Off to Polar Bear Land

A bit of delay with the blog update as life has gotten in the way….I spent the weekend procrastinating from packing for work, imprinting in my mind the look of the beautiful autumn day with the harbour sparkling and the leaves in their splendour. This because I checked the weather forecast for Sachs Harbour and found -19c overnight, snowing with 2 cm accumulation. Winter is not eased into as per the season but confronted when commuting. 

To pick up the blog update from where I left you last month….I did teach the final first aid course, in a rather distracted manner as the dog (who had made an almost complete recovery) suffered another medical event and passed away peacefully. She had a great quality of life and was 108 after all….She was a loyal friend for over 15 years and we are adjusting to being a dog less household. Glad to have been home since May to do daily walks and spoil her. 

Needless to say, all the emotional upheaval did not add to my powers of concentration and although I managed the PALS course just fine in the practical exercises, the exam was a tight squeeze. After finally being told I'd passed, there was a note that the current BLS (CPR) which had been required was to be Heart & Stroke (not Red Cross as mine is). This is of course, ludicrous as all BLS (regardless of agency) is based on JAMA regulations. I spent some time attempting to find a provider who would grant me such certification, wrote a strongly worded message to Heart&Stroke reminding them that all BLS was the same and received a message that there is no reciprocity. This AFTER I had been issued my PALS certification online. Trust me it was (quickly) submitted to Operation Smile to review my credentials. Bureaucracy at its most crippling must be worked around. 

The travel partner joined me early Sunday morning at the daughter and son-in-laws where I was keeping the cats company as they attended a family wedding and we headed to the airport. Our fly day was straight forward as we learned how to travel with our Nexus card and that sucker is the bees knees! Puts you at the head of any security or customs line, which over the course of trip saved hours of waiting. Not to mention being able to keep shoes on, liquids and laptops in the carryon when being screened. Definitely a good investment and we became more efficient as we went. We had a straightforward run from Halifax to Calgary to San Fran, located our airport shuttle making our way through the hills and painted ladies and were deposited at our hotel in Fishermen's Wharf. After the early leave, four hour time change and full day of travel the free wine in the lobby at 'wine o'clock' hit us hard, so we had an early supper and crashed. 

We spent the first few days exploring the city, took the hop on and off bus tour - wow was it cold and windy going across the Golden Gate bridge, enjoyed the Maritime Museum and various ships, were amused with the coin operated machine museum (apparently vintage is

Golden Gate Bridge

40+ years so we're vintage) and of course had to see the fishing boats, watched a ball game in AT&T Park - very tame compared to Fenway - had a little nap in the middle. We discovered that sea lions are smelly and noisy, the tourist food was kinda crappy, Uber is an excellent way to make your way around urban areas and the homeless population in San Francisco is completely out of control. What a city of inequalities. When the info binder in the hotel room has guidelines for not interacting with this group….you know there are issues. Housing is completely unaffordable at $3500/month for a small studio apartment and a room in a crack hotel is $1800. All ages, lots of women, some children, sleeping on the sidewalks, wandering….Disturbing enough that I wouldn't make plans to spend more than an overnight in the city in the future. 

We had rented a car for for wine country and so Ubered our way to the rental office. I am sure that every time we climbed into a Uber ride, we raised the average passenger age by about 20 years as it's mostly millenials using that service. Middle of the day and GPS assistance made a relatively painless exit from the city. Over to Sausalito, which was smaller and more touristy than expected and out to the freeway. A detour over to the Pacific Coast Highway, 

Pacific Coast Highway

Napa Wine Train

through very winding, hilly roads, enormous redwoods, wineries and then the ocean. Spectacular. Stopped at a little winery along the way and made it to Windsor, Sonoma without incident. Headed out for a delicious asian supper and an early night. Wine country is beautiful and over the course of the week we visited various wineries and did tastings, took the Napa wine train, enjoyed a walking wine/food pairing in Healdsburg and checked out the little towns of Calistoga, St. Helena etc. There has been a drought for decades in California and the past five years have been particularly bad, everything is brown and the reservoir was really indicative of the extent of the dryness. We witnessed the destruction of the recent wildfires with
melted plastic fences in flat strips on the roadside as the crews were reinstalling power poles, FEMA and American Red Cross tents still in place. Sad. Enjoyed Yountville which is a beautiful wine town, wine and food pairing at Cornerstone Cellars had a great supper at Ciccone. Napa is a good sized town with all sorts of amenities - OxBow Public Market, Gotts Roadside for burgers - you name it, we sampled it. 

The return to San Francisco was a nail biter as we negotiated the freeway, bridge and city traffic with the chauffeur not listening to either the GPS or the navigator. One of those "I'm not going to repeat experiences". I was very pleased to grab my suitcase from the trunk and sashay down the street to the Hotel Whitcomb - one of those grand railroad hotels. We spent the afternoon shopping in the upscale downtown shops and after a bit of digging I managed to find a 'travel' shirt for my work commute. We spent a day in Chinatown, shopping in the

Chinatown

quirky little stores and checking out the disturbing food displays, in retrospect it might have been a better idea to eat BEFORE seeing the snouts, black or flattened ducks etc. We also had wonderful meals of Italian, Greek and seafood and a charcuterie board with wine tasting at a trendy hotel - we Ubered back to the hotel, ahhh we are so trendy for old folks! The fortnight flew by and before we knew it we were on a flight to Calgary and a layover to visit the electrician daughter. The Peruvian restaurant we'd chosen wasn't available so we opted for some great steaks and a catch up. The travel partner was being a worry wart about the time (think he was having a flashback to missing his flight the last time he and the daughter had a layover meal) and we were back to the airport in lots of time. Good thing, as mister realized he'd left his iPad on the plane so spent over half an hour at the counter and then making his way to the lost and found. Fortunately he retrieved it. An uneventful red eye flight then a stop at the daughters to have some breakfast and home. 

This past week has been one of ticking off the to-do list as I usually do in the run up to return to work. Pull out the action packers and duffle bags and sort through the collected items packing clothes and such, retrieve shopping list and provision with vittles for two months, pick up any last minute items. And today's list also included getting my annual fasting bloodwork done, voting and connecting with the prodigal son - had to leave him with a birthday card for next week when he reaches the big 2-8 mark! How did that happen? Managed to squeeze in a visit with a buddy who is wrangling with the bureaucracy of a course she is attempting to complete. Fingers crossed she gets to write her exam next month - of course she will ace it - I left her a graduation present as I'm confident of the outcome. Nice chat with the teacher daughter who sat in traffic x 2 hours this morning (bridge reno was delayed) and was half an hour late for class - the principal had to teach her first lesson (I'm thinking 30 minutes with some grade primaries is more fun than fielding hateful parental calls any day). Tired of fighting with the internet provider, photo book company and anyone else who is providing crappy service with an attitude today. 

Tired of waiting for the final election results, just glad we have a local female MP, and hitting publish without review for typos - deal with it. Time to hit the hay for the last night in my 'own' bed until New Years Eve. Next posting….from polar bear land. Charging the camera batteries as they apparently come ashore before the sea ice freezes solid leading to problems as well as photo ops.