Celebrating, PLI, Rain and, of course, stoic challenges

Posted on July 19, 2026 by trueloveadventures

July 17, 2026

I can’t believe it’s been almost a month since I did the last blog entry. Between guests, cruising, stoic challenges, lots of sun and just chilling the desire to write hasn’t bubbled to the surface.

But this morning we are at our summer dock in Pender Harbour, the weather is cool and drizzly and we have a moment to fill you in on the highlights of the last month.

Friends:

The joys of the last month centered around friends. First we stopped at Schooner Cove (just north of Nanaimo) to see our friends Denise and Ian. We even got a round of golf in.

From there we took advantage of a relatively easy crossing of the Strait of Georgia and even got a slip for the night in Lund (just south of Desolation Sound). It’s been a few years since we’ve been there and we got to shop at the wonderful bakery and revisit the art gallery there.

We hoped to get some last minute provisions, but that grocery story in Lund isn’t great. However, it did carry our favorite special Haagen-Dazs Layers Mint Ice Cream with layers of mint and chocolate that we can only find in Canada.

We were a little late leaving Lund, so before we headed up to Dent Island to meet our friends Kurt and Mona, we stopped for the night and dropped anchor in Gorge Harbour on the west side of Cortes Island.

Our first 10 days after departing Seattle in mid-June, we were blessed with glorious weather. The usual “June gloom” was nowhere to be seen, until late June when all of the usual June rain and cold was packed into a few days, just as our first guests arrived by seaplane. So instead of leaving Dent immediately on our planned cruise north to Erasmus Island (near the Blind Channel Resort), we decided to stay at the dock an extra day, and ride out the storm with Kurt and Mona at the very nice Dent Island Lodge.

And it wasn’t only the 1.5” of rain that kept us at the dock an extra day. It was our first (key the dramatic music) stoic challenge.

Stoic Challenge #1:

As usual we were welcomed like family at Dent Island and assigned one of the best slips at the dock, right next to the little tidal rapid that runs next to the Lodge. That night, after exercising at the gym and enjoying a scrumptious dinner we slept soundly.

The next morning I went below to check the engines and noticed pools of cooling fluid under the engines. Well that’s not good, I thought. So I looked around. We called our mechanic, we explored for possible leaks in both engines, inspected the insulated hoses going to the block heaters and found: a crack in the starboard coolant hose. Sadly, this looked like a hose that definitely should have been replaced before we left Seattle when all the fuel injectors were replaced. It was too short, looked old and was actually touching the hot engine. I suggested to the mechanic that I get some new coolant hose and replace it, but he warned me that it was difficult to do without all five gallons of cooling fluid spilling out. After video calls, we decided I should just wrap it with some silicone tape, which of course I have in my repair supplies.

It was a good idea, but unfortunately, the old coolant hose was so brittle that as soon as I tried to move it a little bit it completely broke on both ends, followed by a fountain of fluid gushing out like a volcanic eruption. Ok maybe not that high, but you get the idea!

Thinking quickly, I put my finger in the hole that was leaking and screamed to the captain for help. Climbing down to the engine room while I’m panicking is not the Captains favorite thing to do. We tried to work through some solutions that could replace my finger, like wine stoppers or corks or shaved corks of various sizes. None of them did the trick.

The good news, was that we were at Dent Island Resort and I suggested Jim call up to the team to get help. And they were awesome! They didn’t have the right size hose, but they helped us stop the leak with the correct size silicone plug (from a bag of various sizes of plugs that I’ve already ordered for my repair supplies). They also told us where we could order some new coolant hose from the boat supply store in Cambell River, which believe it or not, arrived by water taxi before the day was out.

About 90 minutes into our crisis, it was time for Kurt and Mona to arrive by seaplane and right on time we got a text that they were on final approach.

Needless to say, I needed to change and take a shower ASAP. I did and was ready to meet them at the plane just as they arrived at the dock. Did I mention it was pouring rain at the time they arrived and we got 1.5 inches of rain that afternoon and overnight? Normally, I would have made everyone dinner, but we decided instead to make a dinner reservation at the lodge.

But before dinner, we enjoyed Dent’s new outdoor hot tub.

Also before dinner, Kyle delivered the new coolant hose and helped me replace it, a fairly simple repair with the right parts, although a bit messy, so I needed another shower before I was ready to go back up to lodge for a lovely dinner where we were treated to great food and the sounds of heavy rain, lightning and lots of thunder.

Friends Continued . . .

The next day the rain stopped, we left the dock and headed to one of our favorite anchorages on the west side of Erasmus Island. But first we stopped at Blind Channel and our timing couldn’t have been better because the bakery there just put out fresh, bubbling hot apple turnovers. Normally, we would all eat half a turnover but these were just too good and hot and yummy, so we all enjoyed apple turnovers for lunch.

After lunch, Kurt, Mona and I went for a short hike in the woods to the big old cedar tree. It’s a lovely walk and a very big, thousand year old cedar tree.

We anchored at Erasmus Island for the night. It was still cloudy and drizzly, so no star watching this time. But the best stars we’ve ever seen were at that anchorage. Here’s one of my favorite photos from the archives.

Next day we cruised around looking for orcas, dolphins and humpbacks, but unfortunately we didn’t see any. While we were waiting for the rapids to calm we got to show Kurt and Mona what they look like at close to full strength. Again since we didn’t see any marvelous sea creatures, I thought I would share one of my favorite photos from the archives of dolphins jumping at that location.

While cruising to Dent I turned on the generator so I could use the microwave, which leads us to . . .

Stoic Challenge #2:

After turning on the generator the port engine battery light alarm sounded. Nothing seemed wrong. There was not a problem with amps or obvious voltage problems but engine alarms are never good, so we turned the engine off, then on, then turned the generator off, the on. During all of our experiments, we kept the starboard engine on, which is important when cruising near a tidal rapid. I love having twin engines!

After we got back to Dent, Mona and Kurt went off to enjoy the lodge, while the Captain and I did some sleuthing. I used ChatGBT to help us diagnose what the heck was going on and after lots of questions and answers we decided that while the battery alarm is a problem we have to fix eventually, we didn’t need to fix it immediately. And the Captain discovered that turning the battery charger off allowed us to once again use the port engine and the generator at the same time without triggering the battery alarm. Since then the problem seems to have just gone away entirely. Clearly there is something wrong, but we will just add it the “need to fix this” boat list that always begins once you leave the dock. One would think that after 10 months of getting the boat ready for our summer cruise we could get more than two weeks without something going wrong. But of course that is just a boating fantasy.

Friends and Celebrating continued . . .

Our last night at Dent coincided with celebrating our 45th Anniversary. The Chef’s Table at the Rapids Grill meal is always a wonderful experience, but this year was especially nice because we were celebrating with friends. And everyone at Dent, staff and guests, wished us a very happy anniversary. Many people asked us how we did it. I said, “start early”!

The next day we left the dock at Dent before Kurt and Mona’s seaplane arrived so we could get through the surrounding rapids during slack tide and headed south to Desolation Sound for an anchorage in Walsh Cove. It’s a great little anchorage and gave us a chance to practice our stern tie skills. I’m not going to lie, we needed the practice.

Given my lightly lame shoulder, it took some work and unfortunately, we had to redo it a little deeper water with more anchor chain before we went to sleep. But we slept well knowing we were now ready to stern tie at our more challenging stern tie anchorage in Princess Louisa Inlet.

Powell River to Pender Harbour to Princess Louisa Inlet

From Walsh Cove we headed to Garden Bay Marina (near Powell River), because we wanted to get some of our favorite fish and veggies at the little market there. After docking and refueling we took out our e-bikes using our new pulley system and rode into town. Sadly, the market was closed for renovations so we continued on to have dinner in town. The next day we made our way to our summer moorage in Pender Harbour. So, after about 3 weeks, we finally arrived at our summer “home”. We loved the beginning of our cruise but we were ready to return to our comfort zone.

Pender Harbour is home to a wonderful little spa at the Painted Boat Resort where we both got massages, enjoyed the heated soaking pools and then ate at the yummy Lagoon restaurant.

The next day, after re-provisioning, we prepared to head into Princess Louisa Inlet for the first time this summer. I would say it never disappoints, but . . .

Princess Louisa Inlet and the algea bloom.

PLI is our happy place. It’s pristine, calm and glorious. But there was a huge algae bloom there that was just icky, brown and very unappealing. A sepia wash covered my favorite mountain reflections in the water. I did some research and there didn’t seem to be any concern in Canada. Brown algae blooms occur every 10 or 15 years, but we had never seen one. It comes on suddenly and dissipates suddenly. Apparently, despite its sewage look, it isn’t toxic like green algae. It didn’t keep us from paddle boarding or kayaking, we even pizza floated on the hot day, but we didn’t swim. We worried about the seals and wondered if it would keep the calving from starting, but it didn’t and we saw are first newborn seal.

