PNW and Canada adventure // part three: knitting edition

My parents, my brother and I went on a four week road trip through the Pacific North West and Canada in August. It was an awesome experience and I took hundreds of pictures. I wanna share some of our adventures with you so I've decided to share our trip in three parts:
Part I: the USA (from Seattle to Yellowstone NP to Glaciar NP)
Part II: Canada (from Calgary to Vancouver)
Part III: Knitting edition (duuuh, this is a craft blog and there are just so many awesome yarn shops and wip photos to share!)
I'd like to start this post by saying that I was very lucky because a) I traveled with another knitter and b) my dad and brother were very patient when it came to waiting in front of yarn stores, driving around dodgy neighborhoods to find yarn stores and trespassing to take pictures of alpacas.

Packing for a long vacation
The picture above was taken the evening before we left Germany. I had planned out my knitting projects perfectly: from front left: alpaca yarn for the Elfreide scarf, some merino for a hat for a friend, Wollmeise lace yarn for a cardigan. top left to right: merino for a cowl for Julia and Isager yarn for a pullover.

One hour later I had already changed plans: I didn't bring the red/pink merino and the Wollmeise, instead I brought the buttercup to finish and 86 grams of sock yarn to make another pair of scrap socks. In retrospect I'd say it was a pretty good choice. I didn't end up knitting the red/orange pullover (though I casted it on about 5 times... it just didn't feel right.) but used most of the other yarn I brought.

Projects I finished during the trip:
scrap socks
buttercup
molly hat

Projects I started:
elfreide scarf

Naturally, I couldn't bring my knitting projects in a plastic bag. I made USA-themed project bags for my mom and me(they're still available in my shop if you're interested) because I love a good excuse to sew project bags. I also brought my trusty sock project bag that I made years ago to hold all those mini skeins.

I brought needles, stitch markers, etc. for five different knitting projects. I squeezed them all into one of these travel knitting needle case. It even managed to squeeze in the stitch markers I bought in the states :)



It's a habit of mine to always bring my knitting. I rarely leave the house without a knitting project in my bag. The picture above was taken while waiting for the Old Faithful at Yellowstone. The scrap socks were one of those on-the-go knitting projects that I brought everywhere and finished rather quickly.

We got an awesome rental car which my dad, my mom and I were allowed to drive. Although I love driving (especially through such beautiful landscapes!) I didn't mind the extra knitting time I got when I wasn't driving.

Bonfire knitting!

Knitting in hazardous areas.

Dock knitting (it was too windy to actually knit in the boat).


We were very lucky and saw several alpacas. I just love these fluffy animals. Aren't they super cute? I wonder whether the brown one actually saw us. I think (s)he needs a haircut ;)

The yarn stores
I like to take a business card whenever I visit a yarn store. I have no idea what I'm gonna do with them but one day I'd like to make a sort of yarn shop map in my studio where I display all the business cards I collected over the years of fiber obsession.

Here's a list of yarn stores we visited:
So Much Yarn in Seattle, Washington
Alpaca Direct in Hayden, Idaho
Joseph's Coat in Missoula, Montana
Y'arnings in Helena, Montana

The Loop in Calgary, Alberta
Art of Yarn in Kelowna, British Columbia
SweetGeorgia in Vancouver, British Columbia
Baaad Anna's in Vancouver, British Columbia

I'd say we had the best experience at the Art of Yarn in Kelowna (huge selection of yarn, great displays, very friendly and chatty staff). Though I also liked the yarn selections at So Much Yarn, Joseph's Coat, The Loop and Baaad Anna's. Y'arnings only had a small variety of yarns and not many colours/qualities I liked.
By far the most disappoint store was SweetGeorgia yarns. I took Felica Lo's craftsy class on spinning dyed yarns and loved it. I think all the SweetGeorgia yarns are beautiful and one of a kind. But the staff was very unfriendly, they didn't have the stuff in stock that they had in stock according to the website and gave me wrong information when I sent them a mail prior to visiting the store because I wanted to make sure that driving out there to the industrial area would be worth it. Plus their 'sales' on seconds was ridiculous. Seriously, 5-10% off if the yarn has huge chunks of undyed parts?

I ended up buying now roving because I felt like I had to buy something to make the trip out there worthwhile. Don't get me wrong, I love the products, but ridiculous prices on seconds, basically no decorations in store and a staff member who isn't interested at all in customers is not my idea of a LYS. Bummer.

I came back with a suitcase full of yarn and spinning fibers. Well there were some hand knits stuffed in there, too and a book or two. I also bought some kool-aid for dying yarns and fibers. Luckily, yarn is easy to pack because you can squeeze it in small corners (or shoes, mugs and sleeping mats...).

