Almost ready

Several people have asked for house updates. We estimate that we are just a couple of weeks from possession. Just the plumbing fixtures and the appliances as well as the final structured wiring (cable, phone, internet, sound system etc.) to go.

Day 2 of another vacation

They like me!! They really like me!! People still visit my much neglected Blog.

Today was a travel day, starting in Revelstoke and ending in Kelowna with stops in Sicamous (Butter pecan ice cream in a waffle cone at D Dutchman Dairy - yummmy!!). Craigaliky...no....Craiggalagy...ummmm.... the place with the last spike!! The requisite craft store for Cheryl. BTW, HAPPY BIRTHDAY, CHERYL!! We also visited the Old Log Barn to smell the food and feed the goats - exciting!! Tomorrow we go to Vancouver and then the cruise ship on Saturday.

Day 1 of another vacation

I know it will come as a great surprise to many of you to see a Blog update. Then again, the "many of you" to whom I am referring have long since stopped visiting my Blog looking for updates, 'cause there haven't been any. Make a comment to let me know someone out there still cares. Today is day 1 of our B.C./Alaska vacation. We drove with Cheryl's parents to Revelstoke and will continue on to Kelowna tomorrow. Today we saw much wild life. Unfortunately it was all ravens and crows. The only "mountain" wildlife we saw was stuffed and looking very ferocious at the Rogers Pass orientation center. It was very, very...ahhhh.. informative in a drab and altogether boring kinda way. Not much in the way of exciting pictures. There were some good photo moments at Lake Louise, but the Japanese tourists had taken them all by the time we got there. I know that because with the spectacular panoramic vista presenting itself over the aqua blue lake, some were taking close ups of the rocks by the pathway. I looked to see if I had missed something and if there was anything interesting. I hadn'y and there wasn't.

Talk at you later!!

On our way home

Well we are almost at the end of our vacation. Yesterday we had our final port of call in Helsingborg, Sweden which is a small city near the southernmost tip of the country. Accordingly it tends to be the vacation and resort area of Sweden because it gets the best weather. We visited one of Sweden’s most famousest lighthouses which didn’t do that much for us ‘cause Newfoundland has many lighthouses more spectacular that this one, but the weather was beautiful and warm and it beats working!! We also visited a quaint country inn which is famous for their home-baked sweets. They, too, were very good and since we hadn’t eaten in at least an hour, we were, understandably, famished!!

The day previously, we were in Copenhagen, Denmark which is a cool city. It was also the coolest day of our vacation, but it didn’t rain as was forecasted. In the evening, we went to Tivoli Gardens which is an amusement park that’s been in operation for over 160 continuous years. It’s said that Tivoli was the park that gave Walt Disney his ideas for Disneyland and it has that same feel to it although nowhere near as big. Given that cruises usually leave their ports of call around 5 pm, it was unusual to be somewhere in the evening. We enjoyed it very much.

Now we are spending our last day at sea before arriving back in Dover tomorrow morning. We have a tour of Windsor castle booked before being dropped at Heathrow airport for our flight to Calgary. We’ve had a great vacation, but know that there’s much waiting for us at home too, so we’re anxious to get back now that all the fun is over. We saw a woman walking her dog yesterday and Cheryl’s looking forward to seeing her puppy – I’m pretty she’s looking forward to seeing everyone else as well.

In Copenhagen

Finally, I can make a blog update. We are overnighting in port in Copenhagen and I'm camping on an unsecure network that I can access from the ship, so it costs me nothing. The ship's internet connection is a satellite based feed and slow doesn't even begin to describe its connection speed or expense - almost $0.50/minute and it might take 2 or 3 minutes just to download a page!! Upload speed - laughable!! usually times out before complete.

Here are some pic's - out of order, but at least you can finally see them!!


The white cliffs of Dover


St. James Park, London


Tallin, Estonia


Peter the Great's palace at Peterhof, St. Petersburg, Russia


St. Isaac's cathedral. St. Petersburg, Russia


Tallin, Estonia


Old Gdansk, Poland

Today is Wednesday, May 30. Yesterday we visited Berlin. It was a 3 hour train ride from the ship. Berlin was nice, not sure we experienced enough of it to really appreciate it, but we got a chance to touch the remnants of the Berlin wall and we saw a few sights. Our tour included 2 hours of free time, but they dropped us in the trendiest of shopping areas in West Berlin – all the same high end shops we have at home (and don’t shop at there either) plus the largest department store on mainland Europe and a Starbucks on every corner – again, not exactly a “Berlin experience”. The weather turned out better than expected with sunny skies and about 25 degrees. I’m glad I wore those zip-off pants, ‘cause shorts were definitely great. But at 4 pm, while we were shopping, a HUGE thunderstorm rolled in with crackling thunder and pounding rain, but we had already done our sightseeing and our bus was leaving at 4:30, so it didn’t interfere that much.

Today, we visited Copenhagen, Denmark (it’s about 9 am here). It’s an unusual port stop for us, ‘cause we don’t get in until noon and don’t leave until 6 am tomorrow. We got to stay onshore late at night and enjoy Tivoli Gardens (if you want to know what that’s about, just google it). Tomorrow we spend a few hours in Helsingborg, Sweden which will be our last stop for the cruise.

In the Baltic

Today is Monday, May 21 and we are enjoying our 2nd day at sea. We are deep into the Baltic Sea having rounded the northern end of Denmark and going under the 2nd longest suspension bridge in the world which connects Denmark with Sweden. The weather since we left Dover has been fabulous. I was a little nervous given the reputation that the North Sea has for rough waters, but the seas are absolutely calm the skies are sunny. Yesterday we saw several people get sunburns from lying by the pool. Tomorrow we arrive at our first Port of Call and we have a very busy schedule over the next few days with six consecutive days of ports (Gdansk Poland, Klaipeda Lithuania, Stockholm Sweden, Tallin Estonia and 2 days in St. Petersburg Russia). We’ll be very tired after all that.

Eating in London

Cheryl has been updating her facebook with lots and lots of pic's. So i thought I'd talk about the food. First of all, we enjoyed a typical British tradition of Fish & Chips, served up in a typical corner pub. Believe it or not, this pub had a "No Smoking" section. It was completely disregarded, but at least it was a nice try..







Next we had another typical British meal of Bangers and Mash with mushy peas. It was very good especially since they served 3 different kinds of mustard with it.





Heres food that we could have had, but didn't!! But doesn't it look yummy!!






Now here's a first for me - a plate of fried bait!! Mmmmm - good!! We ate in a French restaurant and one of the appetizer choices had some hoity toity name of course, but when served, it was basically fried bait. Little fishies not big enough to clean or de-head, so they didn't. Look carefully for their little eyes!! At first I left the heads, but after a while, I said.. "What the heck" and ate the whole thing. I wonder what the inside of my stomach looks like - I'll have to ask the little fishies!!

There's also other things in London which eat of course..



there's squirrels always looking for a handout.



..and pigeons in the public squares being ever opportunistic and unafaid of people.







..and geese doing what geese do.








Tomorrow, the London portion of our vacation ends and we are off on our cruise north through the Baltic Sea with stops in Denmark Poland, Estonia, Lithuania, Germany, Sweden and Russia. Lots to see yet!! Stay tuned for updates to my Blog.

Kerry and Cheryl