Traveling Experiences 3 – Sunmound Ranch

RUSSIA & UKRAINE

In 1985, Nora and I traveled with the group sponsored by the University of Alberta to Russia and Ukraine. The group included several Americans. The tour leader was a professor in Russian language at the University of Alberta.

We landed in Moscow and proceeded to our hotel. Our first experience with the treatment of tourists in Russia occurred when our phone rang late at night and there was no one there. We were advised that this was the accepted way of checking to see if the tourists were in their hotel.

Our tour around Moscow, visiting the various attractions, was without incident.

On the day that we were scheduled to leave at 2 PM for Kiev in Ukraine, there was heavy rain. We were asked to remain in our hotel until they weather situation had improved. We left for the airport about 5 PM and were told that the weather was still unsuitable for landing in Kiev. We settled down to wait in the airport for further information. The airport had no eating facilities, but our local tour guide managed to find several dozen eggs and had them hard-boiled. This constituted our supper.

I noticed a group, which looked somewhat North American, waiting in another corner. When I wandered over to investigate, I found, by listening to their conversation, that they were from Mexico and had been waiting in the airport for three days. This was not a good omen.

About 11 PM we were advised that the weather had improved in Kiev and that we could take off. We boarded the Aeroflot plane and we were on our way. There was another group on the plane who were tourists from Belgium. They were complaining loudly about something or other, when the flight attendant, who could barely make it through the cabin door and looked like a member of the Olympic weight lifting team, came in to investigate the disturbance. She picked up the loudest complainer, held him at arm’s length and dropped him into a seat. There were no further complaints.

We landed in Kiev in light rain and proceeded to our hotel. We spent the next two days exploring Kiev.

The Diplomatic Academy and St. Michaels’s Monastery

We then boarded the boat on which we were to sail down the Dneiper River to the Black Sea and on to Bucharest, Romania. We sailed at night and during the day went on various excursions to sites of interest along the river.

One of these visits was to a training college for teachers. We were split into small groups and one of the students was assigned to each group. The exercise for them was an opportunity to practice speaking English. I commented to the young woman who was our guide that the city where I live had a nickname of “Edmonchuk”. She could not understand this, so I explained that it was because a significant percentage of the population were descended from Ukrainian immigrants. She had no idea that Ukrainian people had emigrated. She wondered if they had learned English and how they earned a living. I explained that they had in fact become Canadians and were an integral part of the population. I’m not sure she accepted this.

On another stop, we went to local market. One of our group, who was reasonably proficient in Ukrainian, began a conversation with one of the vendors. It became rather heated and, since I had no idea what they were talking about, I wondered why. Bill later told me that the Ukrainian had claimed that he, Bill, had only come to show off his wealth and embarrass the locals.

Another stop was at the collective farm. Here we were seated in one of the buildings and heard a description of the operation of the farm. Since all of this had to be translated from Russian to English and vice versa it took considerable time. This particular farm specialized in dairy cattle and vegetable seeds. It was partially irrigated and encompassed over 100,000 acres of land. A panoramic view of the farm is shown below.

They asked if anyone in the group was a farmer. Since at the time I was operating a small farm, I raised my hand without giving it any further thought. After this introduction, we were invited to a picnic lunch beside one of the canals.

I began a conversation, through the interpreter, with the young man who had been introduced as the Communist Party representative on the farm. He indicated that he was an engineer and I told him that I also was an engineer. His response was, “You said you were a farmer”. I was somewhat surprised that he had noticed this and remembered it. I tried to explain that I was able to do the work on my small farm on weekends. Somehow I doubt that he believed what I was telling him.

