Monthly Archives: October 2012

Sorry Canada, but I’m telling everyone about the Okanagan Valley

27 Saturday Oct 2012

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Calgary has it’s Stampede, Banff lays claim to Lake Louise and the rising Canadian Rockies, but head just west of there and you land smack into a wonderful valley called Okanagan in British Columbia. The Okanagan Valley is wedged between two mountain ranges (Columbia and Cascade) and painted with orchards and vineyards that line the long, meandering Okanagan Lake, which travels southward toward Washington State. Canadians seem to know all about this place (natch), but the rest of us? Not a clue. And I think the Canadians like it that way.

Vineyards in the Okanagan Valley of British Columbia

This wasn’t my first time visiting Okanagan Lake. My first visit was when I was dating Steve five years ago. Color me so shocked to find all those vineyards lined up as grids all along the valley, and the orchards of apples that stretch from Kelowna–the main city in the valley–up into the hills.

The weather is very mild compared to the rest of Canada, which I realize is not saying much. The speed is slow like you would expect in an area that attracts retiring Canadians who consider themselves snowbirds, but not snowbirdy enough to dip their toes into the United States. In fact, living in Okanagan Valley is much more tolerable than, say Montana, which though certainly south of Canada isn’t a place where you’d want to winter.  It’s all relative, you know.

Vineyards in Okanagan Valley, British Columbia

I’ll state the obvious here: water sports are aplenty and a person has no trouble finding their preferred watercraft. There’s also the Jazz Festival every September, and winery after winery. I’m not talking a handful of wineries–but oodles of wineries. Sure, there are some smallish operations, but there are also the more well-known Inniskillin, Mission Hill and Jackson-Triggs. And with wineries you’ll naturally find award-winning restaurants. Oh, the restaurants! (Can we retire here, sweetie?  Just wonderin’. Oh wait, I forgot we were retiring in Panama. Maybe the Okanagan Valley can be the Summer home.)

Say “cheese!”


In between our decadent winery meals we returned to one of our favorite lesser-known points of interest: The Carmelis Goat Cheese Artisan, Inc.in Kelowna.To get there you take a road that serpentines up one of the highest hills overlooking the lake and where you can still see the remnants of charred trees from the firestorm of 2003 that burned over 60,000 acres.

At Carmelis you simply must sample the cheeses, buy some goat cheese and crackers to take back to your hotel room and especially don’t miss the goat’s milk ice cream. It’s totally worth the calories.  (In fact, everything in the Okanagan Valley seemed to be worth the calories, so bring pants with an elastic waistband.)

Speaking of that elastic waistband…

Tim Horton’s and I are just taking a break from each other

On our last day in Kelowna we decided to do something absolutely crazy and not have breakfast at Tim Horton’s. (Tim Horton’s was the Yin to our Yang of decadent and pricey lunches and dinners at wineries.) So instead of our usual breakfast sandwich and donut at Tim’s we found the Marmalade Cat Cafe where you smell the tea brewing as soon as you walk through the door and where their breakfast sandwiches are, well, look at this:

The best breakfast place in town (Sorry Tim!)

The Okanagan Valley isn’t a one-note region. You don’t have to drink wine, enjoy jazz, water ski or even collect a pension check to find your niche here. Hey, I’d keep coming back just for that goat cheese. It was my second trip to the area and I still feel like I haven’t fully realized everything there is to enjoy, so I’m going to keep the idea of a summer home alive with Steve. (And sorry all my Canadian friends–I just let the cat out of the bag about the Okanagan Valley.)

More photos here. Click on any of them and it will take you to a slide show for better viewing. Everything looks yummier with a black background anyway, doncha think?

Browsing Paris

21 Sunday Oct 2012

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Seven hours. That’s all we had.

Our plane had just landed at Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris and we had two choices: A) Sit around the airport for seven hours or B) Get into Paris somehow to see something. Anything. And get back in time to catch our flight to Venice.

We went with B.

I’m generally a planner and I follow rules. Both planning and rules seem to keep me out of trouble and keep things “safe” for me. They also, I’ve learned, spoil adventures and don’t leave much opportunity for serendipity to call on me. So this time adventure trumped “safety” because I wanted my mom to see Paris–even if it was just for a few hours. We were on our way to Venice to begin a 14-day Mediterranean cruise and it was just too tempting to not let her see one of Paris’s storied landmarks during our seven-hour layover.

I had been to Paris before on business but my mom—this was her first time. So we had a mission and our adventure was bound by a clock, which made the whole thing a little bit more exciting.

The always crazy Charles de Gaulle Airport

I love Paris, but I have to tell you, the airport just wears me out. For some reason, Charles de Gualle airport is a serpentine of stairwells and hallways you have to navigate through. And it doesn’t help that the airplane I generally arrive on doesn’t even drop me off at the actual airport building, but somewhere in the middle of the tarmac.

