When we first moved to Montana, we were so excited to use our new jet skis that we braved the cold. We’d don wetsuits and head out on the lake if the air temperature was anywhere above fifty (never mind the water temperature, which was also around fifty). In our first autumn, we were cruising the lake in mid-October!
Now we’re much more hesitant to put on those wetsuits. We’ve been out on the lake so often that we can afford to wait for the weather to feel more like summer. Well, that weather came today. The mercury inched past eighty, and we decided it was time to go out.
We’re looking forward to another summer on the water with our toys…
We hosted a barbeque tonight– it’s a Memorial Day tradition, after all– and just before our invited friends showed up, an uninvited one decided to stop in.
He seemed quite content to just walk around on our outdoor couches. When I finally went out to start preparing the grill, he decided he had other places to be. It’s a good thing, too, since I much prefer beef to turkey on my burgers.
We threw a party tonight. It involved Oreos. I wanted to do something a little more fancy than just put out a bag of them so everyone could grab a handful.
Inspiration struck, and the Oreos looked amazing.
Oh, and there were also Fudge Stripes.
As Megamind would say, it’s all about presentation…
During our time in Montana, the most difficult thing about our house has been the driveway. It’s steep, it has sharp curves and sudden drop-offs, and in the winter it turns to ice. Over the years we’ve shoveled it and even raked it. But once we’d paved it, I thought things would finally be easier.
Alas, today I had to sweep the driveway. Yes, all 1,800 feet of it. During the winter, our snow plow crew had done a great job keeping it clear for our cars, but during those months, a bunch of sand had been dumped on it to provide traction. As it turns out, when the snow finally melts, the sand doesn’t go anywhere. It just sits on the driveway, thick enough in some areas that the car actually spins out on it!
So we bought a 24″ wide broom, and I went to work. Here’s a close-up of my point of view as I worked my way down the asphalt.
It’s taken me two days, but I’ve finally cleared all 21,000 square feet. It looks a lot better:
As I did this, I kept telling myself “next winter, I won’t have them lay down any sand”. But when the snow and ice show up, I may change my mind…
Our “fun day at sea” yesterday wasn’t fun for 50% of us. Pepper and Alex both succumbed to motion sickness and spent the bulk of the day lying on the couch or in bed, respectively, while their stomachs complained about the waves. Kaitlyn and I were completely unaffected; most of the time I hardly even noticed the rocking and swaying.
Today we arrived in Juneau. Alex and I watched as the ship pulled into port. The view from their balcony was amazing. Even more amazing was the weather: 60 degrees with beautiful blue skies. Our friends from Juneau had warned us before we left that May weather in Alaska is unpredictable, and could be anything from 35 and raining to 70 and sunny. We were fortunate to get the latter.
After disembarking, we wandered the streets for a bit. I stopped for a photo op at the Red Dog Saloon, which was a tacky tourist shop our Juneau friends had said was a “don’t miss”.
After a bit of confusion amidst thousands of tourists who’d come off the ship, we managed to hop aboard a shuttle bus that took us up to the Mendenhall Glacier area. Our driver was Tlingit and an absolute riot as he pointed out important historic sites like the McDonald’s. We arrived at the trailhead and started up to Mendenhall Lake. It was quite crowded, mainly because it’s a relatively short hike and ends at Nugget Falls, an enormous waterfall coursing into the lake. Here’s Pepper with the falls a half-mile beyond (they were packed with people and not very photogenic up close).
Mendenhall Lake had a number of ice chunks floating on it. Pieces of the glacier!
We found a few small ice chunks right along the shoreline too.
The glacier itself was inaccessible from the trail we were on; you had to take a helicopter tour to get there. But it was very pretty in the distance, and the wonderful weather helped make it a great day.
Another incredible dinner followed, and we watched a hilarious stand-up comic for the evening entertainment. I went topside to capture the sunset as we pulled away from shore on the way to our next stop.
I know many folks who have been on cruises. Mom and Dad have made it an annual tradition, racking up some impressive stats on number of countries visited and number of international friends made. I don’t think anyone has ever told me they didn’t enjoy their cruise experience, but for one reason or another I never seemed to get around to doing it.
