The Itinerary So Far

Let's see... What's the plan for our 2-weeks' vacation? For this year's trip, it is a bit different for us because a friend of mine will be tagging along.

So far, our itinerary looks like this:

Day 1 - Asakusa 
Arrive Narita Airport at 7.00am, get our JR East Pass and head to Asakusa.
We'll spend the nights in a hotel in Asakusa whenever we are in Tokyo.

Day 2 - Disneysea
Awhole day of fun fun fun!

Day 3 - Tazawako
A day trip.
Our initial plan to spend the night at Tsurunoyu Onsen had to be scrapped due to a change of travel date and we were unable to secure the room we wanted on the new date. :(
We are also thinking of going to a matsuri in Morioka that evening, if the time permits. If we do, we'll only be able to check-in at 12.00am that night!

Day 4 - Kagaya Orchard, Akita 
for some fruit picking trip instead of picking up those fruits at the nearby supa!
* Budo, nashi and ringo to pick!

Day 5 - Yokohama
And a  visit to Bandai Namco Wonderpark. Maybe a meet up with a friend there too...

Day 6 - Odaiba/Ginza

Day 7 - Harajuku/Shibuya 
 and the surrounding area. A visit to Yoyogi Park, maybe?

Day 8 - Asakusa
Maybe check out Akihabara, Ueno or something.
Make sure my friend buys everything she wants to before going back to Malaysia the day after.

Day 9 - Sendai/Matsushima 
Send off my friend to the airport and off we go to Sendai and maybe a trip to Matsushima Bay.

Day 10 - Nagano
A stop at Karuizawa for a spot of shopping is an option

Day 11 - Atami

Day 12 - Asakusa
 last day of shopping for us!

Day 13 - Head home. 

Of course, our plan is always susceptible to change. And I look forward to meeting a few people there too.

So, stay tuned and read where we end up to in Japan!


*Japanese lesson for today:
Budo - grapes
Nashi - pears
Ringo - apples

Returning to the Pacific Northwest, Part 1

After fourteen months of cruising North America, to Alaska though the Alaska Highway, to the Arctic Circle, down the West Coast to Mexico and across the Gulf States to the Keys and the Southeast, back west through parts of the Midwest and now up the Northwest, living in 23 American states, 3 Canadian provinces, and 4 Mexican states, we are finally coming ‘home’ to Seattle, Washington. Although it is now only a mailing address, Seattle seems home to us with friends, family, tenants, doctors and agents there.

From Boise, Idaho, we crossed the Blue Mountains, reached Southeastern Washington, and settled in Moses Lake, the largest city (pop: 18T) in Grant County, the potato capital of the country (despite Idaho’s claim!) . Its Saturday Farmer’s Market was spectacular ($1 large watermelons)!  From there, we toured the Grand Coulee Dam near Electric City, the Hanford Reach National Monument near Othello, and the Gingko Petrified State Forest near Quincy, and the county’s  the orchards, gardens, and nurseries.

Grand Coulee Dam is currently the largest dam in North America and the fourth largest in the world, behind Three Gorges in China, Itapúa in Brazil, and Guri in Argentina.  Under construction in Canada, however, is Syncrude Tailings which will become the largest when completed and, along with a few others, will soon greatly change the rankings.  Nevertheless, Grand Coulee is grand, especially with the laser light show in the evening (headline photo above), with the dam as the screen, telling its story.

The unusual topography of Eastern Washington was debated for a long time but is now widely believed to be the result of massive Ice floods from Lake Missoula in Montana. Created by huge glacier fingers from Canada first acting as dams and then giving way, in repeated waves, about 12-15,000 years ago, Lake Missoula is believed to have carried 520 million cubic miles of water (Lakes Ontario and Erie combined). Imagine the power of the water that rushed through the area, finding its way to the Ocean in just 3 days!

The coulees that were formed are unique in the world and on the biggest of them all, the US under FDR invested Fed funds in building, during the Depression, the largest dam in America.  On the way to the dam are interesting sidelights of the flood.  From Moses Lake, you will pass through Soap Lake, an internationally renowned medicinal lake whose healing waters are mineral-rich (creating the look of soap suds around the lake), supposedly effective in curing many ailments.  The Monument to the lake is a sundial of a Native American couple calling the gods to give the lake its healing powers.

Just north of Soap Lake is the Indian Caves of Lenore where petro glyphs can be found. Then several miles to the east is Summer Falls, the result of the releasing of water from the Dam for irrigation during dry months. It is a 165-foot water fall gushing down a dry, treeless landscape, helping to irrigate 650,000 farms (the capacity is for a million). And further north is another waterfall of a different nature: Dry Falls.  As the name implies, there is no water gushing but mere potholes at the bottom, but once, it was the site of the biggest waterfall in the world, at 400 feet tall and three miles wide, double Niagara!

