Alaska Trip - Day 9

A pic from the road leaving Whistler

We were extremely sad to leave Whistler. We took our time packing our luggage & getting breakfast downstairs. The cafe in the hotel had a wonderful granola/yogurt parfait and a delicious cinnamon roll, which we all shared. (I'm not a fan of cinnamon rolls, but this was AMAZING!)

The bellhop came up to the room and took our stuff down; we took one last look at the view from or room before we shut the door behind us & vowed to return again REAL SOON! We had a long drive ahead of us - Whistler to Prince George.

It was a beautiful drive, with a little bit of traffic. There had been a BIG 4-day concert festival in Pemberton, about 5 miles North of Whistler. People had driven in from MILES...I believe Kevin & Bean were there too! Anyway, most of the people were leaving the same morning we were in town, so the traffic was ridiculous! Luckily, most of the people were driving back down toward Vancouver and we were going north toward Prince George. So, our traffic was light...but it was still traffic and, for these parts, any traffic is heavy traffic!!

As we drive along these long stretches of road there are many Rest Stops. Some have toilets and some don't. Most of them are nice with a concrete building surrounding the toilet & room to move within the building. However, some are just basically an Outhouse. Well...on this trip I just couldn't wait any longer to hold it until we got to the next town, which was hours away. So, we saw a Rest Stop sign & pulled over. In the woods was a small outhouse with a "Toilet" sign pointing in it's direction. Like I said, I couldn't wait. So, I plugged my nose & held my breath and quickly got in & got out! It was a Traditional Outhouse...wood...hole in the ground...I'm sure you've heard of them. This was my first experience with this, so I had to share.

Anyway, I usually try to stay awake while Chris is driving to keep him company, but I actually got to take a little bit of a nap before Chris woke me and told me it was my turn to drive. I only drove for about an hour until he wanted to drive again. He didn't even get to sleep while I was driving; he said he was too nervous -- I did fine though!!

It was a long day of driving, but we made it to our hotel in Prince George around 9pm (it is still light outside.) We checked in and then went to the coffee shop to get a late dinner before returning to our hotel.

We didn't sleep too well...Emily was restless and the neighbors (a family with 2 young boys around 6 years old) they came barging into their room next door and made a WHOLE BUNCH OF NOISE. Bryndall barked & Emily woke up...needless to say, we didn't get much sleep that night!

Alaska Trip - Day 8

Today was Whistler, and I have one word "AMAZING!" This place was beautiful; one of the most beautiful places I've ever seen! We stayed at an AMAZING lodge (http://www.nitalakelodge.com/) and I think everyone should stay here! Our room was AMAZING, the view from our room was AMAZING, the staff was AMAZING, downtown Whistler was AMAZING! We WILL be back there in the future!!! We were just so overwhelmed with AMAZEMENT that there really isn't more to say then "AMAZING!!"

Oh, and Emily officially took her first steps here, in Whistler! We were sitting on the floor in our AMAZING hotel room, playing with her. Chris was supporting her standing, and let go.....she stood there, on her own, for a few seconds and smiled at Chris while she walked two steps on her own toward him. We both looked at eachother and said "Oh my God, Did you see that?!?!"

Sorry, but I won't have too much time to write too much more then this because our Internet time is limited to the hotels. And we're driving 10 hours each day from here-on-out, so when we get to the hotel late at night we will only have a few minutes, if any, to go online. We'll keep trying to get online and keep you updated along the way.

Alaska Trip - Day 7

Day 7 started as every other day we have had on our trip...struggling to get out in the morning to get the day going. At least we were staying 2 nites at the hotel, so we didn't need to pack our luggage and try to get out by 11.

Chris left early (around 9am) to drop the dogs off at, yet another, Doggie Daycare. We found another spot in downtown Vancouver, but she was filling up fast...so Chris rushed out to send them off so we could go sightseeing. By the time he got back Emily & I were ready to go out for the day.

We headed off to Stanley Park where we had planned to visit the Vancouver Aquarium. By the time we got there it was already pretty busy. Stanley Park is this HUGE park in Vancouver...kind of like Central Park in New York, but BIGGER and on the other side of the harbor. Anyway, we had to drive for a while before we found where we were going and could find a good place to park.

The line to get into the Aquarium was really long, but it seemed to move somewhat fast. We got into the Aquarium and Emily just LOVED IT!!! We brought her up to every tank and she "squeaked" at it, slapped the glass, and had a HUGE GRIN on her face! She had a BLAST!!