It did lead to a mini stoic challenge because the algae is too much for our watermaker. We had to change the filters and it still didn’t work. We thought it was broken because it wasn’t getting enough pressure probably because of the algae. After a call to watermaker support team, we decided to wait until we left PLI a couple of days later and see if running fast would clean the intake out. Luckily, we had enough water.

After about 5 days it was time for us to return to Pender to re-provision before picking up our Canadian/Oahu friends in Egmont last Monday. On our way out we discovered the algae bloom extended out of PLI and into Jervis inlet for most of the 30 miles back to Egmont. It turns out when we changed the filter on the watermaker the “O” ring slipped out of one of the cylinders. I remembered seeing an extra O-ring in the stern of the boat, but didn’t know what it went to. A key to boating don’t throw things away. So after I reinstalled it, the watermaker worked back at Pender Harbour.

Friends part 3 . . .

On Monday, our friends Brian and Donna flew their private plane from their home in Revelstoke to Sechelt where they rented a car and drove to Egmont, the little hamlet closest to Princess Louisa Inlet. After a quick lunch we enjoyed a beautiful sunny cruise, riding the tide and a trailing wind all the way back to PLI.

Like a mirror

Having Brian and Donna onboard made shore tying in our favorite spot a breeze. Amazingly, last week’s algae bloom was gone. The water in both Jervis Inlet and PLI was, like usual, crystal clear! The next 3 days we feasted on steak, fish, salads and Donna’s homemade relish, pickles and adorable mini burgers. And we can’t forget the brownies and ice cream. We deployed the kayaks and paddle boards and floating pizzas and even got some great stars too. On our second day I had a zoom board meeting for our Hawaiin Princess Condo Association, while the Captain took Brian and Donna on an excursion to the Malibu Young Life Camp, through the rapids to the petroglyphs. It’s so much fun sharing our favorite place with some of our favorite people.

We exited really early Thursday morning to catch the ebb tide and winds back to Egmont so Brian and Donna could get to their plane and fly back to Revelstoke ahead of an incoming storm. Luckily, the weather held off long enough for them to fly home and for us to dock back at Pender Harbour.

About 30 minutes after we were docked, connected to shore power and refilled our water tank, the big winds arrived, followed by heavy rain, thunder and lightning. There was a break in the rain yesterday afternoon, so we took the tender across Pender Harbour to the “big” town of Madeira Park, and walked up the hill to our favorite restaurant, Mama’s Japanese Kitchen for dinner followed by quick visit to the local IGA grocery store to re-provision again for our last guests of the summer (Ned & Deborah) who will arrive by seaplane tomorrow.

But first biking to Motoko Gallery

I’ve admired Motoko’s art at the Painted Boat for 15 years. But, we weren’t in a place to purchase anything. When we were in a good place 2 years ago, she was back in Japan to take care of her aging parents. A couple of weeks ago I noticed her husband cleaning the brush from the sign for her studio on the main road while I was running. He let me know they were in town and the gallery was open again. Today, the stars finally aligned and we road our e-bikes to the gallery. We hoped we would find a something to celebrate our 45th Anniversary, and we did! We found this beautiful painting of a waterfall she saw in Narrows Inlet (between Egmont and Sechelt). It reminded us of the beautiful waterfalls we see every year in PLI.

A Dark History in Pender Harbour.

When we left she told us about a small historical site nearby that just opened, focusing on the history of Japanese immigrants to Canada and their Internment in WW2. It’s in an old school house. Who knew that Canada was even worse than the USA in their treatment of the Japanese during WW2. Not only did they take their property without compensation and move them to internment camps in the middle of nowhere, and never returned their confiscated property, but when WW2 was over Japanese Canadians were not allowed to return to their homes in British Columbia. Under Canada’s “Go East or Go Home” policy, all people of Japanese descent had to return to Japan or move east to Ontario or beyond. Like the USA, Canada did not apologize or pay reparations for this injustice for over 40 years.

As an interesting aside, the first teacher came from Vancouver by row boat. That’s right, a row boat with her husband and two children. That is about 200 miles along the coast in pretty rough conditions. She certainly was tiny, but tough.

The Coffee House

On a happier note. We also got to attend a great local music night at The Medira Park Performance Center. There are concerts throughout the summer, but we have never been here when happened, until this year. The band was terrific and the local community made us feel so welcome. We only had our phones to pay and it was cash donations at the door. People donated on our behalf and bought us cake and coffee. We of course paid them back the next morning at the visitor center and have made friends with Shannon.

As usual we really appreciate you reading along with our journey.

It’s like a mirror.

The Captain and the First Mate of the True Love

Written by the First Mate and lovingly edited by the Captain.

True Love 2026 Summer Cruise

Posted on June 20, 2026 by trueloveadventures

Our normal cruising pace has traditionally been pretty fast after we leave Seattle with the goal of getting us up to Pender Harbour and our favorite spots as soon as we can. But this season we’ve chosen a slower journey.

Due to the big tides and some fun grandchild activities our journey north began late Saturday afternoon on June 13th.

But the day before we left, we got to pick up James and Robert from their last day of school. Their custom for this important occassion has always been to head to Dick’s for a burger, fries and ice cream, so of course we did that first and then we went to the True Love where they helped us replace the battery in the tender.

We hadn’t tested the tender yet and given the calm winds and glorious weather we launched it for a fun trip to the floating World Cup soccer party dock on the nearby Seattle waterfront. James just wanted to chill but Robert wanted to drive the tender so they both got what they wanted. It was a perfect outing. When we got back we rested and made sure they ate before we dropped them both off at Robert’s baseball practice and James drove home with his Mom.

That evening we went back to the boat and watched the USA win its first World Cup match. Saul joined us on the boat for the end of the game, which made it extra special. Needless to say, we slept well that night.

Saturday morning we did our final errands and shopping before heading out. The few weeks prior to our departure were super busy and included a successful and extremely special ground breaking ceremony of Dick’s next restaurant (#11!) just north of Everett, next to Marysville, on the Tulalip tribal homeland.

So as we began cruising north, we were hoping for a slow and drama-free start. As we all know gas and diesel are super expensive this year. Our best option heading north was Kingston, at “only” $6.45 per gallon. Gulp. But we were entertained by the band playing at the nearby Pirate Festival. Normally, we would wind our way north and anchor at the Fort Flagler marine park (across the bay from Port Townsend), but we just weren’t up for the drama of dealing with the super low -4’ tide the next morning, so we got a slip at the Port Townsend marina instead. It wasn’t fancy, but it did the trick and we were treated to a great sunset.

The next morning we snuck out before the tide got too low even for the marina and cruised easily to the San Juan Islands. We had a brief stop from the Coast Guard out doing some training and we got a safety check, which we of course passed with flying colors.

Again, our goal was to take things slow, catch up on our sleep and make our lives easy. So we spent two lovely nights at Roche Harbor. Roche is the center of the boating universe on and near July 4, but in mid June, Roche is definitely in pre-season mode. Our stay included good food, donuts, e-bike riding and even pickleball. Every morning we awoke to bells and music at 9AM sharp. No one sleeps in late a Roche. Every evening there is a flag lowering ceremony for 4 flags (Roche, Canadian, British and US), complete with a canon blast and taps played by trumpet.

Before we left Roche we puzzled through creating a pulley to help us get our ebikes on and off the boat. It took us longer than we thought it should, but with a little help from ChatGPT, we ultimately were successful.

Because Roche is only 6 miles from the Canadian border, we could call Canadian customs from the dock at Roche and get clearance to enter Canada (using our Nexus cards) before we left.

Normally, we clear customs in Montague Harbour. Notice this Harbour is spelled with a “u” vs Roche Harbor. That’s what happens when you cross into Canada. But I digress. There weren’t a lot of people out on the water, probably because of the high price of fuel, and it’s early in the season. But I thought it would be fun for the same reasons to visit the world-famous Butchart Gardens now, rather than wait to the end of our cruise as we usually do. Our readers know that Butchart Gardens is truly one of our favorite places in the world.

Tod Inlet offers a small, but protected and magical anchorage, because, from there, boaters can take their tenders to the special entrance to the Gardens for small boats.

Our first anchorage was a bit dicey. When we drop the anchor we usually aren’t satisfied until we get a good grab from the anchor with good scope. Unfortunately, we didn’t judge it well. The anchor grabbed and then released, but given our shallow depth we thought we were ok. The Captain decided to let it go even though we had dragged a bit. An eagle flew over us as we settled in for the night.

When we woke the next morning, we definitely had dragged some more and knew we were going to have to reset the anchor before we headed to the Gardens. But we weren’t in a rush, until we were! While drinking our coffee and reading the news, I looked up to see we had drifted almost to shore, and had to jump into action. It really wasn’t a stoic challenge. But it could have been. The second time we set the anchor in another location it grabbed perfectly. What can I say, we are out of practice.

