self guided tour of the Rambo sights we found at the tourist office. Points of interest include "the site where the gas station was blown up, although it can't be seen as it was purpose built and then of course blown up " and "the footpath along which John J Rambo rode his motorbike to escape the police" as well as " county jail, no longer on this site". Fascinating!

What was actually interesting, if a little quirky, was the self guided walking tour of the incredible wood carvings here along the streets of this very small town. Hope's claim to fame, apart from Rambo, is chainsaw wood carving. We actually arrived on the weekend of the chainsaw festival and the winning sculptures were pretty impressive.

We are heading to Okanagan Lake, really just because we met someone in Victoria who lives there said we should go, but we may have to change plans as we're heading towards wildfires that are not yet under control.

Fort Langley, birthplace of BC

We usually avoid ye olde historical towns, but Fort Langley is not far out of Vancouver on our route east so we stopped in, and we're happy we did. Fort Langley is where the Hudson Bay Trading Company set up a trading station with the local First Nation people ( not referred to as indigenous here). They soon realised the trade in salmon was more profitable than the trade in fur so adapted their plans and seemed to live respectfully amongst the locals. That was until gold prospectors arrived who apparently could not care less about the land or its people and were soon at war. My understanding is that in part, British Colombia was founded at Fort Langley in 1858 as a way of establishing British rule of law (and possibly undercutting any rights of the Trading Company to resources) in what had become a pretty lawless region during the Fraser River goldrush.

The site is really well set up, particularly for children who receive a booklet on entry with activities to complete around the fort. There is an embossing press at each activity so children can collect stamps each time they complete a task. Ruby loved it and afterwards was able to explain why the fort was built, what was traded and with whom and had a go at making a barrel, some blacksmithing, bale carrying, animal feeding and panning for gold......or at least some gold painted stones.

Downtown Vancouver

We had a strange encounter today on a bus in the city. We were heading down town to have a look around and were really struck by how many people we saw in the streets who seemed destitute and drug effected. Of course this is not exactly unique to any city including Melbourne but the number of people in filthy clothing, walking in circles, lying semi-conscious on the footpath or shouting to themselves was striking, even if the bus route was a local hangout the numbers were shocking. As tourists I think we notice it more as we're not in a hurry, on our way anywhere or knowingly avoiding areas.  Ruby has got into the habit of fleecing my pockets for change to give to beggars. As we got to down town Ruby said "Hey there's a man wearing a union t-shirt" and sure enough out the window was a homeless man with his shopping trolley, looking pretty dishevelled wearing a black IEU proud to be union t-shirt. We couldn't believe it. I think the most plausible explanation is that some of my colleagues came to Canada a few years ago to visit the teachers union here and may have given t- shirts as gifts. Something tells me those t-shirts weren't universally loved and may have been regifted. Anyway, it was a really strange sight.

We have been doing some t- shirt collecting of our own.

We had dinner at a pub called Morrisseys and were pleased to see that Australin wine at least made the 'decent' list.

Vancouver

It was a very picturesque ferry trip from Victoria to Vancouver, weaving between islands and pods of orcas. We're staying in East Vancouver in a nice condo and just around the corner is Trout Lake, a small lake next to a community centre with a gym, tennis and basketball courts and playgrounds. The swimming beach is really nice, we swam across to the pontoon and met two nice Irish guys, one attended Girton in Bendigo on a student exchange. This is the swimming area

nice and safe which is just as well as I wasn't confident the lifesaver would be getting out to help anyone in distress quickly.........and this is once the row boat was actually in the water.

Hello Canada

After a few days in the beautiful Olympic Peninsula of Washington we took the ferry across to Victoria Canada. Our accomodation is a fantastic three bedroom house not far from the centre so we've had the space to have some downtime, reading, sleeping and occasionally seeing the sights. This is the holiday house of a family who live in Vancouver I think. They have a young child whose toys Ruby has been playing with. Some of you will remember this book of Ruby's (from Aunty Catherine I think)  that we used to read to Ruby every night before bed.

She was very excited to find it here.
The weather has been a little cooler than the past few weeks and today we even had light showers. Yesterday we had a BBQ at the home of someone I used to work with at VIEU.  Felicity moved to Australia some decades ago just as her sister moved to England. They both moved back here 9 years ago and have a lovely house right on the waterfront. Off to Vancouver tomorrow.

Olympic Peninsula

This morning a member of our travelling party got out of the wrong side of the bed and the bad breakfast and nonexistent coffee made things worse, so when we got to the beautiful Lake Quinault, that grumpy person who shall remain nameless was sent off by the rest of the travelling party for a long swim in the lake alone. 

Somewhat revived we all enjoyed a leisurely paddle in a canoe, particularly those at the front and middle who gave up paddling halfway back.


There was some sumo wrestling to follow with Oscar winning round one and Ruby taking round two. 

