i'd be safe and warm if i was in L.A...

 

Flight to Los Angeles is booked! We will be leaving on October 15th for sunny California.

Some photos from our first trip to LA, in January 2008:

We turned the heat on, in our house, for the first time today. We were kind of hoping that we would avoid this day. Oh well. I suppose having waited until the end of September is pretty good for Winnipeg.... and we can't complain because we're going to miss the disgustingly frigid winter.

things we'll miss - sunday morning breakfast + board games

is there such a thing as travel scrabble?

it's official!

All the conditions of our house offer have been met, so the house is definitely sold now. It's also an exciting day for me; I quit my job of four years. I handed in my two weeks notice to my boss today. Although there were some interesting projects and problems to solve at work, I'm very excited to now be moving forward with our plans of traveling.

The possession date for our house is October 28th so we're hoping to start our voyage the next day.

-Alex

wanderlist - a list to inspire wanderlust

We're inspired by John Goddard who, at 15, wrote a list of 127 goals to accomplish during his lifetime. Although we're not interested in making a 'bucket list' at this time, we thought that a 'wanderlist', a list to inspire wanderlust, would be more appropriate. These are all things that we hope to accomplish during our travels.

Our list, in no particular order, is:

1. Learn to Scuba Dive

2. Climb Mount Kilimanjaro

3. Walk Across Spain

4. Visit all 7 continents

5. Skydive

6. Drive around a country in a campervan

7. Sing Karaoke in Japan

8. Learn 'Hello' in as many languages as possible

9. Take Dance Lessons

10. Go on an African Safari

11. Volunteer Abroad

12. Study Yoga in an Ashram

13. Whitewater Rafting

14. Ride an Elephant*

15. Go on a cruise in the Galapagos Islands

16. Participate in a flash mob

17. Hike the Inca Trail up to Machu Picchu

18. Try Shark Cage Diving

19. Learn to Surf (sort of...)

20. Attend Burning Man

21. Be an extra in a Bollywood movie

22. Eat an insect (by accident while eating dates. GROSS)

23. Go Zorbing

24. Join a huge choreographed dance (See here & here)

25. Try CouchSurfing, at least once

26. Learn to ride motorcycle

27. Go Sailing

28. Swim with dolphins

29. Explore a cave

30. Run a Marathon in another country
31. Climb a volcano
32. See one of the remaining Beatles live
33. Go Zip-lining
34. Volunteer with the Let's Colour Project (thanks Katie!)

*We've seen several travel photos of people riding elephants and it looks like fun. However, elephants at some tourist destinations are treated quite cruelly. We would like to make sure that we don't indirectly contribute to animal abuse, and would rather support an organization that promotes conservation or forgo the experience completely. Any recommendations?

Speaking of suggestions, we'd like you to tell us what you think we should add to our list. If your idea makes it onto our list we will send you a postcard during our travels.

a matter of time...

Guess what? We got an offer on the house and we accepted it! It's still subject to financing, but we're confident that it'll be official by next week. This is a huge relief to us. In the past few weeks we've had to reject other offers for various reasons, which was incredibly stressful. Showing the house to "Sunday shoppers" wasn't fun either. It seems like all that frustration is finally over. Now we can focus on sorting out the last few details for our wedding, selling remaining possessions, and planning our departure. The hardest part is finally over!

so, this is a travelogue?

Our apologies to everyone who is tired of hearing about how we like to hang out and do nothing and eat and go to parks and eat and explore Winnipeg...and eat delicious food.

Trip planning is kind of difficult to do when you are trying to sell a house. We haven't wanted to post about the details of the sale process because: 1) this blog has been an escape from that and 2) it's boring.

We decided to sell our home privately and are very happy with our decision. We don't want to jinx anything, but we're kind of excited today while waiting for some news. Some (hopefully, good) news that means we can share some more details about how our plans have been progressing.

{P.S. We're still going to keep posting about how much we like to hang out and do nothing, and go to parks, and, I am sure, a lot more pictures of us eating.}

a-maze-in' corn

Some more pictures from our tiny trip just outside the perimeter of the city:

A confession: we didn't actually make it through the maze. We were being eaten alive by mosquitoes and didn't really even make any sort of attempt to navigate through to the end. The exit picture was completely staged. We know, we suck.

milk man!

Here's a 10 second video I took during our little trip to the petting zoo:

We experienced Pavlovian conditioning at it's finest - you should have seen the animals go crazy at the mere sight of the milk jug. If you listen closely, you can hear the poor lambs whining in the background as the calf is being fed. I was too scared to go into any of the pens. Most animals terrify me - but Alex had a great time (...and I still had fun observing). 

-Mina

petting zoo

Since we can't start traveling just yet, we decided to take a little 'trip' anyway and went for a short drive that led us just outside of Winnipeg to go to a petting zoo and a corn maze.

Meet jack the horse:

(He didn't like Mina)

These lambs were hilarious:

This thing was frightening:

the forks

The long weekend brought lots of sunny weather - this weekend doesn't seem like it's going to be so pleasant. Between house showings we were able to get away to go hang out at The Forks one last time.

The Forks would probably be considered the primary 'tourist attraction' here and we use that term loosely. We are not sure if it actually attracts any tourists - but if you're visiting family/friends here they'll force you to go there.

The skatepark was particularly busy when we walked by. Apparently this is one of the largest skate parks in the country. Tony Hawk filmed some scenes for a movie here a few years ago.

We can't believe fall is approaching so quickly. As long as we don't have to be here for another Winnipeg winter, we'll be content.