This summer we are testing a new device for Jim called a Sidekick. The device is a first generation exo-skeleton that gives Jim’s calves an e-boost to help with walking. We read about it in the Wall Street Journal and decided to give it a try. When we first tried it Jim was disappointed. They are much heavier than they will be in the future and the ability to personalize the power assist is less than he hoped. In his head he thought it would be more robust. But we thought the walk through the hills and gardens would be a great second test. They aren’t perfect, but they really did help. He walked for a couple of hours and wasn’t extremely tired. After taking a break we even were able to walk the gardens again when we went back for lovely dinner.

This time of year many of the garden beds are less full, but the roses were magnificent. I wish I could send you the aroma through this blog. Unfortunately, that is not available. It’s funny that some roses are visually spectacular but have no aroma.

Yesterday, we left Tod Inlet and anchored at another of our favorite spots, about 20 miles away, on the north side of Montague Harbour. There is no place more beautiful for sunset views and there were only two other boats. Light winds and the warm sun made for a perfect afternoon.

Jim isn’t the only one needing to take it easy this summer. Over the winter I injured my shoulder starting the snowblower and I’ve scheduled surgery for August 18 to repair my right bicep ligament. The surgeon said I could go on our usual boat trip this summer because I really can’t damage it more. So we decided to give it a try. I’ve been using my left arm more, becoming more ambidextrous, and even playing pickleball left handed. It’s going pretty well. Last night I tried paddle boarding at Montague and although I’m not supper strong, I can still do it. Shoulders are complex. I can still do some things but not others.

While watching the sunset an interesting bird landed on the boat and began singing. ChatGBT couldn’t really identify it, but the Merlin bird App did. It was a female Purple Martin.

Song of the Purple Martin

Last night the winds really picked up. It was a windy noisy night, but the anchor held beautifully. And we woke up at 2:30AM for our first star gazing of the cruise! Although it was windy, the sky was dark and clear, with the Milky Way bridging over us across the night sky. As is typical now, the night sky is filled with the movement of satellites, but we ended our star gazing with a small, but enchanting shooting star.

Today, we headed to Ganges on Salt Spring Island, in the Southern Gulf Islands on the east side of Vancouver Island.. Again, cruising the June preseason made finding a dock space easy. I absolutely love Ganges’ Farmers Market, which happens every Saturday, especially the fresh baked sourdough bread, special goat cheeses and other yummy goodies. We will stock up tomorrow and spend one more night here before continuing north, through the Dodd Narrows rapids (at slack tide) and probably spend the night in Nanaimo.

Yesterday we rooted for the big Canada win in the World Cup. On our way to Ganges we listened to the fabulous first half of the USA-Australia soccer game. During this World Cup we are all soccer fans. It’s fun to see people from around the world enjoy the sights, sounds and tastes of America. More sports, less politics and no terrorism makes for more enjoyable life. After we docked and settled a bit we walked to the local Pub (Moby’s) for great food and the second half of the game on a big screen TV. From what we could see, it looked like everyone at the game in Seattle had a great time.

Our slow and easy start to the cruising season meets our needs this summer. We hope to meet up with Vancouver Island friends over the next few days before meeting other friends at Dent Island, and later, Princess Louisa Inlet.

The Captain and the First Mate of the True Love

Final Day In Japan

Posted on April 16, 2026 by trueloveadventures

We woke April 12th Japan time/April 11th Seattle time. James wanted to watch the end of the masters, so using the VPN we brought it up on the iPad and watched the last few holes in bed.

Then it was time to pack up and head to our last yummy breakfast at the beautiful outside deck at the hotel. Baba was moving slowly. He did so well on this fast paced trip, walking almost 12,000 or steps a day. Everyday he surprised himself, even though James and I knew he could do it. We used trains as much as we could and got pretty good at finding elevators, but sometimes we had to go up steps with Fawn providing an extra push from behind, which worked well. All good, no worries.

We had two last stops before we headed to the airport: Shibuya Crossing and a tour of the Imperial Palace Gardens. After analyzing our train vs cab choices, we decided to cab to the crossing.

The traffic stops and the hordes of people cross the intersection in all directions including diagonal. It looks a little like Times Square. We crossed diagonally and experience the flow around us. We crossed a few times and then cabbed back to the hotel.

At the hotel, we did a final look around our room, checked out and stored our luggage with the valet before heading out to the train for the Imperial Palace Gardens.

The sun was out and the temperature was perfect to tour the gardens. We met our guide at a Starbucks near the beautiful fountain park just outside the Palace.

Brandan, our Trip Advisor guide, was originally from the Vancouver (BC) area and was exploring his Japanese heritage by living in Tokyo for a year, learning Japanese, getting a black belt in Judo (he already had one in Karate) and doing history and food tours. His BA was in history so he was super pleased to be able to work in his field.

We were lucky to have such a knowledgeable, articulate guide. Learning history while walking through the flowering gardens is the a wonderful way to learn something new.

One thing new we learned is that Tokyo’s original name was Edo. When the Imperial Capitol was moved, after over 1,000 years, from Kyoto (which means “Capitol” in Japanese), Edo was renamed “To-Kyoto” (which means “Eastern Capitol”). Over time, To-Kyoto was shortened to “Tokyo”.

Another thing we learned is that the Japanese Imperial Family is, at over 2,000 years, the oldest royal family in the world. The reason is that for most of that time, the royal family was primarily the head of the state religion (Shinto), rather than the head of the government/military (usually one or more Shoguns), similar to the Pope and various Kings of the Holy Roman Empire between the years 800 and 1806.

The Imperial Palace Gardens used to be for the exclusive use of the Imperial Family. However, after WW2, the Gardens were opened to the public 5 days a week (on Monday and Friday the Gardens are still reserved exclusively for the Imperial Family.

The actual Imperial Family actually lives adjacent to the Gardens but for security reasons, the public remains completely excluded from that area, in fact, you can’t even see the living quarters of the Imperial Family because of the tall trees and walls that surround it. And no building in the surrounding area can have a view into the palace.

James and I talked about how most history books are so boring. There are so many better books than classroom-based history books. After a couple of hours of walking we took our last train ride with a transfer to the hotel. And we nailed it!

A quick cab ride took us back to Haneda Airport, the closer to downtown of Tokyo’s two airports. Security and check in was easy. I had heard the ANA lounge was quite nice and with good food and we weren’t disappointed. They had a fresh noodle bar and special chicken curry. By this time we were pretty hungry because we had a late breakfast we didn’t really have lunch. By the time we left the ANA lounge we were well fed and ready to sleep on the flight home to Seattle.

We couldn’t all sit together. The guys had two seats next to each other and I was separate. It really didn’t matter because we were all planning to sleep. Jim and I went to sleep almost immediately, while James watched a movie and ate some steak first.

Getting through customs in Seattle was a breeze. We were all pretty tired, but we loved going to the time machine across the international date line. We left Japan at 9:30pm on Sunday in Japan and arrived at 2:30pm in Seattle the same day!

Jasmine picked us up and dropped us off at our car parked at the marina. The weather was good, so we drove directly up to the mountains and forced ourselves to stay up until 9pm.

Unbelievably, James went to a football practice that afternoon! We talked to him tonight and he looks good and says he is over his jet lag. JIm & I are both close to over it. Clearly, jet lag is easier for 13 year olds than 65 plus!

Unfortunately, our group cold that passed from James, to Jim got me a couple of days before we flew home. So, even though the guys are are over it, I still don’t have my full energy back yet.

Our time with James in Japan fulfilled all our hopes and created special memories we won’t forget. It was such a special time of learning and sharing together. We can’t wait for our next “grandparent adventure”, this time with Robert, in about 3 years.

Tonight as I write this it is snowing heavily. I certainly miss our spring in Japan. Thanks for reading the blog and sharing our journey with us! I’ll blog again when we boat to Canada again this summer.

The Tokyo Giants against the Swallows Plus the Amazing TeamLab

Posted on April 12, 2026 by trueloveadventures

Our last days in Tokyo contained James’ favorite experiences of our trip. Sure the bowing deer were cool, but going to a baseball game at the Tokyo Dome was really the main draw. And we had the added bonus of getting to go to the game with his baseball friends from the Jorris family. We knew they were going to be in Tokyo at the same time so we bought game tickets together.

The concierge at the Grand Hyatt at Roppongi Hills in Tokyo got us the tickets in advance for all 7 of us. We highly recommend this hotel for a lot of reasons, but the concierge was especially good.

We left Kyoto in the morning and took the train to Tokyo. This time we exited at the Shinagawa station instead of the Central Tokyo station. It’s definitely a more chill station, but we had to wait a ridiculously long time for a cab. We were on a tight schedule to get to the game early and meet our friends. The cab system is strange and inefficient. It cues up cabs in multiple waiting lines but then allows only one cab to load at a time, even though there is plenty of room for multiple cabs to load simultaneously. Weird.

Anyway, we finally got to the Hyatt and were able to check in early to our room. This one (#1213) is a little bigger and has a great view of the Tokyo Tower. The photo shows James working on the blog.

We dropped off our bags and headed for Tokyo Dome City almost immediately to meet up with the Jorris family at the batting cages before heading to the stadium early for all the pregame hoopla.

