Day 3

Day 3 started with breakfast at a place called Jasmine's Family Restaurant. Our waitress was a cute Asian lady who informed us that the kitchen staff were ninja fast.

When in a different region, I like to eat like the natives. (Well, to a certain extent, anyway.) Therefore, for breakfast, I ordered Eggs Benedict, or "Eggs Benny" as the British Columbians affectionately call it. It's ham on an english muffin, topped with a poached egg and then covered in Hollandaise sauce (which I ordered on the side).

This, my friends, is a poached egg:


Pretty weird looking, huh? It looks like it was cooked while traveling at light speed.

The bacon we ordered looked quite American to me:


But, who knows? Maybe "Canadian Bacon" is just about as Canadian as "French Fries" are French.

After breakfast, we ventured out to find a few of these:


Look hard at the following pictures because you're not likely to see me on a horse again for awhile.



Here's our guide, Christine, a German transplant, who took us around Elk Lake:

It was such a beautiful area. Jeff took a lot of pictures but a lot of them came out blurry since he was getting bumped around on the top of a horse.

Jeff rode Roxie. Tobias had Bandit. I was on Lexie and Delaney had Trixie. I see a bit of an "xie" theme.

Delaney said this was her favorite part of the trip. Yay! I chose well.

That afternoon, we drove over to:


A week or so earlier, I told Jeff, "There's something I'm planning for you and the kids to do, but I will NOT be participating, so I want it clear in your head that I won't be talked into it." This, of course, piqued his curiosity.

The adventures that this place offers are excellent for people who enjoy this kind of thing, but for someone like me...I'd much rather spend my $40+ doing something else. The other three in my clan, however, loved it.

To simply call it a ropes course place doesn't quite do it justice. There's a bit of climbing, balancing, zip-lining, swinging, etc.

First, everyone got harnessed up.


We're too sexy for this safety gear:


My three Tarzan wannabes:


The management is smart. They first take you through a training course which is low enough to the ground that they can see you've learned the safety protocol of all the dos and don'ts. Here's the teacher, teaching:


Once a participant passes the I'm-not-likely-to-fall-and-die test, they are set free to go play.

There were three color-coded courses available. (My three bypassed the "kids" course.) Once you started a course, you had to go through it to completion, so you needed to ask yourself if you had the strength, will and guts before you started the next level. Black was the most difficult course. The guide told me she thought the designers were just being mean when they planned it out.

Like flies on a web:

Yes, I was there. See?


Man, look at how high those black course platforms are above me! Yikes...

That night I wanted to eat dinner at a place called Red Fish, Blue Fish, but they closed at 5:00 pm! Go figure. Cruising around, we found a shwarma place where Jeff and I wanted to eat. The kids aren't real big on Lebanese food so we were happy to see a pizza place practically next door.

The funny thing about this pizza place was that it was called Ali Baba's Pizza. Now last time I checked, pizza was Italian, not Arabic, so the name wasn't winning me over. I mean, would you want to eat at Vladimir's Tacos or Lupe's Sushi? However, the kids were just glad to be eating pizza instead of hummus, so we went inside to get them situated before we went next door to Beirut Express.

Well, this Ali Baba character must have spent some time in Italy because Tobias let me have a bite of his huge slice of pizza and it was about the best pizza I've ever had.

Yum, yum.

The crust was unbelievable and you could taste the fresh herbs in the sauce. Honestly, if you're ever in Victoria, seek out the ill-named pizzeria.

Day 4

When vacationing in a place you've never been to before, it's a bit of a trial and error experience. Day 4 was taken up with primarily traveling back to the U.S. After it was all said and done, Jeff and I agreed that we're glad we went to Vancouver Island, but if we were to do it again, we'd spend more time there because just getting there and getting back took so much time.

First, you have to drive to the ferry terminal. You want to give yourself plenty of time to get there in case traffic is bad. As you buy your ticket, you find out if there's room for you on the next ferry or if you'll have to wait for the following ferry or even the one after that. This could have you waiting at the terminal for several hours. Once you get on the ferry, the ride itself is rather longish. It's a hurry-up-and-wait sort of a deal.

As it was, knowing that that week was Spring Break for the British Columbian schools, I made a reservation (which cost about $18) for our return trip because I thought there might be extra traffic with all the people wanting to do something fun with their kids while school was out. (Btw, if you miss your reservation, there is no refund.)

I won't bore you with all the details, but basically, we waited at the terminal for two hours...


...rode the ferry for an hour and a half...


...drove back to the border and waited in line to cross over...


...for about an hour.

Yeah, the most exciting day of our vacation, it was not.

But, there was this cool bit of artwork just on the American side of the border to welcome us back:


...and the kids had all day to think back fondly on the French Toast with Cardamom Sauce that they'd had for breakfast:


One other fun thing about Canada--check out this speed limit sign:


Don't get too excited. It's in kilometers per hour. :)

Day 5

Wanting to attend a church on Sunday morning, I had done some research beforehand and selected one in a nice area.

It was a good place full of welcoming people who seemed to know and love the same Savior that we do. One thing they did that was rather foreign to us was recitative prayers during the worship service.

Tobias didn't like that at all. He thought it was cultish for everyone to recite the same words at the same time.

