Chasing Sixty

Meow Wolf House of Eternal Return

2018-06-25T00:00:00+00:00

Ben sent me a link a couple of weeks ago and said “Let’s go here”. Today we did just that and stepped into the alternate dimension that is Meow Wolf House of Eternal Return.

The first thing you notice when pulling up to the museum is the large red robot smelling a flower in the parking lot. Well, maybe the second thing you notice after seeing how crowded the parking lot is. At noon on a Monday the line for general admission was out the door, and the inside was packed. You can pre-purchase tickets if you would like to skip said line. We didn’t bother because the lady outside manning the line had some pretty terrible dad jokes to entertain with. And by terrible I mean awesome.

The big red robot and his flower.

Everywhere you look once inside the doors there is something to see. Even the front lobby has art on the ceilings and walls to view while waiting to go to the main attraction. Admission was $25/person, and you have the option of paying $1 extra for a pair of “light enhancing” glasses. We both decided to get a pair and are glad we did. These glasses are very similar to the paper 3D glasses you get at some theaters or with a code reader toy. If you put them on in any of the rooms with blacklights they “enhance” the colors of the neon lights. Donning them in the arcade behind the house inside gives the walls a 3D appearance.

Once you have paid your admission and have your glasses you are directed down a dark hallway that leads into the museum attraction. Once you go through the door at the end of said hallway the Selig house is right up front. This is where the rest of the attraction spans from. You can choose to simply explore everything inside at leisure or investigate the mystery surrounding the Selig family.

We spent two hours inside and in that time we were able to see every room inside the museum. But just seeing every room was not quite enough. If you can spare the time, I would recommend spending a day here. Nearly everything inside is interactive. You are encouraged to push buttons and touch the walls and anything that glows (which is pretty much everything).

In our two hours inside we did not start the mystery story. The house itself was the most crowded part of the museum. It also happened to be where it was blatantly obvious that not everyone showers or wears deodorant. Don’t be that guy. But DO be the one that goes in every door and crawls through every portal. There is so much to see at Meow Wolf. Don’t forget to look up either! They have covered every inch of the place with something to wonder at. Push the buttons, feel the walls, and touch things. You never know what will make a noise or do something. :)

The Selig family house.

Black and white reality.

Glowy tree ally.

An ice box portal.

Inside of the ice caves.

Tattoo Removal - Part 1

2018-03-22T00:00:00+00:00

After seven years and change of living with a tattoo I never really liked, I finally took the plunge into tattoo removal.

For my 20th birthday present to myself I decided to get a huge black panther tattooed between my shoulder blades. I had just gone to Belize the spring before and after visiting Tikal decided that a panther was my animal totem. My aunt had a pretty realistic looking panther on her right shoulder. Google brought up some pretty awesome images of panther tattoos. I thought it would be perfect for my first.

Let me just say without boring you with the details that I wish I had known then what I know now. I wish I had known that it is okay to back out of a tattoo after an artist has drawn out a sketch. It is totally okay to pay them for their time spent on the drawing and walk out without anyones feelings getting hurt. It also wouldn’t have hurt to know that it does in fact hurt much more to have one removed than it does to have one applied.

Choosing a Doctor

I had mine done at Sanova Dermatology in downtown Austin. I chose them by recommendation of my dermatologist and because they have the only Cutera Enlighten laser in town. The Enlighten offers both the picosecond and nanosecond delivery (how fast the laser fires), and has the three most common wavelengths used to remove tattoos. While mine is primarily black (the easiest to remove), I had some red and green to consider when choosing a doctor and laser. I did not want to have to go to multiple doctors to get my tattoo fully removed.

Removal

For anyone considering tattoo removal, I say this and foremost. Use the lidocaine. I did not believe others when they said tattoo removal hurts more than getting a tattoo. When I had mine done I was able to finish the whole session without any help in two hours. We only took one break to let me stretch my neck. Sure it hurt, but it was more uncomfortable than painful.

