travel

Driving back through Glacier and home to Seattle

Posted by Jason on September 22, 2013 - 2:11am in Our Travels.
When: 
August 31, 2013

I woke up a bit early on our last day so that I could take some photos of the morning sun hitting the mountains. It was really pretty to watch the sunrise, and I got a few good photos. I also wanted to get up early so that we could get an early start to our busy day. We had to pack all our stuff back into the suitcases, drive back across the park (about 50 miles), drive to the airport, return our car, and catch our plane. In the end, we had ample time to make our 4pm flight, but I didn't want us to be rushing at the end.

Lake St. Mary and the east side of Glacier National Park

Posted by Jason on September 22, 2013 - 2:02am in Our Travels.
When: 
August 30, 2013

For our last full day in Glacier, we drove over the pass to the east side of the mountains. Unfortunately, the weather was still overcast on the west side of the pass, so we didn't have very good views of the mountains as we drove over the pass. Instead, we just drove straight over and down the other side. On our way to our next campsite, we stopped at a turn off for a short hike. We hiked to St. Mary Falls and then continued to Virginia Falls, a total of 1.2 miles in from the road. At Virginia Falls, we stopped for lunch along the bank of the creek, then headed back down the trail.

Logan Pass and a crazy storm

Posted by Jason on September 21, 2013 - 6:28pm in Our Travels.
When: 
August 29, 2013

Penelope woke us up around 7AM, which was perfect, because we had a busy day ahead of us. We wanted to get up early to Logan Pass, one of the most popular spots in the park, to avoid the crowds. We had our first hot breakfast of the trip: instant oatmeal and hot cocoa. Penelope usually eats oatmeal for breakfast, but she was very excited to have the overly sugared "maple brown sugar" instant version. After breakfast, we got in the car and headed up to Logan Pass, about 3000 ft above our campground at Avalanche Creek.

Lake McDonald, Avalanche Creek and Avalanche Lake

Posted by Jason on September 21, 2013 - 5:43pm in Our Travels.
When: 
August 28, 2013

After our first night in the tent, Penelope woke us up at about 6:45, same as usual. Still without any way to start a fire, and not feeling like asking for more matches, we had a cold breakfast of yogurt and leftover breakfast pastry from Stefan's backpacking trip (thanks Stefan). We would be staying at three different campsites in the park as we traveled along the main park road, so after breakfast, we broke down our campsite and stuffed everything back in the car. It was a complete mess, with barely enough room for Penelope in the back seat, but it worked.

Fish Creek Campground

Posted by Jason on September 21, 2013 - 5:21pm in Our Travels.
When: 
August 27, 2013

We spent our first night in Glacier National Park at Fish Creek Campground, on the shore of Lake McDonald (or Old McDonald Lake as we liked to call it). This was one of the few campgrounds that you could reserve a campsite ahead of time (the rest were first come, first served), and we didn't want to feel rushed to get there early to get a spot. Penelope was very excited to be camping and was very interested in helping to set up camp.

Glacier National Park - August 2013

Posted by Jason on September 21, 2013 - 5:08pm in Our Travels.
When: 
August 27, 2013 to August 31, 2013

I've been meaning to post about our trip to Glacier National Park, but with our upcoming move, I got a bit behind. It was a really fun vacation. Unfortunately, I forgot to bring along my travel journal, so I'm going to try to remember all the stuff that we did.


Fish, fashion, food, and gardens, then sayonara Japan

Posted by Jason on April 2, 2013 - 11:57pm in Our Travels.
When: 
March 15, 2013 to March 16, 2013

As we fly back to Seattle, it is time to catch up on my journal and describe the last days of our Japan trip. Yesterday (Friday, March 15th), we started our day at the Tsukiji Fish Market, Tokyo's primary fresh fish wholesaling site. We were too lazy to try to watch the tuna auction, which requires getting there by 4:30am and being one of the first 120 people there. Instead, we opted for the more reasonable time of 9am, when the wholesalers' processing and distribution area opens to the public.

Sightseeing in Tokyo from the river to the sky

Posted by Jason on March 31, 2013 - 6:24pm in Our Travels.
When: 
March 14, 2013

Today was our first full day in Tokyo, and like all our days, it was busy. We slept in a bit thanks to some incredibly effective blackout curtains. We grabbed breakfast at a Japanese/French bakery (yummy), then took the subway to our first stop, the Tokyo National Museum. It was the end of rush hour, so the subway was packed when we got on but pretty manageable with just my backpack and no luggage. After a few stops, most of the passengers got off, so we had seats for most of the ride.

Bullet train and our first Tokyo adventure

Posted by Jason on March 31, 2013 - 5:43pm in Our Travels.
When: 
March 13, 2013

We took the bullet train from Kyoto to Tokyo. We had a 9:30am train, so we picked up breakfast and lunch in the station to eat on the train. Our train was relatively full, despite the fact that the trains leave almost every 10 minutes. As before, the train was fast, quiet, and comfortable. We spent the time going through the photos we had taken and trimming out the bad ones. We arrived at our stop on the outskirts of Tokyo after 2.25 hours. Then the real adventure began.

Last day in Kyoto: blossoms, temples, modeling, and night photography

Posted by Jason on March 29, 2013 - 1:05am in Our Travels.
When: 
March 12, 2013

Our day today started at Kitano Tenman-gu shrine to view the plum blossoms. We are in Japan too early to see the famous cherry blossoms, but the plums bloom earlier and are also very pretty. The place was full of people with cameras taking blossom pictures, with everyone swarming to the same sights. It was really pretty (well, except for the crowds).

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