Category: Traveling

Our second full day in Victoria was also spent walking, as everything we wanted to see that day was in easy walking distance of the hotel. We started the morning at Dino Lab Inc., which offers 90-minute tours of their private gallery and fossil prep lab, including some hands-on restoration work. As the first tour of the day, we milled about in the gift shop for a few minutes before walking into the gallery, where we saw the eye-popping scene in the photo above: a triceratops and a tyrannosaurus rex having tea. Our particular tour was oriented towards adults, since we were the only people there; they also have birthday parties and organized fossil digs available (though the later is quite pricey). After exploring the gallery, we had some time in the fossil prep lab, where we were taught to use the the tools to remove the lock layer from real fossils and given a bit of time to work on an existing sample.

After a quick stop at our hotel to drop our purchases from Dino Lab’s gift shop off, we grabbed lunch on the way to the Victoria Bug Zoo. I know, you’re probably looking at that beautiful tarantula in the photo, thinking “that’s not a bug.” They have a variety of insects and arachnids – “50 fascinating species” according to their home page – most of which aren’t classified as bugs. They run continuous tours, looping through showcasing the various animals, including some hands-on opportunities, and switching off tour guides at set intervals. I recognize that not everyone appreciates spiders the way I do, so the photo of me holding a tarantula named Jane Goodall will probably not make it onto our holiday card. They also have a gift shop with a nice variety of themed toys, clothes, and the occasional snack. (No, I didn’t buy the seasoned crickets, I’ve had them before.)

Miniature World is aptly named, as they have over 85 miniature dioramas including the “World’s Smallest Operational Sawmill” (which, for safety reasons, is not running – you want a video of it instead). Their website includes highlights of some of their exhibits, with just a partial photo of each featured exhibit. You need to see it in person to really notice all of the intricate details, including some of the objects in motion, like a train moving around a town or the hood of a classic card slowly opening at a button press. Some of the intricate battle scenes will certainly awe historical wargamers. No gift shop here though, the path through lands you directly at the exit to the street.

That exit gave us the opportunity to walk past this amazing orca topiary again – one of several topiary the downtown Victoria shaped like local wildlife. This orca on a wave is actually cooler from the other side, as there’s a smaller orca next to it. This entire trip was filled with days where I easily exceeded my step goal, usually doubled, as we either walked to nearby places or drove to places that then involved walking.

There are many things to see in Victoria, British Columbia, starting with stepping out onto our hotel room balcony, which had a view of the Fisherman’s Wharf, and more importantly, at least for us, a gap of water and land just between our hotel and the wharf. Our first morning there, shortly after sunrise, we realized the importance when we noticed otters swimming in the area, followed by an exciting couple minutes when several ran out of the water and onto the land made visible at the low tide. Over the next several mornings, we watched an assortment of wildlife, including otters, cranes, a raccoon, and a deer, actively engaging with the area. There was some activity at dusk as well, but dawn was clearly the time to be watching, which I appreciate as a morning person.

But we didn’t visit Victoria for a week just to stay in our hotel room. Our first full day there, we walked to the nearby shuttle stop for our free ride to the Malahat Skywalk, an elevated walkway through treetops that ends at a spiral tower with amazing views of the surrounding area, and a glass overhang area if you want to step off the walkway and see everything. We could easily have spent more time up there just watching birds and enjoying the landscape, but the attached restaurant was at the bottom of the tower. Those who ware so inclined can take the slide down. Everyone else – including strollers and wheelchairs, as the walkway and tower were built for accessibility – went back down the way they came up.

My first cruise with my parents was a family affair, celebrating my oldest nibling’s birthday at the age when they were tall enough for most rides at Disney World. This was not my parents’ first cruise, though I’m not sure when that first one would have been. As I recall, my parents had landed from a trans-Atlantic cruise and flown from New York to Miami on September 10th, 2001. They got stuck in Miami for a few days. This was, however, my only cruise with Dad.

