Mary Poppins

In 2008 Jonathan turned 30. He really wanted to see Mary Poppins on Broadway in NYC for his birthday. So we priced out a trip to NYC, but it just wasn't in the cards. Instead we road tripped to Atlanta, GA.

Now its 2009, and Jonathan has yet another birthday. This year Mary Poppins is on tour, and, lucky me, it's stopping in St. Louis (where he's from). So we flew out to Missour-A for a short weekend trip to see the show.

The Fox theater in St. Louis is pretty cool. It's a really old theater that's been totally restored. It's like a pagoda and a rich antique collector threw up in the theater. It was very ornate with tapestries, lion statues, large mirrors and carvings all over the walls.

Now, and I totally alone in my dis-liking for Broadway shows. I've been to about 5 or 6 different shows, and I just don't really enjoy them. It's not that I hate every waking moment, but I'd rather spend my money elsewhere. Mary Poppins (for me) was no different. The show was cool, with the different flying and dancing effects. Most of the songs were from the original movie, even though the show followed the plot lines of the book (Mary Poppins actually bolts from the family with out notice 1/2 way thru the show!). Still, for me … I'd rather spend my money on football tickets.

I wanted to take more photos inside the ornate Fox, but there was a big sign that said, "no cameras allowed", yet they didn't even search my purse. I took a couple photos of the stage (pre-show), until I got yelled at.

All in all, it was a fun show, and I think Jonathan had a great birthday!

Digital Scrapbooking - Alaskan Cruise

You might be ashamed to learn that I spend a lot of time digital scrapbooking on our cruise.

Now I didn't take any time away from all the ports or other things, but there was a lot of downtime on the ship. I would take my computer to a martini bar that overlooked the huge atrium area, or sit in the ship's library and scrapbook away. It was fun to play with all the photos I had just taken.

That "Alaskan Amber" page is one of my favorites.

If I haven't gotten you into digital scrapping yet - what are you waiting for?!?

Mendenhall Glacier

The main shore excursion we did in Juneau was a trip to Mendenhall Glacier. I'm not sure why it is so famous, but it was a pretty cool glacier.

In hindsight, we saw about 10 more glaciers through out the cruise.

It's hard to see from the photo, but there is a bright blue spot on the bottom left side of the glacier. This is where a spot fell off the glacier over night. We never saw a glacier 'calve' (meaning, have a giant piece fall off), but when they do calve, it shows off the bright blue-ness of a glacier. I guess glaciers are so compact, that the only color that can penetrate thru them is blue. It's the same concept as deep underwater.

It wasn't very cold in Juneau, but when we got close to the glacier it was downright cold!!! I felt bad for the US Parks worker who was sitting right outside the glacier.

It's Olympics time!

I mentioned that the Vancouver-ians are big time excited about their Olympics.

In a downtown park, they had this giant countdown clock (which is impossible to read in the sum) running. I'm normally not really into the winter Olympics, but I guess I'll tune in to see some of the familiar Vancouver sights.

Stanley Park

My favorite part of Vancouver (besides the pizza slice I bought for only $1.25 - it was delicious!!!) was Stanley Park.

The Park is over 1000 acres. There is a totem pole area (I guess totem poles are big business up in British Columbia and Alaska), a huge rose garden, many other gardens, beaches, lawn bowling (what ever that is) and other things. It's named Stanley Park after the same guy that the Stanley Cup in hockey is named after.

Overall Vancouver was a very pretty city.  The day we were there, it was very sunny and warm.  However, I guess it rains A LOT there, which sounds pretty dreary to me.  One of our tour guides said that 20% of Vancouver-ians are millionaires.  So, even though Jonathan wants to pack up and move there (city water is free and health care is free - plus there is hockey!!), I'm going to try to convince him to stay in sunny Florida.

How cute is this guy?

Vancouver is the host for the 2010 winter Olympic games. And they are REALLY excited. All over town was Olympics this and Olympics that.

I fell in love with the 4 Olympic mascots. My favorite was Quatchi. He's a sasquach who dreams of being a hockey goalie.

I didn't buy the life sized Quatchi, but I did buy a little tiny plush. He's just so adorable!

Vancouver: Day 1

Jonathan was very excited to see Vancouver, Canada. I think b/c Canadians are really into hockey, and Jonathan is really into hockey, so he's really into Canada.

We were only in Canada for 1 day before our cruise. We bought tickets to one of those hop on/hop off trolleys that take you all over town. I love those cheesy things. It's a great way to orient yourself to a large city. Plus I stink at map reading.

Thankfully, the trolley took us right next to the GM Place, where the Vancouver Canucks hockey teams plays. If they would've won their last playoff series, they would've been playing a home game! Alas, they lost, so there was no playoff hockey for Jonathan. He drowned his sorrows in a Canucks t-shirt and puck purchase.

We're both wearing jeans and warm long sleeve t-shirts and we were BOILING.  The temp was 80 something degrees.  Actually, our entire vacation was pretty warm weather.  I guess we got pretty lucky, b/c every local we talked to made a comment on the unusual weather.  Yee-haw!

Vacation ... barely!

So I did something yesterday (Saturday, May 16) that I've never done before.

I missed my flight!!!

That's right, when Jonathan and I were unloading our luggage from the car, Jonathan said, "where's my duffle bag?"  I said, "I don't know ... crap, our passports are in there!!!"

Did I mention we're going to Canada, so we needed passports?!?

At this point our flight is leaving in 1 hour.  There is no way he can run home to get them, and make it back on time.

So I took all the luggage to the airport to see what we our options were.

Long story (and tears) later, we actually got a better flight.  Before we had to stop in Houston and stop in Portland on our way to Vancouver.  With this new flight (and no extra fees from United - thank you United guy!!!  I think me crying really sealed the deal), we only had to stop in Chicago.

Here was my time line:

4am - wake up

6am - changing my 6:30am flight to a 10:30am flight

10:30am - leave Orlando

12 - arrive in Chicago (if I would've known I was flying into Chicago I could've had my brother or my friend Julie meet me at the airport.  We had a 3 hour layover.)

4pm - leave Chicago late

7pm - arrive in Vancouver

9pm (which is really midnight) - fall asleep!

So, all in all, I sat around the Orlando and the Chicago airport for about 7 hours total.  Thank goodness we brought our laptop and some Futurama DVDs.

Thank you Ramada Inn for the free wi-fi!

Yay - Vacation!

Jonathan and I are headed to Vancouver Canada at 6:30am tomorrow morning. *yawn*

Then, on Monday, we're hoping on the Coral Princess for a whirlwind trip around Alaska. I have all my sweatshirts and jeans packed.

Beware, in a week you'll be bombarded with photos of ice and snow.