Someone brought up the subject of weeds and herbicides. I volunteered information on the herbicides being used in Canada. They seemed to be familiar with these chemicals. When the subject of weeds came up, I said that one of the common weeds in Canada was Russian thistle. This elicited a negative reaction, so I quickly added that we also have Canadian thistle. I had seen Russian thistle growing by the roadside when we came into the farm, so they also have this weed

Our group included, among the Americans, a doctor and his wife from Alabama. It had been apparent all along that she felt that she was in the company of lower-class people. The doctor became involved in a competition drinking vodka with the farm manager. The manager was much more accustomed to the Ukrainian beverage and the competition suddenly ended when the doctor collapsed. They brought a tractor, loaded him onto it, and took him back to our bus. Needless to say, his wife was not pleased with this turn of events, especially when the other members of the group began singing ‘Sweet Adeline’, which was her name.

After the lunch, we were taken to visit the school for the children who lived on the farm. They came to the school to show us around and explain their program. It was very interesting to learn that their school functioned in a similar manner to ones at home. Late in the afternoon we boarded our bus and went back to the boat.

When we reached Odessa, located on the Black Sea near the mouth of the river, we went ashore and visited a church and later went to a presentation of an opera. I don’t remember the name of the opera, but the people who knew something about it felt that it was a good performance.

Our tour leader had purchased a painting in Moscow. Before we left Russia, the police learned of this and ransacked his room looking for possible contraband or something. They didn’t find anything, but they did a considerable amount of damage to the room in the process.

While we were sailing across the Black Sea on our way to the Danube River, we encountered severe windstorm that caused considerable disruption to the items in the rooms. However, there was no serious damage.

We sailed up the Danube and spent a day in Sofia, Bulgaria, before arriving at Bucharest. Here the Communist regime was still firmly entrenched. There were armed soldiers standing around everywhere. However, they did not interfere with us in any way that we were aware of. The next day we went to visit the site of the story of Dracula. It was essentially a ruined castle that had no special significance apart from the Dracula story. From here, we flew back to Canada.

SOUTH AMERICAN CRUISE

In 1986, Nora and I went on a cruise from Valparaiso, near Santiago, Chile, around Cape Horn and on to Buenos Aires, Argentina. We first heard about the cruise through the University of Saskatchewan and considered going with that group. However, we found that it was $3,000 less to book the cruise with the cruise line. Since I was an alumnus of the University of Saskatchewan, the group assumed that we were part of them and included us in the group activities.

We spent a day in Santiago prior to boarding the cruise ship at Valparaiso. Santiago is a modern city with a population of more than six million people and is located at the base of the Andes Mountains.

Our first stop was at Puerto Montt, where we went on a bus trip to Lago Todos los Santos. From this beautiful dark blue lake, the 3,500 meter high volcano, Cerro Tronador, is clearly visible. We enjoyed a delicious lunch and set out to return to the ship. Approximately 20 km from Puerto Montt, the bus broke down. While we were waiting for a replacement bus, Nora wanted to look in the small town where we were located to see if they had postcards for sale. I advised the tour guide of our intention to leave the bus and she agreed. When we returned from the town, the bus was gone.

I remembered having seen a car in the town with a taxi sign in its window. We located the taxi and I explained that we wanted to go to Puerto Montt. The driver indicated that he had never been there but he thought he knew where the port was located. When we arrived in the port the fact that I had no Chilean money created a problem. The driver was reluctant to accept American dollars. After trying several locations in an attempt to change the money he agreed to accept American dollars for an amount about twice the fare. The fact that I was able to talk to him in his language was a significant help in the negotiations. We arrived at the ship about a half hour before sailing. This was a great relief because there was no way that I knew of to get back to the ship once it had left Puerto Montt. Also, all of our documents were on the ship.

Our next stop was in Desolacion in southern Chile. Here, the Andes Mountains come right down to the sea. The scenery is very beautiful. We continued on around Cape Horn, with a stop at Punta Arenas. Our next stop was in Montevideo, Uruguay. Here we could see the masts of the German warship, Graf Spee, which the captain had scuttled in the harbor during World War II, to avoid capture.

We left the ship in Buenos Aires and began at two day stay in the city. Buenos Aires was a beautiful city before World War II, but it has stagnated since then. Buenos Aires has a population of slightly less than three million.

This is a view of the main thoroughfare, Avenida El Cinco de Mayo, at night.