My sister, nibling, and both my parents went, so we had two separate rooms in each place. This was the beginning of Mom’s tradition of taking each grandchild to Orlando for their birthday. For this particular celebration, we planned a full week that included staying onsite at a Disney resort, followed by a 3-night Disney cruise. At our last stop, the canoeing excursion we wanted only had 2 spots left, so my sister and I went canoeing, giving my nibling the option of the ship’s kids’ area or spending the day shopping with my mother. They chose the kids’ area, with self-checkout privileges in case we didn’t make it back to the ship on time for the showing of the new movie I recommended: Lilo & Stitch.

Over the years, it became hard to keep track of when my parents were travelling, with the cruises gradually increasing in length. When they visited before my black belt test, they were headed to a multi-leg cruises in Europe, and Dad’s final stroke happened on a ship that had already visited several places in South America and was headed to Easter Island. (Yes, a medvac helicopter from Easter Island back to South America will suck up most of your travel insurance.)

When Cassandra reached the Orlando vacation age, I organized the trip with just Cassandra, my mother, and myself. The first night was hellish, arriving late in the evening, then settling into a single room with tiny Cassandra kicking me repeatedly and my mother snoring in the next bed. In the middle of the night, I seriously considering marching down to reception to get a second room in the rather expansive, and not particularly crowded, hotel. On the second day, a friend of Mom’s messaged me and asked if her snoring was still bad… I asked why she hadn’t warned me! As it turns out, it could be abated with allergy medicine, which made the rest of the trip less painful. This was Mom’s first time visiting parks in Orlando outside the Disney brand – she had flagged Discovery Cove as somewhere to visit from talking to people on one of her cruises, and we visited one of the Universal parks. This was followed by another Disney cruise, which included an excursion to a chocolate factory where we prepared our own chocolate bars, and a parasailing event where we were the only guests.

Our last cruise with Mom, which is already well-documented here, was to the Galápagos in 2017. While she was a terrible roommate, sprawling stuff everywhere and complaining when housekeeping straightened the mess she left on the desk, we were all delighted by the trip. She was particularly proud of her first paddleboarding experience, as she managed to stay upright the entire time.

If you’ve spoken to me in the last few years, particularly early in the year, you will have heard me say that Mom was off on another cruise. Those have been 3 or 4 month cruises, sailing around the world or, earlier this year, pole-to-pole. The revised invitation my sister created for December, now for her celebration of life instead of her birthday, reflects her love of cruises.

I recently had the opportunity to travel to Charleston, South Carolina for a business meeting. Of course I flew in early so I could wander a bit, though other than some amazing restaurants, I didn’t really hit any particular tourist attraction. I did see a variety of birds across the two days I was there, including some herons that were shockingly comfortable around people at the Shem Creek boardwalk.

I was in Bemidji, Minnesota recently for a work conference. I know, I know, travelling again… at least, that’s what my cats seem to glare at me about. Look, they have an airport (with a single gate), a Paul Bunyan statue, and some absolutely amazing restaurants. And if you have a car – which fortunately, we did – a nearby state park where you can walk across the headwaters of the Mississippi River in a handful of steps.

While a picture paints a thousand words, sorting through a thousand (or more) pictures takes time. Some of our activities involved water – not surprising for a Caribbean cruise – which means combining photos from across cell phones and the waterproof camera I bought back in 2017 for our Galápagos trip.

As is evident in the photos, we had fairly nice weather… I think there was a drizzle one day when we were already getting wet (“champagne snorkeling” – snorkeling above geothermal vents), and a downpour on another day when we were already in our bathing suits (for a helmet dive). The upside to a cruise is you get to see a lot without having to repack; the downside is that you may find an area you’d like more time in, but the ship is only there for a single day. There are definitely places we want to return to after this adventure, with extended time to explore those areas.

Mid-November found us back in Portland, this time joined by my sister, with the primary goal of the trip to visit with my aging grandmother, scheduled in short visits on alternating days so as to not overstay her energy levels. To those family and friends we did not manage to connect with on this trip or back in June, I offer my sincerest apologies.