It wasn’t just the Jorris family that we met up with at the game, our dear Canadian friends Brenda and Ted Ledding from the Hawaiian Princess were at the game too. It turns out their seats were really close to ours and they stopped by to visit us after seeing us on the way to their seats!

I’ll let James fill you in on the game and the full experience below.

We tried to take the train back to the hotel after the game, but we turned the wrong way out of the Dome, gave up and ordered an Uber. In Tokyo, the trains are very crowded after the games but you can easily get an Uber or taxi, because most people don’t want to spend the extra $20. But after our extremely full day, and not being anywhere need a train station, it was the right choice for us. When we got back to the hotel we were all exhausted but happy with another full day.

TeamLab

After sleeping in, we started our day with a hardy and yummy breakfast outside with our favorite employee, Minami Kakuta, the team leader. She remembered our order from 5 days earlier perfectly and we felt very well cared for. Nurtured and fed we headed out to TeamLab. The tickets are really hard to get and if you are going to come here buy them in advance. There are a few in Japan. This one is called Borderless.

TeamLab is a ridiculous name for this remarkable indoor digital art museum with lights, mirrors, infinity reflections, music, constantly morphing video projections of gorgeous visuals. Many of the exhibits felt like we were inside a kaleidoscope! We spent 2.5 hours there before I found that I couldn’t absorb any more input and needed to get back in the fresh air, sunshine and gardens.

I will attach some videos and pictures but they won’t do it justice I’m sure. One of the exhibits, the lily pads, made me tear up.

I will attach some videos and pictures but they won’t do it justice I’m sure. One of the exhibits, the lily pads, made me tear up.

There was a clever room where you got to color in the paper outline of a sea creature with crayons, then it was scanned and added to the “ocean” room, swimming around and even interacting with a touch.

After leaving TeamLab we grabbed some food at the local fancy market and sat outside to rest and enjoy the sun. We shared a table with Sue, a fellow traveler from Brazil who currently works and lives in Ireland. She was lovely and we enjoyed sharing travel stories with her.

James really wanted to go back to Tokyo Dome City to buy another t-shirt and a souvenir for Robert, so we did! We arrived right before the next game so the energy was electric around the stadium. After that we did some shopping for Jim and experienced more of Dome City, because we didn’t have the time to do that the day before.

James said that, if he moved to Japan he would live in Dome City. It had everything he needed: a baseball stadium, a sports complex with batting cages, an amusement park, and lots of food options including of course, ice cream.

As we were walking around James spotted a “Splash Mountain” ride and Jim/Baba said he would go on it with him. Unfortunately, Jim wasn’t allowed to go because the emergency stairs had no railings and Jim answered honestly that he can’t navigate stairs without railings, so I stepped in at the last minute to take Jim’s ticket. A Splash Mountain ride was not on the itinerary, but sometimes you just need to go for it!

We had reached the end of our day, but this time we exited directly to the train station and enjoyed a very easy train ride back to our hotel. Maneuvering through a station transfer like pros, I think we have shown James how to use transit successfully in a foreign country, which we’re sure will be helpful to him in the years ahead.

Splash Mountain Ride

In the train I said we were going to have to grab something to eat, but we were too tired to go out. So I said let’s just go to the Italian place and get a margarita pizza (which James loves) and salad. And James said, “but we are not here anymore.” And I laughed and said, “well then where are we?” He was thinking about the Italian restaurant in Kyoto vs the one in the Hyatt. We all laughed. It certainly has been a very full trip.

Tomorrow (Sunday) is our last day in Japan. We fly out at 9 PM and we will leave for the airport around 5:30 or 6. It should be a lovely day for our last tour at the Imperial Palace Gardens. We also want to see the super busy, multidirectional Shibuya Pedestrian Crossing. I think we will try to do that after breakfast, but before the tour. No doubt, we will be good and tired by the end of the day and will hopefully all get a good night’s sleep on the flight home.

The James Report at the Tigers/Swallows Game and the amazing TeamLab:

The whole Tokyo Dome City experience was epic. It’s hard to reduce it to just the game (although that was the best part). They have a giant amusement park, batting cages, bowling alleys, golf simulators, and more ice cream than even Baba could eat.

We went to the stadium slightly before gates opened to go to the team shop, and then went in. They did batting practice just like at home: Home team hits before gates open, while the Away team hits as gates open. Hendrick, Shea, and I were going to try to catch batting practice balls in left field, but that was the designated area for the visiting Swallows fans, and we needed a special ticket to get in.

Of course, with Japan being always respectful, the away seats were more cushy than the home ones. Their numbers were small, but they were loud. Both sides had designated chants for each player, for a strikeout, and for pregame. I would describe the atmosphere as a combination of a college football game and a soccer match. It was pretty cool.

The game started with a scoreless first and some good defense. The Swallows threatened, but couldn’t cash in. The Giants drew first blood in the second with a RBI single coming on the heels of a Trey Cabbage double (more on him in a bit). The Giants scored again in the third, putting the Giants up by two. That’s where the score stayed thanks to an impressive performance from Kazuyuki Takemaru, a rookie from Josai University. He was on the bump for five and a third innings, and really settled down after the first. The bullpen struggled a bit after him, giving up a run in the seventh that stirred the restless Yakult Swallows crowd into a frenzy. But, just as the Swallows started to gain some momentum… BOOM!

Trey Cabbage hits a freaking nuke to give some much needed momentum. It may have been the farthest I’ve ever seen a ball hit, in a real game at least. I saw some tanks at the home run derby in 2023, but that doesn’t count. It might have gone 450 feet. Cabbage is one of two Americans on the team, having come from AAA in 2024. Now, the Japanese are very strict about how you play the game: very respectful, no excessive celebrations, etc. When you hit a homer, you are expected to put your head down and run. Nowadays in the MLB, guys bat flip all the time, and always hit their trademark celebration. So, when you put a guy who has been in that atmosphere on your team, he is bound to celebrate. He did what one does when you hit a ball that far in a one run game: admired it for a while, flipped his bat, celebrated around third, and threw the home run stuffed animal (they love those here) into the crowd.

In the next frame, I was waiting for him to go out to left field, but instead I saw number 44 coming out. Well, the Giants manager is no different than the stereotypical Japanese baseball guy. It turns out he pulled Cabbage from the game for celebrating. It immediately came back to bite them too. That inning, the new guy missed a ball in left that turned a single into a standup double, putting a guy at third and most notably the tying run at second.

Thankfully for Yomiuri, their pitcher had ice in his veins and got out of the second and third situation giving up only one run. Their closer turned out the lights in the ninth with a one two three inning, giving the Giants the 3-2 win over their cross town rivals.

Oh yeah, and we also went to TeamLab. That was pretty cool, too. I liked the room with all the string lights reflected in the mirrors. That was the room that I could stay in there for a long time watching the patterns change all the time.

JIM: I loved James’ description of the baseball game! The Japanese are generally very reserved, but at a baseball game they are Super Fans. The fans in the Swallows’ cheer section had at least four trumpets and a big drum, and they sang their various fight songs over and over throughout the game. The Giants’ cheer section was twice as big and even more boisterous. It was a lot of fun.

The Giants have Cheerleaders (“the Venus”) to help root on the home fans, and there are 5 Cartoon Rabbit mascots (Dad, Mom and 3 kids). I’m not sure why the mascots are rabbits, although Dad Rabbit looks a little like the imaginary giant rabbit in the old movie “Harvey” with Jimmy Stewwart.

Unlike MLB baseball, everything was reasonably priced! Our tickets were only $40 and you could get a hot dog, curry beef bowl, or chicken skewers (and lots of other things), plus a drink for less than $10. Beer was $5.

AND, we had TWO foul balls come very close to us! The two guys in front of me each caught one off a bounce! James, Fawn and I have never been that close to a foul ball at a baseball game before!

TeamLab “Borderless” was an amazing, immersive video art experience. You should absolutely get tickets and see if if you are in Japan or if the exhibit comes to someplace near you.

We watched a bit of the Masters Golf Tournament this morning. Go Cam Young! Hopefully, we’ll be able to watch the end of the Final Round after returning to Seattle.

Giant Buddha and Bowing Deer in Nara

Posted on April 11, 2026 by trueloveadventures

We’ve mastered Japanese subways and trains and today we are on our way to Nara. The day was perfect for our journey. First, we walked to the nearby Sanjo subway station.

Along the river I spotted a very cool blue and orange king fisher. It’s officially called the “common king fisher.” But there was nothing common about it to me.

We made it through the subway and then changed trains in Tambabashi to the fancier JR rail line to Nara Park. From there we took the bus the final mile to the park entrance as we searched for the “bowing” deer and the giant Buddha.

When we told James about the deer in advance he seemed skeptical. But, when confronted with the wild bowing deer he was intrigued and we might say a little enchanted.