Thinking that the removal would be similar I started out with only a local numbing cream. That cream doesn’t do diddly squat. When that laser hit my back it was like having a bee sting me at a rapid pace repeatedly. Others have compared it to having a rubber band snapped against your skin a few million times. However you want to describe the feeling, it’s painful. I’ve had stitches in my face without crying but I’d be lying if I said tears didn’t blur my eyes.

After about five minutes of deep breaths they teach women going through labor and some cold air pointed straight at the spot getting burned off of me, I gave in and asked for the lidocaine. That also hurt but it was nothing compared to the laser. I will proudly admit that I am a sissy. My aesthetician was pretty awesome about it though and got me set pretty quickly with the lidocaine. She also made sure I was as comfortable as I could be and kept the cold air on my back.

Healing

The healing process itself was not terrible. For me it was uncomfortable because of the location of my tattoo. It being between my shoulder blades and taking up half of my back, I was unable to lean back. Which meant about a week of leaning forward whenever I sat down or trying to strategically turn and lean to one side. There were some blisters (I’ll spare you the pics), but mainly only on the red parts of the tattoo. Once the blisters went through their lifecycle after five days the peeling started and the itching kicked in. The skin stayed fairly tender and bumpy the whole two weeks it healed.

The first four days we used Neosporin and kept it covered with suran wrap during the day. In the evenings I would do my best to rinse the ointment off and give the skin a chance to breathe. By the fifth day we stopped applying Neosporin and let it stay clean and dry. The whole tattoo area itched like crazy throughout the healing process. After two weeks the skin had completely healed and was back to its normal texture.

Results

I’m pretty happy with the fading seen after just one session. You can already see the pigment breaking up and lightening. The skin healed perfectly. My aesthetician recommended waiting at least 8 weeks between sessions to let it fade as much as possible on its own. I expect it will lighten more than it already has by the time I go in for round two.

Original tattoo, morning of first session.

Two weeks after first session.

Hunting For Treasure In The Rockies

2017-06-28T00:00:00+00:00

At least one of my flaws (gifts) is a burning passion and focus when I lock into a topic. It’s easy for me to dive head first into almost anything when my interest spikes. For instance, taking a few long trips led to us traveling all over the USA. It didn’t take long before I knew it’s what I wanted to do and executed. With that in mind, it is not surprising that when I got a sniff that there might be real treasure somewhere in the Rocky Mountains, it might spark my interest.

How It Began

I read the news constantly. I keep up with politics and dive into technology and science publications. This is a daily habit for me. On one of the days in our travels I came across a headline about someone who had died in the Rocky Mountains hunting treasure. I skimmed over the article and was mostly dismissive of the idea of treasure. The people who hunt for treasure must be bored or have nothing better to do. In the article the wife of the deceased lamented about her missing husband and how the treasure was fake.

Who was this awful human who gave someone false hope and lead them to their death?

…and there it began

Diving Into Details

I started reading about Forrest Fenn. Then I started reading about this silly treasure he supposedly left in the Rocky Mountains. I was late to the party because he apparently had left this treasure years before I had ever heard about it.

The story goes that he went off and left a Treasure somewhere in the Rocky Mountains and then gave people clues on how to find it in a Poem. He has since given countless clues to people who have reached out to him. He has clarified things and narrowed the search location. You can find all sorts of details on reddit, on Forrest’s Blog, and on a blog hosted by some guy named Dal.

Forrest ends up being an interesting fella. Reading about him kept my attention. The more I read about the treasure the more interested I became. I’m fortunate enough that I don’t need a box worth millions but the hunt was enticing. I looked through countless other people’s journeys and ideas and then started to form my own.

Dragging Alex Into It

We had just wrapped up our visit to Alaska. It was time for our journey home. Right before you drive for days without any form of phone service you reach a town called White Horse in the Yukon territory in Canada. We found a spot we liked in this town and it was my first time to sit down and relax a bit. I started to read all the details of the treasure more intently. I had grazed information the past couple of days but now I had time to focus. The more I dug the more passionate I became. -IF- this treasure existed I could find it?

