Sabbatical Blog: 8/27 Toronto

8/27 Toronto: We all woke up around 9:45AM today. Some good sleep on the Heavenly bed, followed by a Heavenly shower. Kylie didn’t last long with her morning awake time though. Within 1-2 hours she was ready for a nap. So I went downstairs to have breakfast in the lobby restaurant and brought Traci some food back, too bad I didn’t catch that she wanted eggs with her French Toast… so all she got was French Toast. I better take notes next time.

The plan today is to hit the Toronto Zoo. And if I’m lucky, I’ll come across someplace where I can buy a bathing suit. I think that’s the only thing I forgot to pack. If you know me well, that’s one thing that I always pack when I travel. I typically leave a pair of swim shorts in my travel suitcae, but for this trip we used the big roller duffels to cut down on the number of bags.

We made it to the zoo, and spent the better part of the day at the Zoo. It’s a large zoo. It puts the Oregon Zoo to shame.
They have much more space here. The animal exhibits are spread far apart too. They’re organized by the continent/sub-continent. Needless to say, we did a lot of walking today. It was good, considering that tomorrow we have a 7.5 hour drive ahead of us to get to Harrisburg, PA. Kylie did well at the zoo. She started to reach her limit towards the end.

On our way back to the hotel, we drove through downtown a bit and tried to find a place to eat. We saw the sign for a restaurant we saw advertised in the Toronto Visitors magazine. This is the “award-winning” Fisherman’s Wharf Lighthouse restaurant… (http://www.fishermanswharf-toronto.com/aboutus.html) seems like it’s a franchise of the one on San Francisco’s Fisherman’s wharf, except this one was a fancy restaurant. $120 (Canadian) dinner for the 2.5 of us. The Sweet Potato fries we got for Kylie to munch on were really good. So were the Lobster spring rolls.

Here are just a few pics from the zoo today.


Kylie pointing out some ducks.


An elephant, but you probally figured that one out.


Kylie running around. Lots of stroller time today.


And towards the end of our zoo day in front of the Flamingos.

Tomorrow, we'll hit Centre Island in the morning before we hit the road for Harrisburg, PA. The ferry terminal is just outside our hotel... in fact we can see it from our room. Tonight I could see across Lake Ontario and see Hamilton to the South and whatever is directly across from us?

Sabbatical Blog: 8/26 Toronto

Kylie all set to go in the baby backpack.


On the Maid of the Mist XII.


American Falls and accompanying mist.


View of Horseshoe falls from the bottom.

8/26 Niagara Falls – Toronto: That morning we made our way down to the river to board the Maid of the Mist. The boat tour that takes you to the base of the falls. This was well worth it. The view from below is great, it gives you an appreciation for the magnitude of the falls. After getting our morning mist, we walked through the English garden, and back to the hotel to pack it up and head over to the Horseshoe falls lookout. The view from the Horseshoe Falls side is nice. Not to mention the tower of mist that rises up and falls down like rain. Since we had not eaten yet, we had lunch right there at the restaurant on the falls. It was a light meal, since nothing is cheap in Canada these days. The US dollar is a wee bit stronger than the Canadian dollar, but after conversion fees, I’m sure it’s a wash.

We then made the 1.5 hour drive to Toronto, and checked into our next Hotel the Westin Harbour Castle. It is hardly a castle as the name implies. It’s a two tower high-rise hotel. Once again we were upgraded to a room with a view. This time of Lake Ontario and the nearby Harbour. The one thing I’ve appreciated about these rooms, is that they’ve been spacious. We’ve had room for our stuff, Kylie’s Crib, and room for Kylie to run around and be mischievous.

After getting settled in, we ventured out to the famed CN Tower (http://www.cntower.ca/portal/). The CN Tower is advertised as being the tallest tower in the world. Maybe they are differentiating towers from buildings now? It’s something like 1052’ tall. With a 58 second elevator ride. It’s a short walk from the Hotel, but a long wait to get to the top. By the time we got to the observation deck, we were so hungry, that we opted to eat at their Horizon’s Café. It was a good meal, and not too overpriced compared to everything else. We then saw the “glass floor” that looks down. After all that, we came back to the hotel and settled in for the night.


Traci and Kylie with Horseshoe falls in the background.


Toronto's CN Tower. (for whatever reason, blogger displays the photo sideways?)


The View through the Glass floor at the CN Tower.

Sabbatical Blog: 8/25 Niagara Falls, Ontario Canada

8/25 Niagara Falls: We continued our exploration of the American side of Niagara falls, and drove onto Goat island this time. And made the jaunt to the “Cave of the winds”. Personally, I was a little disappointed, but it’s at the base of the American Falls and Bridal Veil falls. And there is a deck where you catch some of the circling wind currents and you get blasted with water. It’s cool, but maybe overrated? Sadly we didn’t bring a camera with us, for fear of it getting soaked.

Time to move onto our next stop, the Sheraton on the Falls on the Canadian side. This was Kylie’s first trip to Canada. The hotel here is awesome! We have a fabulous view of the falls. A jetted soaking tub, which Traci will have tell me about. After settling in and taking a little nap, we had dinner at the Hard Rock Café. Kind of weak on service, but once our server saw us, we were doing okay. We wandered around a bit. This area is definitely a tourist/vacation spot. There are lots of activities for the family. We walked by at least 3 different haunted houses, Plus I saw another one in the distance. A Ripley’s Believe it or not museum, and Guiness Book museum, a WWF café, you name it, it’s here!

After dinner we walked down to the observation area to look at the falls from the Canadian side. In my opinion, this is where the views are. Great views of Horseshoe falls, Bridal Veil, and American Falls. We settled back to our room tried to put Kylie down around 9PM and as I write this it’s 11:33 and she’s still awake!
(I wrote this on the 25th).


On the American Side of Horseshoe Falls.


At the base of the "Cave of the Winds"... maybe "Cave of the Gusts of Wind" is a more appropriate title?


The View from our Sheraton on the Falls room with view. So far we've been very pleased with our accomodations.


The Clifton Hill Tourist Area/Trap that is Niagara Falls. This place would be tons of fun if 1. We didn't have Kylie with us... 'cause Traci and I are just big kids. 2. If Kylie were older and we could all enjoy the family activities.


And Lastly, a night shot of the falls lit up, with a near full-moon in the sky. This is a favorite photo of mine.

Sabbatical Blog: 8/24 Buffalo - Niagara USA

8/24: We arrived sometime after 7AM. Next flight was scheduled to depart at 9:25. This was a commuter flight from JFK to BUF. The flight was late arriving, and late leaving. There was also back-up of 20 planes on the runway waiting for take-off. Kylie was losing it, considering she only got about 4+ hours sleep.

8/24 Buffalo - Niagara: Eventually we made it to Buffalo, got our rental car. A Hyundai Santa Fe. Not bad, comfortable fit for all our stuff. Makes me think we’ll have get a bigger car in London? We made the 30 minute drive to our first hotel. The Four Points Sheraton on the Falls. It was a nice little hotel. Nice views.

After many hours of traveling, we were hungry. Our first meal on the road was Denny’s. It hit the spot. As tempting as a Grand Slam breakfast was, I opted for their Buffalo chicken breast sandwich. Good! We ventured out that afternoon and explored the American River and falls. It was nice to get out and move around. Got a few nice pictures. Kylie got her wiggles out after we let her run around on the grass and chase the seagulls and squirrels. I was tired after chasing after her. We settled in for the night around 8PM. And didn’t wake up until 10:30AM. We must have needed the sleep. According to the signage on the Canadian sign there were fireworks, but we slept right through them.


Kylie and I walking around the JFK terminal. She was doing really well at this point considering how little sleep she got.


Kylie and Traci on the plane, before we learned of the big delay!


Here's a photo of Kylie and Traci with the American Rapids in the background. It was good to get out and walk around and explore now that we had full bellys.


Here's one of my many photos of Niagara Falls. This is from the Oberservation platform, and good overall view of American Falls and Horeseshoe falls.


And Here's Kylie running around chasing the seagulls.

Sabbatical Blog: 8/23 time to depart

8/23: Second day off. Still have lots to do on the list before we leave. No matter what we do to be prepared, there never seems to be enough time. We did have a nice dinner with Mike and Laurie though. We flew out of PDX to JFK on an 11:25PM redeye flight. Flight time 4:30 minutes.

Here are few photos of Kylie on the days leading up to our departure and on the 23rd.





Here Kylie climbed up on the couch on her own and was hiding/playing behind the basket and box.

Sabbatical Blog: 8/22

8/22: First day off from work. There were so many things to get done that it hardly felt like a vacation day. The good news is that the bathroom granite went in okay. Looks great. The plumber came in the afternoon and hooked up our new plumbing fixtures. The only remaining work, is deciding how we want to paint the bathrooms and choosing a new lighting fixture and mirrors, and bathroom hardware. We’ll post pictures when we’re done. The stars did align just enough for this project to get completed enough for us to leave our house-sitter with a functional bathroom.

Denali Stoneworks - our Granite fabricator, did a great job. They were very flexible with us, and in the end. We're happy with the final results.

August 15 - 16th

August 15th, was Kylie's 14month Birthday. To celebrate Traci and Nanny took Kylie to JC Penny's for another set of baby pictures. While waiting, they had lunch at the Cheesecake factory.

Kylie really enjoyed her lunch.

The three ladies also went to Costco and picked up a few new toys, including this shopping cart. Now she has something else she can push around the house.

August 14th (Street of Dreams part 2)

The selected property in Oregon City has an exceptional view of Mt. Hood. The lighting wasn't so good, but the view was spectacular.

Imagine having this view in your living room?

This was the "green" house. And also a show favorite of ours. It's part chalet, and beach house. It would be the ultimate Island house, in my opinion, because of the open porches and layout.

Kind of modern. the house featured all Elkay faucets, some of which we considered for our bathroom remodeling. We went with Kohler instead.

August 14th (Street of Dreams)

We made it out to the Street of Dreams again this year. It is an annual tradition. I haven't missed one since I've been living in the Portland area.

I though this river water feature was impressive. It reminded of an extravagant one I saw on HGTV.

Traci's mom, Donna (or Nanny) came up to visit for the week and to lend a hand while Traci picked up some extra work shifts. It was very nice having an extra set of hands, especially while we were going through some of our home-improvement projects.

A favorite house. We especially liked the Turet on the front. Very much an English Manor style office.

We brought the baby backpack this year. Figuring it'd be easier to keep Kylie contained. Worked out very well.

August 10 - 11th

Pig-tailed Kylie.

Pool time fun.

Above a still frame of a video clip I need to upload.

Kylie eating some carrot, tapioca, honey dessert made by some special vegetarian Indian chef. The dessert was the only leftovers from my co-workers dinner party after hosting this chef in town for a few days. The significance of this photo is Kylie using the spoon. She's been doing this for awhile, but I don't think we've photographed it?

August 7 - 8th

A new hat for Kylie to wear. Traci and Kylie were playing a game, Traci puts it on, Kylie pulls it off and giggles.

After our photo-session with Adrian, we had dinner with the Kleins. This is Their daughter. The salmon dinner was fabulous!

Kylie being mesmerized by the blue ball.

"What happens if I do... This!"