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I had a fairly busy evening last night, after leaving work an hour early to get home in time for a telemedicine virtual appointment with the same doctor who saw Shobhit and me on April 20. Unfortunately I decided to take the Monorail and Light Rail instead of the #8, rationalizing that the 8 could get caught up in traffic, but I'm certain now the 8 would have been faster: I barely missed both a Monorail and a Light Rail train, which meant I had to wait a full cycle in both stations, and the Light Rail was four minutes delayed to boot. After walking home from Capitol Hill Station, it had still taken me nearly an hour and I would have gotten there just as fast had I walked the whole way.
And then, it took about twenty minutes before I even finally got connected on the Virginia Mason portal, because the person who had rescheduled my appointment with Dr. Means, who wound up having to be out all this week, with Dr. Eckert, apparently didn't do it right. So, when I got the automated email with a link, it was still to an appointment with Dr. Means. I had to call the office and get a new link, and then we finally connected.
It was a pretty easy appointment, and we got what we wanted: he told us he would happily give us clearance to travel without necessitating covid tests because we recently recovered. I booked this appointment with the idea in mind of taking an anniversary trip to Toronto next month, and even though, bizarrely, testing is not required for land border crossings right now, they are for international flights. Amazingly, Dr. Eckert made good on his promise and had letters on the portal for us by about 6:45 last night, which I really appreciated.
I'll skip ahead a bit now, because it's more directly relevant: much later last night, after we were done with our TV shows, I looked up flight prices to Toronto, and realized I had made a mistake when I first looked them up and found them surprisingly cheap. All those prices listed were for one-way flights, and would be combined with another one-way fare returning. Right now there's nothing really less than $600 round-trip per person, which is kind of nuts. Just this morning I looked up what I paid for my flight to Toronto with Danielle in 2019 and it was $482.
—Oh, wait. I just realized this while I was typing. That was also one way! Because Danielle and I then made our way to Syracuse, New York and we flew back domestically from there. Oh, wait again! I bought both our tickets, I think, and then she bought our American Airlines flights back. So divide $482 by two and that was actually $241 per person; the cost to return was $379 per person, totaling $621. Still, had that been round-trip to and from Toronto, it likely would have been about $485 per person, still much cheaper than flights right now. There's too much air travel demand right now after two years of travel restrictions and as much as it pains me, I think I have to agree it's best to wait for another year to go back to Toronto with Shobhit. Toronto will still be there next year, or whatever year we go.
So, Shobhit made a suggestion I had already thought of: Victoria. I've been there many times, but it's
been 14 years, by some distance the longest I've waited to return since my first time there (the previously longest was 9 years, between 1991 and 2000). I've already found at least one very, very cool looking attraction/point of interest in the area that's new since 2008—it opened just last year in fact—so I do like this idea a lot. It's closer, it'll be a lot less expensive, and there's a lot of outdoor activity to do.
We no longer have to worry about this travel letter, but, I suppose it won't hurt to have it on hand anyway.
I would love to take the Victoria Clipper there, just like Ivan did on the 1st, but the problem there is that we need a car in order to see all the stuff we want to see, including Buchart Gardens which is about a half-hour drive outside the city. We can make a day of going there as well as this awesome looking thing called
Malahat Skywalk. There's even a local "Niagara Falls" in a park along the way too. I think I'll easily find a lot of stuff I've not already seen in Victoria, even though this will be my seventh time there. It'll be only my sixth time there for longer than about six hours (my 5th visit was an excursion stop on the Alsakan Inside Passage cruise we took in 2007); and given that my first and second visits were at the ages of 9 and 15 and I can barely remember either, this will be only my 5th visit as an adult, and my fourth visit for longer than six hours as an adult (previous ones being 2000; an earlier visit in 2007; and once more with Shobhit's mom in 2008). All we really did on that 2007 cruise stop was tour a cemetery.
Anyway, this alternate idea is suitable consolation for having to put off Toronto—even though that feels similar to having to put off my idea of an anniversary trip to Portland two years in a row (but we finally made that happen last year). I worried we wouldn't have any alternate idea that got me similarly excited, but this Victoria idea, even though I've already been there, gets me more than halfway there. I can live with this.
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Also! Of course I've already got a working list of ideas for the trip to Victoria going. But, there's one thing I'd love to do that I can't do this trip: "
Galloping Goose Trail," which looks awesome but is made for cycling, and Shobhit doesn't ride a bike. Dad does, though! I wonder if he'd be open to a trip to Victoria for my Birth Week next year, bringing our bikes for that? He's the only person I can think of who would even possibly do it. I should ask him, or at least plant the idea in his head. It looks like a lot of the trail is an elevated pathway through really beautiful scenery. This would mean, of course, going to Victoria two years in a row (which I last did in 2007 and 2008; actually I was there three times in that span) but I'm also down with that. I can just wait another decade and a half to return again after that!
Speaking of next year's Birth Week, I already have a theme chosen, and one I quite like, and which already has me excited for the couple of activities I already have chosen, although with a year to go even those ideas could change. The theme will be "Best Kept Secrets," a "hidden gems" theme of sorts. My aim is to find little-known points of interest at or near the places the people I spend time with live. This will still necessitate a lot of stuff in Seattle proper and nearby, but, it's also a broader concept that allows for greater flexibility than, say, my "boats" or "trains" years (and even in those cases I had to expand to "boats and waterfronts" and "trains and railroads").
I'd love to find things the people I spend time with aren't even aware of, but, that won't always be possible. For instance, I've already discovered that there is an entrance to the Olympic National Park that's only a 45-minute drive from Union, where my cousin Jennifer lives. I've been to the Olympic National Park a couple of times, but always traveled much further: either to Hurricane Ridge, which necessitates driving to the north side of the Olympic Peninsula, near Port Angeles; or the Hoh Rain Forest, which necessitates driving all the way to the west side of the peninsula or park. I had no idea there was an entrance this much closer! It's called "
Staircase." But, I guess Matthew has already taken Jennifer there! Well, I don't care. She can go again next year because now I want to see it!
As for Victoria, that's nowhere near the home of anyone I know, and it's far from Olympia. But I'd still call Galloping Goose Trail a hidden gem worth seeking out; I don't even know if Dad knows about it. He probably does. But, who knows. Anyway, those are my only two ideas so far for next year, but I have a lot of time to do more research, which is always a big part of the fun for my Birth Week, now that I choose themes for them.
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Anyway, back to last night. We went to Costco, and then to the Downtown PCC to take advantage of a $5 off $20 coupon. We came home and finished up the prep that Shobhit had already done most of, for fajitas for dinner. I also made us hot toddies, our new favorite cocktail. We've made them with both whiskey and with brandy, and I prefer it with whiskey, a phrase I never thought I would say.
We watched Sunday's episodes of both
Last Week Tonight and
Barry. I really enjoyed
Barry, even though something happens in it that was a little over the top in a way that show never has been before, but it still cracked us both up. After that we wound up spending some time looking over Victoria travel and hotel options. We still have more decisions to make there, but we're going to want to reserve a spot on the ferry from Port Angeles sooner than later. Shobhit was saying we could probably just go and pay on the day if we go on a weekday, which may be true, I don't know, but I'd rather spend the extra $42 ($21 each way) for the reservation fee just to be sure. I don't see the sense in booking a hotel and risking not being able to use the booking because we couldn't get on a ferry. There's a bit more research to do there too.
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[posted 12:40 pm]