We had considered heading west on our way home. Alex has family out west and we thought we might take our time taking a different route and enjoying the trees in Oregon. It’s getting late and I’m staring at maps. I’ve dived deep into other peoples Solves (a name given to people’s ideas of where the treasure is). I’m cross referencing things I’ve read about Fenn, diving into other people’s perceptions of his poems and books, and staring at maps trying to tie it all together.

…Suddenly - I’ve found it.

At this point, I’ve gently described what I’ve been reading to Alex and I’m pretty sure she thinks I’m as crazy as everyone else. I’ve quite literally memorized his poem and I’m constantly reciting it in my mind. I explain to her who this guy is and explain what I think I’ve found. It’s 1AM and I’m wanting to change directions and head to Yellowstone. NOW.

Paranoid

Alex follows along and we immediately start driving. It’s now the middle of the summer and there are hundreds of other people hunting for the treasure. Some of them post their failures on Reddit or other blogs. I’m monitoring reddit and I come across a post that hints the treasure hunter might be on the same path as me. This lights a fire in me. After all, this treasure has been sitting there for years, supposedly dropped off by an 80 year old man in a place reachable by anyone, and no one has found it after all this time. I’m certain I know where it is but now someone is talking on Reddit poking around the same place. I’m a two day drive away…

36 Hour Drive Non-Stop

We drive the next two days non-stop straight to Yellowstone. Taking turns sleeping on the bed in the back while the other drives. We get to the border of the USA quickly. As usual, the USA Border agents are absolute ass holes. This time was no different. They are intentionally confrontational and hostile. I’m sure this is part of their training and taking their job seriously. On the other hand, being an ass hole doesn’t really make our border safer. It just makes them ass holes.

The drive is exhausting. We are only stopping for gas and hauling butt. Sleeping while the other person is driving is restless sleep and as the days progress we are getting pretty tired. The anxiety of someone getting to this box before me is keeping me awake.

Our First Hunt

I’ll continue the story in a later post and link to it here.

The Poem

The poem is simple. Fenn has claimed countless times that all you need is the poem to find his buried treasure. The Poem goes like this:

As I have gone alone in there
And with my treasures bold,
I can keep my secret where,
And hint of riches new and old.

Begin it where warm waters halt
And take it in the canyon down,
Not far, but too far to walk.
Put in below the home of Brown.

From there it’s no place for the meek,
The end is ever drawing nigh;
There’ll be no paddle up your creek,
Just heavy loads and water high.

If you’ve been wise and found the blaze,
Look quickly down, your quest to cease,
But tarry scant with marvel gaze,
Just take the chest and go in peace.

So why is it that I must go
And leave my trove for all to seek?
The answers I already know,
I’ve done it tired, and now I’m weak.

So hear me all and listen good,
Your effort will be worth the cold.
If you are brave and in the wood
I give you title to the gold.

Hunting For Treasure In The Rockies

2017-06-27T00:00:00+00:00

How It Began

Who was this awful human who gave someone false hope and lead them to their death?

…and there it began

Diving Into Details

Dragging Alex Into It

…Suddenly - I’ve found it.

Paranoid

36 Hour Drive Non-Stop

Our First Hunt

I’ll continue the story in a later post and link to it here.

The Poem

The poem is simple. Fenn has claimed countless times that all you need is the poem to find his buried treasure. The Poem goes like this:

As I have gone alone in there
And with my treasures bold,
I can keep my secret where,
And hint of riches new and old.

Begin it where warm waters halt
And take it in the canyon down,
Not far, but too far to walk.
Put in below the home of Brown.

From there it’s no place for the meek,
The end is ever drawing nigh;
There’ll be no paddle up your creek,
Just heavy loads and water high.

