Vancouver

Some more Vancity.Some cars in Marty's parkade. I know Alvin likes these fancy cars.

Here's a little park, or community garden right across the street from Marty's pad.How about those pink shoes?

Let's finish this already!

Candra and Marty and Pat and Clara and myself. Devo was the responsible one who documented this meeting for Sarah.











Here's the tail end of the trip. I think everyone's seen the pics already, but some of you want to see.





Alouette Lake, just an hour out of Vancouver. We didn't get very good weather. And we were a little crammed in Marty's inflatable boat. Pearl.

I've got a head of steam now.

More Seattle.Fooling around near Uncle Wally's.

Nice shot of downtown from a little park in Fremont.And Megan's hubby Chris was nice enough to take me to a Seattle Mariner's ballgame. They lost, but it was a lot of fun.

Technical difficulties?

We'll try again. I have a little time to do this right now. It's 30 degrees outside today, and I am not going to spend it all on the computer. But like I said, I have the time now. Just another series of pics from Seattle.

This is so dumb!!!! I have been posting on here for so long and I am ready to delete the account. I just hate posting pics on here. It's never easy. You'll have to crank your head sideways to see one of the pics. That one is from a drive Megan took us on one afternoon to Alki. It's a beach where all kinds of people bring their families and dogs. It's nice there, and a view of Seattle we wouldn't have found from the bus.

The hat is one that I looked forward to buying for a long time. These Brixton hats are not easily found in Canada. So I found a few shops in Seattle that sold them. Wrote the addresses and went hunting. My family knows what a drag it is to go hat shopping with Tom. Turns out it was on sale. I paid under $20.

The cupcakes were a special treat from Meg also. What a nice idea..... I shoud open a gourmet cupcake shop in Edmonton. Right in my parking lot. A specialty cupcake market....... hmmm.

More Seattle

Here's a little more from Seattle.

Farley got more love than anydog I have ever seen. Spoiled rotten.Birthday party with Murray the bartender. Let's say Dev got to be pretty good friends with him by the end of the night.Zig Zag cafe. Thanks for the left Caroline.

Ta Da! Welcome to the Pike Street Market.

Anyone want some fresh seafood?

Seattle Part I

First of all, Happy Birthday mom. Just getting toward the end of the pictures. Only a week and a half after I got home. Or more like two weeks. This is the Seattle leg of the journey.

First thing we did when we arrived was have a cocktail with Hal. What a crazy place he has.

Devyn having a swig of her gin gin mule. It was delicious drink!

Dev had to use the bathroom quite badly by the time we arrived. It is behind that bookcase just to the left of the tv. His place used to be a real garage. It's beautiful.There I am in the sun on Hal's patio. Notice the pool down below. It's so nice in Fremont where Uncle Wally lives.

And Uncle Wal's dog is pretty cool too. There's Farley when Megan first brought him over. We were lucky enough to set up shop at my Unc's condo. Too bad he was in Croatia though. Thanks.

More Seaside and the coast.

Just a few more quick ones of the coast. Tsunami zone!

Another self-portrait. We were able to find one game of the Stanley Cup Finals in Seaside. Had supper and watched the game. But I've already forgotten who won. Doesn't matter much in June does it?

Some more nationalism. Or maybe it was a little Canadiana flowing over the border. I'm not sure which one.This guy tried to make a sales pitch to us at the waterfront. Wyndam something or other. Sounded like a time-share thing where they would give $50 for listening to the pitch. But he soon figured that he wasn't going to find buyers in us and decided to have fun with us. Partying at the ocean.

Part IV Seaside

Seaside, Oregon was only 20 miles west - southwest of Astoria. Not quite as nice, but we stayed in a nice place, two seconds from the ocean. It was still cold, but nice to be there.

The funny thing about the hotel was the roof was covered by seagulls. And the resulting mess was astonishing.

Freedom Kids was about he only thing I saw on the while trip that made me think of the supposed Patriotism. That part of the US is not at all like the stereotypical American from Texas or the "South". The pacific northwest is not too different from home.We get to the ocean and we can run out and dip our hands in. Dev's first thought is to grab a giant stick and chase me around. I think we were pent up in the car for too long at that point.

Part III Astoria

Once we left Portland the trips in the car became much shorter and we spent the days wandering around the coast, slowly making our way toward Seattle.

It was very very cold. The wind, and rain. It wasn't pleasant, but a lovely little town. Nicer than Seaside I think. Only twenty miles apart, but Astoria wasn't quite as tourist-y.

Devyn at one of the docks along the warf.

One of the highlight was when we spotted a seal. I admit he startled me, and by the time we dug out the camera it was too late. However we was hiding under the docks here.

And then we saw that load of logs on a barge being towed by the little tugboat. Funny, it's an everyday thing if you live by the water, but a neat sight if you live in land-locked Edmonton.

Part II

From Cour D'Alene we went straight west toward the coast. A wonderful ride along the Columbia River.

As we pulled into Portland we decided it was warm enought to try and camp. The only site we found was a parking lot with no fire or anything. Not what I had in mind. So we traced our way to another cheap motel. It wasn't the most comfortable place we stayed but it was next to a bread factory which made it smell really nice. Portland was really pretty actually. Not the best for driving with all the bridges though.

Here we are having a little fun down by the river.

And some more fun being tourists. We were trying to take our self-portrait above and someone was kind enough to help us do it below.

This was a little restaurant/brewery we visited on a sunny afternoon just as everyone was getting off work. A nice afternoon lunch while those who weren't on vacation went about their business.