Friday, August 23, 2024

NCL only allotted a half-day in Ketchikan for today’s port stop, 7AM-1:15PM. And it’s made even shorter by the fact that they dock quite a ways out of town requiring a (complimentary) old yellow school bus shuttle service. You can pay for an excursion that includes transportation, or hire a taxi for a chunk of money. I have vague memories of a $50 one-way price gouge on those taxis but who can blame a town for cashing in on dumb tourists especially when their tourist season is so short.

The great thing about the shuttles is that they are driven by locals who gave us commentary in both directions. On the way in our driver gave us general info about the town, and on the way back to the ship a different driver educated us about local tribe culture based on his own lived experience.

The town was quite a bit bigger than I had imagined, since so much tourist info on YouTube is focused on Creek Street.

We didn’t eat breakfast on the ship, so our natural first stop very near to the shuttle drop-off was Jellyfish Donuts. Perfect solution.

We then headed directly to Creek Street with its historic buildings and gift shops. I knew a creek ran through it (DUH) but was not prepared for the front row seats at the Olympics event of salmon running going on here. Those fish are badass.

We used our remaining time to wander and browse on our path back to the shuttle pick up area.

We stopped into a local book store so I could buy a sticker (always stickers) and Scott had this fortuitous find of his new favorite book:

I did that thing again where I walk into a local yarn shop “just to browse”. Yeah, you know where this is headed. Fabulous Fiber Arts was just too good, and I grabbed two more goodies from Raven Frog Fibers.

You can tell this was too short of a day because the only brewery experience was Scott ducking into Bawden Street Brewing for the fastest pint ever while I was yarn shopping. We definitely need to go back to Ketchikan with a longer port day scheduled or ideally another transportation method.

Back onboard we had our last specialty dinner meal at Q Texas Smokehouse with some live music. We enjoyed the food but again, way too much was served and I ended up feeling bad about the waste. Next time I’ll know to not order every course included in the price.

We finished up our evening with our reserved 10 PM showing of Choir of Man which was really well done!

Wednesday, August 21, 2024

Today was our Skagway, Alaska stop, and we were scheduled to have a long port day here.

We wandered the streets of the very small town. It was quite quaint with pioneer-era buildings and small shops surrounded by an epic natural backdrop.

I got an official Klondike Gold Rush National Historical Park stamp in my NP Passport, and also snagged a couple of extra stamps for my journal. Between those, a couple of stickers, and an artist postcard my journal for this day is quite well decorated.

Despite my insistence that I wouldn’t buy any yarn on this trip, I couldn’t stop myself from wandering into Boreal Artworks/Aurora Yarns “just to browse”. But then I found kits from Raven Frog Fibers that match a book that I already own and will use extensively when we start our RV retirement adventure. I restrained myself and only bought the kit for the NP we would see on this trip (Glacier), but then also couldn’t stop myself from buying this gorgeous yak & silk blend. BAH! Hi, I’m Stacy and I’m a yarnoholic.

We went for a coffee stop at The Sittin’ Sasquatch, sitting in the window to enjoy some people watching. I ordered a cappuccino and the manager/owner (?) warned me it would take a bit to make because they “do it right”. OK, he was not joking. This was one of the best cappuccinos I’ve ever had outside of Roma.

We stopped in at Skagway Brewing for a pint, which was a large-brewery experience. Typically breweries with souvenir shops attached aren’t my jam, but the beer was tasty and we enjoyed their peaceful back patio.

The brewery winner of the day was the much smaller Klondike Brewing. The outside upper deck with a view (that for some reason hardly anyone else noticed?) was perfection and we lingered there for quite awhile.

Scott suggested some more exploring out into a trail area called Yakutania Point and I grumbled. But I went anyway. And thank god we did because… well, Alaska was Alaska-ing on this glorious sunny day.

We eventually made it back to the boat and dressed for our 8:00 pm dinner reservation at Onda, the Italian restaurant. We had a lovely seat next to the window and really enjoyed the food which was much better than they had at the previous Italian specialty restaurant that was called La Cucina. In fact, Onda is probably my new favorite specialty restaurant. My only complaint was that it was SO MUCH food, but they were nice and averted their eyes when we walked out with pizza leftovers (for some reason I don’t think you’re supposed to do that).

Spoiler alert: This ended up being my favorite day of this trip. I know we will love finding Skagway again in the the future when we explore Alaska in our RV.

Sunday, August 11, 2024

When we were in Japan I made it a point to stop into yarn and craft shops because… “Hello, my name is Stacy and I am addicted to yarn and starting knitting/crochet projects.”