If you’ve been wise and found the blaze,
Look quickly down, your quest to cease,
But tarry scant with marvel gaze,
Just take the chest and go in peace.

So why is it that I must go
And leave my trove for all to seek?
The answers I already know,
I’ve done it tired, and now I’m weak.

So hear me all and listen good,
Your effort will be worth the cold.
If you are brave and in the wood
I give you title to the gold.

Exit Glacier

2017-06-18T00:00:00+00:00

Before heading back to Anchorage we decided to visit Exit Glacier just north of Seward.

The road to Exit Glacier is 3 miles north from the north side of Seward. It’s another 9 miles from the Seward Highway to the glacier parking lot. Exit Glacier sits near the border of Kenai Fjords National Park and Chugach National Forest. Water runoff feeds into Resurrection River and eventually makes its way down to Resurrection Bay. The quick drive is just another in Alaska that left us at a loss for words. We stopped at a couple different pull offs to take pictures and just enjoy the view.

The second pull off we took was a view point of Exit Glacier. With a row of trees a few feet below the edge of the parking lot, a river past that, and the glacier two miles straight ahead with no obstructions, it allowed for a wide open view of the glacier. From where we were standing it was hard to believe something that looked so close was actually a full two miles away as the bird flies. Ben was able to fly the drone for an arial view of the glacier before we drove into the park. We almost learned just how accurate the drone is at estimating how much flight time is left on a battery. Down where we stood the winds were light to nonexistent, but closer to the glacier they were strong. This meant the drone had to work harder to stay in one spot which meant more battery usage than in optimal flying conditions. Fortunately, the drone made it back with battery to spare and Ben got some amazing photos and video out of it.

Once you cross the border into the Kenai Fjords National Park you’ll notice sign posts along the road with a year on them. These posts designate where the tip of the glacier was at the year on the post. The first post after the park sign is 1815. Some posts were only 20 years apart, while others were 40 or more. At the edge of the glacier was a sign post for the year 2005. Standing next to it looking at the glacier really gives you an appreciation for how far the glacier has receded in the last 12 years.

Sign post indicating where the glacier tip was in 2005.

We decided to take the 0.6 mile hike to the glacier’s edge from the Nature Center. Almost completely uphill, the hike took maybe 20 minutes counting pauses to allow people to pass in narrower sections. The hike was pretty easy aside from the uphill aspect. Just be sure to watch for loose gravel in some sections so you don’t slip! On the trail we got fairly warm with the sun on us and no wind. I started to regret wearing long sleeves and a vest. Until we got to the glacier edge. At the edge of the glacier where the trees break, the wind kicks up. And I mean kicks up. I had to hold my hair down to take photos and the temperature must have dropped at least 15 degrees. All of a sudden I was incredibly happy to have my vest, and even that almost wasn’t enough.

The wind whipping my hair around - much to my humor.

Wildlife Along the Alcan Highway

2017-06-07T00:00:00+00:00

Every time we go on these trips I have only one wish. To see a moose. I know it seems silly. It’s just a moose. It’s like the whitetail of Texas up here in Canada. They’re in everybody’s backyard, and spotted in cities. They’re apparently common in Grand Teton National Park and I didn’t get to see one there. People in our group at Music Fest saw one on the slopes and shared video of it. Paul at Pleasure-Way mentioned when we picked our Plateau XLMB up that one had been spotted just that morning down the road. It felt like I kept missing them. These creatures were elusive to me.

I finally got my wish. After years of wanting nothing so much as to see a moose in person I not only saw one, but three! Just standing in the grassy sections alongside the road. The first two we spotted were smaller and looked to be like younger females. Today we saw a third one near some brush along the road. He also was smaller, but had some horns on him. My first impression of the two we saw last night were that they looked wet. I couldn’t tell if they were or if it was just the look of their fur. I’d still like to see a full grown moose. Maybe we’ll get lucky in the parks in Alaska.