We finished the day with a walk around the park to the Totem Poles. We had a late lunch in downtown and then ordered a pizza to the hotel room for dinner. We repacked the car and the luggage, I did a little work online, and that was the end of our night.

Alaska Trip - Day 6

Hello again...it's Chris Moore. Apparently my last posting was good enough to keep up here so I have been permitted to write another one :-) So, day 6 had another slow start, bu turned out to be pretty good. We started our morning trying to get our stuff together to get out of Seattle, except Emily was determined to deter us. We could not leave her alone for one second, as usual, so we struggled to get out of there.

I went down to the office to check out the breakfast they had out and it turned out to be pretty good! Tracy and I had waffles and toast! Not bad for a Days Inn. We thought it would be a good idea to start some laundry at the hotel that morning so we would have all clean clothes for Canada, however, in all the hustle and bustle of the morning, we left it there! Tracy remembered when we were about 5 miles away, so we turned around and went back. We were able to get it out ok. Remember the great idea we had about leaving the Jeep at the Coast Guard base overnight? Ya, well neither one of us thought about how we would get all of our stuff into the truck at the hotel the next morning (most of it rides in the jeep!). So, we started packing the the truck and believe it or not, we got all of our stuff (3 suitcases, 5 extra bags, pack and play, baby walker, dog beds and dog food)all in the backseat of the truck, next to Emily of course. In the front seat, there was Tracy in the passenger seat with Bryn on her lap, Chloe in the middle and then myself. We had to drive 30 mins to the CG base like that!

After getting to the base to get the Jeep and getting everything back in its appropriate place, we set out for the local REI store...it is a gigantic store that is actually labeled as a tourist attraction for Seattle. We got over there and then realized that there was no parking for our two cars and we couldn't bring the dogs inside, or leave them in the car, because it was already 80 degrees outside. By this time its a little after noon and we just want to get on the road for Vancouver. We hadn't eaten lunch yet and we needed gas. So, we stopped for gas and Tracy went in the store to get lotto tickets and scratchers, as usual. Tracy won $5 on a scratcher, so she went back in and got 5 more. We hit the road and on the way we won again! Two more bucks! woop woop! So we stopped to get lunch at Quiznos about 50 miles out of Seattle and we swung by a gas station to redeem our tickets (we were leaving the US, so we had to get this done now). We won 2 more times in the parking lot of the gas station and just kept going back for more tickets. We eventually lost and we hit the road again. It was fun.

So, the drive to Vancouver was short (in comparison) only took us about 3 hours to get the border. We waited at the border for about an hour or so before it was our turn to get cleared by the border agent. We finally got up there, expecting to get the gamete of questions and a full inspection. We were totally prepared. We had a "certificate" for everything. I mean we had passports, birth certs, marriage cert, dog health certs, Canadian insurance cards...you name it, we had it. Tracy went through so much trouble to get this stuff that we almost wanted them to ask for everything only to justify all the trouble. So did they? Nope. I pulled up to the window, the Border Agent asked me to remove my sunglasses and roll down the windows, I did, while handing him the passports. He asked where we were from, where we were going, how long til we get there, where we were staying that night....and then he asked if we had any weapons, I said no, not with me. He said, where are they? I told him the military shipped them and he asked about the bullets (its illegal to bring bullets to Canada)and I told him I gave them to my brother because I wasn't allowed to ship them or bring them into Canada. He then asked if we were planning on towing the Jeep all the way, I said "yes," he replied, "okaaaaaayy???" He didn't instill much confidence in us. He then handed our passports back to me and said "have nice day," and we were on our way to Vancouver!

Shortly there after, we were in Vancouver, we checked into our hotel, similar to the hotel in Seattle, a little nicer though. We neglected to tell them about the dogs; the last place put us in a smoking room because of that, so we didn't tell them. We dropped our stuff and went out to eat, we found a fast food place in a Chevron gas station that was pretty good. We went back to the hotel after that, unpacked and relaxed for the rest of the night. It was nice.

Alaska Trip - Day 5

We woke up early in the morning because Emily is an earlier-riser. Because we were stuck in a smoking room, we both woke up with a smoker's cough and the feeling of smoker-nasty. We don't smoke..never have...never will - So, being in a smoke-infested room was just horrible for our lungs. We spent a good part of the morning calling around to other hotels to see if they would take us for that evening; and we tried to talk with the management of the current hotel we were at about canceling our 2nd day with them. After hitting dead-ends at every avenue with the hotels, we were so frustrated that we just decided to get on with our day and just stay where we were.