I reminded him that he's just not used to it and that it's actually no different than a congregation singing a worship song together. When that happens, everyone's saying the same words at the same time, it's just set to music. Also, if you don't agree with a certain part of the prayer then you can refrain from saying that portion. Of course there is the danger that repeating a prayer can just become a meaningless exercise in reading, but if one diligently attends to the words, reaffirming in their own mind that they are sincere in speaking them then it can be a wonderful, collective experience with a group of like-minded believers.

He remained unconvinced.

Oh well, I don't expect to have all the answers for a 16 year old.

After church, we looked at some houses for sale (we can dream, can't we?) and then went on a hike. A very steep, muddy hike.


Yes, there is a trail in there:


Once we got to the top of the hill we were climbing, we watched a large bird swooping through the sky. Jeff suspected aloud that it was a bald eagle.

We were informed later by locals that it likely was.

That night we dined with our friends at another amusingly-named restaurant:

It kind of makes you wonder, doesn't it? I assure you, the food was delicious and not one of us found a dog tag in our burrito. (Oh, and they gave us "Americanized" portions, too, so we all left full, some of us with left overs.)

Smile with your belly full:

Day 6

How's this for an early morning view?

Today, we did something that should be on the bucket list of all my friends. We hiked a certain trail along the Nooksack River. Jeff has declared this spot to be his favorite place in the world. Personally, I'd like to have my ashed sprinkled there. Or at least some of them.

I'll give you detailed directions so that you know how to get there, in case you ever find yourself in northern Washington.

While traveling on the I-5 through Bellingham, take the Sunset Dr./Hwy 542 exit and turn east. You'll stay on this road the entire drive. Upon leaving the freeway, it will take you about an hour to get to the trail head.

Depending on where you're from, you may or may not be used to following the speed limit on wide open roads. Well, follow it closely in Washington because the law enforcers are sticklers.


Make sure you don't accidentally branch south onto Hwy 9 just after Deming. Also, don't turn north on the 547 in Kendall. Stay the course on the 542.


Shortly after passing through another mountain hamlet called Glacier, you will cross over the river. Just past that there will be a campground to your left and a small parking area to your right. Park on the right and walk west, past this sign...


...and down a staircase to the trail head. Turn left and begin your adventure in Wonderland.

Here are some pics which, of course, don't do the place justice.








It's not just the landscape that is gorgeous. Don't walk too quickly or you'll miss out on all the amazing details of God's creation.

Here's a fungus larger than a 16 year old's hand, growing out of a log:


Behold the unintentional artistry of a woodpecker's hunger:


Here's an up close shot of the woolly green sweater that all the trees and rocks seem to be wearing this season:


Fun with moss:

Soon it was time for us to leave this verdant Utopia behind and go meet our friends for another hike.

Another hike? Isn't that getting old already?

No way!

If you go to Horseshoe Bend and still have time after your hike, I advise that you continue east on the 542 for another hour or so. It ends at a place called Artist Point at a ski resort. Talk about views! We didn't go there this time, but I'm including a few pics from our trip there last August so you'll see what I'm talking about.




The Alps don't have anything on the Cascades! It's difficult to see, but if you look closely at that third picture you can make out the outline of a very snow-covered Mt. Baker in the middle of the frame.

Soon we met up with the Mom and the Younger for our second hike of the day. Darling Doggy came along but wasn't allowed on the trail so he went for a ride:


The trail we traipsed is known as the Dagobah Hike in our friends' home because it reminds them of the swampy planet where Luke Skywalker met Yoda. It was very cool.




Another great thing about these hikes is that they aren't strenuous at all. They're pretty much just nature walks, so you don't need to shower when you're done and you can just walk along, chatting with your friend:


That evening, the Dad took us to the local chocolatier per our request. I was a bit startled by the posted prices.

However, I was pleasantly surprised by the chocolatier himself. He was this bearded guy, behind the counter, dressed in a couple of mismatched flannels and very eager to talk about each product. It was kind of odd because we're standing in this classy, upscale shop, oohing and awing over finely made chocolate and we're being waited on by a knowledgeable and chatty "lumber jack".

He threw a couple of free pieces into our bags and charged us less than the posted prices on certain items. I figure that's his way of being able to charge people a lot if he wants to or appear generous if he wants to. Fine by me!

Each of us chose a few pieces and settled down to take little luxuriant nibbles.

Two of my selected three:


Voila!


Make it last, Girlfriend:


We passed around a few of them to sample $0.30 worth of each others' chosen items--not the most hygienic exercise, but tasty.

Here's my Hazelnut Hedgehog after it had done the round:

I'm not sure whose teethmarks are whose, but at least it wasn't dripping with saliva.

I got really excited when I saw that they sold sipping chocolate. Ever since I'd heard about that stuff, I wanted to try it. Think hot cocoa, but thicker and more decadent.

I was not disappointed.

I passed my three ounce cup of velvety delight around for everyone to taste.

Pinkies out!

Now that's fancy! (For you SpongeBob fans.)

When I finally got my little expensive cup back, I did what any chocoholic would do:

Sorry you had to see that but the dregs were positively delicious. Here's a nicer, pre-vacation picture of me posted in hopes of erasing the above vision from your mind:


After all the chocolate consumption took place, someone had the bright idea to jump into a nearby lake. Three of the four of us rose to the challenge. Guess who declined...

Delaney gave the experience two enthusiastic thumbs up:


Tobias, on the brink:


Where's that hot tub???


Here's Jeff, manning up for the event:


Ready?


And...go!


Brrrrrr...


Let's put that "before" shot up again. (It was a bit sexier):


Ahhh...much better.