Surprisingly to me we saw more black bears than anything else. It seemed like they were everywhere along the stretch of highway between Ft. St. John and Ft. Nelson. In a matter of three or four hours we saw over a dozen black bears along the road. All of them were just chilling out eating some dandelions. It’s hard to see them as dangerous watching them sit on their bums chewing flowers like that. Especially when the sun is out and making their fur glisten and look like nothing short of spectacularly silky and fuzzy. Like you just want to rub your face in it. We pulled over to watch one of them and snap some photos from the door of the coach. Even if it did look adorably harmless we were still cautious. After we had been there for a bit an RV pulled up behind is. It was a man and his son, and the man was making loud noises trying to get the bear to look their way. They ended up causing the poor thing to run off into the woods. We both felt that it was incredibly rude and stupid. They left right after the bear disappeared into the treeline, and we were more than happy to let them get ahead of us. Since we had hung back a bit, we got to see the bear come back out and go into one of the road pipes to cross to the other side. Smart bear.

Adorable black bear in the dandelions.

In addition to my elusive moose and bears, we also saw plenty of bison and some sort of sheep. I thought they were goats, but the signs all designated them as sheep. Some of them had the wrapped horns like a ram, and the rest had smaller horns that curved straight up. In one group of them there was a little white lamb with them. We had to stop in the road to let them move over to the side. I saw one sheep running along narrow ledges of the rock wall next to us while we waited. It’s incredible how they’re able to comfortably move along ledges like that.

The sheep were all in an area of a provincial park that had rock cliffs and gravel. Some of them really blended in and if we hadn’t seen a few groups out on the road I probably would have missed them. Shortly after we saw the sheep was when we saw a herd of bison. They were along the road in a construction area - right next to the road machines. And just across the road from the bison was another black bear eating some dandelions. All of this around a construction crew waiting for the cars to pass. Makes you wonder how often these road crews see wildlife and if it still awes them like it does us.

Cell Phone Providers - Our Experiences

2017-06-04T00:00:00+00:00

One of the compromises of our lifestyle is that we need to be connected at all times. We were extremely fortunate that right as we began this lifestyle, T-Mobile pushed the “unlimited” data plans back into the mobile market. We decided to get service with all three of the carriers as insurance for our connectivity. We’ve gone coast-to-coast and here’s our experience.

Our Devices And Situation

Two of our devices are Android and we use them with our VR headsets. We do not use those phones for any other purpose. They were purchased to be “internet hotspots”. We each have an iPhone as our primary devices. We then have an iPhone dedicated to Waze and an additional iPhone dedicated to our drone. Finally, we each have our own iPad.

We started with all eight devices on AT&T. When T-Mobile pushed out their new T-Mobile ONE plan it really pushed me into testing other carriers. I had tried both Verizon and T-Mobile years ago. At that time their service was not that great and I was dropping calls frequently. Things have changed!

I transferred two devices over to T-Mobile at first. I then made my primary phone on Verizon. I have unlimited plans with all three carriers now.

Summary Of Carriers

AT&T has always been my goto for coverage in rural areas, tiny roads in the middle of nowhere, and farm areas. I’ve always relied on them to give me “something” while the other carriers say “No Service”. I can tell that over the past few years market pressure has caused AT&T to clean up their customer service experience and improve their website. Even still, they always seem slow to respond to changes in the market, they seem to be the biggest ass holes about using their network, when you get throttled their network is absolutely unusable, and their response to the “unlimited” plans was TERRIBLE. They were slow to respond and their offering was poor.

Verizon has been touting the best LTE coverage map for years. The last time I tried them I had a fairly poor experience with dropped calls but they have spent billions of dollars on their network since then. They are typically the same or more expensive than AT&T. They responded quickly to T-Mobile’s unlimited offering with their own offering. Their offering was reasonable - but, more expensive.