Well, we offered Kyra a “graduation gift” of a trip, and she chose Hawai’i. Naturally we had to make the same offer to Alex and Kaitlyn as they finished their time in school. They quickly decided an Alaskan cruise would be a proper celebration. After talking about it, they said it would most likely need to happen “sometime next year” (meaning 2024) because Alex was going to start a summer internship and then move on to a full-time job, and both of those things bring a lot of unknowns. They weren’t sure when they’d be able to block out a full week for a cruise. We agreed, and figured we’d take some time to plan it later this year.
Then Kaitlyn called to tell us she’d found a good deal on a cruise in three weeks and asked if we could jump on it. The timing was actually perfect: she and Alex would have graduated, but his internship wouldn’t start for another couple of weeks. We made the arrangements, and went on a hastily-planned adventure. (Which is pretty much how our Hawai’i trip went too…)
We flew to Seattle yesterday and had a grand time exploring the city and hanging out with Julian. Today it was time to get on the big boat.
And I mean big. Holy cow these cruise ships are mammoth. When we arrived at the dock, my camera couldn’t even capture the full size of the ship once we were in line. You can just see deck upon deck of staterooms.
Kaitlyn, who’s been on many cruises over the years (It’s the way her family travels), informed us that the Royal Princess is a “medium-sized ship”. It carries about 3,700 passengers and 1,300 crew. Talk about a floating city!
Once we embarked (look at me, using the cruise lingo) we dropped our stuff in our stateroom and explored. The top deck was littered with pools, hot tubs, deck chairs, tables, and of course eating spots.
After our 3,700 co-cruisers had all boarded, we slowly backed out of the port. Yes, backed out. That was interesting to see. Here we are on the top deck, with the Seattle skyline behind us:
We watched the ship navigate the inlet for a while, but the excitement wore off pretty quickly and we decided it was time to eat. If there’s one common thread in all the comments I’ve heard about cruise ships, it’s how the food is amazing. And indeed it was. We snapped a few pictures at the fancy restaurant as we tucked into our dinner.
After a leisurely meal and some more exploring, we went to hang out in their cabin. We’d bought a mini-suite for the two of them, because we knew we’d be spending time together and wanted some space. It had a king-sized bed, couch, desk, small table, full bath and shower, and a massive balcony looking fore. Super swanky.
Compare that with our interior stateroom. No windows, a queen bed with narrow walking areas on each side, and a bathroom whose shower was barely larger than me.
I’m not complaining, because all we did in our stateroom was sleep and shower. It wasn’t necessary to spend the coin on something bigger; we just hung out in their room.
So we’re off to bed and ready for a “fun day at sea” (as the cruise lines say) tomorrow…
We’re heading out on a cruise! The first stop for our Alaskan expedition is a flight to Seattle, where we’ll board the cruise ship for the week-long journey. It’s generally recommended that you arrive the day before your cruise, so flight delays don’t mean you miss the boat. So we took a direct flight (nice!) from Kalispell to Seattle, and landed just a few minutes before Alex and Kaitlyn on their flight from Salt Lake City.
Now we had a day in Seattle, without any real plans. The weather was gorgeous, and as we were riding the train out of the airport to our hotel, we were talking about things to do. I said to the group, “You know, Julian lives somewhere in Seattle… we should see if he wants to meet up for lunch or something.”
As it turns out, Julian lives a few blocks from our hotel! I called him up and (although it was a workday) he said he’d love to get together for lunch. We asked for a recommendation and he suggested a sandwich shop called Potbelly. We walked two blocks from the hotel and he was already there. Lunch was amazing… I’ve officially named Potbelly my second-favorite sandwich shop in the world.
Apparently Julian doesn’t even keep his car in the city; he just goes everywhere either on foot or on his electric skateboard. To demonstrate, he showed us how he travels around the city. He rides the skateboard in traffic along the streets. I think it has a top speed of at least 30mph, which is plenty fast to keep up with the cars. In this photo, he’s zooming through the intersection with a bus right behind him. It was really cool to watch.