I’ll let him describe the experience:

JAMES: (deer and Lawsons chicken)

Yesterday was definitely a different experience than any other I’ve had. The deer roamed wild all over the city, not just by the Buddha. We got some crackers and gave them some if they bowed. It was very cool and unlike anything I’ve ever seen. The Buddha and its building were huge. The building wasn’t just tall, but also very wide. And the Buddha inside was massive. It also had other cool gold statues next to it. We have now checked-out of our Airbnb and are on our way back to Tokyo. The game is going to be a lot of fun, and it’s exciting to see a building I saw on tv just a month ago in the World Baseball Classic.

James and the sneezing deer.

Also, I finally tried the chicken from Lawson’s, which was recommended by an exchange student that came to our school the week before I left. It was great. It had the breaded outside of a McNugget combined with the moist inside of regular chicken. I hope to have more before we head back home.

FAWN: We strolled the beautiful park filled with deer and cherry blossoms on our way to see the giant Buddha. Jim and I saw it 10 years ago on our first trip to Japan and quite honestly it was just as remarkable the second time. Interestingly enough many people don’t go to see the Buddha even though it is an amazing historical site. They just go for the deer.

panorama of James x 2, Jim, deer and cherry blossoms

Because Jim has some mobility issues we could use the special ADA entrance, which was a real plus. Unlike the main entrance, the ADA entrance is totally uncrowded and provided a peaceful stroll through the outer Temple complex before entering the central building housing the historic giant Buddha.

Then it was time to stroll back to rail station to take our train and subway back home. After returning to Kyoto we decided to stop for dinner before walking the last 1/3 of a mile back to our Airbnb because we were all pretty hungry and didn’t want to walk any more than we had already.

Jim was exhausted so he stayed behind to soak in the hot tub while James and I went out to do our final laundry and get some more cereal and milk for breakfast.

Tomorrow we leave Kyoto to head back to the Grand Hyatt in Tokyo, drop off our bags and then immediately head out to the Tokyo Dome for the baseball game between the Giants and the Swallows. It’s going to be another packed day! But we get to see our first Japanese baseball game in person AND meet up with James’ friend, Shea Jorris and his family. It should be a blast!

JIM: It was great that we could walk to the subway, ride that to the train, and then take the train, and then a short bus ride, all the way to Nara Park. The giant Buddha was built over 3 years and completed in the year 752 as the center of the Todai-ji Temple complex. Over the years, the Temple and its giant Buddha were partially or fully destroyed, then rebuilt, after earthquakes, fires and civil war. Finally, in 1709, the current Buddha and its Temple complex were rebuilt again, and that is what we visited today.

James loved the giant Buddha, and even got a commemorative coin that was customized with his name and today’s date. But James loved the bowing deer even more, laughing and running around as the deer begged him for food, usually by bowing but sometimes by chasing him around and trying to snatch the deer food he bought right out of his pockets. The deer also ate grass from time to time, and even cherry blossoms if you gathered them up for them, but what the deer loved most was the “deer crackers” that you could buy from many vendors for 200 yen ($1.25).

We woke up to a rainy day and so we ordered an Uber to get to the Shinkansen Bulletin train at the main Kyoto station. Uber works really well if you have to schedule a taxi, not at a hotel.

The cherry blossoms are almost over but the dog woods and azaleas are blooming. Before boarding the train back to Tokyo, we noticed a local man collecting some of the fallen blossoms and feeding them to the deer. They don’t eat the petals alone, but they love the blossoms.

Sumo and Biking in Kyoto

Posted on April 9, 2026 by trueloveadventures

We are all getting used to our little Airbnb and Kyoto neighborhood. Tuesday was cold and windier than forecast. But we saw the rain coming so planned to do an indoor Sumo demonstration and lunch. On our way we planned to stop at a local coffee shop, but we keep running into the problem that the local shops are closed most of the time, so we ended up at a Starbucks to escape the wind and warm up a bit.

The Sumo event was part educational and part entertainment with a hot pot lunch held at the “Sumo Stable” located in the middle of a large outdoor-but-covered shopping mall on the 5th floor of an office building.

It was fun! The Sumo wrestlers are retired because of injuries, but they still love the sport. Our somewhat gimpy pair of wrestlers were still strong although no longer heavy weights. They demonstrated techniques and put on a show. In a strange, “it’s-a-small-world-after-all” twist the Master of Ceremonies was a skinny, Japanese-speaking, Italian.

There were also two geisha dancers. And then we all played a kind of “rock, paper scissors game” but with Samurai, tiger, & old woman. Everyone in the audience played the game and James won!

Eventually, they did a bit of a real three set match. The show ended with 8 audience volunteers taking on the Sumos. A few big guys thought they might have a chance (they didn’t) but the really cute part of the show were the kids, who all wore inflatable sumo outfits and won every match!

On the way home we tried to avoid the cold wind in the covered shopping area and found the Kit Kat motherload with the “72% Dark Chocolate” Kit Kats not available in the states.

We made it back but Jim was exhausted, unfortunately, and feeling the beginning of a cold. So Jim took a nap and James and I went out for a walk about and got some more breakfast stuff at the local grocery store. It’s always a fun way to get to know a new country and culture.

When we got back Jim was not up for joining us for dinner, so James and I went out again. The wind had died down and the evening air was still cold, but still. The two of us had a lovely date, and James picked out an Italian restaurant on the central Kyoto canal. I loved our dinner and discussion. We brought Jim back some pasta and some margarita pizza. On our way back we decided to stop and get him some ice cream too. As you all know this is again one of Jim’s favorite food groups.

The TV in our Airbnb is quite old and we couldn’t stream anything or screen share. We asked the proprietor about it and he ended up buying an AppleTV. So we all watched Blazing Saddles and laughed a lot before going to sleep..

Biking Tour:

On Wednesday, we signed up for an Old Kyoto E-Bike tour. We hoped for sun and no wind and that is was we got! The day started early and we needed a cab to get to the bike rental shop to begin our tour. We used an Uber and the pick up worked out perfectly, but the drop-off was confusing because the driver dropped us off close to the bike shop but couldn’t explain how we could get there, and our phone directions sent us off in the wrong direction. I had insisted we leave early in case something didn’t work out perfectly, so we had time to get lost a bit before we called and found our way to the bike shop. James doesn’t ride bikes often and this was his first e-bike experience but he did a great job over the 5 hour tour. The day started at 9 and we biked through an interesting twisting part of the old city. The tour included stops at two Buddhist Temples and one Shinto Shrine before sharing lunch at a little ramen restaurant.

This time of year, as expected, the flowers are beautiful and I’m glad we are here to see them, the temperature is warmer, but it is, as expected, very crowded.

The “Golden Shrine” was quite beautiful. Our group included the three of us, two other couples and our guide Jay. Jay did a great job. We learned some new things and we only had one person get lost. Unfortunately, that was Jim. Jim was at the end of line, and wasn’t able to turn right across a busy street because of the traffic, so he didn’t see everyone making a second right immediately after crossing the busy street. So Jim just kept going straight until it was obvious he had lost the group. After a couple of phone calls, texted pin drops that didn’t go through, and our guide telling Jim to stay where he was instead of coming back to the busy street, finally one of our fellow bikers asked me why I didn’t just use “Find My” app to find Jim. That worked! Jim was only a few blocks away. Personally, I was just glad it was Jim and not James. From then on, Jim rode directly behind the guide. Actually, Jim did such a great job. It was a very long day of biking and there was a lot more walking than we anticipated. But we all had a great time.

We left our place at 8:15am and returned at 3:30pm. All of us needed a bit of a break. Jim and I used the outdoor hot tub first and felt much better.

We ended our day with another walk to dinner and stumbled onto a restaurant that just opened that day. One of the employees sold us on giving it a try on their “soft opening”. It was a Halal Wagyu Raman Restaurant. We weren’t craving another Raman meal, but our hearts were with these small business owners and they were so pleased we came in. We were the second group they served that day. The broth, wagyu meat, fried chicken and noodles were yummy and if you scanned the QR code to leave a review you also got a free matcha. James especially like the Japanese fried chicken.

During dinner James shared that he was surprised how sore he was from the bike seat. Only Jim’s bike seat was the cushy kind, so I could relate. After dinner we convinced James to take the outside tub to sooth his bike aches. He did and it helped a lot.

Taking a local train to the Giant Buddhist Temple in Nara is next on the agenda for Thursday, our last full day in Kyoto.

James:

The Sumo wrestling was a fun experience. In the prematch I was trying to follow the end of the men’s basketball national championship when Grandma said that if I didn’t put the game away she would “Throw my phone away”. Sports have taken the back seat anyway because we’re with Grandma and because, as any Mariners fan knows right now, things have been pretty depressing. The wrestlers weren’t very big, but they were good entertainers, and we had a great time. The margarita pizza they served at dinner was great. Ramen is great, but it is safe to say I am starting to get a little sick of it. Plus, no trip is complete without some Italian food, even if we’ve now had it twice.

E-biking was another great activity. Those bikes are powerful, so it took some getting used to. I got the hang of it though, and despite the uncomfortable seat, I had a good time. It was fun to get on a bike again. The Golden Temple was really cool too. I enjoyed the outdoor tub (which is a one person hot tub, and even then it’s a little cramped). To end the day we watched “You Only Live Twice” with Sean Connery as James Bond. It is set in Japan, with some Sumo wrestling at the beginning, so it was fun to watch while in Japan.