These are houses in one of the upscale neighbourhoods

We were walking in one of the parks when we were approached by a local family. The man advised me that there was a smudge on my pants and offered to remove it. After he left, I found that my wallet was missing. Fortunately, I had left our valuables, passport, tickets, and Visa card at the hotel. When we got back to the hotel, I decided that it would be a good idea to report this incident to the police so that I could later make an insurance claim. The hotel clerk explained the location of the nearest police station and we went there. It turned out that there was a fairly large group of people, who had been involved in a three car accident, ahead of us. After a lengthy wait, while the policeman at the desk tried to sort this out, he suggested that we should talk to the Lieutenant in charge. I explained our problem to the Lieutenant and he asked where it had taken place. When I told him the name of the park, his face brightened, and he said, “That is in the next precinct”. Not wanting to go through this again, I gave up the idea of reporting the incident to the police. Four months later, I received a letter from the Canadian ambassador in Argentina advising me that they had my wallet. Of course, all the valuables were gone and I did not want to spend the $45 that they requested before they would return it to me. Our flight home was uneventful.

DENMARK TRIP

Nora and I made a trip to Denmark in 1987 to visit our son who had moved there with his family the previous year. He was employed as a Petroleum Engineer by the largest Danish corporation, Maersk, which is primarily in the shipping industry. They were living in a suburb of Copenhagen that required commute trip by train of approximately 20 minutes to get to downtown Copenhagen. Both he and his wife were working in the downtown, and went there daily. Since he was provided with a company car, they didn’t use the train regularly. Their daughter was also going to a school in the downtown. The majority of the people in Copenhagen live in rented accommodation, because individual houses are very expensive.

We spent much of our time there visiting the local tourist attractions, such as the Tivoli Garden amusement park and various other attractions. There are hundreds of museums in Denmark. They feature a wide variety of topics, including Viking history, mediaeval life in Denmark and features of more modern life.

On the weekend, they took us to visit a Viking boat building and launching site located in a museum at Roskilde on the west coast of the country. Another interesting sight was a new railroad bridge being built between Denmark and Sweden. This bridge is intended to be an integral part of the improved rail connection between the Nordic countries and continental Europe. We spent 10 days in Denmark and then returned home.

THE BALTIC CRUISE

In 1988, Nora and I went on a cruise in the Baltic. We spent a few days in Copenhagen with Dale and his family and then boarded the ship for the cruise. The first stop was in Oslo, Norway, where we spent a day ashore. Among the sights we visited were the Oslo Opera House and various museums.

This modern looking building is the Oslo Opera House, located on the waterfront.

This ship, The Fram, was used by early Norwegian explorers in the Arctic and Antarctic.

We continued on to Stockholm, Sweden.

The next stop was in Helsinki, Finland.

A monument to the Finnish composer Sibelius

Ekanas, an island park near Helsinki, where we had an enjoyable cruise among the islands in a small boat.

We then continued on to St. Petersburg in Russia. St. Petersburg was the location of the Hermitage Palace during the time of the Russian Czar’s. It was severely damaged during the second world war during a siege. Since then it has been extensively rebuilt, in a modern style, and is now the second largest city in Russia.

The Hermitage Palace was not severely damaged during World War II and has been restored to its original condition.

A view of St. George’s Hall, also known as the Throne Room. This room was completed in 1790 and was used by succeeding Czars until the Russian revolution in 1919.

The Hermitage was noted for its art collection. Two examples are shown here. Much of the art was sold when the Communists took over the government. For example, the picture on the right, The Alba Madonna, was sold, for more than a million dollars, in 1931 to Andrew Mellon.

On our return voyage we stopped at Riga, Latvia, and spent a few hours ashore. The next stop was in Gdansk, Poland. The city’s main claim to fame is that Gdansk was the location from where Lech Walesa started the revolution that resulted in the end of the Russian occupation of Poland after World War II. The final destination for the cruise was Copenhagen. We spent a few days here with Dale before flying home.

