Travel Trinket: A Driftwood Board

Not all travel trinkets are purchased.

This board is a piece of driftwood I brought back from Washington.  Himself and I were walking along a beach when I found this old piece of a dock.  

It took a bit of cleaning, then I had to bring it home in my luggage.  (I wonder what the TSA dudes thought when they saw this!  LOL)

Now it is on the wall in our beachy bedroom, a reminder of a lovely walk on the beach.

The Lighthouse at Port Townsend, Washington.

This is a "wish I were there" photo.

I wish I were there is Little Bird and Little Hoss.

A great play beach, a nature center, and a short hike down to a sea glass beach.

Scotty... beam us over!!!

Torch Lily

Torch Lily

Port Townsend, WA

June 2011

Pink Bouquet

Pink Columbines

Port Townsend, WA

June 2011

River Otter

River otter at Port Townsend, WA.

May 2011

Temperate Rain Forest

Near Olympia, WA

May 2011

Listening to the rain falling as I write this reminds me of many of my trips to Washington.  All that rain creates the most incredible green vistas.  So beautiful.

Fun In The Sun

Port Townsend, WA  

May 2011

Children having fun on the beach.

My Favorite Vacation Destinations

When asked what my favorite vacation spot is… I can’t pick just one!  So here are my THREE favorite places to visit. 

Local – St. Louis, MO.  I don’t think the fact that St. Louis is my “home city” makes me prejudice so that it is my favorite local vacation place.  What I love about it is that it’s a small city packed full of things to do… and many of them are FREE! 

Yes, you read correctly.  Free.

In Forest Park there are world class attractions (many in building from the World’s Fair in 1904) with no admission charge to the main areas.  The zoo.  The art museum.  The science center.  The MO history museum.  Street parking is free too.

You can also visit the Anheuser-Busch brewery, Grant’s Farm (there is a parking charge), the Cathedral Basilica of St. Louis, and several other attractions at no charge. 

For a small admission you can visit the Museum of Transportation (adults $6), the MO Botanical Gardens (adults $8, kids under 12 free), ride to the top of the Gateway Arch (adults $10, kids $5), the American Kennel Club Dog Museum (adults $5) and more!

Great “hands on” kid places are the Magic House and the City Museum.  They are a bit pricer tho. 

Then there are all sorts of concerts and theater available.  Great food (The Hill is an area of Italian restaurants known worldwide). 

If you are bored in St. Louis… there is just no hope for you!  I’m labeling my St. Louis blog posts “Show Me St. Louis”.

USA – Seattle, WA area.  If I have to get on an airplane, I’m happiest if it is heading west to Seattle.  Mountains, ocean, and great weather (who minds a bit of rain!?). 

I’ve visited Pike Place Market, the Space Needle, Seattle Waterfront, Seattle Aquarium, the Fisherman’s Terminal, Tillicum Village, eaten at ‘Salumi’, and more. 

Going a bit farther afield, I’ve taken glass blowing classes in nearby Tacoma, hiked on Mt. Rainer and thru Federation Forest.  I’ve gone down to Mt. Saint Helens.  Explored small towns in both the mountains and along the coastline.   

And there is so much more to see and do!  I’m working on labeling my blog posts about my Washington trips under “Wandering In Washington”. 

Overseas – Scotland.   Scotland was like coming home to a place I’d never been before.  I loved the villages and open space.  The mountains and the ocean.  Laid-back friendly people.  Great food. 

I would go back again in a heartbeat.  If you want to see more about my Scotland trip, look under my blog label “Scotland Walkabout”. 

http://thepolohouse.blogspot.com/

Survival Suits and Sea Trials

The last thing we did in Washington was to get Himself settled in on the ship.  Much easier to do since we had a rental car. 

Each season everyone on the ships has to perform the survival drills.  Before the ship leaves they do immersion suit practice.  Also known as “Gumby suits” (I think you see why…), these will save your life if you’re forced into arctic waters.

They are buoyant to keep you floating, bright with both the orange color and reflective tabs so you can be seen, and they cover almost all of you so you don’t lose body heat. 

The instructor teaches them to form a ring so they will stay together.  That third set of feet from the left is Himself.

Then you are taught how to get into the lifeboats.  Himself is an old hand at this and gets up there pretty quickly and with minimum effort.

Others aren’t so graceful…

See?  Pretty much dry.  Most of that wet are from drips as the suit came off.  (Plus he got dunked a few times by a slightly panicked first-timer.) 

Back at the ship, loading was in full swing. 

