Still Traveling

It has been quite a while since my last post. After the wedding, we had two more days of celebrations. On Sunday everyone was invited to an afternoon party at the lake house of the groom's parents. It was a lovely day. The younger generation enjoyed playing in the water; most of the oldies sat in the shade and visited. In the morning most of our group drove out to the Oregon coast to see some of the sights.

"Cobra" plants that are carnivorous

Coastal rock formations

Monday afternoon we had a rafting expedition on the Mackenzie River. There were about 40 people who went. It was fun, but it was a very long, tiring day. In the evening my sister Becky suffered from dehydration and ended up in the emergency room. They kept her for observation for two nights, worried that it might be something more serious. In the end she was fine and was able to fly home Thursday as planned. But it did fill our last few days!

After dropping Lucy and Becky at the airport, I headed north toward Portland to visit some old Charlottesville friends. We had a wonderful afternoon catching up. Dinner was at an authentic Kashmiri restaurant, which was delicious. The next morning I drove to Bainbridge Island to visit cousin Sally. It was good to miss all the driving on the Seattle side of the Sound. I had lunch with former student and friend June on the way.

The next day Sally took me on a driving tour of the island. There are many, many beautiful homes. There is a lovely park as a memorial to the Japanese people who were interned from the island during World War II. We walked along the pathways and saw the place where they were herded onto ships taking them away from their homes. You can see some of the stones on the ledge; they spelled out words such as "love", "remember", and more.

Sally loves animals, even the wild raccoon that she feeds just outside the back door.

My next trek included a ferry ride from Port Townsend. I had time to stop very briefly at Elevated Ice Cream and visit with Dave, also a former Woodstock student. From there, I drove through Whidby Island and onto I-5 heading for Vancouver. Janice and Evan are some of our oldest friends, going all the way back to college over 50 years ago. I was happy to have a very relaxed stay with them. On Monday we went to Granville Island, a well-known tourist destination. The produce stands in the market were amazing. The fruit was beautifully arranged and we got quite a lot of it. We also visited a store called Maiwa that has imports from India. Their textiles were wonderful and we talked Janice into purchasing a skirt.

A highlight of our past visits to Vancouver included dinner at Vij's, a fusion Indian restaurant. Vij is a creative chef and everything was delicious. We had a paneer-based cutlet topped with a pickled beet slice, a coconut-gravy vegetable dish on lentil-rice pilaf, and eggplant with onion rings. 

The following day they took me to the campus of the University of British Columbia, where they both worked before retirement (Evan in musicology, Janice in the library). It is a huge campus. One place we stopped overlooked a beautifully designed rose garden.

My next drive was to Spokane to visit the family. I woke early and headed out before 6:00. It was rainy but I didn't have any difficulty with the driving. I was worried about getting through Seattle, but my GPS took me east and south before Everett. After I crossed the mountains, everything was dry. I stopped at a scenic overlook at Lake Wanapum on the Columbia River. 

Dan is flying out to Spokane on Friday. We'll have a weekend visit and head home on Monday, with a stop to visit Glenn and Peggy near Driggs, Idaho. I'll be glad to get home after more than a month on the road!