THE CARRIBEAN CRUSE

In 1988, we went on a Caribbean cruise, starting in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. The first stop was San Juan, Puerto Rico. Puerto Rico is a territory in the United States and as such is in a slightly different situation than the other states. San Juan is the second oldest city founded by Europeans in North America. The population is approximately 400,000 people.

We next visited Aruba, which is a country in the Kingdom of the Netherlands, even though it is located in the Caribbean. Aruba has an unusually dry climate which makes it a favorite tourist destination.

A natural bridge formed by erosion. Because of the dry climate, the surrounding area has very little vegetation.

We then proceeded on to the Caribbean end of the Panama Canal, which oddly is further west than the Pacific end. The Panama Canal was completed in 1914 after many years of construction under very difficult conditions that led to abandonment of the project by the French, who originally started the project. The Panama Canal Zone is considered to be part of the United States, because the canal was completed by the Americans. Approximately 14,000 ships pass through the canal yearly. The central part of the canal is Gatun Lake, which is 90 m above sea level and constitutes 80 km of the length of the canal. Passage through the canal locks is facilitated by locomotives on each side of the waterway.

Another ship passing through the lock. Two of the locomotives, known as MULES, can be seen in the lower right corner of the picture.

We did not complete the passage through the canal, we cruised around the lake and then returned to the Caribbean end of the canal.

The next stop was at Limon, Costa Rica. From here we went on a bus tour to the capital city, San Jose. Here our cruise came to an abrupt end. Nora fell and broke her wrist. She was taken to a local hospital, which had been originally started by a Canadian group, and was admitted for treatment. The company providing the bus tour accepted responsibility for her care. I shared a room in the hospital with her and acted as an interpreter for the Spanish speaking staff. The doctor had been trained in Italy and seemed competent. She remained in the hospital for 10 days. The day before she was to be discharged I went on an excursion into the jungle. Unfortunately, I contracted food poisoning from the lunch provided.

Examples of Costa Rican Wildlife seen on the excursion

We were not in good traveling condition the next day; Nora in a wheelchair and me still feeling very much the effects of the food poisoning. However, we made that flight to Houston satisfactorily and continued home from there.

THAILAND, BURMA AND JAPAN

In 1989, I made a trip to Thailand, Burma and Japan with a group organized by a retired professor from the University of Alberta. Our initial stop was in Bangkok, Thailand. We spent three days in Bangkok exploring some of the interesting sites.

We would be approached by people on the street, who unlike those in many places, did not want money, only the chance to practice their English. This was a welcome change.

These River Boats are known as “Long Tailed Boats” because the propeller is mounted on the end of a long shaft. The motor, taken from a used car, is on a flexible mount and is moved as required to steer the boat.

We next went by bus to Chang Dao, where we visited the elephant training school. Here elephants are trained for work, primarily in the logging industry. A film crew from the BBC happened to be there on the same day, so they were putting on a display of their training for them. This made our visit more interesting.

A baby elephant approached our group and I touched his head. There was a loud roar and the elephant scampered away. Then I saw the mother elephant across the yard. It was apparent that she was concerned about her baby. Fortunately, she was securely chained to a large tree and could not move. It would have been a real disaster had she been able to rescue the baby by attacking our group.

We continued on to the city of Chang Mai in northern Thailand. This area, known as The Golden Triangle, was noted for the production of illicit drugs. We then began a trek through the forest to a village, similar to the one shown in the picture, where we stayed overnight in the second floor above the animals. The village had an electrical generator. They were watching a wrestling tournament on television that was taking place in Bangkok.

This area has traditionally been inhabited in the valleys between the foothills of the Himalayas. The people in these valleys spoke different languages and consequently had very little interaction with their neighbors. To improve the situation the Thai government built schools in the villages, where the children are taught to speak the Thai language. This has resulted in better communication between the villages.

The next day we embarked on an elephant ride that took us to a location where we could continue our trip, back to Bangkok, by bus. Elephants have a rolling gait, from side to side, that makes the ride a little unusual. However, they have an extra joint in their feet that gives them good footing on side slopes. When we came to a river they rushed in to drink. Since the driver did not seem to have control, this was a little disconcerting.

