The end of the school year

The school year is drawing to a close, and it has crept up rather quickly.

We had planned a day at the local outdoor swimming pool today, but the weather forecast had not been looking good. I woke up this morning and it was already raining. Unfortunately the pool we were going to had no shelter, so I decided to cancel the trip. I spoke to the principal, who said it was up to us to decide. I sopke to some parents - some were OK with it if we shortened the time, others said that their child would not be going if we went. I decided that I wouldn't want my own kids out in this weather for so long without any shelter. We had planned to be at the pool for about four hours and with the steady rain and the breeze the kids would have frozen.

The alternate plan???

I brought a few movies from home and we set up a digital projector in the classroom and we started with "Wallace and Grommett - and the Curse of the Were Rabbit". That lasted until recess. After recess we let the kids double up with a partner in the computer lab, and after lunch we will see what happens. If there is a break in the rain we may walk up to the local shopping centre and buy an icecream or something.

Surviving at the moment.

Tomorrow the students come to school from 9:00 am - 10:30 am. There is an assembly for about 40 minutes and then back to classrooms for the rest of the time. That is when we hand out reports. After that there is a staff meeting followed by lunch provided by the principal. Friday is the last official day at school. We are having a breakfast at a staff member's house starting at 8:30 am. I am told that some people may go to school afterwards, others may not. I will see what happens. I don't think I will need to go to school.

Bridget and Daniel were both going to school today to get their reports. Bridget had her last exam yesterday, and Daniel has been finished for over a week.

Summer break is almost officially here. Yeah!

Sturgeon fishing on the Fraser River

I got an unexpected invitation to go fishing. One of the educational assistants at school said that her husband was going fishing and wondered if I would like to go with him. He is a member of The Fraser River Sturgeon Conservation Society, and they catch and tag the fish. She said that he only had a small boat, but I might be able to take Daniel. I checked that Daniel was free and went to get a saltwater fishing license. I found that they were available at Wal-Mart, and as a resident for 12 months, I could get a 12 month license for $22.

Daniel and I drove down to meet Peter at around 8:00 am, and we headed off along Highway 1 for Langley. We launched the boat near Fort Langley and headed down the river for a bit before anchoring the boat and setting lines for sturgeon.

Check out some of the pics here.

Sturgeon are one of the oldest families of bony fish in existence, they are native to subtropical, temperate and sub-Arctic rivers, lakes and coastlines of Eurasia and North America. They are distinctive for their elongated bodies, lack of scales, and occasional great size: Sturgeons ranging from 7–12 feet (2-3½ m) in length are common, and some species grow up to 18 feet (5.5 m). Most sturgeons are anadromous bottom-feeders spawning upstream and feeding in rivers and estuaries. While some are entirely freshwater, very few venture into the open ocean beyond near coastal areas.

We hadn't had any bite in the first hour so we pulled the anchor up and moved further down the river. I hadn't realised that we were actually in a side channel of the river, in between Macmillan Island and the bank. As we got to the tip of the island and could see the river at it's full width, it looked huge. It is actually about a kilometre wide at this point. We tied up on a boom of logs that were moored on the western point of the island. We watched a couple of boats that were driftnet fishing. We didn't have any luck here either so this time we headed up river for a few kms. We stopped where the Stave River flows into the Fraser. We caught a couple here.

It was exciting when the first fish took the bait. Peter passed the rod to Daniel, and we started to set up the boat for landing the fish. Daniel started to reel the fish in. Peter set up a stretcher from side to side across the boat and put a couple of buckets of water in for the fish. As the fish was pulled in close to the boat, Peter leaned out and grabbed the fish by the tail and lifted it on to the stretcher. The first thing to do was to remove the hook. We used barbless hooks so that they were easy to pull out. You are not allowed to keep sturgeon - you are only allowed to catch and release. After the hook was removed, we had to scan the fish to see if it had been tagged with a micro-chip. This one hadn't, so we prepared to inject one near the dorsal fin. We checked on the digital reader to make sure that the chip was working and Peter cleaned a syringe with alcohol and got ready to inject it under the skin. After that was done we had to use a tape measure to measure the girth just behind the pectoral fins, and the lenght from the fork of the tail to the tip of the nose. All details were recorded for later input the the register. Once this was done we were ready to take some photos and release the fish back into the river.

