Quinn’s Extraordinry Travel Ramblings

 Quinn’s Extraordinary Travel Ramblings
 
 September 21st-22nd
 
 We left Juneau on September 21st at 8:00 a.m.  Henceforth the week or so prior to our leaving was spent cleaning and packing up the house when we weren‘t at the Mount Roberts Tramway or on board a cruise ship giving Southeast Alaska Odyssey Shows.  Much of that time was actually just spent running up and down the halls dancing and “singing” to artists such as Dan Balan, Frankie Valli, The Chordettes, The Chords, The Penguins, Kristin Chenowith and many more.

 Some of the more prominent tasks that we had to accomplish were pressure washing Xoche’s cage (the parrot), and disinfecting Quinn’s room, (so whoever stayed in it wouldn’t contract any unpleasant malady.)

 Our flight out of Juneau departed  late as usual.   We flew two and a half hours to Seattle.  When our flight was leaving Juneau Quinn started a timer to see how long it would take us to get from our point of origin to our point of destination.  When we lined up to board the jet the gatekeeper asked Laura to step out of line and go to see the ticket agent.  She also instructed Paul to gate check his guitar.  Paul being the true rebel he is, and not wanting to have his guitar broken into a thousand pieces, marched past the gate and on to the plane where he asked a stewardess to put his guitar in a closet for him; which she did very nicely.  Check this You Tube link out –  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5YGc4zOqozo       –  to see how some artist’s instruments fair when they fly in the cargo of today’s airliners.  It’s enough to make a rebel out of many otherwise mild mannered gentlemen. 

 When Laura boarded she was without her instruments.   Apparently the ticket agent had confiscated her instruments and sent them down to the hold.   Laura of course demurely followed instructions.  We were all rather disappointed with the gatekeeper.  Happily on arrival in Seattle, Laura’s instruments were handed back to her in mint condition.  Way to go Alaska Airlines!

 We were in Seattle for just long enough to get from point A (our arrival gate) to point B (our takeoff point); and board. None of our instruments were gate checked this time much to our relief.  This next flight took about three hours. It was a rather grueling journey.  Laura and Quinn sat by each other two rows behind Paul, Melissa and Abby.

 Quinn was sitting next to a college age looking student. During the flight Quinn stole a sideways glance at him and saw that the diligent scholar was working on a school assignment.   He was writing about choral reefs. Quinn was transfixed by all of the new fascinating facts that he learned. Such as: 1) Choral reefs are underwater  2) Choral reefs are wet  and 3) many other such things.

 During the flight Paul, Laura and Quinn watched the new movie, The A Team .   They all enjoyed it immensely.  Abby watched Marmaduke.  And Melissa slept through the whole flight. She slept due to the fact that she stayed up all night long before we departed Juneau cleaning house and packing for the trip. 

 When we arrived in Minneapolis, Minnesota we headed for the baggage carousel to retrieve our baggage.  Our Grandpa Zahasky was there waiting for us. We had almost walked by grandpa without noticing him when he spoke up.  He said that he had seen us a mile away due to my illustrious top-hat.

 Grandpa and my dad went to retrieve the vehicle from the parking garage.  While they were gone Mom, Laura, Abby and I lugged our baggage off of the carousel. We had about six or seven, twenty ton bags.  Actually each suitcase weighed in at precisely 50 pounds, due to the new weight limitations and the lovely baggage charge which is added to your ticket if you pack one ounce over the weight limitation.

 We dragged our luggage out to the curb and sat in wonder at the warm night air, relishing our bare feet in sandals which is a rare phenonema for Alaskan kids.  When we were picked up dad figured out how to get everything to fit just right into the van. It was somewhat like a jigsaw puzzle, only not quite. Grandpa had rented us an eleven person van. There was more room in it than we had had in the airplane, which meant that each of us could actually stretch our legs more than five inches.  Come to think of it there was more room in it than any car we’ve ever driven in.  We were headed to Decorah, Iowa which was about a three hour drive.

 On the way we stopped in Rochester, Minnesota at Menard’s Builders Supply to purchase new shower walls necessary for the fixing of the shower in our bus.  Leaving Menards we headed for a Subway shop to get a bite to eat.  That was my favorite part of the whole trip that day.  I’m partial to the meatball marinara.  At 10:30 p.m. we pulled to a stop in front of grandma and grandpa’s house.  I stopped my timer.   It had taken us 13 hours and 30 minutes to travel three thousand five hundred miles from Juneau, Alaska to Decorah, Iowa.  Not bad time.

 We visited with Grandma and Grandpa for about the next hour and discovered that Grandmama had baked us her most incredible yummy, yummy for my tummy, super duper extra chocolaty sour cream fudge chocolate cake.  We were very excited about that.  Of course we all tried to act very nonchalant about the whole affair and made a great effort to restrain from eating it all before breakfast the next morning.  Eventually sleep got the better of us and we went to bed.  It had been an eighteen hour day which included traveling through three different time zones.  So after a long day of time travel we collapsed in a heap of wriggling pudding.

