Visiting with Mr. Goalie

September 14, 2019September 14, 2019 / Greg / 1 Comment

On every trip with my dad, something kind of crazy, something memorable, always seems to happen. As we were doing a road trip through the mountains, while we were having an amazing time, we hadn’t yet had that “you’ve gotta be kidding” kind of moment.

Until Edmonton.

Dad and I met a family friend for lunch at the West Edmonton Mall and at one point the conversation drifted to my dad’s time as a goaltender in northern New Brunswick in his younger years. A few minutes later we had a proposition for our afternoon. Did we want to drop in on his friend outside the city? His friend? Hockey Hall of Fame goaltender, one of the greatest to ever play the position in the history of the game, Glenn Hall.

We left the mall, drove west of the city, picked up a six pack and casually dropped in on a hockey legend. As you can tell by the photo, he’s a pretty gracious hall offamer.

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Into the mountains with dad

September 7, 2019September 7, 2019 / Greg / 4 Comments

I’m not going to bury the lede on this… The five day, 2,200km road trip I took with my dad from Saskatoon to Calgary, then onto Banff, Lake Lousie and Jasper, and finally back to Saskatoon via Edmonton was one of the most fun things I’ve done in a long, long time. Every time I speak with my dad on the phone since he returned to New Brunswick, we end up talking about this trip and how much fun it was. Here’s the recap of an epic road trip, at least what I’m willing to share publicly. As with any good trip, there’s always a few things that need to respect the mantra “what happens on the road, stays on the road”

Calgary

When dad booked his flight from Bathurst, NB to visit me in Saskatoon in May, I immediately booked hotels for a mountain road trip so he could see the Rockies up close for the first time in his life. He arrived in Saskatoon, got acclimatized to my hometown for a couple of days, then we packed up the car and pointed it west. About seven hours later, we rolled into a rainy Calgary. First stop was at National on 17th, a great beer bar close to our hotel. Dad seems to be a fan of the pint I picked for him.

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Windy city pints

August 31, 2019August 31, 2019 / Greg / Leave a comment

Chicago is an interesting, but slightly logistically challenging city for craft beer exploration. If you’re staying in the centre of the city as I was, and want to visit a number of breweries or taprooms, you really have to do some traveling by subway and bus to some far flung locations. Like every trip I plan, I pinned a number of potential destinations on a map, then using the limited time in the city, tried to hit the really interesting and convenient places.

By far and away, the brewery I was most excited to sample from was Rick Bayless’ Cruz Blanca Brewery. You already know I’m a bit of a Bayless fanboy, in love with every culinary thing he does, so of course I needed to see if I would be a fan of his brewery.

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A change of plans

August 24, 2019August 24, 2019 / Greg / 2 Comments

When my wife was unexpectedly able to join me on my trip to Chicago, it turned a baseball trip into a restaurant exploration trip pretty quickly. My original plans called for a lot of ballpark food and craft beer, but I was thrilled to spin those plans on a dime and make each evening about heading out on the town in search of deliciousness.

With the last minute nature of our new plans, we used points to get my wife into Chicago flying a different route and airline than was I. When we parted ways at the Saskatoon airport, she didn’t yet have a seat assignment, so we weren’t sure if we’d actually meet up in Chicago. In light of that, we kept our dinner plans simple – at Fisk & Co, a hotel bar in the loop, for some seafood and (surprise, surprise) craft beer for me. It ended up being a great choice. She did make it into Chicago, and our first order of business was crushing some oysters. Delicious!

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Let’s play two

August 17, 2019August 12, 2019 / Greg / 2 Comments

Chicago is one of my most favourite cities in the world. It’s a great eating and drinking city. It has stunningly beautiful art and architecture. It is filled with down to earth midwesterners who always make me feel at home. And, as a baseball fan, it has two teams, which means any spring or summer trip to the windy city will have baseball to watch.

When I made my original plans, it was as a solo visit, extending a work trip for a few days so I could get to 5 or 6 baseball games. The trip I planned wasn’t the one I ended up taking, and that was a good thing. Some last minute changes of plans meant my wife could join me for a week in Chicago. While she’s not a huge baseball fan, she’s always up for a game or two. As both the Cubs and White Sox were in town, we decided on two.