We went through that process six time during the day, with the fish ranging from 79 cm through to 118 cm in length. We moved several times, and by the end of the day I had blisters on my hands from pulling in the anchor. The record for the number of fish caught on this boat in a day was six. We came close, because we actually hooked eight, but two of them got off, so we equalled the record. We pulled up the anchor for the last time at about 7:00 pm after being on the water for ten hours, and pulling in 6 good fish.

A ball game

Thanks Kim and Rob for organising the night.

Weekend in Seattle

We had an invite down to Seattle for a Mariners game. I met Kim and Rob in January at the welcome dinner for the International teachers to Washington for 2009, and the welcome home for the Washington teachers who had been overseas in 2008. Kim was on exchange to Mittagong in 2008. I went down because I had a link because of or 2001 exchange to Washington. A few weeks later they sent out e-vites to anyone who wanted to join them at a Mariners game. We decided to go and left on Friday lunchtime. We only had a short wait at the border and arrived at their house in Shoreline at about 4:00 pm.

After introductions, and some refreshments and snacks we headed towards Safeco Field. We met Tony and Gaye, and their three kids who are on Bainbridge Island this year. They are from Grafton in NSW.

As we entered the stadium we were all given a souvenir railway carriage as a momento of the 10th Anniversary of the opening of Safeco Field. We found our seats on the top level looking down the third to home base line. It was a pretty good view of the field with the open roof and the city skyline of Seattle in the background.

As a special celebration the Huskies Softball team, which had just won the softball National Championship, were presented to the crowd. Danielle Lawrie, the pitcher, threw the first pitch of the evening, the national anthem was sung and the ballgame begun.

Ichiro was on a streak of 27 straight games that he had mad a base hit. He didn't make it to 28.

The game got exciting in the 10th innings. It was 1 - 1 after 9, so the extra innings. The twins scored in the 10th winning the game.

We headed in to the Edmonds market on Saturday, and then headed in to the University area to rent some sea kayaks. We hired 2 person sea kayaks for $18/hr each from the Paddle Club. After fitting life jackets, and getting guidance on how to get in at the jetty, we crossed Portage Bay, paddled under the bridges to Lake Union and views of the city of Seattle and the Space Needle. There is certainly some money tied up in the boats along the waterfront, and the houseboats that are on the pontoons along the shore.

We arrived back at the jetty after 70 minutes of paddling and enjoyed a Mexican meal at the Agua Verde Cafe.

After a late luch we headed up to the Allen 40th birthday reunion in Mt. Vernon. The invitation was for current and past staff, and past students who were over 21, because it was in a licenced venue. It turned out to be mainly current staff and it was great to catch up with everyone.

Winthrop weekend

Thanks Carol and Terry, we had a great weekend.

Weekend in Winthrop

It was a pretty warm day on Friday with beautiful blue skies. We pulled the kids out of school at midday, packed the car and left for the border. Radio reports said that the closest crossings had delays of up to one hour so we headed for the Huntington/Sumas crossing and followed Highway 9 down to Sedro-Wooley. From here we joined Highway 20 for the crossing over Washington Pass.

This is an amazing drive. We drove inland along the Skagit Valley to Concrete, Rockport, and Marblemount. From here the road starts to climb towards Newhalem, which is where much of Seattle's power is generated. There is a series of three dams on the river, all within a few a few miles of each other. There is an overlook at the Gorge Dam with vies up the valley, and Gorge Falls which brings snowmelt down to the dam. Further up above Diablo Lake there is another viewpoint with fantastic vies of the lake, valleys, and snowcapped mountains.

Each bend in the road brings amazing vistas of mountains, trees, waterfalls, valleys, and fast flowing rivers and streams. It is sometimes difficult to keep your eyes on the road as the scenery is breathtaking. You can't pass a viewpoint, or pullout, without stopping to take in the view.