South of Moses Lake, on the other hand, is Othello where the Potholes Reservoir and State Park are. The potholes are smaller versions of the coulees.  Further south is the Hanford Reach National Monument.  Hanford Reach is the outlying delta of the Columbia River and the site of about seven reactors built to produce Plutonium for the WWII atomic bombs.  One in particular, Reactor B (with C close beside it; there is no A), was where the plutonium for the Nagasaki bomb was produced.   At the northern end of the Reach and near Reactor B are the White Bluffs, white cliffs rising out of the Reach for 400 feet.

West of Moses Lake is Quincy.  From Othello, passing through the Bluffs and the Saddle Mountain from whose summit you can get a spectacular view of the Reach, you will reach Quincy after making a quick stop at the Gingko Petrified State Forest across the Columbia.  Petrified logs of spruce, Douglas fir, elm, maple, gingko, etc. are laid out in an interpretive trail. We cut short our visit for there were howling winds that almost blew my 120-pound frame away.  Furthermore, the logs seemed pretty odd, ‘jailed’ onto holes in the ground with thick steel meshes, quite unlike the Petrified National Forest in Arizona.

Just north of the Petrified State Forest is the Wild Horses Monument, a spectacular sculpture of 15 wild horses on a cliff overlooking the Columbia Gorge.  The Dave Govedare masterpiece depicts the first horses to roam the earth.  And further north are the Cave B Winery and Inn with its yurts and the 20,000 seat Gorge Amphitheater beside it where Keith Urban was to have a concert the following day.  Lastly, there is the Crescent Bar Resort, a member of the 1000Trails system we belong to.  The resort belongs to a vacation spot on the banks of the Columbia with coulee cliffs all along it. Next time we will stay there!

Next Stop: Fall City, Washington and Anchorage, Alaska          

   

Selca Moments

No, I'm not talking about a place in Croatia but rather a term coined by South Korean netizens. Selca is a combination of two English words together, self and capture.

For those who visited this blog often, you  should've realize that I'm not much into this "selca" shots. ^-^

I found this hilarious Samsung ad at youtube :

Many bloggers got this selca-ing thing down pat. For me, I'll just settle taking candid photos of my hubby and son. I'm not that photogenic anyway. XD

How about you?

Game Cards Mania - Data Carddass Style

One of the nonsense we allow Raimie to splurge each month is buying Japanese magazines which is either the Terebi-Kun or the Terebi-Mag. And he has started collecting Kamen Rider, Super Sentai and of course Ultraman carddass that he got as free gifts from these two magazines.

A surefire way to make kids want to buy these magazines and subsequently buy whatever toys they are promoting in their current issues - give out freebies! Come to think of it, the Kamen Rider series and the Ultra Series, (or whatever tokukatsu* series from the Land of the Rising Sun) it's like watching an extended ad for their toys and merchandises anyway!

For your info, Carddass is the Bandai subsidiary responsible for releasing game cards based on popular Bandai franchises. This includes games such as the Gundam War Collectible Card Game based on the metaseries, as well as a Gash Bell (Zatch Bell!) TCG, Naruto CCG, Rangers Strike (Super Sentai Series, Kamen Rider Series, Metal Hero Series), Neon Genesis Evangelion, Ultra Galaxy Daikaijyu Battle (Ultra Series) and most recently their most sucsessful to date, the Battle Spirits Trading Card Game.

Raimie can't wait to go to Japan and play the arcade games either  Ultraman's Daikaiju Battle RR and Kamen Rider 's Ganbaride. Japan game arcade centres : here we come! Bye-bye all our 100yen coins! *^_^*

p.s.*Tokukatsu is not to be mistaken as Tonkatsu, OK?

Tokukatsu : is a Japanese term that applies to any live-action film or television drama that usually features superheroes and makes considerable use of special effects(tokusatsu literally translates as "special filming" in Japanese).

Tonkatsu: is a breaded, deep-fried pork cutlet, one to two centimeters thick and sliced into bite-sized pieces, generally served with shredded cabbage and/or miso soup.

That children, concludes our Japanese lesson for today. XD

Study Time For Mommy!

Less than one month till our vacation to Japan and I really, really need to refresh and familiarise myself towards the Japanese language again.

Admittedly I don't really know much, and what I depend on is the survival phrases and for that JapanesePod101 came handy with their Survival Phrase segment.

It's been a year since I listened to any of their podcasts (because I was too pre-occupied with all things Koreans this year) and it is high time I start listening again. Zaini and I have different roles when vacationing. He is the navigator and the planner. I am the talker. Need to ask for direction? Then that's my job.

And there's one more reason why I should better comprehend the language. I don't know why but when we were in Japan, I always get stopped by Japanese women and girls asking for directions, take their photos or whatever. There was one time, an old lady asked for the direction of a hotel  in Kinshicho and luckily, we were going the same way so we took her along with us. Walking towards the hotel, she just kept talking in Japanese to me and I just kept nodding! LOL

Clearwater Beach, Florida

My first recollection of "the beach" was Clearwater Beach, where we spent several vacations and holidays every year.

