6/9/23: I went to Lowe's, Pima Cooperative Extension Gardens and Reid Park Rose Garden. It was such a nice day with cloud cover that it didn't feel like summer. My camera was in the shop, but I took pictures with my phone.
6/12-6/16 was VBS at our church. Nathan went with me and was able to help this year. He helped with the games for the kids. I helped with the penny offering. It was stressful this year because they wanted us to record every transaction writing down the name and how many pennies bought for each child. We also had to write raffle tickets for them. It was a lot of work and I am not sure if I would want to do it again next year. I have helped with the penny offering in the past and it was not that difficult. With our Assistant Pastor Grant and his wife taking over the VBS this year, this is the way they decided to do it. Hopefully, they do not do it the same way next year.
For Father's Day, 6/17, Paul wanted to go to Vivace.
6/24-7/8 We went to Canada.
We flew to Washington on 6/24 and drove over to Canada with a rental car.
We first went to Banff National Park. The two main sites are Moraine Lake and Lake Louise. Both are beautiful, but I liked Moraine Lake the best. For one, it wasn’t as crowded as Lake Louise. Lake Louise has the Château and the ski resort which make it a tad more commercialized. Vehicles are not allowed at Moraine Lake so you are forced to take a shuttle bus. That actually works out great because the shuttle takes you to both lakes and runs every 20 minutes.
We stayed in Radium Hot Springs which was a couple of hours from the Lake Louise Ski Resort where you get on the shuttle. There’s plenty to see on that drive including wildlife and waterfalls. We saw quite a bit of wildlife while in the Canadian National Parks including a fox, bighorn sheep, mountain goats, bears, elk, deer, golden-mantled squirrels, magpies, etc…. The one animal we wanted to see, but never did, is the moose.
We didn’t really care for Downtown Banff because it was way too crowded. Well, Nathan did…because he’s a city boy!
6/25 We went to Moraine Lake and Lake Louise. At Lake Louise, we ate at the Chateau. We also did the ski lift at Lake Louise. Unfortunately, they had lightning in the area and shut it down. We ate lunch at the top and they had to drive us back down in a work van. On the way back to our hotel, we stopped at Numa Falls in Kootenay National Park. We also saw some bighorn sheep near our hotel in Radium Hot Springs.
6/26 We went by the Continental Divide. We went back to Moraine Lake and Lake Louise. We saw the Bow Falls at the convergence of Bow River and Spray River near downtown Banff. We also took some pictures of the Fairmont Banff Springs Hotel. We took a quick tour of Cave and Basin National Historic Site which is part of Banff National Park. It is a very small cave. Nathan couldn't handle the smell of sulfur. They also had some rare snails in the basin, but we couldn't really see them.
6/27 From Banff, we headed to Jasper along the Icefields Parkway. There’s a reason why this is one of the most scenic drives you can ever experience. Again, lots of wildlife, waterfalls, turquoise lakes and of course the glaciers, including Athabasca. We walked up to Athabasca Glacier. If we had more time, I would have liked to do the Ice Explorer Glacier tour where they take this monster truck bus right on the glacier and let you get out to walk on the glacier as well as the Glacier Skywalk (kind of like the Grand Canyon Skywalk). We saw a fox along Highway 93 on the way to Icelands Parkway. Along the Icelands Parkway, we saw mountain goats and elk. We stopped at Bow Lake. We also stopped at Marble Canyon where we did a short hike to a waterfall. Another waterfall right off of Icelands Parkway was Tangle Creek Falls.
We liked the town of Jasper since it was small and quaint. We stayed at our first airbnb there.
6/28, We drove back on the Icelands Parkway to visit some new spots and to see Athabasca Glacier again. We saw an elk on the side of the road as we were leaving Jasper. We stopped at Athabasca Falls.
6/29 From Jasper, we headed to Vancouver which was an all day drive. We stopped at a couple of waterfalls along the way., including Overlander Falls and Rearguart Falls.
We had been to Vancouver once before with Nathan a little over 5 years ago. We returned because he likes aquariums and I remembered we really liked the Vancouver Aquarium. It is an amazing aquarium (they even have sloths!), but Nathan was disappointed because they didn’t have any pufferfish. They had some at one time, but not on this visit.
6/30 We did Vancouver Aquarium in Stanley Park. Then I went over and took some pictures of the rose garden in Stanley Park. From there we headed to Gastown to eat dinner and see the steam clock.
7/1 was Canada Day. The City of Vancouver didn't do fireworks this year. We went to a small event at Rocky Point Park in Port Moody.