T-Mobile has been making waves in the press lately with their “uncarrier” moves. They are making a real effort to be different and not treat their customers like crap. You still find the occasional story online about how they suck but my experience has been great. Apples-to-Apples my bill has been MUCH cheaper with them. Additionally, they are the only carrier that allows you to pay a little more for “unlimited LTE tethering”.

Service Across America - The Surprise

As we’ve crossed America I expected to need to shift between the carriers. T-Mobile has the best plan for us with an Unlimited LTE Tethering Option. We expected we would only be able to use T-Mobile near large cities. Wrong! It works everywhere now (mostly)!

I have to say - T-Mobile - you guys have really grown up. We have received equal signal or “better” signal with T-Mobile in all sorts of unlikely places. That’s not to say T-Mobile is better. There have been a few instances where AT&T and Verizon had service while T-Mobile was dark but it’s been rare. VERY rare. Based on this experience, after this year we will be switching all of our devices to T-Mobile. There isn’t enough of an advantage to AT&T or Verizon to warrant keeping them. T-Mobile is being really aggressive with their offerings right now and their service has been.. STELLAR.

Verizon and AT&T has been neck-and-neck in our experience. I don’t have bias towards either of them but I would likely keep Verizon over AT&T these days. After 17 years, AT&T’s response when I was removing six lines from them was meh, see ya. Their counter offer to the unlimited plans was poor and now we have real world coast-to-coast experience that proves to us that Verizon has caught them in coverage.

The big surprise for us as been T-Mobile. They have improved their network tremendously.

Service In Canada

We probably won’t travel to Canada or Mexico nearly as frequently as we will travel around the USA. Choosing a provider doesn’t factor in Canada. We were willing to pay “extra” or do what was necessary for the temporary time we were here. It turned out to be unnecessary. ALL three carriers have data, text, and minutes included while in Canada.

They all have about the same coverage here. They are piggy backing off contracts with local carriers. The BIG BIG HUGE difference is T-Mobile again. “UNLIMITED LTE DATA” in Canada also. Verizon has throttled me twice when my apps updated. As soon as the throttle kicks in - the service drops to NOTHING. Dead. Can’t even use data. AT&T has been fine but similar data concerns. They turn your data off after a little usage.

We have been able to rely on T-Mobile all over Canada for our data needs without any throttle or any worry. This company is really starting to stand out for us.

Banff National Park

2017-06-04T00:00:00+00:00

To celebrate the 150th Anniversary of Canadian Parks, admission to all Canadian Parks is free this year. Including the famous Banff National Park.

We drove into the park from Calgary, Alberta Saturday afternoon. Our first stop was the Natural Cave on the west side of the town of Banff. Banff - the town - was a beautiful, quaint town. It reminded us a lot of downtown Jackson Hole and Breckenridge. We didn’t stay in the town long as we were nervous about parking our coach in a tight space in such a busy place. The Natural Cave was beautiful but underwhelming. Much like Rock City, it turned out to be just a small place that is a quick walk in for tourists. The small cave and spring was beautiful, but small and crowded. If we had had to pay extra for it, it would have been disappointing. Fortunately the free admission also applied here.

After leaving the town of Banff we headed up to Lake Louise to try our luck at getting a camping spot. The hard-side camping site had plenty of openings and we lucked out and got an end spot right by the river. The Lake Louise campground we were in was hard-side only, which meant only RVs and camper trailers. No tents. The spots had power hookups but no water or dump. We slept with the windows open and would have left the door open if we weren’t concerned about bears. The campground attendant had mentioned they saw two in the campground earlier that day before we checked in. This campground had a well set up dump station with multiple lanes. Each lane had a spot to dump and fresh water.

The river just 20 yards from our camp site.

We made Moraine Lake our first stop and were surprised to find that part of it was still frozen! In June! It was crowded on the shore and at the lookout point. We managed to squeeze into a clear area near the water for a few photos before we walked down the trail towards the end of the lake. There were a lot less people further down the trail and shore around the bend of the lake. Even partly frozen the water is a beautiful light blue. Almost a powdery robin’s egg blue. I wish it had been warmer so we could have canoed and enjoyed the water. The day before it had been fairly warm but today was overcast and sprinkled on us a few times.