Back in the day, the beach was lined with huge rental beach homes and the smaller mom and pop motels with assorted tourist traps, restaurants and nightly open air auctions. The backdrop was the gorgeous Gulf of Mexico with sounds, sights and smells that nothing else can replace.

The week after school let out was designated "Beach Week" . . . and everyone I knew from school went to Clearwater Beach for that week. Well . . . everyone but me . . . it was not allowed.

As a young adult, it was still my favorite beach and I would load my beloved blue Camaro with friends, brother, cousins . . . whoever wanted to go . . . just about every weekend. I adored the beach and it was my favorite place ever . . .

Many years have gone by and other area beaches and attractions became popular and I wanted to experience "new and different" . . . I had not been back to Clearwater Beach in a very long time.

My boyfriend and I decided at the spur of the moment to visit the beach, so we packed the van, picked up my mom and headed out towards a new adventure and old memories at the same time.

Gone were the mom and pop motels . . . in their place were gorgeous high rise hotels and fancy restaurants. The sadness hit when I knew we were at the beach, but could not see it like we could before all the new development.

It was comforting to see some of the old tourist traps made it through the transformation, although we didn't have time to walk the street and take it all in. Some of my fondest recollections of beach visits past were shopping at the shell shops that sold everything made with shells, loose shells, seahorses and sand dollars . . . I still have some of them!

Anyway . . . today's visit brought back many old memories that made me happy and sad. Sad was the fishing pier my dad and I fished many allnighters at was gone . . . a victim of a recent hurricane . . . we sat on a portion that was made into a seating area. Cool, but way more cool was the fishing pier of days past . . .

Happy was seeing the little boy come out in my boyfriend's eyes when we finally got out to the beach. The gulf beaches hold some kind of magic to kids of all ages . . . and it all came back to me today too. My mom shared her childhood memories of the beach and the way it was back in her day. I could see the little girl in her eyes too . . .

It was unfortunately a very rainy day and we didn't want to get our cameras wet . . . so, only a few photos of the beach for today's visit . . . but we will be visiting again very soon :-)

Some photos from today's visit:

Some vintage postcards from Clearwater Beach:

Visiting Family in Idaho & Passing-thru Big Sky Wyoming and Montana

After the spectacular duo of national parks, passing briefly through the big skies of Wyoming (seeing this unusual scene of a house being moved across a freeway and strange rock formations) getting there and Montana (seeing the arch welcoming people from the state into Yellowstone and snow catchers all along the highway) leaving there, we finally arrived in Boise, Idaho where Bill’s eldest son Jim and family live.  They were our first stop when we began this never-ending cruise last year and now we are coming back to visit, fourteen months after, on the way back to Seattle for a housekeeping visit and the trip to Alaska for Cristine’s (Bill’s youngest daughter) wedding in September!

Boise is the largest city in Idaho with a population of over 200,000.  Jim is married to Ana Goitiandia, a member of the Basque community there.  Numbering about 15,000, it is the second largest such community in the United States after Bakersfield, California and the fifth largest in the world outside Mexico, Argentina, Chile and the Basque Country in Spain and France. Downtown Boise features a vibrant section known as the "Basque Block" and Boise's mayor, David H. Bieter, is of Basque descent.

Jim is a partner in a real estate law firm in Boise and he and Ana have two lovely children, Madeline, 6, and Ben, 3. We went swimming, wandering around the huge Farmer’s Market, and visiting the Train Depot.  They went bumper car riding and ice skating (the same afternoons I chickened out and went to the library and outlet malls instead, respectively). We spent many hours playing games, watching movies and devouring delicious meals capped by delectable desserts which Anna and I alternated in preparing.

One night they stayed with us at the campground in Meridian, twenty minutes away from Boise.  They enjoyed the pool and spa, played billiards, tried puzzles, horseshoes, and the playground, and grilled burgers and dogs, barbecued chicken and steak, and made sinful s’mores (melted chocolate and marshmallows between grahams) over the fire on our brand new fire pit. Inside the RV we comfortably played Rummik-ube and sang with the Karaoke we bought in the Philippines (with a chip of 2,000 songs).

On our last night, the RV rocked from the huge 70mph gusts of rain-free wind that swept Boise, rendering the RV and most homes around powerless until the morning. Actually, when we were approaching the metropolitan area from the east, the whole horizon was a beige layer of dust storm.  I had not really seen both phenomena until this part of our trip.  The windstorm, in particular, scared me so that I did not really sleep that night, catching only about an hour or so after 7 am!

It was a great visit, nevertheless, and we look forward to the next one next year!

Next Stop: Moses Lake and Fall City, Washington