We had made arrangements to call Carol and Terry when we got close to Winthrop. They live about 15 minutes drive out of town, and would come in and guide us. There was no phone reception in the mountains and we kept checking as we got closer to town. It wasn't until we were about 5 km out of town that we actually got reception. Bridget rang Carol at home, who thought that it was her daughter. Terry was waiting for us at the Big Red Barn, which was on the outskirts of town. It had been just over 7 years since we had seen him. He hadn't changed much - except maybe he is letting his hair grow a bit longer. The kids jumped in with him and we followed him through town and up into the nearby hills, winding our way along gravel roads, through valleys and around hills until we pulled into a gravel drive towards a house sitting on the upper slopes of a hill with fantastic views down the valleys and towards the snow capped peaks in the distance. The day had been warm. It had reached about 97 F on this side of the mountains.

Carol greeted us and we went inside for a quick tour of the house and taking in the views before sitting down to a tuna burrito dinner and a few drinks. There were bluebirds darting in and out of bird boxes on either end of the decking, lots of wildflowers, the odd chipmunk, and the sound of woodpeckers in the distance. We watched the sun go down and the mountains became silhouettes against the evening sky. I said that sunrise here would be magic, and Bridget said that she would get up to see it. She woke me at about 4:45 am while the sun was starting to brighten the dawn. The birds were chirping and darting in and out of their boxes and everthing started to emerge from the shadows of the night. We sat there and snapped photos as we watched the birds and the day dawning. I then headed back to bed for a few more hours sleep.

Saturday was the local Farmer's Market in Twisp, so we headed off to expolre the market and look for bargains. It is very Western around here, and some of the locals look like they have just been an "Extra" and just stepped out of a western movie, or a tale of the gold rush era. We found a few treasures including an original Stetson hat for Daniel. We headed back to the house for lunch, but not before stopping in at the local supermarket for supplies and a few photos. The owner of the store has his trophies mounted and displayed above the freezers in the middle of the store. There are all sorts of animals from North America as well as some from Africa. I was told that he has just come back from a safari with a lion and two elephants. I didn't think you could still hunt them.

After lunch we went for a drive to the nearby Sun Mountain Lodge. It has amazing views of the mountains and valleys. In winter it is surrounded by about 250 miles of groomed trails for skiing. In summer there are hiking trails, horses, bike riding, river rafting, and a variety of other outdoor pursuits. It looked very inviting in the pool.

We headed into Winthrop and walked around on the wooden sidewalks under wooden verandahs that conjure up thoughts of the western towns of the movies and television. We stopped and had an icecream, which was very refreshing. I like berry icecreams and decided to taste huckleberry flavour, which was good. Terry had heard from the locals that the rattlesnakes were active, and that someone had counted about 36 along the side of the road as he was driving the other day. They said that you could hear them as you drove. We drove towards the area, not knowing whether we wanted to find any, or not. As it turned out we didn't find any, but we did get some great views as we drove.

We had made arrangements to Skype friends back in Australia. Robert and Leanne had been neighbours in Geelong, and had looked after, and become friends with Carol and Terry. They had spoken over the phone since, but not seen each other. We installed Skype on their computer and had a great conversation. Bridget and Daniel showed Terry a few other things on the computer, including Twitter. I think that a whole new "social networking" world has been opened.

On Sunday we got up to another warm, but slightly overcast morning. We had breakfast, packed our bags, said our goodbyes, and headed back to Highway 20 for the reverse trip back over The Cascade Mountains. The views are just as magnificent in reverse. The climb to Washington Pass goes up a huge U-shaped valley that has been carved out by glaciers, and heads towards a magnificently rugged looking Liberty Bell. Again we stopped at almost every viewpoint and ended up by having a lat afternoon lunch on the Skagit River at Rockport.

We called in on friends in Burlington and headed back towards the border and home. This time we headed for the Peace Arch crossing and I was surprised to be able to drive right up to the Customs booth at the border without any wait, or queue.