Down the steps of the plane onto the tarmac. (Am I the only one who thinks she’s going to fall down the plane’s stairs?) Then on to a shuttle, then through a door, up a small staircase, then down another hall, down another staircase then up another staircase, then down more hallway. Every time this happens to me I’m convinced I’m going the wrong way and will end up in the employee locker room.

Can someone tell me why this line isn’t moving?

Once we saw Customs and Immigration we were relieved to find that we were indeed in the right place, but the line wasn’t budging. No one moved. We were in line for nearly an hour (tick tock, tick tock) and we were losing time on our adventure. There was only one immigration officer’s booth open and he wasn’t moving very fast either. After the hour passed the line started moving again. (It was around lunch with very few workers at this time. Just keep this in mind if you try this on your own, kids.)

One reason to love the French: The Air France Bus into Paris

Because I did my research ahead of time I learned that once we went through immigration and checked our bags in for the Venice flight all we had to do was make our way to the Air France counter between terminals 2E and 2F and we could catch a bus into Paris. It had been two hours since we landed.

Five hours left in our adventure.

Catching the bus into Paris couldn’t have been easier and it was only €24 RT for each of us (and by the way,1/2 price for kids under 11 years). We found the Air France counter, paid our fare and hopped on the bus (which leaves every 30 minutes) for the hour-long bus ride into central Paris.

This is what I look like after a long flight from the U.S.

Hey look! It’s mom at the Arc de Triomphe in Paris!

The driver dropped us off at the Arc de Triomphe where my mom and I shot photos of each other, visited a typical Paris café and she had French Onion soup while I had quiche—so cliché but oh so French! After our lunch we wandered around the corner, admiring all the Parisian street lamps, the architecture and the bakeries—yes the bakeries! We each bought a pastry and then decided we needed to catch our bus back to the airport.

Two hours left now.

The cute Parisian cafe where we had lunch

We weren’t rushed, we weren’t worried. We were simply caught up in our little slice of Paris. It was kind of like visiting a library where you flip through the book while you sit in the comfy chairs but you’re not committed enough to check it out of the library and walk out the door with it. We were just browsing Paris.

Right when we got to the corner where our bus dropped us off our bus to take us back to the airport just arrived. We got on and took the hour-long journey back to the airport. We went through security again and found our gate just as they were calling our names to check in.

We checked in at the desk and then plopped ourselves into two chairs next to each other. And then my mom said, “That was really fun!”

Mom, let’s go back to Paris sometime and really spend some time there. Paris isn’t a seven-hour kind of place.

It’s about the journey: An afternoon visit to Oak Park, Illinois

08 Monday Oct 2012

Posted by in Business Side Trips, Trips

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We could have taken a taxi. In fact, that’s how I thought we were going to get to Oak Park from downtown Chicago where I was staying on business. But we were taking a city bus and then the green line train.

Thanks to the concierge at the hotel we were at (Hyatt McCormick Center), we were able to get a day pass for all our public transportation needs for the day at the bargain basement price of five dollars and some change.

When you travel for work, taking a taxi is a no brainer. I generally have little time and besides, I have a travel budget. But when I’m traveling for pleasure and on my own dime I often have to remember that it’s on my own dime. I’m not kidding. There’s been a multitude of times I’ve had to stop and remind myself that I’m not filling out an expense report at the end of a vacation.

The other thing I forget is that the saving time means I’m missing out on a whole bevy of experiences whether it’s people I might meet, things about a town I might learn or things I might miss seeing. And this time I coerced two colleagues to join me for our adventure to Oak Park before our meetings began, and taking the bus and train meant we had time to catch up, share insights and have an adventure that didn’t involve work.

If we had taken a taxi, sure we would have seen the Agora at Grant Park at the corner of Michigan Avenue and Roosevelt Street, but we would have only whirred by it. Since we were catching the train from the bus station at this corner we were able to walk among the statues as they were intended and felt as though we were walking among the giants.

106 headless cast iron figures called Agora at Grant Park in Chicago

We also would have missed seeing the storied (oh dear, a pun) Chicago Library:

Oak Park is about a 25 minute journey on the green line (a.k.a Harlem train), making it the second-to-last stop. When we arrived at the stop Cicero, I thought “Cicero, Cicero, where do I know that from?” And then I figured it out: Why it’s in one of the songs in the Broadway musical, Chicago. Ahh, now I’m getting it. The city of Chicago is a puzzle and when I get some time I’m going to figure out what Cicero has to do with that musical story.

When we arrived at Oak Park, I found myself in a neighborhood of which I only had cursory information. I knew of Frank Lloyd Wright, but I could have studied more. I certainly knew of Ernest Hemingway, but it was only that morning that I learned that he was born in Oak Park. Yes, I felt a little dumb. Smart people have lived here. VERY smart people. I should have showed up more prepared.