So, game one – on a spectacular April afternoon, here we are checking out the ballpark in advance of a White Sox game against the Tampa Bay Rays.

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Rediscovering my travel groove

August 3, 2019July 31, 2019 / Greg / Leave a comment

For a host of reasons, some of my trips over the past year or two haven’t been as much of a vacation as I would have liked. Whether it was allowing work to intrude in a few cases, or me not able to get my head in the right frame, or a plethora of other factors, I had been struggling with consistently achieving the sense of rest, wonder and pleasure of a good vacation.

I’m back from a recent trip to Washington, DC, and while it started out with a work-related course, once that outstanding learning opportunity concluded, my mind slid pretty easily into vacation mode. I think I found a bit of my groove again by accident, but something I can learn from. While there are weeks and weeks of stuff to do in DC, I didn’t cram my itinerary full. I saw the sights I wanted to, and allowed a lot of time to just wander (take one look at my step count, and you’d see that I did some professional level wandering around the city). With little “fear of missing out”, I skipped the Arlington National Cemetery and hit a craft brewery taproom with a book because that felt like more my speed on that day. I was indulgent and went to five baseball games and enjoyed being absorbed in the games and nothing else for a few hours. All of this unlocked a lot of time for my mind to be by itself, and when I found myself listening into its background chatter, I could tell I was happy and relaxed. I mean, seriously, relaxed.

I’ve got trips coming up to Denver, Phoenix, and a big one to Japan including Tokyo and Osaka over the next few months. I’m hoping I can tap into the magic there was in these five days of vacation in DC and continue this groove for my upcoming trips.

Snowbanks for miles

July 29, 2019July 29, 2019 / Greg / Leave a comment

People in Saskatchewan, at least around Saskatoon, have no idea what a lot of snow looks like. Snowbank size is relative, but when I visited my mom and dad in northern New Brunswick in March after an epic winter, there was no question who should have had a licence to say something negative about their winter.

Landing in Bathurst, I was immediately taken by the amount of snow on the ground. Driving on the highway from the airport into town was like driving down tunnels of snow. Even after about a week of melting, here’s what the snowbanks in my parents’ driveway looked like.

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A mostly East Austin visit

July 20, 2019July 18, 2019 / Greg / Leave a comment

Luckily for me, this was my second visit to Austin. On my first a few years back, I had plenty of time to check out all that Austin has to offer. I had seen and experienced enough to know where I’d focus my very limited time on this past visit – food and craft beer. While I’ll need a third visit to Austin to make my first pilgrimage to Franklin Barbecue, I did manage to get to another of the city’s best reviewed barbecue joints. In East Austin, about a fifteen minute walk from where I was staying sat La Barbecue, a perfect amalgamation of restaurant, craft beer store and tap room. A real slice of heaven for someone like me.

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Porto in photos

July 14, 2019July 14, 2019 / Greg / 2 Comments

My last words on a fabulous two weeks in Portugal won’t be anything profound. It won’t even be a lot of words. Our trip ended in Porto, and its beauty is something that has stuck with me since back in October last year. I think some of the photographs I took can speak to the sense of place better than I can by attempting to write about it. So, here is how my mind will always remember Porto, one of the most beautiful cities I have visited in my travels.

Early evening view from our Porto apartment

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The famous Porto sandwich (and more)

June 22, 2019June 21, 2019 / Greg / Leave a comment

I’ll remember Portugal for a lot of things. The coastal vibe of Nazaré. The beauty of Lisbon, especially as seen from atop one of its many hills. The old world charm of Coimbra. But most of all, I’ll remember Portugal for its food and drink. This trip ended up being one of the best in terms of eating that my wife and I have ever taken.

The three days we spent in Porto at the end of the trip capped off our eating adventures in a wonderful fashion. On night one, we saddled up to the bar at Cantinho do Avillez and let the bartender do his magic with cocktail creations through the evening. This was a very wise choice.