I can’t remember where we were honestly, but in one of the larger kind of “big box” craft stores I found a selection of amigurumi kits. I have a couple of pregger friends and thought these would make cute, unique gifts. And unlike my more recent attempts at completing baby blankets, I thought this scale of project might actually get done in time for the births.

Scott helped me pick out a couple of kits, including this whale shark. It came with what you see pictured here – an instruction book, the two yarn colorways, and the eyes. It was all wrapped up in a little plastic box.

Do you know what didn’t occur to me when I bought it all wrapped up in that plastic box? One seriously dumb thing and one fairly reasonable thing. IT DIDN’T OCCUR TO ME THE INSTRUCTIONS WOULD BE IN JAPANESE. I have no excuse other than perimenopause brain. The other more reasonable thing was that apparently Japanese crochet patterns use an entirely different instruction method that uses symbols instead of abbreviations.

I’m not going to post a picture of the inside of this particular instruction booklet (because copyright), but here’s an example of a Japanese amigurumi pattern that I found for free on the internets. Just to give you an idea.

Um, what? Thankfully there are lovely, generous people in the world that have posted many tutorials in the form of blogs and YouTube videos so I could figure this out. It definitely helped that I’ve got a strong handle on crochet in general. Oh and shout out to Google Translate photo feature as well, of course.

The other somewhat dummy thing I did is I didn’t bother to notice that the whale shark’s mouth in the instruction booklet photo is white, and just ended up doing the whole thing in the variegated yarn.

But here’s the finished product! Despite my three layers of ignorance/mistakes, I think it turned out pretty darn cute! And when my friends in St. Louis got it in the mail they texted to say, “Thank you so much it’s adorable!”

Tuesday, July 9, 2024

Today Scott and I spent a day apart. We had the BIGGEST FIGHT EVER. Just kidding.

Typically we both love, love, love food tours. But when I was trying to find one in Japan I was hitting a lot of roadblocks due to Scott’s, um, limited palate. He won’t touch sushi, or most seafood. There are a lot of foods in Japan he likes, but finding a food tour limited to those options was impossible. I had resigned myself to missing out on a food tour this trip, then Scott discovered an amusement park that he wanted to check out and that’s not a taste that appeals to me. So, boom – a day apart to enjoy our separate interests. Fuck codependency.

Scott left very early in the morning for Fuji-Q. He walked over to Tokyo Station and caught a pre-booked coach bus that provided a direct, 2-hour one-way service to the park (and then back home again). He wanted to maximize the opening hours so his bus left at 7:20 AM, and he didn’t get back to the hotel until really late. The r/t bus fare was about $30, and his park entry fee was $44. He spent around $15 on food/snacks that day. Later we would know that he would be the only one of us to see Mt. Fuji on this entire trip and it was on this day. Also, when have you ever had a full day at a big amusement park for less than $100?

My day also started early (but not that early) for my Tsukiji Market Food Tour with Japan Wonder Travel. The starting point was only a 22-minute walk from our hotel, but as it was once again north of 90 degrees and humid out I elected to take the train. I arrived a bit early so had the pleasure of exploring the Hongwanji Buddhist Temple. It’s a bit unique as it is built in the Indian style rather than the Japanese style.

I met up with the tour at 8:15 which was guided by this lovely woman, Yoshiko. The group was really small – only 4 travelers.

It was a Tuesday morning so the Market wasn’t crowded at all. Yoshiko led us around several of the streets, educated us on the foods and preparation processes, and fed us a lot of yummy snacks. Snacks included fresh muscat grapes (not covered in sugar), octopus fish cake, dried snacks (I don’t remember what they were exactly), tamago, and saki. OK, maybe saki isn’t a snack.

The absolute most tastiest snack was the wagyu skewer with a side of real wasabi (I now know the difference!). I knew I needed to bring Scott back to this place.

Yoshiko then took us nearby to the Namiyoke Shrine. I got a refresher course on shrine etiquette, and I also learned about omikuji, the fortunes you can buy. Yoshiko helped me translate it on the spot – it wasn’t a bad fortune so I took it home with me and later fully translated it into my journal using Google Translate. Kind of like fortune cookies, the omikuji was more advice than foretelling. “No matter what happens on the rainy day or the wind or whatever happens on the pathless road, don’t stop and just keep moving forward.” Sounds good, will do!

The tour ended with a live demonstration of preparing sashimi, with a nice tasting platter at the end to share with our group. Does the chef look like a California model, or what?

I definitely recommend this tour, and of course Yoshiko if you’re lucky enough to be able to make that request. I would also target a weekday to avoid the crowds. Unlike other food tours in other parts of the world, I felt full but not gross at the end of it. Like pleasantly full, I got my money’s worth, but I didn’t feel like I needed to slip into a coma afterwards. Oh, I forgot to mention it was only $83.