While Himself ran here and there, I opted to stay on the dock for a bit; shooting some photos and visit with some friends I hadn’t seen in a few years before I went up to help him with the inventories.

A couple of those friends.  Alex (on the left) is the most fantastic artist.  And I love the dry humor of Julius (center).  On the right is Sean.  I don’t know him, tho I’ve met his wife who also works on the ship.  Himself speaks highly of him.  

I was invited to “ride along” on the ship’s sea trials (that is when you take the ship out for a little run to make sure all the kinks are out).  I jumped at the chance. 

Here’s Capt. Steve making sure that everything is being done as we leave the dock.

To get us out away from the dock, they used a tug boat to push/pull/shove us into position.  Looks kind of small, doesn’t it?

It’s NOT!

Soon we were out circling around Puget Sound “getting the carbon blown out”.  That is the assistant vessel manager Paul on the left and Capt Steve on the right talking to someone on the radio.

My favorite place on the ship! 

The Ferry to Whidbey Island

When Himself and I left Port Townsend, WA we decided to go back a different route.  This time we took one of the ferries to Whidbey Island and then another ferry over to the main land.  

What fun!  I’d never been on a big ferry before… just the smaller ones that go across the Mississippi River (the ones that can give you a bit of a white-knuckle experience as you wonder if this rickety thing will actually make it across!). 

So we drove onto to this big boat with a lot of other vehicles.  Once we parked, we could wander around on the upper decks and enjoy the ride across.

Bye-bye Port Townsend!

We saw some really beautiful homes on the crossing.

Soon enough we were at Whidbey Island.

Where there were more beautiful houses.

We had decided to make a drive around the island, so we turned right when we left the ferry.  Our first stop was to Driftwood Park.

This beach is the mother lode of driftwood.  And you can’t take a single piece!  There were some boards I could have done some amazing things with…

But it was fun to wander around looking at.

Our next stop was Coupeville.  That is Mt. Baker in the background.

I LOVE this sign!  Aren’t’ the different woods wonderful?  It spins too.  I admire the art of the Pacific Northwest tribes and these orca are beautiful.

And this was a fun sign over a shop.

One of our last stops was at the end of our circle… if we’d gone left from the ferry it would have been our first stop!  Admiralty Head Lighthouse.  It was one of the lighthouses featured on the US postal stamps back when they were .25c. 

There is a nice exhibit inside.  I like the copies of the lighthouse keepers’ notes.  Wouldn’t it be fun to sit and read those logs?

You could go up into the tower too. 

Ft. Casey with Mt. Rainier in the distance.

I could sit here all day!

"Under the Sea" Made Easy

After I left Mr. Otter snoozing on the beach I headed over to the nature center I passed coming in.  

I started with the building on the land side of the road.  There is a small gift shop and a room with various displays on the plants, animals, and minerals of the area.  Hanging on the ceiling is a whale skeleton.  Many displays are interactive; children are invited to touch and experiment (as did a certain soon to be 49 year old!). 

I particularly enjoyed the geology displays.

Isn’t this sand exhibit cool?  A thin layer of sand it held between 2 layers of glass.

After I finished there, I walked across the road to the second building at the end of a long dock.  This building is dedicated to life IN the water. 

It is all about ‘hands on’ learning.

As you enter and go to the right, there are large tanks of full of sea life from the area. 

Some sort of fish.

A display showing what lives on the dock pilings in the area.

Or on the rock jetties.

Clams saying “Ahhhh”!

OK, I was told by one of the docents that this starfish was ‘giving birth’.  But when I looked up starfish reproduction for this blog… I found out that most likely isn’t true at all.  I emailed the center asking what was happening but they did not answer.  L  My guess is the tiny little starfish next to the big one just happen to be there and are young starfish who have progressed thru the nymph stage.

Along the back were the “touch tanks”.  These put me in Happyland very quickly.  Don’t you always wonder what a living starfish feels like or how soft an anemone really is?

Here you can find out!

Starfish feel like the rocks they are attached to.

And an anemone is so delicate you can barely feel it.

After touching a sea urchin I can understand why stepping on one is such a terrible thing.  It’s like a mat of wooden skewers!  I thought it was cool how there were spines of different lengths.

This is what a living sand dollar looks like.  They are kind of bristly. 

We had seen a few of these on the beach.  They are sea cucumbers.  Weird.  The body is firmer than you might think but the ‘spines’ are soft.  They are actually a type of tentacle.

These little shrimp went shooting off whenever you got too close.  No touching them!  

The volunteer docent warned to watch out for a few critters in the touch tanks that really don’t care for being touched… and who might just touch you back!

“I pinch you man!”