7/2 We did the Capilano Suspension Bridge Park which was cool, but overpriced. We went to the Railway Museum of British Columbia. We drove the Sea to Sky highway. This is a very scenic route, however there are minimal pullouts and those pullouts don’t offer the best views. I did the Sea to Sky Gondola and quickly took some pictures of Shannon Falls nearby.
From Vancouver we took a car ferry over to Vancouver Island.
7/4, Our first outing on Vancouver Island was at Butchart Gardens. It is one of the best gardens I have been to. I took tons of pictures. It was a little strange not being in the U.S. for our Independence Day. We went to a great Greek restaurant for dinner in Victoria that night. I loved their avgolemono soup and their Greek potatoes.
7/6 Nathan and I went to the Victoria Butterfly Gardens. It is on the smaller side, but they have butterflies, parrots, koi, a flamingo, frogs, insects, tropical plants/flowers, etc. That evening the 3 of us went out first to see a castle, but it had a huge crane in front of it. Then we went to see a lighthouse which was small and in need of a paint job. Then we went to Fisherman’s Wharf which was small, but made for some decent pictures.
There really didn’t seem to be much else to do on this island. The island is hard to maneuver and the downtown area of Victoria (the capital) looks kind of dumpy. So I think one day on Vancouver Island seeing Butchart Gardens would have been enough.
7/8 The last day we took a ferry back to Vancouver, drove to Washington and then flew home.
7/18, I went to the gynecologist and also got my mammogram. Mammogram came back normal. The gynecologist appointment was disappointing. I weighed 153, about 12 pounds more than what I weighed in 2019 when I lost about 20 pounds. My blood pressure was good - 116/68. I had blood tests done that day and the results were not good. They put me in the pre-diabetes category because my A1C was .1 away from the normal range. Mine was 5.7. My vitamin D was actually on the higher side at 60.8 and I realized that several of my supplements have vitamin D so I need to cut back on them. The worst part was my lipid panel. I did not have one done last year, but the results this year were worse than a couple of years ago. My lipids have never been good. Obviously being so short it is hard to maintain a healthy weight and BMI. My cholesterol was 238 compared to 214 in 2019. My triglycerides, however, were 416 compared to 233 in 2019. Basically, I know it is time to get back to healthier habits. I have had to dramatically cut down my Starbucks iced lattes. I am trying to cut down on sweets and fats. My body was hurting for several days after returning from our vacation and it is still so hot out, but I also need to get back to 10k steps a day, including doing the elliptical.
7/20, Since Nathan didn't get to see any pufferfish at the Vancouver Aquarium, I took him to Odysea to see Jalapeno! We also ate lunch at our favorite pizza place Grimaldi's!
7/24, I had 8 cactus blooms in our yard: 5 First Light flowers, 1 June Noon and 2 June Noon Hybrids. Another June Noon tried to open the next day, but never fully opened because of the heat.
7/27, Nathan went to Nerf Day at Greg Lyons' house with Arizona Adventures Camp. I think about 17 kids were expected, but there ended up being about 12. Nathan had a great time. They were also doing water games and having a movie night. Nathan couldn't stay for that because he had his Back to School Night at Legacy that night. So that was between 4-7. We got there around 5. The parking lot was a nightmare trying to find a parking space. Then it was chaotic the rest of the time trying to find all of his teachers, getting his school supplies, etc... We talked to the Principal and the registrar. They put Nathan in 8th grade math as opposed to Algebra or Geometry. The registrar said they never got a transcript or his state test scores. So they along with the Principal and us are trying to get that information from Academy of Math & Science. Nathan had Algebra last year. It didn't start out so well, but he ended the year with an A. The Principal mentioned that there is currently only one other 8th grader who is doing Geometry this year. School starts on 8/2 so I am not sure if this will all be resolved before then.
8/2 is the first day of 8th grade at Legacy. This will be another new school for Nathan. He doesn't like going to school and he already has a bad attitude about going back. There have been some things which have set off some minor alarms for me with our limited dealing with Legacy so far. However, I think it is going to be a lot better than Academy of Science last year. For one thing, it is closer! The Principal has been there many years and I really like her. All of his teachers that we met at Back to School Night seem nice. I think some of his classes he will like. We need to get the math class straightened out. He is going to be taking American History with a lot of focus on wars which is right up his alley. He will be taking a coding class and he loves that. He thinks it may be a little too easy for him, but he will be learning some coding languages he hasn't worked with before. He will also have Science, English, Literature and PE. His PE teacher is his homeroom teacher, Mr. Jones. I think he is new this year and came from Pusch Ridge. Paul and Nathan are still talking about the possibility of Nathan going to Pusch Ridge for high school. I think it is too late to get in there at this point. I think he is going to end up at Mountain View. We will know soon enough because that process will be starting in just a few months!