Jim:

Wednesday was sunny and warm, a perfect day for our e-bike tour. I’ve always loved bicycling, and with an e-bike I’m as fast as everyone else. The Shinto Shrine we visited first was over 1,000 years old and dedicated to education and learning. The Shinto Shrine wasn’t crowded even though it is free to visit. Instead of charging admission (as the Buddhist Temples do), the Shrine sells annual sponsorships in the form of painted cylindrical banners. These banners are sold to individuals and businesses in three different sizes and there were hundreds of sponsorships throughout the Shrine.

The Buddhist Temples we visited next all charged admission and were very crowded, even after we got past the admission gate. This is the disadvantage of coming in spring instead of winter. The Golden Temple was beautiful, surrounded by a beautiful pond and gardens. The Zen Garden and Bamboo Forest Temple was a very large property but the most crowded, so it was difficult to find any tranquility there in April. When we visited it the first time, over 10 years ago, it was late January, so a lot colder, but not crowded at all. I actually enjoyed the Buddhist Temples in the winter season a lot more.

But I am loving my time in Kyoto with my travel buddies and looking forward to traveling to Nara and showing James the Giant Buddha there on Thursday!

From Tokyo To Kyoto

Posted on April 7, 2026 by trueloveadventures

Yesterdays was Monday for us and we are on the bullet train from Tokyo to Kyoto. Last night we overcame most of our jet lag. We stayed up until 10pm and slept (mostly) through the night.

Yesterday, Easter Sunday was a full day. James had a rough overnight with a bloody nose. He is prone to them (like his mother) especially after a cold. So he and I were up around 1:30am, after falling asleep around 8pm after our first full day in Japan on Saturday.

James is a real trooper and after we cleaned up what looked a little like a crime scene we both tried to go back to sleep, without much success. Ah well, that is what Kindles and audio podcasts are for. Remarkably, Jim, blessed with the senior male gene, slept through all of the excitement.

Looking for Kit Kats. James using translator.

We had originally planned to go to the 10am Easter Service. But, given our early wake up, we decided instead to go to the 8:30 service. We took a cab to Tokyo Union Church. The building is quite interesting and the inside of the church featured stunning stained glass, lit by the early morning sun. The flowers with tropical lillies filled the sanctuary with a lovely scent. As is typical we were welcomed warmly and enjoyed a meaningful and special Easter service led joyfully by the Pastor. The choir filled the sanctuary with the sounds of hymns throughout the service and I particularly liked that they sat in the pews with us for most of the service, singing the hymns with us.

The church was located in the Shibuya district of Tokyo. We decided to walk around a bit before heading back to the hotel by subway. Most Tokyo subway stations have at least once entrance that includes an elevator or escalator, and after some looking we found one and headed down.

Jim thought he knew the destination station that was closest to our hotel based on his iPhone map directions. James thought we should choose a different exit, Roppongo, since that’s the Tokyo district where our hotel is located. We went along with Jim, but he was wrong, and we ended up a half mile away. But it was a great mistake, teaching us about the serendipity of travel. It turns out the “wrong” choice led us to a fabulous “Cherry Tree” pedestrian walkway that went through a park next to the Ritz Carlton. That was another bit of serendipity, because as we explained to James, you can always get a cab if you’re at a hotel, even if it’s not the hotel where you’re staying. And Jim was ready for a cab ride to our hotel.

The exercise was great, but we were still pretty tired even after showering so we decided to eat at the hotel’s Italian restaurant rather than go somewhere else and it was the right choice because we had the energy to do something else on our list: visit the Tokyo City View from the observation deck of the 50 story Mora Building next door. It was a great way to cap off our night. I’ll let James describe the view and compare it to the view from Toronto’s CN Tower which he visited in 2025.

Back at the hotel we were all fading and decided to rest before heading out to dinner. James got up first and went to the hotel gym for another work out. James ran on the treadmill first and then I joined him for a quick swim before dinner.

I’m looking forward to seeing our AirBnB in Kyoto in person. The Hyatt was a wonderful Hotel with great service and a fabulous Concierge. But our room was small like most affordable hotel rooms in big cities and of course we couldn’t open a window so there is no fresh air.

It was a beautiful morning this Monday morning so we decided to eat breakfast in the sun on the hotel’s 2nd story patio restaurant. .Eating outside was perfect and we all enjoyed the food and the sun. I got to enjoy a Japanese bento box breakfast, which I love. The men had eggs and very unusual, but yummy pancakes.

We took a taxi to Tokyo Station to catch the 2 hour “Shinkansen” bullet train to Kyoto. We planned to enjoy the shops and food before heading to our train but, unlike the other Japanese train stations we have used, Tokyo Station had almost no services after we passed through the turnstiles. So we arrived early but then had to wait an hour for our train with no shops or restaurants. No worries.

While I’ve written this blog sitting comfortably in our seats, our “Shinkansen” bullet train left Tokyo, first into the industrial area and then the country side. We’ve passed a big lake (Lake Biwa), photographed Mt. Fuji in the distance and passed lots of hills dotted with blossoming cherry trees. I even saw a large ferry boat crossing Lake Biwa.

Our Kyoto Airbnb.

We made it easily from the train to our Airbnb. The neighborhood is great and really quiet. The instructions were pretty good to get us to the small apartment. The pictures are similar to the unit. It does have 2 bathrooms and 3 bed/matts. Everything is very clean, but . . . very small. We expected small, but this is smaller than we expected. The staircase upstairs is sturdy, but as James would say “sketchy”, with no railing. The screen door is in good condition, but because it doesn’t have a rubber seal that connects to the sliding glass door the bugs can just go around the screen and follow the light into our living room. But the proprietor has been very responsive and hopefully will fix it tomorrow.

After we got settled and laughed quite a bit, we headed out to the coin laundry near by. We met a local there who gave us some tips and we had a great conversation. He’s studying modern and contemporary history (specifically imperialism affecting Taiwan). His English was excellent. While we were waiting for the laundry, we headed out to grab a quick bite.

On our way we crossed the canal and came across the most beautiful cherry trees reflecting in the water. Then we came across a Mexican restaurant in strange little office building that also housed some other small ethnic restaurants.

Here’s the entrance. James was worried. He said it looked sketchy. We thought it was pretty ideal. The food was simple, but good. James was a little worried but soldiered through.

James: Easter was great. Our pastor was full of energy and it was a cool building. It felt just like a regular Easter back in the home in the states. It took some walking after that, but it ended up being even better because of the aforementioned cherry trees. One of the main things I’ve found with this trip is that going the wrong way, more often than not, leads to another adventure. It’s been great to be able to workout and swim, too. The hotel had a very nice workout room and pool. Plus, I think I’ve finally stopped the bloody noses. The night before the train we went to the observatory and had a great view of the city lights. The Tokyo tower is the best at night. The bullet train was interesting; It felt kind of like a mix between a plane and a regular train. Our view of Mount Fuji was awesome. Pro tip: When going from Tokyo to Kyoto, sit on the right side of the train to see it better. I am writing this from our Airbnb. It is small, but it works. The beds were on the ground, but surprisingly comfy. I slept great. I am excited for the sumo wrestling demonstration at lunch.

After the appropriate time we headed back to the coin laundry, folded our clothes and then headed to the local market where we stocked up for breakfast.

Today, for lunch, we are going to a sumo demonstration and chicken hot pot meal. Stand by!

Jim: I’m continuing to enjoy sharing time with my two travel buddies. Our Easter service was one of the best I’ve attended in years. The Pastor was definitely in tune with the Holy Spirit, and the setting, music and sermon were perfect. The Easter miracle and our individual lives are, as the Pastor said, definitely analogous to the miracle of dormant cherry trees awakening, blooming beautifully, living vibrantly, returning to dormancy and re-awakening again, in accordance with God’s plan. T

The rest of Easter was full of serindipities, ending with the beautiful nighttime lights of downtown Tokyo from 50 stories up.

The Shinkansen “Super Express” Nozomi bullet train is always a treat, as we journey 230 miles in just over 2 hours, including just 2 short stops along with way.

Our Airbnb in Kyoto is a very small 2 bedroom, 2 bath apartment, but it’s in a very quiet neighborhood next to a Buddhist temple. We sleep on floor mats which are quite comfortable, but for me, getting up from the floor takes some effort, especially in the middle of the night.

This morning we watched the NASA feed of the Artemis II spacecraft just before and after it went through a communications blackout as it went around the far side of the moon and began its journey back to Earth.

Now we are heading out to begin our exploration of Kyoto with James on foot, including lunch at a Sumo wrestling demonstration. Tomorrow, we’ll be e-biking around Kyoto in a 5 hour guided tour. I’m much better at e-biking than walking so I’m really looking forward to that and the weather should be sunny all day!

Breakfast while watching Artemis go around the moon.