After I said goodbye to Yoshiko and our group, I made my way back to Shibuya to buy my favorite souvenir. Amimono Spin was closed on the day we had been in Shibuya, but was worth the extra effort to go back. The shop is only their own dyed yarn so it was small, but the products were so nice and the store was very cute and inviting. I walked away with 5x 50g skeins. Yep, I’m gonna need to buy an extra piece of luggage to get my Japan-inspired consumerism home.

I came home with these specific beauties. Three skeins of dyed DK to make something for a friend having a baby, and another two skeins of undyed to make something for me (gloves, maybe?).

I contemplated doing some eyeglass shopping but I was pretty exhausted. I headed back to the hotel for a lovely nap, to get some laundry done, and to organize the many things I had already purchased on this trip. I think the draw is that there isn’t much of that touristy made-in-China crap around – the shops are all full of lovely, quality items that look and feel great.

Saturday, May 11, 2024

Cross stitching as a hobby is a bit difficult for me to admit. Somehow it feels more geriatric than my knitting. But it’s one of the first crafting hobbies I had as a child, and recently when I needed a knitting break I went in search of a project that interested me. It had been so long that my first instinct was to go to Joann’s to look for kits and patterns, and I was surprised how limited the selections were these days. Then I got a clue and looked on Etsy, where apparently there is a cross stitch pattern for anything you could possibly think of. OK, well that’s not true because I have a dark and inappropriate imagination. But there are some good ones…

Alas I did not succumb to my basest instincts, and instead found a wonderful seller with patterns for every single US National Park. Score.

I purchased the Mt. Rainier pattern from their “Mini” (6″x6″ on 14 count) collection in January, then went to Joann’s (or was it Michael’s?) for the hoop, aida, and floss. I tend to be a pattern follower so I attempted to buy all of the prescribed DMC colors from the pattern, but when they were out of some I made substitutions of similar colors. I didn’t feel good about that, but that was pre-medicated ADHD-brained Stacy so I had to get everything immediately in order to get started on my new dopamine fix now, right now. #impulsecontrol #allornothingthinking

I just finished the project and am happy overall with the process and outcome. I’ve brightened this photo, but left contrast, color saturation, etc. without edits.

The aspects I’m not 100% in love with are the fabric, the thread saturation (that might not be the right word), and all of the color choices. I went ahead and did some YouTube viewing and ordered linen for my next project, which will be a first for me. I’m also going to experiment with 3 strands instead of 2 on the next one to hopefully get more color density (that seems like a better word). And for sure I will not automatically go with the pattern-prescribed DMC choices for the entire project.

I ordered the patterns for Olympic National Park and North Cascades National Park, and as soon as the linen is delivered I’ll be doing some floss shopping.

I could see us a few decades from now, when we return to a home base with walls, framing a whole collection of these as mementos from our many, many years on the road.

Saturday, August 5, 2023

I went to my first fiber festival ever! And it was the first year that this fiber festival was ever held. So I’m like a pioneer.

Flock Fiber Festival was held at Magnuson Park here in Seattle and I’m so glad I went. I didn’t go with any particular projects in mind but still managed to walk away with my bank account hundreds of dollars lighter.

I met knotbadbritt in person – she likes yarn, Ballard, and the Kraken, too. I was too ~~shy~~ introverted to ask for a photo. I got a couple of goodies from the Makers of Color Collective booth that she was operating.

I’ve long admired Hello Lavender’s stitch markers/progress keepers and scored myself a couple of gorgeous sets.

I discovered Sewrella and loved the perfectly coordinated yarns that were available. Not sure what I’ll do with these lovelies, yet.

The Yarn Nouveau booth was wonderfully moody with a color palette that spoke to my soul. I’m anticipating a striped sweater for these beauties.

And I couldn’t leave without stickers. I’m a bit of a sticker whore. Kind of like when I was a kid. But when I was a kid stickers were like ten cents.

Tuesday, July 11, 2023

Oh, but first, let’s get everything done that I coulda done yesterday. Or a few things I coulda done a couple of weeks ago. 🤦🏻‍♀️

I finished Scott’s gloves. I used this yarn (the top one) that I bought at the Spincycle store in Bellingham back in April. I picked the store, Scott picked the yarn. Lovely first experience with Spincycle (both the store and the yarn).

I kinda followed the pattern for “Gloves with Fingers or Fingerless” by Mary Garing. Except my partner has man hands and required thicker fingers. I didn’t make the cleanest stitch additions, but the yarn hides it well when he’s wearing the gloves. Overall we are both happy with them. They should serve Scott well on our trip. Luckily they were completed literally on the last possible day.