Quinn’s Extraordinary Travel Ramblings:

 QUINN’S EXTRAORDINARY TRAVEL RAMBLINGS
    Alaskan Summer 2010
 
 Juneau was gifted with glorious sunshine and warm temperatures in May and June.  July was a rather nasty month weather-wise. Even though the weather was slightly like a bowl of overturned cornbread we still got out on several grand adventures such as camping, hiking, biking, swimming, cliff jumping and much – MUCH more.  All of the locals were pleasantly surprised as the weather made a turn for the better and ended up quite beautiful in August and September.  

 
 The Alaska String Band played music at the Mount Roberts Tramway four days a week, giving shows in the Chilkat Theater through out the late spring, summer and early fall.  Silver Sea, Asuka, Regent Sea and Holland America cruise lines all welcomed the Alaska String Band on board their ships to give evening performances of the Southeast Alaska Odyssey Show in their theaters.   Other interesting music engagements in Juneau included the Alaska Folk Festival, the Island Pub, State of Alaska Legislature Session, Governor’s awareness rally to prevent domestic abuse in Alaska, wedding at Glacier Gardens, Mountain Music Festival, Grand Ole Opry to benefit the United Way children’s fund, Laborers Union Labor Day Picnic and more.

 Laura traveled to a wedding in North Dakota in June and she was gone for a week. When she came back she was all set to get herself a beau. She didn’t find one luckily. If she had, we do believe that Quinn would have encompassed her intended in raspberry JELL-O.
 
  Quinn produced his first “Movie” with his friends this summer. The movie was “WWIII”.   They planned a double night sleepover and over the course of three days consumed tons of pizza and filmed a grand movie. He has also started his own movie company, Chester Van Gogh Predictions (yes, predictions.)
 
 Abigail attended the three week Weber Dance Camp of Boston, MA which was held in Juneau this summer. She went every day from 1:00 till 5:00 Monday through Friday. At the end of the dance camp she performed on stage at the Juneau Douglas High School.
 
 Paul went on a hunting expedition up a mountain with his friend Jeff Machakos. He was gone for two and a half days. He didn’t shoot anything.  And he woke up in the night with severe Charlie horses in his legs.  He says his old age is to blame but he was secretly delighted when his friend Jeff who is ten years his junior also complained of a Charlie horse. 
 
 Melissa discovered the Bobby Pin Blog on the internet and promptly ordered the hairdo book illustrating do’s from the 1930’s to the 1960’s.  She then began to create some wild new (or shall I say “old”) looks for my sisters.  Laura looked like a Cocoa Cola pin up girl.  And Abigail chose a beehive. 
 
 One exceptionally fun music engagement our family attended was the local home education retreat held at the summer camp at the end of the road.  Abby and Quinn went out with the rest of the students and attended several workshops with their friends.  Abby attended the cross stitch class where she learned how to cross stitch her name.  Quinn attended the Aerodynamics class where he made paper airplanes. He also attended the Tie-dyeing class and made a shirt. The last class he took was a jitterbug class where he learned to– well that’s obvious–jitterbug.  While at the retreat we played a concert and hosted a ballroom dance.
 
 We had company up from Virginia this summer for a week. While our guests were in Juneau they took us on the zip line at the local ski area located on Douglas Island. We glided from tree top to tree top in the thick rainforest.  Eaglecrest, the ski area where the zipline is located is one of our favorite hiking places.  Several days each week we would hike to the top of the mountain and hang out on the ridge overlooking the Southeast Alaska Inside Passage waterway and Admiralty Island in the distance.  Admiralty Island is North America’s largest island and averages one brown bear per each square mile of the Island.  Douglas Island where we live and play is home to black bears, deer, wolves, and many other smaller wild animals.  
   
 
 Auke Bay Bible Church was privileged to host the African’s Children Choir from Uganda.  The orphan children ages 9 – 12 gave a beautiful song and dance performance.   One day the Alaska String Band prepared and served them a spaghetti luncheon.   At the request of the Alaska String Band the Mount Roberts Tramway generously gave the African Children’s Choir complimentary passes up the Mount Roberts Tramway where the children were able to explore the alpine meadows above downtown Juneau. 

 We enjoyed several outings in the boat this summer.  On one outing we were amazed to see three humpback whales breech simultaneously from the water.  Wow! What a sight that was to behold.  On one of our fishing jaunts, Quinn caught a Dolly Varden at the boat launch while Paul was putting the boat in the water.  Quinn named it of course and promptly prepared a new habitat for the fish in a bucket at the back of the boat.  The fish’s name was Frederick. Much to Quinn’s dismay, Paul intended to use Frederick for bait!!  As we motored out beyond the protective islands of Amalga Harbor and into the broad expanse of water known as Lynn Canal which leads on to a favorite fishing destination at St. James Bay we discovered that we couldn’t go on.  The wind had really kicked up and the ensuing rough water was not something to tamper with.   So as Paul kept his watchful eye on the growing swells and steered the boat back to safe harbor Quinn unobtrusively slipped to the rear of the boat and wished Frederick a prosperous life as he threw him back into the water.   Paul got rather mad at Quinn upon discovery of his escaped bait. 
 
 The weekend before we left on tour Abigail and Quinn got together with ten of  their hometown friends and went to a ballroom dance hosted by the Juneau International Folk dancers. Abigail was proud to be wearing her first ever high heel shoes.  And Quinn looked smashing in a pink suit.  Everyone was formal and they looked splendiferous.   And that ends a brief synopsis of our shenanigans for the summer.