Dewa Sayonara!

Going to Japan with James

Posted on April 4, 2026 by trueloveadventures

First thoughts from the airport

Fawn: I’m so excited for our journey. Jasmine and James picked us up at the boat. Getting through security and checking in was a breeze. ANA Air opened their terminals with a greeting. That was a first for us. We are now sitting in the Centurion Lounge. It’s hard to believe in about 10 hours we will be in Japan . . . Tomorrow.

James: It’s really cool to go to the lounge. I’ve never been here before. Security was easy enough and our flight is on time. I am very excited to see Japan.

Jim: I’ve been looking forward to this trip for a long time and today is the day we begin! Very nice to be traveling with both Fawn and James. ANA is supposed to be a great airline and we’re flying to the Tokyo airport that is closer to downtown (HNA) but we’ve never been there before.

First day in Tokyo:

Fawn: We arrived last night after our 10 hour flight. Jim and I had some trouble sleeping. Unfortunately, there was some turbulence that triggered a very unhappy baby. Luckily, James was undisturbed. That being said it was a really pleasant flight. Our friend Anthony, told us that the Japanese airlines are extremely efficient and boarding everyone very quickly. We boarded 30 minutes before our flight and the flight left the gate on time. It’s really amazing.

After deplaning and traversing an extremely long path to customs we arrived at the cue. For those traveling to Japan here’s a pro tip: get your customs code online. The experience will be much faster. It wasn’t bad for us. James and I had trouble with our photos and finger prints, but Jim’s went through easily. The process takes one computer stop, two forms and two manned-stations. All and all it took an hour.

Getting a cab was easy and we made it to our hotel, The Grand Hyatt, about 30 minutes later and the efficiency with check in was impressive.

This is a great place to begin our journey. After we dropped off our luggage we explored the nearby food options and munched a late steak & fries dinner before getting into bed. We all slept well and had a pretty normal evening.

In a funny side note, when we were riding the elevator back from dinner, two lovely stylish women joined us. It turned out one of them was also wearing toe shoes and we shared a moment.

With some rain and wind expected the next couple of days, we ventured out early for some wandering in Tokyo’s Roppongi District in search of some pretty cherry blossoms.

We imparted the important travel wisdom of finding a good local bakery to James and found one very close to our hotel for breakfast before heading out on our sojourn.

It turns out that James is pretty spectacular at navigating with a real map. He has the gift! Which is fantastic because his young eyes are very good at reading the incredibly small type on most of our maps. Jim did a great job walking around and we found some blossoms, experience the subway and grabbed second breakfast at the local McDonalds before heading back to our hotel. All this accomplished before the rain started.

We’ve enjoyed the pool and workout area. Tonight we head out for an early dinner to a place recommended by the concierge called GonPachi.

Tomorrow, we will celebrate Easter at a nearby church, hopefully watch some of the Final Four games and maybe head out to Takashimaya Shinjuku by train so James can experience the giant food court at the bottom of the shopping mall there.

James: Japan, in summary, is a lot different than back home. The sidewalks are giant, there are ads everywhere, and apparently McDonald’s has two floors. The farthest outside the US I’d ever been was Canada, so this is a big step up. Grandma and Baba are used to it, but I still find all the differences really interesting. It is a very clean place. There are no trash cans on the sidewalks, and there is almost no trash on the ground. They are very strict when it comes to littering. It was a very nice temperature here before the rain, which was nice for our walk. I was able to get a good workout/swim in, and we are going to have linner at 4:00 (We didn’t have lunch and it’s too early for dinner). Tomorrow we will go to an Easter service and do more exploring.

Jim: I love Japan, especially when the cherry blossoms are putting on a show. We walked a couple of miles together, exploring the area closest to our hotel, where there are a lot of tall office buildings, separated by small but beautiful gardens. Before we walked to dinner, the wind picked up and the cherry blossoms were falling like snow!

2025: What A Year!

Posted on December 31, 2025 by trueloveadventures

Last night Jim and I were talking about the last year as many of us do when Dec. 31st approaches and we both thought it felt extra full, extra tense, extra happy, & extra impactful, so quite mixed up. Looking back, maybe that is the way every year unfolds in early retrospect but that’s how 2025 feels to us.

We began 2025 waiting for Jim’s Aortic Valve surgery and we were nervous, but hopeful. Thanks to Jim’s inner strength and the amazing doctors, it was remarkably successful. We have spent the past year getting physically stronger and rebuilding muscle. Dealing with downstream radiation issues from Jim’s youthful cancer treatments will always be part of our lives. But the successful valve surgery was a huge blessing. Last month Jim began using a “FAO” bionic leg brace to increase stability and strength in his lower legs. It’s a learning process, but it definitely improves his walking and pickleball!

We did our first River Cruise in May which you can read about in our blog here from Amsterdam to Budapest, followed by a week in beautiful Switzerland.

We were back for the June opening of our 10th DDIR in Everett.

Our summer boating in Canada was very busy & successful with lots of friends and of course lots of stoic challenges. But that is boating.

We saw the Eagles at the Sphere in Las Vegas in September and it was awesome! Every seat is a great seat for the immersive music video experience. After that we visited Zion National Park, our favorite, for some late season desert mountain majesty. If you’ve never been to Zion you need to put it on your bucket list along with the Grand Canyon, Bryce Canyon and Monument Valley

Sharing time together with our family and friends is really what makes life so special and worthwhile!

We have so many blessings, but of course, national and international politics, addiction and homelessness and the darkness of antisemitism were a constant sadness for us. We are sickened by the war in Ukraine and the ongoing genocide in Sudan. We do what we can, try to stay informed but the Zeitgeist (“Spirit of the Time”) feels sick.

As “normies” we see the world pulled by the darkness of the extremes. All we can do is continue to speak out where we can and do good deeds around us as much as we can. We all have the power to make a difference with positive work.

Finally, the last living hostages were finally released by Hamas. Thank God they are home but true peace seems so elusive and the attacks on Jews around the world and in the US continue as we have recently seen so horrifically in Australia. It makes traveling to antisemitic cities like Toronto and countries that glorify “globalize the intifada” impossible for us. We really believe most people are good and caring, but we all need more people to speak out against evil when it reveals itself.

To stay up to date we listen to a lot of podcasts and read a variety of newspapers and blogs with diverse perspectives. Our favorites are The Free Press, The Dispatch, The WSJ, The New York Times (for some things it’s excellent, but definitely not regarding Israel and the Middle East), the Times Advertiser for Hawaii news, The Seattle Times for Seattle news, The Atlantic, and the blogs Noapinion & the Liberal Patriot. Our favorite podcasts are EconTalk, Advisory Opinion, Call Me Back, and For Heaven’s Sake. How do we have time for all of this you ask? We are retired, we like to read, and we love listening to interesting conversations when we are doing other things or driving somewhere.

I continue to counter all the negative energy out there by feeding my creativity with ukulele, creating mobiles and other fun stuff with sea glass “Calder” style, reading books, gathering for my book club, and traveling when we can.

Spending as much time as we can in the sun and salt water helps a lot too. Thanks to our friend Ken, I can finally make sourdough bread, cinnamon rolls, “discard” sourdough pancakes and other goodies. We are big sports fans of our local teams but most especially of our Grandkids’ teams. This summer we got to listen and stream their Little League Playoff games while floating on the True Love in Princess Louisa Inlet. The world is full of miracles and wonders, for sure.

We love good movies. Last night we saw “Song Sung Blue” with our dear friends Stephen and Kaysi. What a great movie, especially if you love Neal Diamond music, as we do. Of course, the music is wonderful, but it is so much more than that. It’s a movie about dreams, love, and perseverance despite extreme adversity. What more can we ask for than that as we look back on a year like 2025 and look forward to 2026?

Sending our love and aloha to all of you!

Jim and Fawn

“How Cool Is That!”

Posted on August 18, 2025 by trueloveadventures

We’ve only seen a bear in PLI once before over 5 years ago. We were kayaking just like today. Only I saw it sleeping in what we now call bear burl. But today The Captain saw it first while we were kayaking and he got a video! I love Jim saying “How cool is that?” In the video.

Friends old and new

This summer we decided to use Pender Harbor as our base and go in and out of PLI many times. Friends came by seaplane and car. We broke bread and shared this very special place with people we knew well and people we had met briefly. We traded cheeseburgers for shrimp with dock mates. Making connections with people is what makes life special. We’ve chosen to make connections, not focus on differences. We’ve been welcomed with open arms by our Canadian friends and neighbors. Most of the fear in the news is just noise and really needs to be ignored.

Movie Friends

Throughout covid, Jim and I kept up our Cinemark movie membership, so we had lots of extra tickets. We met Steve and Marsha in line and asked them if we could buy them their tickets. Steve asked, “Why”? After we explained it to them, they said, “ok” and offered to buy us our popcorn. We were practically the only people in the theater to see ”My Old Ass.” Again, we stayed in touch. They came to see the True Love at Elliott Bay Marina after we shared our love of boating. During their family boating years they never made it to PLI, so we asked them to join us, and they did!