As we walked back towards the parking lot, we saw some emergency vehicles pull up in the parking lot. A visitor had fallen on the far side of the lookout point. We didn’t go up the lookout point because of the crowds but from the side we were on you can see that it’s very rocky and can be dangerous if you aren’t careful off of the trail. A helicopter had to come and lift the injured person out of the spot they were in. From where we were parked I could see the helicopter lift up. It had a rope attached to the gurney, and an emergency responder stood on the gurney hanging on the rope as the helicopter moved them to safer ground by the ambulances. We didn’t hear how they fell (we mostly assume they did because of the rocks), but we hope that they’ll be alright.

Lake Louise was our last stop in Banff before heading north. The water was the same beautiful powdery blue as Moraine Lake. We had initially planned to hike here, but the temperature was dropping slightly and rain looked imminent. We spent a bit of time here on a bench looking out over the lake. Some brave souls went out in canoes and kayaks.

Driving through Banff and Jasper National Parks is probably the most beautiful drive I have ever taken. Mountains line either side of the highway and there are frequent river crossings and lakes. In Jasper along Hwy 93 we saw a few caribou right off the road. While we were taking pictures one looked right at Ben in a way that made Ben quickly move back to avoid irritating him. We had already seen him get pushy with the other two caribou with him and we wanted to give him ample space.

The caribou staring at Ben.

Surprise With Fast Food

2017-06-03T00:00:00+00:00

Of course things are different when you visit a different country. The first farm town we reached in Canada right awe we crossed I was approached by a friendly fella who explained the town was getting its first Tim Hortons. I had never heard of such a thing but this was a big deal.

It took us several days in Canada to finally try a Tim Hortons but we finally did. I’m disappointed to say that it wasn’t a great experience. I believe we are fortunate to have better options in the USA for donut and coffee shops. It’s not that it was “bad” food - only that the donuts we got were meh.

Another surprise is the prevalence of A&W stores. It feels like A&W in Canada is as common as McDonalds is to almost all of the USA. We finally ate at one of the A&W’s at a truck stop. My only disappointment was that we didn’t do it sooner. It had been years since my last time at an A&W. My food was delicious.

We haven’t found much difference with the Starbucks in Canada. That is unless we are talking about the internet service. I was very pleased when Google took over the internet service for Starbucks in the United States. This allowed us to work remotely and have a reliable place to call home. Canada is even better! The internet is not provided by Google but we have not visited a Starbucks with less than 100mb/s. The internet has been fantastic!

Our Tiny Stay In Saskatoon

2017-05-29T00:00:00+00:00

Our first destination in Canada was the Pleasure-Way headquarters in Saskatoon.

We are getting some warranty work done in Saskatoon at the Pleasure Way headquarters. This is our first taste of a City in Canada. When we mentioned this was our first stop the border crossing guard suggested we skip it. We didn’t go into why we were coming here but we didn’t expect much. It turned out to be fine…

While we were in town we needed to get some laundry done. We regularly check crime maps and various other resources to get a sense of where we should settle down in a city. Now that we are in Canada some of our resources and tools we use online are not available. So it wasn’t until we looked on forums later that evening that we learned we had dropped our laundry off in the worst part of town. It was kind of obvious while we were there but the internet confirmed we should not spend a lot of time over near our laundry.

We worked from the hotel provided to us while we stayed for the warranty work. We also worked at a Starbucks right down the road. The people here are so friendly. A sweet girl named Sheila started chatting up Alex about what she was working on and asking all about our little adventure. This was not the first time a random stranger had engaged us in conversation since we crossed over into Canada. You can immediately tell folks here are friendly and engaging.

I do believe we’ll be back.