No, we did not get to all the attractions that were on the itinerary for Seattle, but we did get to the Space Needle and Pike's Market (that's it). Since we got a late start there was only so much we could do. So, first-things-first...we took the dogs and dropped them off at Doggy Daycare because we couldn't leave them in the hotel room alone. We found a place that turned out to be really nice and loving. So, we dropped them off to play for the day. It was hard to leave them because we've never left them at a place like this before. But, if we wanted to go see Seattle, we HAD to do this!

After the dogs were taken care of we went off to the Space Needle, via the US Coast Guard Base, Seattle. We stopped by the Base to drop off the Jeep we were towing. Why? -- Well, we didn't feel like the Jeep would be safe in the hotel parking lot and because we didn't want to risk losing anything, we thought the best place for it would be behind the secured gates of the US Coast Guard. The guards at the gate gave us a little bit of a jokingly hard time and a snicker when they saw Big Bear driving the Jeep...but they let us in and let us leave the Jeep until the following morning.

It was already noon when we dropped off Chloe & Bryndall, and we had to be back to pick them up at 6pm from Daycare, which didn't leave much time to drive into the city and see everything. So, we rushed off to the Space Needle. I love the atmosphere of the Space Needle...they have this 1950's space motif...it's totally sheik. Although there was a good-sized line of people it didn't take us too long to get up to the top. There are so many buildings in today's day-and-age that the Top of the Space Needle wasn't too impressive. It was neat that it was built in 1962, because that was a long time ago...but the city's skyline has far surpassed it's height. There was a nice view from the top.

After leaving the Space Needle we went across the street to a sport's bar where we had a couple of MUCH NEEDED beers. At that point it was about 4pm and we needed to rush off to pick up the dogs from Daycare. So, we left the city but planned to return with the dogs to go see Pike's Market.

The dogs were OVERJOYED to see us when we arrived at daycare!! The lady said that they did well, but she said they should go to a daycare more often because it would help them feel more comfortable with other dogs. So, we left the daycare and returned to the city.

We parked at this lot under the freeway, which was between the tourist piers and Pike's Market on the above hill. There was this crazy homeless lady bugging us for money...and then she followed us as we parked the car (scary!) We all got out - the dogs got new harnesses so we could better control them in the crowd, and Emily had a new backpack that Chris wore. We walked up the 300 foot elevation climb to get to Pike's Market (huff'n & puff'n all the way)

Once we got to the top we were sad to see that we had missed it...we were too late. We arrived after 7pm and the whole market had been closed for sometime. (I don't recall seeing anything that said they closed early) But there was just a bunch of tables with ice where you could see there had once been fish. Oh, and IT SMELLED!!!!! We walked the whole market with a few other tourists who, apparently, were also unaware that the place closed early. So, we took the long way back to the car and stopped for a lemonade at the pier on the waterfront before we left and went back to our horrible hotel.

Once we got back to the hotel I went into the office & requested a new room. After some finagling we were able to get something on the other side of the hotel, which was A WHOLE LOT BETTER!! We were actually happy with our NON-SMOKING room!! We spent the rest of the night reorganizing our luggage and stuff in the car (things have gotten messy over the last few days) And we were actually able to get a good night's sleep without all of the ruckus caused by the casino near the room we had previously inhabited.

Boogers and Elevation

Let's talk for a moment about a topic that most of us don't experience when we have a cold. Boogers and Elevation. Have you ever had a head cold and been on a plane as it takes off from the airport? I have, it's not fun. Driving through the mountains of Oregon has the same affect on your boogers as gaining altitude on an airplane.

You can feel your head swell even more then it already felt to begin with. It feels like a sweltering pimple that is about to burst. Your boogers expand in your sinuses and begin to bubble with a distinct Pop Rock sound, and all you want to do is get off the roller coaster. It's not just the boogers, your ears get plugged up and the surrounding sounds are muffled - you could stuff marshmallows in your ears and have the same affect.

Your breathing is labored and your eyes swell from all the bubbling fluids in your sinuses. You tilt your head back as to relieve the tension in your head, but it doesn't work. As you're sitting there in pain, listening to the bubbles in your nose try to escape...your drive went from going up, to going down.

You begin to feel relieve instantly. You can see again out of your eyes, which previously had been full of water. You still can't breathe, but it is easier for the air to enter your lungs. The excessive popping in the boogers of your nose die down and you tilt your head back to the normal position. You think to yourself that the worst is over, and although you're not well again, you're thankful that you have come down in altitude....and then you see the road ahead...it's a long windy road through a mountain chain.