We arrived too late to take the tour of Frank Lloyd Wright’s home and studio because we had to get back for a meeting that began at 5:30. Apparently tours fill up fast so if you visit be sure to get your tickets in advance or show up early. Same story for the Hemmingway tour. But the weather was beautiful–mid 60s, blue skies and the leaves were just beginning to dress in their red and gold couture. Maybe not a formal tour this time, but just walking in the colorful neighborhood was all we needed that day.

People walked around the neighborhoods with headphones, listening to a narrative tour. It would be a little strange living in this neighborhood, watching people wander around with headphones as they stared at homes with a far off stare. A little alien-like, I must admit. We chose to wander sans headphones and while our little tour was a bit of a walkabout drive by, it was a bit like eating from a sampler platter knowing that you’d be planning to go back at another time. I’d suggest spending two days in the area to take advantage of a deep immersion in both Wright and Hemingway.

In the end, I walked away with this book I bought from a very chatty woman at the little shop in the Hemingway Museum. (The sales woman was so obsessed with Hemingway and had very strong opinions on what she would and wouldn’t allow in “her” shop.)

Chatty sales woman aside, perhaps this book would help me become a better writer about my travels. Yes, it’s about the journey, but for me, it’s also about the writing.

Click on any of the photos in the gallery below and it will take you to a slideshow for better viewing.

Four rather solid excuses for not blogging

02 Tuesday Oct 2012

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I know. I have some explaining to do. And I really don’t even have a good reason for my absence of over a month.

There I was back in August, cranking out some of my best writing—and I even managed to get Freshly Pressed—and what do I do?

I drop off the face of the planet.

It was a year to the date of blogging where I posted every week (in fact, I have two blogs–this one and Accidental Birder, so that means sometimes I was posting twice weekly), and I totally up and stopped. (screeching car sound)

The husb, Steve, calls it my blogcation.

Maybe.

The “Why”

Here are four possible theories on why I didn’t blog for over a month:

Sometimes writing is scary. My last two blog posts (It’s About Travel, Saying I Love You and Death and Channeling Sting’s Fields of Gold) were, I have to say, some of my better pieces of writing and for me, was a little (how shall I say?) revealing. Writing with that kind of honesty is new to me and I learned that it’s quite difficult to do. I felt a little weird like I did in Junior High School drama class when I had to get up on stage and act. It’s emotional and you have to do it in front of people. I dropped out of drama class on day 3, by the way.

My husband lives in Canada. I betcha didn’t know that. My husband’s business, which he just started, is in oil and the oil is in Calgary, Alberta. My career right now is taking place at a Fortune 100 Company in the U.S. For now, the right thing is to hang on to my job here in the U.S. until my husband’s company gets some legs. So, yes, we have a commuting marriage and it’s a little sad that I won’t see him as often. Alas, my muse is in Canada.

(Plus, he did the dishes a lot and cleaned the house and I’m doing all that stuff now. I won’t lie. I’m not good at all that. Did Hemmingway or Faulkner have to do the dishes? I doubt it. I learned this weekend from a friend that Proust sat around in his bed for years as he wrote. How come I can’t do that?)

Distraction #1: I’ve been redecorating. I’m queen of being distracted and there’s no better distraction for me than to shop. Since it’s just me and the cat puttering around the house I decided to get new furniture. It started with needing a new couch. The fabric just gave up after 12 years and all those worn out holes made me feel like I was living in a third world country. (I’m also queen of over stating things.) But the couch led to a chair and another chair and a coffee table, console table, lamp table and of course then a new lamp.

“What recession?” she says.

Behold! The new furniture

Check out those awesome candlesticks!

All this redecorating hardly helps me feel like Walt Whitman or Henry David Thoreau. (Though, maybe more like Proust now.)

Distraction #2: I’m up to my eyeballs in digitization. I came home from work late August and there was a big box waiting on my porch. I thought it was a birthday present. (My birthday’s in August. What, you forgot?) I tore it open and it wasn’t a birthday present. Instead, what I found was a box full of hundreds of slides and an unopened slide transfer machine I bought my mom for Christmas from Brookstone almost two years ago. My mom never got around to transferring the slides to digital so I just gave her a heavy sigh one day over the phone and said, “Just send it all to me and I’ll do it.” That was over six months ago. I have to be honest, it’s been one of the funnest things I’ve done and as I was posting them on my family’s private Facebook page this past month, my brother and sisters and my mom were all having a blast commenting and sharing stories. It was better than birthday and Christmas combined for me!

One of my favorite photos I transferred. That’s me, my older sister and my mom at Grand Teton National Park circa late 1960s. Dad’s taking the photo.

So, instead of writing I’ve been spending my blogging time going down memory lane. (And I’m only halfway done.)

Being okay with it all

I’ve pretty much decided that it’s okay that I didn’t blog for a month. Sometimes I need a break and I imagine you, dear reader (I’ve always wanted to write that), need a break from me.

Now, I’ve got to order some new pillows and an ottoman to go with that furniture. You don’t mind, do you?