So, after initially planning our first really big family holiday in years… the best laid plans of otters and men went awry when Mr K was accepted into the MBA program this year and his schedule is hectic as all hell.  No holidays for Mr K, who seems moderately disappointed.  🙁  But only moderately disappointed compared to the expression of ‘oh bother’ and unhappy heavy sighs emanating from my mother who was going to join us in a great North American Adventure.

After lengthy discussions… oh, I’d estimate about 3mins and 46 seconds… Aunty Mary and I decided “Hang it! This is a trip of a life time, we’ll go anyway!”  And so began the planning.  Mostly we want to see as much of Canada and Alaska as possible and luckily Quaint-Arse had post Christmas air fare sales on so we have mapped out a trip that looks something like this:

Fly directly to Vancouver, Do Not Pass Go (but have short stop over at LAX), Try not to spend $200 on a cuppa there.  Spend about 14-16 days checking out the famous National Parks that British Columbia/Alberta has to offer – Whistler, Banff, Jasper, Lake Louise etc… and (very importantly) find hot springs!  Will look something like this and take around two weeks:

After travelling around the beautiful Rockies in Canada, hop on board luxurious but moderately sized (all things being relative for the size of the boats that travel these areas) cruise ship for 7 day tour of the Alaskan Inside passage and glacial scenic cruising.  Itinerary for which looks like this:

Put up token resistance about cost of cruise and then get blown away with Balcony room upgrade for same price as Ocean View room on said fancy ship (like the one below but nowhere near this big thankfully!)… not sure the balcony will get a lot of use due to freezing temperatures (well for people from the subtropics) but it will probably afford some great photo opportunities without having to race up on decks.

We will find ourselves in Anchorage at the end of this section of the trip where we have I think 9-11 days to go check out some of the Alaskan interior.  Very excited about this, places to go see killer whales, walrus and other amazing Artic animals which will be awesome!  Itinerary possibilities for this section are going to look tentatively something like this:

Anyone who knows me at all knows this entire adventure is entirely centred around attempting to get in as many otter sightings as humanly possible… why else would you put yourself through all this painful and long travel?!?  So you know… it’s all about the otters.  🙂

Now if all that weren’t exciting exciting enough… on the way home we have to fly back via LAX anyway so we thought we’d pop to Las Vegas for a few days to see some of the Cirque du Soleil shows that are permanently in the Vegas Casinos.  These shows never travel so there’s no other way to see them other than to go there, so we are hoping to catch three or four of them… Will be booking tickets well in advance!  🙂

Then it will be back home to gorgeous winter weather in sunny Queensland.  🙂  My biggest concern with this enormous and exciting plan is… how on earth is my back going to hold up under the long haul flights and constant travel?   :S   I foresee a very fine balancing act between enough drugs to manage my back pain, but not so many as to befuddle my memory!  Let’s hope I can pull it off.   😀

"Ahem.  Welcome to Brisbane where the outside temperature is 25 degrees and the local time is just going on 7 minutes past six.  Please remain seated until the Captain switches off the seatbelt signs overhead and the plane has come to a complete stop.  Please also be aware that your overhead luggage may have moved during our flight and we ask that you take care when opening the overhead lockers.

We will be disembarking via the front doors only this afternoon so please follow all directions of the ground staff and remain within the yellow lined areas.  The plane will be refueling durring our disembarkation so we request that all mobile phones remain switched off until you are safely inside the terminal building.  Let me also remind you that smoking is not permitted i this area and there is no smoking allowed on the tarmac or in the terminal building.

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