During their visit the PLI seal nursery was in full bloom. They both swam in the water. It was getting warmer, but still quite refreshing.

In fact, while Steve was in the water a pack of 16 male seals ventured into the inlet. We had never seen this before. They were prowling around like a biker gang. Of course, seals are generally harmless, but it was unnerving to me, although you can’t tell from how calm Steve sounds.

We thought they were interested in Steve joining their gang. Steve and Marcia’s grandchildren and daughter had gone to Malibu camp so they definitely wanted to visit there and we got a special tour.

Shore Tie Malfunction With New Friends

We met Ian and Denise while taking an end-of-day walk last year near Nanoose Bay. We instantly connected and they came back to look at the True Love. Throughout the following year we continued to connect and they decided to join us for a few days in PLI aboard the True Love.

They drove to Egmont, boarded the True Love and we headed into PLI after looking at the Skoomchuck Rapids. Because of the tides we left later than we usually do. We normally like to get settled well before the sunset, but this night high tide slack was at 7. Our favorite and easiest anchorage was taken, but our second favorite was available. Normally, PLI is super calm with no winds. But of course this night we had winds first from the South and then from the North. The shore tie was easy but we were definitely moving North and South more than usual. Despite that we had a delicious dinner and then after a long day, I went for shower. When I came out I looked at our shore tie and we had moved way too close to the shore. For some reason The Captain (who usually is so vigilant about monitoring the quality of the shore tie) didn’t spot the problem. With darkness falling we had to do what no boaters ever want to do: raise the anchor and redo the shore tie in the dark.

We tried many things. At one point the Captain tried using the engines gently to pull us further out but the shore tie ricocheted us backwards and we were literally in the overhanging trees next to shore. That was a shocker. The good news was that at high tide, depth wasn’t a problem. Now it was really dark so we were using spot lights on the bow and stern, pulling out our other flashlights, making lots of noise with our engines and thrusters.

Poor Denise who was a little worried about adventuring on the True Love to begin with, quietly asked if we could just move to a buoy. Unfortunately, they were all taken. Through out the process the wind was moving us closer to a boat that was nearby. We completely loosened the shore tie and had Ian and Jim eventually use the tender as a mighty little tug boat to pull the True Love further out and north. We dropped all 300+ feet of our chain and this time, it held. The upside of the adventure was that by the time our re-anchoring adventure was all over, the stars and Milky Way filled the sky. This was truly a bonding experience. We all collapsed and watched the sky together for over an hour and saw lots of satellites and several shooting stars.

Names of the campers in the prayer hall.

The poor family who were in the nearby boat left our preferred shore tie location at sunrise so we moved and showed Ian and Denise how we can (sometimes) shore tie and anchor like pros. The following days were sunny and warm and the rest of our visit together was filled with good food, floating on the water, visiting Malibu Camp and lots of friendship.

Ukes And Friends

We also enjoyed a nice visit with Laird and Carol. They are old friends and have joined us on the True Love before. During their visit the water was at peak warmth, about 76 degrees. I spent lots of time in the water. In fact, for the first time I even swam across the inlet. I was swimming around the True Love and Jim was using the paddle board like a kayak and he escorted me across. I thought I might swim both directions but 1/2 mile was enough for me, so I climbed onto the paddle board and Jim paddled me back. Laird and Carol brought their Ukuleles on board and in the evenings we had a lot of fun playing together.

Kurt and Mona and Yes, Another Equipment Stoic Challenge

Our final guests are Kurt and Mona. We met Kurt through Saul and found out we both had a love of boating. His wife Mona had never been to PLI so they decided to fly in.

Once again we had a lovely visit with great food, wonderful wine (thanks to our guests) a visit to Malibu camp and lots of star watching. They were with us during the peak of the Persied Meteor Shower. Despite the full moon we saw lots of fantastic shooting stars and then watched the moon rise in PLI. Because of the moonlight, we couldn’t see the little shooting starts, but there definitely were some big ones that we all saw and cheered.

We are all looking forward to next year, when the Perseids will peak during a new Moon on the night of August 12 (put it on your calendars now!)

Kurt brought us a part that we needed to do a quick repair for the outside shower on our aft swim platform. But that wasn’t the stoic challenge. No, our generator failed to start on our last night with Kurt and Mona, after working fine a few hours earlier. The darn generator just wouldn’t turn over. After further investigation and multiple attempts, we still couldn’t get it to start. We even tried the magic “brain bypass” switch that Mike “MacGyver” Martin installed two years earlier but that also didn’t work. So we started the main engines and used our big alternators to top off the house batteries. Unfortunately, that was only a partial solution because we were now having a problem with the voltage of our house batteries. We checked our records and we bought them 6 years ago, so this was probably the end of their useful life. Together these failures meant we were going to have to leave PLI a day earlier than we had planned to go back to our dock in Pender Harbour where we could plug in.

After Kurt and Mona flew home on a Kenmore seaplane, we released our shore tie, lifted anchor and said goodbye to our wonderful summer in PLI. Unfortunately, slack tide on the Malibu Tidal Rapids wasn’t until 3pm, so we needed to cruise back to Pender later in the day, and against both a strong 20+ mph wind and a strong tide. Boy was it windy and wavy! But we also got an unexpected bonus: two humpback whales spouting near Vancouver Bay.

At around 7:30 we finally reached our summer moorage only to find another boat in our slip. On late stormy days, it isn’t unusual for people to find “any port in a storm” and the harbormaster let them stay in our slip because he thought we weren’t arriving until the next day. We could have stayed at the gas dock but instead we were saved by our Pender friends, Mike and Linda, who let us use some space at their private dock nearby and even came down from the house to help us dock in the wind!

That was so nice because the Captain and First Mate had reached our exhausted end. Once we were tied up and plugged in to power, we showered, heated a quick bite up in the microwave, and enjoyed a great night of sleep without “low battery” alarms waking us up.

Mike Martin to the Rescue!

Before we left PLI, I contacted Mike Martin, our mechanic savior who had help us in the past and he came aboard to look at the generator the next day. What can I say, I love Mike! He laughingly said we don’t have to sabotage our equipment just to see him. Although, I prefer not sitting squished in the engine room, I do love learning from him and watching him sleuth out the problem.

Long story short, the fuel pump he installed two years ago failed. Of course fuel pumps should last much longer, but this one didn’t. So he left, got us another one and came back the next day to install it, cleaned up a few things that needed tightening and we were ready to go!

Big Rain and Wind before Crossing the Strait to Nanaimo

Then the predicted big rain storm came in, but thankfully we were safely in our space at the John Henry Marina. And we met a some new friends over dinner at the Osprey Resturant. A young family was sitting near us. Small world alert: Stephen the Dad knows Ron, Jim’s cousin. They had taken a cab to the Osprey, but couldn’t get a cab back. They were planning to walk back with the kids but it was really wet, getting dark and it was at least 1.5 miles along the shore road to reach their marina.

So we brought them back to the True Love, dropped the tender, put them in our extra rain gear and the Captain ferried them all across to their boat in 5 minutes. Then we stayed in contact because we both had to find a window to cross the Strait of Georgia over to Nanaimo, get through the Dodd Narrows tidal rapids and find a place to overnight by Saturday night. Why you may ask? Well we had scheduled a full replacement for the house batteries on Monday morning in Sidney, and they had a family wedding on Sunday.

We need to be in Sidney this week for DDIR Family Assembly gathering in Victoria (about 30 minutes away by taxi). Originally, we planned to leave the True Love much farther north, in Campbell River and then rent a car to drive to Victoria. Our hope was to spend early September up north, but with all the boat issues we decided to head south and get this battery repair done here in Canada while we can.

We rushed the crossing a bit and although it was safe, it was exhausting with all the waves and the salt spray. I don’t know how I didn’t get a picture of my hair at the end, this is my good hair look, but it literally was blown out, straight up and out and frozen with salt spray. Once again after we anchored, showered and ate, we were treated to a beautiful Montague Harbour Sunset and then we slept hard.

From Montague Harbour it’s an easy 2 hour cruise to Van Isle Marina and the Philbrooks Boat Yard there. By now it was time to refill our 750 gallon fuel tanks and because Washington has decided to increase fuel taxes to some of the highest in the the US, the fuel prices here in Canada were lower than those in WA for the first time in our 17 years of boating. The excellent customer service at Van Nuy Marine rivals that at Dent Island: two dock people helped us into our slip and connected our power for us. Then we proceeded to wash off the massive amounts of salt spray from our crossing.

It’s Monday morning and the battery swap out including adding two more batteries has begun. The good news is they are smaller and more powerful.

It’s raining men in my engine room! And my Captain/Barista is making my latte. Life is good!

Thanks again for reading.

The First Mate (writer) and Captain (editor)

Don’t forget to download and listen to the Curve of Time Podcast. It’s great for listening to on the boat or in traffic. We now have over 5200 downloads!

True Love Adventures

The Travel Adventures of Jim and Fawn Spady