  

After a brief stop at a place called Ruby beach we took a walk through the Hoh Rainforest, the densest, wettest, greenest and most surreal temperate rainforest on Earth according to Lonely Planet. Afterwards we headed for the nearest town because the unnamed grumpy traveller was hungry and if you happen to know that person you'll now how that story goes ( but before you point the finger remember these things run in families). 

We arrived in Forks simply looking for some food but it seemed everyone else was here to tour the sites of the Twilight books and films. If I'd read those books I may have known the story is set in Forks but it wasn't until I noticed not one but two merchandise stores selling souvenirs of that spunky young man and scowly-faced woman that I realised something was up.

Meeting the locals

We're leaving Seattle tomorrow and whilst we loved the Pike Place Market, the aquarium, the Skydeck and Seattle generally, what we've enjoyed most is meeting some locals. Ruby had the week at holiday camp and seemed to fit right in pretty easily. We've been staying in an airbnb apartment rather than a hotel so have become regulars at the local cafe and market. We're really close to downtown as well so it's been perfect. Is it over sharing to show you the view from our toilet?  You may recognise the Seattle Space Needle

 On Wednesday Oscar and I were looking for a pool and a guy passing stopped to ask if we needed directions and ended up chatting with him for some time. Truman is a mature aged student at the University of Washington getting his teaching credentials although he's been teaching math (not maths here) at university for some time but wants to teach at high school. After a long conversation comparing the education system here and in Australia we discovered that teachers in both countries face similar challenges. After I told him about my work, he invited me to speak to his classmates about some of these issues, which sounded interesting (does that mean I can claim this trip on tax ?) He invited us over for a BBQ on Friday to meet his wife Audrey, a professional writer who has done some teaching, his children, classmates and his lecturer - who were keen to hear about conditions for teachers in Australia. Sadly they were talking about the same issues teacher in Australia face, data driven curriculum where they test more than they teach. Even more concerning here is the emergence of charter schools which are essentially private schools which still receive funding but are run by third parties who have financial interests, some of them major corporations. Many of these charter schools have managed to exclude unions completely. Amidst all the teacher talk we had a great afternoon, they had two cats and two rabbits much to Ruby's delight, particularly as Henry the rabbit really loved being held and patted.

It's been really hot here and as the apartment does not have a.c by the end of the day it's pretty warm inside, we really have been "sleepless in Seattle" so tonight decided we'd eat out and not even pretend we would get to sleep at a reasonable hour. Last night we watched  a documentary called inequality for all which is really worth watching if you can find it, about the widening wage gap here, challenging some assumptions about how to grow an economy (watch out Australia). So when I read this morning about a local restaurant which has started paying staff $15 per hour minimum wage, which is due to be introduced in two years here, rather than the transition rate of $11, recently increased from the state highest rate of $9.47, of course I felt compelled to give them our business as well. Even if it's a marketing ploy I think it's a win-win. The restaurant has increased its prices and advertised that patrons no longer have to tip, almost heresy here but it seems the sky hasn't fallen, the place was packed, didn't look about to go bankrupt to me. As I went to pay, our waitress told us we didn't have to tip as they were now getting $15 per hour and when I told her I knew about that and that was the sole reason we had chosen that restaurant she said many people have reacted the same way, the restaurant has waiting lists every night, sales are great and patrons are vocal in their support. Let's hope this is the start of a movement, $9.47 is NOT enough to support yourself on here and paying people a just wage is paying off for the business too. Speaking of life struggles, we read more today at the aquarium about salmon and their treacherous journey upstream, a recurring theme in this state and its neighbours.............and then really enjoyed eating some this evening, Oscar had Chinook and I had Coho. Ruby stuck with cod, perhaps she had more empathy for the upstream battle of the salmon.

As we arrived home we saw the two girls next door trying to get a sofa off a u-haul ute which looked a bit ambitious. We offered to help and found ourselves, along with another neighbour lifting a large couch up a narrow external, twisting staircase into their second floor lounge room. They were very grateful as there was simply no way they were going to be able to do it by themselves. To get it up the first turn of stairs we had to climb on the garden wall and hoist it over the railing with Oscar holding one end and the other four of us at the other end.  Lovely girls and lots of laughs, nice to meet some more locals.

Hello Muddah hello Fadduh

As we're here in Seattle for a week we enrolled Ruby in holiday camp so she can play with some people her own age for a change. Ruby's program is a daily camp which runs out of the primary school just near where we're staying although there are plenty of overnight camps too. She attended her first day yesterday and loved it, made some friends and couldn't wait to return this morning. Ruby and her new friend Leila made a karaoke clip in the mock recording studio, baked some pretty unpalatable bread, played on the 'slip n slide' and played bingo.

