January 20, 2009

The Three Faces of Snow

This year
has brought
us the most
snow we've
ever seen in
Seattle –
even the
old-timers
cannot
recall
this much.






First, there's the "Fun" face of snow – making snowmen, sledding, throwing snowballs . . .









Then there's the "Artistic" face of snow – the trees look splendid with their snow jackets on . . .











But then there's the "God, I Hate This" face of snow – scraping snow off of your windshield, trying to navigate the streets . . .

Holiday in Victoria

On the Saturday after Christmas, we decided to brave the snow and head for a holiday in Victoria with our friends Diane and Mary. The weather cooperated (by not getting worse) and we arrived after our ferry ride to find three times as much snow in Victoria as we had left behind in Seattle.

We took along some wine for a special wine tasting, looking forward to other wine tastings as well as some superb food.
In this first photo you can see the glasses arranged for the tasting, each with a colored sticker matching one of the four bottles in the tasting. The point of the tasting was to rate quality vs price, so there was a wide range in price – from $3.50 to $25 in one case, from $8 to $40 in another.
The testing hypothesis was that non-experts would pick exactly backwards – our results were mixed – I probably did the poorest, Clara slightly better, Diane and Mary better still (but they've had a wine tasting class – right!) In three nights we had tastings of Malbec, Zinfandel and Petit Sirah, with the Petit Sirah being everyone's choice as best varietal that we tasted!

One afternoon we went over to a cidery – a place that only makes cider, hard of course, but in an amazing variety of flavors and textures, ranging all the way from an ultra-dry aperitif to a
lush dessert.













Another fun aspect of our visit was the wildlife viewing, watching the birds come to their feeding stations. But the pictures I got were of the squirrels pirating the bird's feed – at both of the stations.










Of course, the ultimate highlight of our visit was Diane's "Baltimore Dinner" – an elegant presentation featuring lobster salad and crab-stuffed shrimp. We were so busy enjoying this luscious feast that we forgot to get any pictures!!

How Time Flies!

We now have a budding Little Leaguer, who's learned quite a lot about baseball, likes to play catcher, and is often in center field because he has a strong arm and accurate throw. He is so lucky in that he wound up with a coach who wants to TEACH the kids about the game and to ENJOY the experience regardless of the score. Anyway, from this series of pictures you'll see how time flies!

Mother's Day 2008

We had a great time yesterday and thought we would share some of it with you – we hope that you had a very good day, too!

After church (for Clara and me) and a late breakfast followed by some baseball practice (for Lesley and Leo) we moved on to an early afternoon brunch – Glenn put together and fried some of his "crab-and-smoked-trout-cakes," Clara fixed some asparagus, Lesley made some cous cous, and Leo took the pictures (and also made cards for his Mom and Grandma.)

And, of course, there was champagne – what would Mother's Day be without it?

We finished up with a chocolate tasting – some single-source cacao chocolate that we picked up over in Issaquah a couple weeks ago, after going to a quilt show over there.

More on Da Big 51

Olympic National Park has three lodges, each situated on a beautiful lake, so here's a series of lake shots – Lake Quinault, Lake Kalaloch, and Lake Crescent. We've done the tour, going to all three, with lunch Monday at Quinault, dinner Monday at Kalaloch, and a closed, locked door at Crescent on Wednesday – they close for the winter (?) until mid-May.





















This fourth picture is somewhat quirky, taken off the balcony of our room, and just because I liked the looks of it. To me it shows what happens to you when you're subjected to the vicissitudes of life, especially if you happen to be a tree.


The weather was problematic, and somewhat curiously interesting, during our trip, with rain one minute, sunshine a few minutes later, and then snow – all within an hour! This fifth picture shows frozen snow on the treetops at Lake Quinault.

What makes this area a rain-forest is the blocking effect of the Olympic Mountains on the wind currents coming in off the ocean, causing them to drop all of their moisture here. A ranger told us that they measure their rainfall in feet, not inches, and that last year's was twelve feet! You can sorta see mountains along the side of Lake Crescent and in the clouds behind Lake Quinault, back in those lake pictures.



Finishing up with the theme of "what we drank" rather than "what we ate," here's our anniversary evening dessert – Washington state Port together with dark chocolate covered toffeed pistachios – a great end to a great day!












P.S. Clara wanted to share with you this picture of a Pacific Coast Trilium seen along the trail up to the big cedar on Monday, prized as a harbinger of spring here in the Northwest.








P.P.S. For the sharp-eyed or observant, "Lake Kalaloch" is also known as "Pacific Ocean."

Da Big 51

Greetings from Kalaloch Lodge on the Pacific Ocean and somehow a part of Olympic National Park even though many miles from the main body of the Park and the Mountains.

When we arrived Sunday afternoon and went to our room, we found a card wishing us "Happy Anniversary" together with a bottle of champagne and two glasses! So we sat out on our balcony, gazed at the ocean and sipped our champagne – what a nice way to start an anniversary retreat!

























Monday morning we drove over to (relatively) nearby Lake Quinault to look at this and that – a somewhat strenuous hike up to "The Largest Cedar Tree" – and further around to where some Roosevelt Elk were quietly grazing.





















After a pleasant lunch at the Lake Quinault Lodge, with an unexpected but pleasant guest, followed by a brief visit to "The Largest Fir Tree" and a quick trip to an Internet Café in nearby Amanda Park, we headed "home" for a short nap before our anniversary dinner at Kalaloch Lodge.















Note that, due to the many protests over our emphasis on what we have eaten while traveling, we have changed the emphasis in this communication to what we are drinking! Our loving daughter had gifted us with a special bottle from the environs of our recent Columbia River trip and glasses to go with it, and the Lodge graciously allowed us to bring in our own. Dinner was excellent – Clara having a wild mushroom strudel with goat cheese fondue and I the crab cakes and strawberry spinach salad.

Tomorrow we'll explore to the north of Kalaloch, hoping (without much optimism) for a little less of the rain and clouds which normally grace the Olympic Rain Forest.