Alaska Trip - Day 4

Hello everyone! Its Chris Moore today....I know you are used to Tracy writing these things but she has been bugging me to "get involved," so here I am. Day 4 officially started last night on our way home from seeing Carolyn...we didn't get home til about 1 a.m. or so. We all went to bed and attempted to get a good nights sleep because we had a long drive to Seattle to make that morning. Well, as you can imagine, a good nights sleep was the last thing we got! Emily only slept for 6 hours....she was waking us up at 7 am!!!! We struggled to get her to sleep and never made it back to sleep ourselves. We got up and got the cars loaded to go to Seattle and we left Medford, Oregon at about 12 noon. TomTom (GPS) told us it was about 8 hours to Seattle so we thought we'd add 2 hours to that to account for stops along the way. Turns out we were right on schedule! We got into Seattle a little after 10 pm on Wednesday night and attempted to then find our hotel...this is where our Day 4 turns upside down. First of all, apparently, TomTom hasn't visited Seattle very much. The GPS was way off on its directions to our hotel, I mean way off. I was so frustrated with it! Tracy was sitting in the passenger seat saying "I told you so" the whole time. For those of you who do not already know, she never wanted me to buy TomTom in the first place. Tom eventually got us there and when we pulled up to the hotel, we were appalled. It was the nastiest hotel ever and it was in a nasty part of town. I mean there were homeless people, hookers, gangs and trash everywhere! We drove right thru the hotel driveway and parked the car to find another hotel. There was no way we were staying in that hotel!!! After about an hour, we finally found a Days Inn in the city of Auburn, WA; its about 30 mins from downtown Seattle. We showed up and they put us in a "Smoking" room, facing a Casino next door and there was no parking left so we had to park in the Casino lot!!! We were so frustrated at this point, we just went to bed...it was again, 1 am. I woke up at 6am and moved the cars to the hotel lot. We complained to the hotel and got relocated today the other side of the hotel and in a non smoking room (much nicer).

Alaska Trip - Day 3

Today was a real long day on the road. We left Sacramento at 9:30am and arrived in Medford, Oregon at 5:30pm. It was a whole day of driving and when we got the the hotel all we wanted to do was lay down and watch TV. The road to Oregon was, for the most part, flat farmland. It felt like it was a much longer drive then the 8 hours drive we did on Day 1 to Milpitas...that's probably because there is nothing in Northern California.

Emily and the dogs are doing well with the drive. They sleep most of the time. We usually get out of the car to strech about ever 3 hours or so. I think they are kind of getting tired of being int he car. Emily has tried to take her seatbelt off a few times...I mean, she isn't even close to understandng the intriquet 5-point safety harness, but she will pull at it. She's so good in the car though.

You know, California is a BIG PLACE! Being out of CA, I feel like we're getting closer to our destination...like Alaska is right down the road from here. We entered Mt. Shasta, in CA, just before getting into OR. We finally hit some trees, ok...A LOT OF TREES! The hills are covered every inch with beautiful, tall, green pine trees. We climbed the windy road through Shasta but it wasn't as beautiful as the post cards they sell in the gas station. There was a very low, lingering cloud of smoke from the local fires. Sadly the lake was about 50 feet below the waterline, but was still full of boaters.

We stayed in Meford and drove to Winston to visit Carolyn (a good friend of my mom's). It was nice to see her, she hadn't met Emily yet. We ate at the local hamburger diner and then went back to Carolyn's for pie and to feed the goats. Carolyn has 8 goats, 4 of which are only few weeks old. She has one goat that needs to be bottlefed because the mother cannot provide for him. I got to hold him and feed him with the bottle, it was super cute! Chris was walking around the yard with Emily petting all the other goats. She is so cute, and sadly I left my camera in the car...so I don't have any pictures of her interacting with the goats. After I was done feeding "Diego" the baby goat, Chris handed me Emily and he held "Chi" (Diego's sister) for about 45 minutes...just petting her. She loves to be held and just layed in his arms like a cat...she even purrs! It was a fun evening with the goats!

Alaska Trip - Day 2

The drive from Milpitas to Sacramento was only about 2 hours +/- a few because we stopped every now-and-again to let the dogs out to go potty and let Emily walk around. The drive was nice - same ol' same ol' -- lots of farmland! I can't wait until we get into a place that has some diversity, and some trees that are not planted as a wind-breaker for the crops!