Oscar went to visit the University of Washington to see if it had changed much since he ran here years ago. I declined the opportunity to look at another athletics track and stayed local, visiting the local coffee shop. This part of Seattle reminds me of Brunswick full of fixie riding, beard growing, kale eating hipsters, although the ones here look a lot fitter, maybe it's the riding and walking. Speaking of walking, at the bottom of the street we're staying in is a set of stairs marked on maps as a fitness and recreation area. People come to walk or run the stairs, all ages and paces, one elderly woman told me she does one circuit up and down every day and has done so for decades. This confirms for me the blatantly obvious key to physical health - you just have to move! Oscar and I decided to do a stair workout (when in Rome), it was great but feeling a little sore today. This is the same set of stairs Ruby ascends to get to holiday camp, all 372 steps!

Accommodation woes

Unfortunately leaving Portland meant leaving Deb and Dan's house where we've felt very welcome and have had great company and great food including home roasted coffee, margaritas and home baked peach pie, not to mention the raspberries and blueberries from the garden, not that there's many of those left after Ruby went berry picking! We set off for Olympia but found accomodation for a Saturday night incredibly scarce so decided we would stay in Tacoma, just south of the capital. When we got to Tacoma things were just as bad and we ended up at the only place we could find remotely affordable thinking, what's the harm, we're only there one night ? What a night!

It seems that most other hotel guests were long term residents and despite signs everywhere prohibiting the smoking of marijuana (nicotine smoking in the rooms seemed ok) there seemed to be a fair bit of that going on. The room was equipped with a kitchenette but you had to go to reception to borrow even a glass to avoid these things being stolen. We kept our shoes on as the carpet was a bit sticky and the stairwell made us think there must be a lack of toilets in the area. We were kept awake late into the night with lots of comings and goings and even when it did go quiet the bed was the most uncomfortable and noisiest bed I've slept on. Ruby the trooper noticed none of this of course and was happy when Oscar and I decided the best thing to do early in the morning was leave and go to i-hop for breakfast.

That experience left us a little worried about the next 7 weeks, especially as we'd also had trouble finding something in Seattle, finally securing a place a few days ago only because the owner had only just listed with airbnb. Our trepidation  proved unnecessary as we arrived at the apartment we had booked. It's a fantastic two bedroom place on the hill within walking distance of everything we need and close enough to downtown to walk if we wanted. Ruby's favourite furnishing is the four foot giraffe in her room, Penelope. It has all turned out well, no need to stay where my husband wanted us to.....

Mt Hood Oregon

 We ended up in a town called White Salmon on the Washington side of the river with spectacular views of Mt Hood and really cute salmon crossing road markings in lieu of zebra ones. Mt Hood is Oregon's highest peak at 11,240 feet but has Mt Adam, even taller in its landscape. Oscar has skied Mt Hood which you can do year- round although there's not much snow up there at the moment. Like other states on the West, Oregon is very dry, California in drought.

We started the next day with an unusual breakfast, we must stop ordering eggs on toast as it has caused much confusion and some interesting looking dishes, I assume the way we eat that dish comes to us from England not the USA? Our route took us on a road that loops Mt Hood, and with each turn I was drawn to take another photo. We decided not to stop in at Timberline lodge which is where they shot The Shining just in case Johnny's still there but travelled on to a little town to base ourselves to do some hiking. We had a great hike this afternoon along a stream in the bush, forest, woods, what is it called here? It was a little longer than expected thanks to me being in charge of navigating and a km/mile issue with my Garmin so no wonder Ruby had started to tire at what was 6 miles not 6 kms. You all know my directional and spacial issues, don't ever ask me for directions or believe how far I say something is. Miles or kilometres, it didn't deter us, the trail was so pretty beside a crystal clear stream, only very occasionally crossing paths with other hikers, the setting could have been straight out of a chapter of Tolkien.

Those gymnastics classes kept her feet dry several times today

Columbia River Gorge

We had been invited for dinner to the house of Oscar's former DP from Waldport, Pat who is now teaching at the University of Portland. Also invited was Pat's charming 91 year old father ( who seemed to know more about the nuances of internet speed than anyone else there). We had a lovely meal sitting in Pat's backyard under a sequoia tree, but not a drive- thru one thankfully. The next day we headed east along the gorge of the impressive Columbia River, making the Yarra look like a mere trickle. The road was built in 1914 by a very progressive engineer who started out by trying to build a road to highlight the area's natural beauty, not at the expense of it. The road also apparently covers the most concentrated collection of waterfalls in the world, not sure if this is true but they are certainly beautiful.

 Bonneville Dam made for an educational stop at which Ruby found herself part of a demonstration about how electricity is made. A group of people were handed objects and had to line themselves up in order of what comes first. Luckily she was given the light switch so she didn't need any help working out she was at the end of the line. Even more impressive than how electricity is made, which I clearly don't get or I would find it more fascinating, is how those salmon get through the dam and swim upstream all that way only to spawn then die. This is salmon country so we are keen to sample some, particularly the Chinook, although I'll feel bad thinking they may have made it 3/4 of the way through their masssive journey only to end up on my plate and never fulfil the ancient call of their instinct. Really tasty though!