Our House in the Middle of Our Street

I have *so* many trips to attend to on the old blog. I am now keeping most of my traveling records on my Instagram, but this geriatric website seems a permanent spot for some of the excitement. It's my goal to (this Christmas break) catch up on many years of travel!  This trip was a GSW to where our friend Ali was stationed - in Albuquerque, NM, along with some close-by Sante Fe adventures! We did 4 states, 2 national parks, a protected wilderness, did an international event, took horse rides in the desert, tore up Moab on a side-by-side, went to a million (?) museums, and had delicious New Mexican food.  Every single one of these photos, I believe, was from my friend Emily or Ali. The only one I took (I think?) was the picture OF them during sunrise at the Arch.  Nothing is in order, either! Just bear with me (wipes brow from 2022).  Day 1:  We drove to Sante Fe to visit Meow Wolf (WEIRD and I loved it), visited historical Sante Fe (the buildings are beautif...

 Although this mini-vacation for our family was near 6 months ago, I'm catching up on my blogging over Christmas break, and hope to reach back into two years (wince) of vacations as I'd like to document them here, for my own purposes. I'm setting the publishing date to the day after we returned. It'll be our little secret.  The pictures aren't in any particular order.  a short and easy hike: Hidden Grove in Sechelt Day 1: After dropping off our dog at the kennel in Aldergrove, hopping on the ferry and finding our airbnb, we rode our bikes around Kinnikinnick park twice and then around the neighbourhood for the only off-road biking (the good stuff was too hard for 3 out of 4 of us). We hung out at Sechelt Pier before eating at PKLS Burgers.  Best unique milkshakes:  PKLS  Burgers. The long list is a bit daunting but every single one was absolutely worth the exorbitant cost.  view from the Soames Hill hike lookout, an easy hike with final steep incl...

 Finally, I'm sharing just a few photos and bits about our 2021 family vacation to Sooke, BC (only 18 months later!). Sooke is on Vancouver Island; near the southern most tip. It is about an hour's drive to Victoria, the biggest city on the island, and about an hour's north-westerern drive to Port Renfrew, which touches the tip of the Carmana Walbran Provincial Park .  We stayed at this wonderful little house (fawns! quail chicks! hummingbirds! in the morning) right outside and it had a great ocean view and was so tranquil on a bit of property. Because we found this listing last-minute and it was brand-new, they had offered it at a discount and we scored big. I think we paid roughly 100$/day. It's now quite a bit more, but if you have the budget, it's a beautiful house.  an orca skeleton at the Royal BC Museum Orcas: Our Shared Adventure exhibit was at the Royal BC Museum, and the first section was all about the science of the whales, and the second part was about...

This is nearly 6 months after the fact, but better late than never. I wanted to write about our Cumberland vacation in July because I wanted to share this wonderful little town (and larger Comox Valley) with anyone interested in an outdoor-focused, local(ish) vacation.  We travel light, and expect most of our activities to be somewhat free (hiking, biking, swimming) with our money mostly going to a nicer Airbnb rental and a few treats/meals out in the week. We mostly make all our food, and that helps keep our costs low. This was a really affordable trip for our family of 4, and frankly, the majority of our money went to our lodging and the ferry ride (oof), our splurge was surf + boogie board, wetsuit rentals.  We found so many of these great spots from friends who had been in the area, or had previously lived within a 20 mile radius. Always ask a local!  With our large Europe trip cancelled because of Covid, I wanted to go to the Island because it would feel like we "wen...

a lavender cart using the honor system  My friend Susie and I tooled around a new-to-us place, Vashon Island in Puget Sound, this past weekend for a very quick (but very full!) girls' trip. Susie comes stateside once a year and I'm lucky to live close to her husband's family, so I often get a visit, too, though she's usually with her family in Nebraska. We had both heard about Vashon Island but had never been, and found really cheap accommodations through airbnb.com. I read this article and this one in preparation and rented a car, while she communicated with our hostess. It worked out brilliantly. We headed down to the Faunterloy ferry in West Seattle and got there around noon, and although we had a bit of a wait going out, the price was so cheap! Something like $20 for the two of us and our car roundtrip . We had reservations at The Hardware Store for dinner that night and very little expectations for the rest of the time. Lighthouse on Point Robinson ...