So, today we went to Sacramento and spent the day with Mike & Rose. We had a very nice visit, and it is unfortunate that our stay had to be so short. They have four dogs, and our two made six. The dogs got along just fine (except for Henry, he's a 1-man kind of dog) Oh, and I loved Walter! He's a Todo dog and is just the CUTEST thing out there! Rose doesn't know it yet, but I snuck him in the truck when she wasn't looking and now he's on his way to Alaska! (ok, not really, but it crossed my mind!)

Oh, and Chris gave me his cold (which Emily had yesterday) She's doing much better today, but still has a bit of a runny nose. Me, I've got a sore throat and a runny nose.

Alaska Trip - Day 1

Well, today we left San Dimas. It was pretty hard to do...saying "good-bye." The last week has been an emotional toll on everyone - it's been a long drawn out goodbye because we saw a new person practically everyday and had to say "good-bye" over and over again. It wasn't easy. I think if we come & leave again we'll just have a Good-bye Party the day before we leave so that we can just do one big good-bye...get all the emotions all out at once.

So, we left home. I think I cried until we got to Magic Mountain - about an hour...until it all dried up (I think that was all the tears I had in me) I was a long ride, but full of anticipation and excitement. We drove with no problems until we reached Milpitas around 4pm. (we left San Dimas at 9am) We stopped twice for gas (just t top it off) - and 2 scratches & a $1 lotto ticket...that is going to be the "gas station standard" - oh, but our MAIN REASON for stopping was to use the bathroom.

We've had some hurtles and been kind of edgy most of the day yesterday & today. We've got a lot to try to balance here...baby cries, Bryn wants out, Chloe wants water, our food is getting cold, have to pee, no where to change a diaper, how do we feed baby in the car - I think by Day 3 we'll get it all down pat!

After arriving in Milpitas we checked into the hotel (which was actually super nice!) and then we jetted out to Great America. We entered G.A. at about 6:30pm and only stayed for 2 hours - it was really cold, super windy, and LAME! I remember going to that amusement park when I was young and it was neat! I've been wanting to go back! However, it would appear that they haven't updated anything since 1980! Everything was old, broken, peeled, scratched, dirty, and reminded us of the state fair.

Emily is doing ok. She really likes to be in the car, so that's a plus. She didn't sleep much last night because she has a bit of a cold. So, I don't think she could breathe too well and therefore kept us up all night. I'm sure she'll get over it soon. We're giving her some over-the-counter medicine & it seems to be working.

Emily's 1st Birthday Party

We all had a great time last weekend at Emily's 1st Birthday Party...gosh, time has gone by so fast! Thanks to everyone that was able to make it - it was great to see you one last time before we head off to Alaska. It was a great party and we felt so fortunate to be able to celebrate with all our family and friends!

Hands & Toes

Hi just had to write a quick blog to tell everyone that I got a manicure & pedicure today.

Now, I know this may not seem like a BOG DEAL to most of you because you do this all the time. Well...the last time someone did my nails was for Emily's Baby Shower, back in August of 2007!

It is amazing how life has been so Topsy-Turvy and how I have never had any time for myself. And, it's not like I was paying for it...I got a gift card from Scott & Mel for my birthday back in January and it took me seven months to finally be able to use it.

I feel so awesome right now! It's amazing what a little polish can do!

Our Stuff is on it's way to Alaska!

Well, the movers came yesterday and today. They packed the storage shed ALL DAY yesterday...filling up an entire big rig! They didn't have enough room for the stuff we had at my parent's house, so they had to come back for a second day (today) and spent another half day here! All-in-all we figured we have about 9,000 lbs in stuff we're moving. We definitely need to have a yard sale when we get there!!!!!

I really hope all of our stuff gets there ok. That is everything we have. I am so nervous that it will make the 4000 mile journey without any trouble...sinking, fire, broken glass, etc. I haven't even seen "our house" in seven months - I couldn't even tell you what we have in there! I think the nerve-racking part is that I have to wait another 6 weeks until our stuff arrives! So, I'll just have to be worried until then!

National Exam

Chris passed the

Emergency Medical Technician
National Registry Exam!!

He's, finally, an EMT!!

...good job sweetie!

** Happy 4th of July!!!! **

We had a great time on the 4th! We spent the afternoon in the pool at Aunt Carol's house. We celebrated not just the 4th, but also Grant's real birthday and Scott & Mel's wedding anniversary.



We spent the evening at an Angel's Baseball game where Emily made her 1st television debue on Fox Sports West! (a clip will be posted soon)

Grant's 4th Birthday

Today was the "friends birthday party" to celebrate Grant's 4th Birthday. We had a great time at a community water park.

Lisa made the cake:

More B-Day Photos: