Blake and Deb Far Away

Granville Island, which is not really an island (it’s a peninsula), is a former industrial area just south of the downtown core. Since the 1970s it has been transformed into a food and entertainment district with a public market, galleries, theatres, restaurants, craft studios and buskers on every corner. There are echoes of the island’s industrial past in the remodeled warehouses, cranes, corrugated metal and railroad tracks. All makes for a great day trip. The bridge that leads to Granville Island, but you can also get there by small passenger ferry. Impressive fruit stacking at the public market View of downtown condos from Granville Island Can a crane be cute? Yes. (photo by Deborah) Speaking of cute... No shortage of souvenir shops, but some have clever t-shirts like this one.  Love this. Who knew a cement plant could look so good. Another view of downtown. The gravity-defying building on ...

We love a good botanical garden, especially in spring, and Vancouver's VanDusen is one of the better ones. It's a 22 hectare (55 acre) green oasis in the city. The gorgeous weather didn't hurt either. (photo by Deborah) I'm not sure why this little log cabin was in the botanical garden, but I was instructed to lean against it in a photogenic way. Not sure I succeeded. (photo by Deborah) (photo by Deborah) (photo by Deborah)

Our latest trip, which will last a bit more than five weeks, is built around a one-week cruise to Alaska. Since we embark in Vancouver it made sense to spend several days prior in this great Canadian city. Vancouver is only about a 4 hour drive from Olympia but we don’t make the trip nearly as often as we should. This time we took Amtrak, which stretches out the journey to about six hours. Unfortunately, there was an additional two hour delay due to some mechanical problems with the train coming up from Portland, so by the time we made it to our Vancouver Airbnb it was nearly 1:30 in the morning. Still, it was an easy, comfortable and affordable (only $35 pp) way to travel and we would do the train again. Our Airbnb is a very nice, bright one-bedroom apartment in the pleasant seaside district of West Vancouver with easy bus access to downtown and areas beyond. But we haven’t been out exploring every day. We’ve spent a few days just relaxing in our comfortable apartment. Our less ...

I thought I was done blogging about Ecuador, but I just received a batch of photos taken by the staff photographer for our cruise in the Galapagos Islands, so I wanted to share some of these. It was nice that they provided these free of charge to all passengers. Our ship the Santa Cruz II Great Frigate Bird Sally Lightfoot Crab With the sea lions San Cristobal Island Blue Footed Boobies Red Footed Booby Lava Lizard Mocking Bird Land Iguana New friend Susie with the sea lions South Plaza Island Swallow-tailed Gull Nazca Booby If I look tired here it's only because I am. Deborah wisely took the bus. Giant Tortoise Oyster Catcher Marine Iguanas Galapagos Hawk One of the younger cruise passengers feeling at one with the birds. Iguana in her egg laying hole Galapagos Hawk Espa ñ ola Island ...