After a day in Bangkok, we flew to Rangoon, in Burma. We were advised that it was considered expedient for each traveler to take two bottles of whiskey. One was to facilitate passage through the Burmese customs and the other was to be sold to obtain local currency. As it turned out, there was nothing we wanted to buy using the local currency so we used it as a bonus to the hotel staff when we left. Economic conditions in Burma were very poor. As an example, there were many men sitting on the streets straightening used nails and selling them.

After a day in Rangoon, we set off for Inle Lake. This is this is a large lake where many people live on floating islands.

It is also the home of the leg rowers. They have developed this skill in order to have both hands free to use with their fish nets.

As in most of Southeast Asia, rice is a very important crop in Burma. All of the planting and harvesting was done by hand.

We continued on to the location of the start of the Burma Road. During World War II this was used as a means of delivering military aid to China. There was also a small airstrip located there that also was used to fly planes into China. Neither of these facilities was currently in use.

We then returned to Bangkok. Our tour guide was going to India, so he asked John, a member of the group, to take care of the formalities at the airport. John collected our passports and tickets in order to get boarding passes for the flight out of Bangkok. When he returned with my boarding pass, he did not have my passport. He remembered that the ticket agent had set it aside because I was only going as far as Tokyo and the rest of the group were going to Edmonton. He was able to get back to the ticket agent and retrieve the passport, but he neglected to take his boarding pass with him so he had a problem getting back into the waiting area. Eventually it was all sorted out and we boarded the flight.

Once we landed at Narita Airport, I went to Tokyo and checked into our hotel. I then went back to the Narita airport to wait for Nora’s arrival. As an example of Japan Airlines (JAL) operations the arrival screen showed the following information; JAL Flight # 123 Late Scheduled Arrival Time 5:25PM Estimated Arrival Time 5:27PM. When Nora arrived, at 5:27PM, we returned to the hotel for the night. We spent the next two days looking around Tokyo. We were able to get a student from the University to act as our guide for a day. He showed us around Tokyo and took us for lunch at a private home. This was an excellent service provided for tourists. To show our gratitude I sent him some tapes of Western music in which he had expressed an interest. I don’t know for sure if he got them.

The entrance to the Meiji Shrine and the interior garden associated with the Shrine

We found the people to be very helpful. As an example, we asked a guard in a railway station, using a map and sign language, how to get to a particular destination. He sketched out a map on the floor, and we left him. The next thing we knew, he had seen that we were not going the right way. He left his post and caught up to us and steered us to the proper gate.

We hired a taxi to take us, and an American lady who staying at the same hotel, to a theatre. I was sitting in the front with the driver, who started explaining things in Japanese. Occasionally I would say “Hai” (“yes” in Japanese) and he would be off on another explanation of something or other. The women in the back seat found this to be hilarious.

We made arrangements to go on a bus tour of Mount Fuji. When we arrived at the station, we found that the only people on the 25 passenger bus were two Koreans, Nora and I, and the tour guide, who did not understand Korean. However, the tour went as planned and we had an enjoyable day.

Fuji is a seemingly extinct volcano; at 3,800 meters high it dominates the Japanese landscape. The image of the mountain is reflected in the lake in front of it.

We took the Japanese bullet train to Nara and back to learn more about the trains. We had heard a good deal about them and wanted some personal experience. The cars are very comfortable and it wasn’t overcrowded on this particular day. The only evidence of the high speed at which the train was travelling was the buckling of the side of the car caused by the change in pressure between the cars when they passed on adjacent tracks.

We wanted to stay an extra day in Tokyo, but we found that owing to a national holiday, the hotel where we were staying was completely booked. The lady in charge of customer service spent at least three hours phoning other hotels to find us another room. I felt that this was another example of the friendly service that we encountered in Tokyo. Our flight back to Edmonton from Tokyo was uneventful.