Alex and I both gave the skateboard a whirl, and it was a ton of fun to ride. There’s a little handheld remote that controls the speed, including forward and reverse (for slowing down or stopping on downhills). As with any skateboard, you just tilt the deck to turn left or right. Here’s Alex cruising along, although the photo looks horribly boring:
I think if I lived downtown in a city, like Julian, I’d get one myself. As it is, a skateboard on the rural highways of Bigfork wouldn’t be that useful.
As the ladies wandered Pike Street Market (a hopelessly crowded tourist magnet), we guys walked along the shoreline.
We probably covered a few miles, and after a while we met up with the gals. We continued our walk of the downtown area, and eventually ended up at (where else?) the Space Needle. We wandered around the base, but all agreed that thirty bucks a person to ride to the top was kind of excessive. The park at the base is nice, though, and we spent some time chatting and relaxing. As the afternoon wore away, Julian decided he needed to get back to work.
It was awesome to spend a few hours with him. He zoomed off on his board while we started the trek back to the hotel. Along the way I snapped some shots of the cityscape and buildings. Here are a few of the more interesting ones:
As often happens, I said to myself “I should’ve brought my good camera!”. Instead, I just had my cell phone and had to make the most of it. The city was really cool, and it was a gorgeous day to walk along the sidewalks and take in all the hustle and bustle of Seattle.
After a delicious dinner, we retired to the hotel and made sure we had everything ready for the big cruise tomorrow…
It’s been seven weeks since the accident. The body shop finally told me the repairs were finished, and I could come pick up our car. The catch: the body shop is in Helena, over 200 miles away. That’s the only place within 500 miles which does body work on Teslas, and it means driving over three hours each way just to get the car. Sigh.
I suppose I should be grateful it’s only been seven weeks, instead of the three months they originally quoted me. Pepper and I figured as long as we have to drive out to Helena and back, we might as well make a day of it and see a few things in town. Neither of us have been to Helena– other than a quick pass-through a few months ago– so we looked for some interesting places.
There’s the governor’s mansion, which looks like it could double as a haunted house on a dark moonlit night.
We stopped by the state capitol as well. This is what the hallways of power look like:
The legislature wasn’t in session– they only meet every other year, and even then it’s for the first few months. Our friend Mark is a state senator, and we even saw his office, but he was likely back home in Bigfork enjoying some time with his family.
Here’s the legislative chamber, where the formal work gets done:
It’s not quite as impressive as the U.S. Congress building, but of course our congress is much smaller. I suppose that’s good, at least as far as getting things done.
We also peeked into the Supreme Court chamber:
Continuing our tour of the capital city, we headed over to the aptly-named Cathedral of Saint Helena. It was stunning.
The photo doesn’t really capture how immense the building is. The spires are 230 feet high, with 12-foot crosses atop each. The back of the building looks reminiscent of Hogwarts Castle:
Inside it’s all towering marble and stained glass.
The altar area is massive; there’s probably enough room for a tennis match.
In the main chapel area of the cathedral, it seems like the pews would accommodate everyone who lives in the town of Bigfork.
It was most impressive.
Afterward we visited the still-under-construction Helena Temple, which is far smaller than the cathedral but still cool in its grey granite architecture.
The clouds were rolling in, and soon there was a cold steady rain. We cancelled our visit to the park, and although we went to the huge walking mall, it became a pretty brisk walk– without stops in the various shops– because the weather was growing steadily worse. We’d also planned to walk along a few trails up in the hills above the city, but in the end we decided to call it a day and head back home. Had the weather been better, I think we would’ve enjoyed our time in Helena more.
Kyra’s been hunting for an apartment so she can be closer to her new job, but she hasn’t been having much success. The housing market is tight, and affordability is a constant struggle. So I decided to surprise her with a little gift, which I ordered on Amazon and sent to her. She just sent me this:
It’s hard to tell from the selfie, but that’s a cute blue tardigrade. Tardigrades have become a bit of an inside joke in our family, so it seemed a fitting way to cheer her up. She’s named him Timmy the Tardigrade, but apparently he goes by Little Tim Tim. Or Timmy T. Or Lil’ T. Whatever, as long as she makes my girl happy.