As part of our effort to not overstay our welcome with Grandma, we once again stayed in downtown Portland with an amazing view of the riverfront and a couple blocks away from the Portland Saturday Market. What we somehow missed in June, possibly because of the later sunset, was the number of murders that appear at sunset by the river; Portland is apparently known for its crow population (among other things).

Portland is also a prime location for quirky art, or in the case of this blog post, quirky immersive art. We revisited the Portland Aquarium, vaguely justifying the repeat visit because my sister hadn’t been there yet, and a few days later, explored Mike Bennett’s other immersive art experience, the Wonderwood Restaurant & Indoor Mini Golf. While I have absolutely no golfing experience, I have played a few rounds of mini golf over the years, and this was by far the craziest set of holes I’ve played. (Please note that I’m not particularly good at mini golf. Par is something that exists for other players.)

In addition to Mike Bennett’s delightful art, I could tell we were in for something different when we noticed the plethora of extraneous holes at the first hole, with writing inside like “Nope”, “Wrong”, and “X” (which did not, in fact, mark the correct spot). In addition to odd patches of mismatched carpet texture, deliberate bumps in otherwise flat surfaces, one of the holes has you teeing off at chest level (depending on your height, of course), with the choice of standing on a wobbly log or a nearby step to hit the ball onto a narrow, unevenly cut, carpeted (with multiple textures) bridge above a plinko-style structure that drops your ball back out to ground level. While we had the option of playing again – your admission covers unlimited plays in the same day – we opted to escape (this time) across the street to a lovely yarn & book store.

A couple days later, we explored another nearby immersive art exhibit: Hopscotch. We weren’t sure what to expect from this one, I had picked up a brochure at the airport in the 20-minute gap between our flight arrival and my sister’s, so we were working from a single page description and photos, including “23,000 sq. ft. of total immersion in the unexpected” and “15 vibrant installations from 40+ local, national, and international artists.” This turned out to be another delightful experience, with some exhibits being harder to leave than others, like the colorfully lit trampoline room (not much bounce, but the wall lights are reactive to nearby activity) and a ball pit. Tickets do need to be purchased online, and if you’re visiting on a Saturday, ahead of time. Don’t show up like we did and be disappointed that it’s sold out, though that did offer us the opportunity to visit the nearby Hippo Hardware store and walk across the Burnside Bridge; we then pre-purchased tickets for Sunday.

If you know of other immersive art exhibits – anywhere! – I’d love to hear about them.

As luck would have it, we scheduled our day of wandering around downtown Portland, Oregon to coincide with opening day of the Portland Aquarium. To be clear, this is actually an art-quarium rather than live animals, all drawn by the delightfully talented Mike Bennett.

As part of your admission, you receive a compendium that documents the five biomes you’ll explore and some of the over a hundred cartoon species you’ll encounter in those rooms. Each species includes both a photo and a drawing, along with information about the species and their geography. Some species include side comments, like the Giant Pacific Octopus (pictured below) has a note that reads “My favorite animal without a backbone!” And, conveniently, there’s a checkbox by each one so you can track which creatures you’ve found. (Yes, my compendium is unmarked; our group collaborated on one checklist.)

The inside cover of the compendium includes instructions for exploring Bennett’s Bay – among other things, don’t go backwards! This is a one-way trip through the various biomes, with the compendium organized in the order you’ll encounter them. And while most animals get a sixth or eighth of a page, sea otters and the effort to bring them back to Oregon have a full page spread.

Presumably because it was opening day, we were offered free star(fish)-shaped doughnuts as we moved from the aquarium into the gift shop. While I was tempted by various animals – such as a snail or turtle – holding a “slow down” message, the yard sign that came home with us was a rainbow, which seems appropriate during Pride Month. I’m delighted that stickers have made a comeback, especially since the fit shop had stickers from both this exhibit and some previous ones.

Two minor things to take into account when you visit the Portland Aquarium: keep an eye out for a missing goldfish named Gilly (she makes appearance in several places) and definitely use the bathroom while you’re in the gift shop.