Blogging has not been top priority with me for the past few days, but it's raining cats and dogs in Vancouver today so it's laundry and blogging for me, before going out to the good old hockey game tonight.

So here I am playing catch up and I hope you'll excuse the time lag, and the length of this entry.

After the convention in Ventura I headed back to LA for the train and bus journey north to Vancouver. We started on one of those trade marked Southern California days, blue skies, warm air, sun on the water making everything look gorgeous. By the time we pulled into Sacramento at around midnight we were in Northern California and the temperatures were back to feeling more normal to me for the time of year. Ventura had managed to make me forget that it is still March and only Spring not Summer.

We left the train here and boarded a bus which was to take us on to Portland in Oregon.
Sadly not one of Amtrak's usual buses, but a normal coach with very little leg room. Let me tell you that 12 hours on this bus was not so great on my knee. It was an interesting time though (in the Chinese curse sense almost).

As we boarded the bus I passed a woman who I thought was just hanging about at the depot, but it transpired that she was actually travelling with us to Seattle!

She was clearly not in the best of mental health and possibly ought to have taken some medication, though it was doubtful that she had. She talked non-stop the entire 12 hour journey and apart from two lucid interactions to buy breakfast on our rest stop and to apologise for standing on someone's toe she was almost totally in her own head-space and oblivious to the world around her.

I transcribed some of her chatter, not to make fun of her but because it was both interesting, disturbing and very thought provoking.

I enclose a sample here;

"Nixon, Carter, Bush and Kennedy kidnapped my husband and had him killed because he knew too much about their conspiracy, along with the FBI, CIA and Scotland Yard, to murder Princess Diana. So they murdered him. The English are being lied to by Scotland Yard in Scotland, they're misinformed because Scotland Yard are part of the conspiracy. Greedy cannibals are eating the children. I can't use a credit card because I've had so much taken from my account by bank officials who are commercially negligent and they are going to tell Blair. The cheques went in the banks and all the cheques have one signature on them, the President of The United States, who is passing them around. He handles the cheque books and is part of the conspiracy. I've got enough to get them all locked away, which is why they sent the cannibals. As soon as you get the things from the bank you've got to justify yourself to the plastic surgeons who have to certify that you are insane. It's like a pink cloud which is a magnetic field. It transfers our memories and uploads them to a satellite and the psychiatrists say that is shows the things that your brain is thinking. I pay taxes for the hospital but I don't understand all the effects. I used to go to the doctor's to be put to sleep but he's a homosexual and he's got a big beer belly and the Carter Agency tell me that she is the one. The cannibals ate the babies and we are scrutinising this."

You get the idea. I was impressed by the amount of energy it must have taken for her to keep this up for the entire journey. I was also pretty concerned that she ought to be somewhere being looked after. The writer in me wanted to document what she said and the humanity in me wanted to get her help.

We pass through stunning scenery in Oregon and as the sun starts to come up we can see the wild beauty of it all. Wolf Creek dips down from the mountains, and the landscape here seems to act as a cauldron for brewing mist which coalesces amongst the trees. On the tops of the mountains some snow is visible. The air smells colder and really clean. Above the clouds, which have been netted by the trees, the sky is blue. Another beautiful day in the Pacific Northwest. Cooler than California, obviously, but nonetheless gorgeous in its own right.


We left the bus at Portland and boarded another train to take us on to Seattle. The scenery had changed considerably by now. More evergreen trees, cooler air, snow on mountain tops and more cloud cover. When you travel through the US in this way you really do get an idea of the size of the country as well as the diversity of the landscape and the people who live there. It's one of the reasons I like to do this journey.

We arrived in Seattle with plenty of time between our train and the next bus to Vancouver. I started talking to two young guys who had just taken a cycling trip from Port Angeles in Washington State, down the west coast to San Diego. It sounded like a lot of fun. The sort of thing I'd have liked to have done at their age. The sort of thing I did do actually, albeit over much shorter distances.

Sunset in Seattle and sitting outside King Street Station waiting for the bus to leave to take us on to Vancouver. In the space between several tall buildings a veritable flock of seagulls are circling in a column of warm air. The fading golden light catches the white their plumage and highlights it brilliantly. A beautiful display of arial acrobatics which lasts for more than 20 minutes. With one of those cosmic alliances of timing the gulls start to roost and cease their performance just about a minute before the driver closes the door and hands out customs declarations cards for us to fill in and hand over when we reach the Canadian border.

This is the first time in over 5 years that I have entered Canada by road rather than flying in. It's been a great journey, if a little long at 36 hours. I love the train, but I miss the stops that we had to cut out because of landslides in Oregon. Klamath Falls and Crater Lake in particular. Amtrak did their best to keep us on track though and we arrived in Vancouver with as little fuss as possible so much kudos to them for dealing so well with the situation.

People ask me why I want to travel from LA to Vancouver by train when I can fly up in 3 hours....well two reasons really.

One - it is so cheap and it does cut the carbon footprint by a considerable amount.
Two - I get to see the scenery pass me by, I get time to myself to think and to write and to indulge in people watching, it's almost like a meditation and I think it is wonderful.

That's not to say that I wouldn't fly up if I was in a hurry, but I count this journey as an integral part of my holiday so it all adds to the joy. Sometimes slowing down the pace of life is necessary to the wellbeing.

On my first morning in Vancouver I take my customary walk down to the beach and look out over English Bay. The land seems to have an affinity with the sky here in this part of the world. The clouds have a love affair with the landscape that is not wholly unrequited. After all it is the moisture that those clouds dispense so lovingly that causes the flora of this region to be so wantonly profligate. Washington is called 'The Evergreen State' and British Columbia announces itself as 'Super Natural'. Neither accolade is afforded lightly. Vancouver even goes so far as to produce a temperate rainforest. All of this is possible solely due to the vapour ridden skies that gently (and sometimes fiercely) lavish their attentions on the land.

This is clear sitting on Sunset Beach and looking across the bay to see the clouds nuzzling the tops of the mountains on the North Shore. I love this place.

Walking along the sea wall from Sunset Beach to Yaletown I encounter more and more building sites and new condos going up to cater for the Olympic fallout....2010 is not so very far away now after all. I find myself wishing that fewer high rise buildings were being built though, and judging by overheard comments from locals I'm clearly not alone.

Vancouver is still beautiful and warm and welcoming, but I can't help but think that there is some part of the integrity of the place that is in danger of being lost.

I spend time with my friends Sue and Russ, I shop and window shop, I walk and I write. All too soon though I reach my last day.

Hockey tonight, and I am hopeful that we will win though the Canucks are having a rollercoaster ride of a season so far and whilst we are still in a playoff position at the moment that could change in the last ten games of the regular season. Fingers toes and eyes crossed that they can pull their fat out of the fire and maybe finally get a cup. They've only been to a final once in their history and to be honest it doesn't seem that this is their year either. Still, whatever the outcome I shall enjoy myself and pray for better luck - and greater work ethic - next year.

Well that's me up to date now. Pictures will follow when I get home. Since none of the promised features of remote posting have worked I need to wait until I get back to my own hard drive. In the meantime I hope you are all well and that your own creative juices are flowing.

Sharon