I ended up wearing my hiking boots on the flight home because I needed more space to store all my yarn purchases. And let's face it, wearing yarn on your feet doesn't make much sense on a long distance flight ;)

If you have any questions, please let me know.

ps: In case you're curious about the yarns and fibers I bought, you can check out my ravelry stash where I listed everything. I basically bought all the spinning fibers I have during the trip. I was very lucky to buy a bunch of luxurious fibers off craigslist while I was in Vancouver.

PNW and Canada adventure // part II: Canada

My parents, my brother and I went on a four week road trip through the Pacific North West and Canada in August. It was an awesome experience and I took hundreds of pictures. I wanna share some of our adventures with you so I've decided to share our trip in three parts:
Part I: the USA (from Seattle to Yellowstone NP to Glaciar NP)
Part II: Canada (from Calgary to Vancouver)
Part III: Knitting edition (duuuh, this is a craft blog and there are just so many awesome yarn shops and wip photos to share!)

We spent the second half of our trip in Canada. Immigration was much quicker than expected. We spent our first full day in Canada exploring Calgary before we headed to Banff National Park in the evening. Luckily, we had reserved our campsites the day before so we didn't have to worry about not finding a place to sleep.

Banff and Lake Louise were... well, rainy. Just like the rest of the Rocky Mountains. We walked through (the very tourist-y and overcrowded) the city of Banff and stopped at the famous Lake Louise to snap a picture but it was too cold and rainy to actually enjoy the scenery.

We stayed at the Tunnel Mountain Campground in Banff (where an entire elk herd visited our campsite!) and the Lake Louise campground. Lake Louise was the first campground we ever stayed at that had electric fences to keep bears out.

We drove along the icefields parkway but the landscape wasn't as impressive as we were told because it was overcast and all the lakes that are suppose to be turquoise coloured looked gray and muddy. A little bit of sunshine would've made a huge difference! So the icefields parkway is on our 'visit again when the weather is better' list (along with the Glaciar NP).


We did go on a small hike though. The 'parker ridge' was a rather steep hike but we were rewarded with an awesome view over glaciers and we got to see this cute animal sniffing the plants.


We stopped at the three valley gap ghost town to take a break and take these pictures in the parking lot. There were two cats that were snuggling/fighting - they're adorable, aren't they?

We had planned to stay in the Rocky Mountains a couple days longer but we were all annoyed by the bad weather (camping in the rain with tents isn't fun...) so we fled to the Kelowna. The Okanagan valley is famous for it's warm weather (there are lots of vineyards) and we enjoyed wearing shorts/skirts again after being bundled up in all the warm clothes we had brought for days. We went peach picking close to Kelowna and they were the best peaches I had ever eaten. Soo aromatic and moist and BIG. Yum!

We visited friends in Harrison Hot Springs for a couple of days. They are our former neighbours and it was so much fun to stay with them. Warm home-cooked meals and comfy beds are priceless after camping in the rain for days.

We hiked parts of the needle peak trail (here's a video of the trail I found online) and picked blueberries on our way back. They were sooo delicious!

The next day, we went out on the Lake Harrison. I don't know a single person in Germany who owns a boat (probably because it's very expensive and we don't have many lakes compared to Canada) so spending the day on the lake was one of the highlights of our trip. My brother tried wakeboarding, we  'hiked' to hidden waterfalls, spent some time on a deserted beach with lots of driftwood and enjoyed the scenery.

Last but not least, we visited Vancouver!

Of course I had to go back to UBC (I studied there for a year in case you're a new-ish blog reader) to show my dad and brother around because they've never been to Vancouver before.

We stayed at a very cute bed & breakfast in Kitsilano, one of the 'hip' neighbourhoods and just 2 walking minutes from the beach! If you ever need a place to stay in Vancouver, I highly recommend the Between Friends B&B. The breakfast was awesome and we got to meet new people every morning. Oh and the owner and her stuff are so friendly and interesting - we could've stayed there all day just talking to them ;)

I'll share the final part about all the yarn stores we visited (& awesome stuff I bought) next week.

PNW and Canada adventure // part I: USA

My parents, my brother and I went on a four week road trip through the Pacific North West and Canada in August. It was an awesome experience and I took hundreds of pictures. I wanna share some of our adventures with you so I've decided to share our trip in three parts:
Part I: the USA (from Seattle to Yellowstone NP to Glaciar NP)
Part II: Canada (from Calgary to Vancouver)
Part III: Knitting edition (duuuh, this is a craft blog and there are just so many awesome yarn shops and wip photos to share!)

We chose to fly with Icelandair because they offered two free checked baggages. Since we went camping, we had to bring all our gear (tents, sleeping bags, pots, dishes, etc.) and needed the extra luggage. Also, who wouldn't want to have a layover in Reykjavik and get to see the beautiful landscape from an airplane?
Turns out it's a rather cheap airline (no meals even on long distance flights; drinks were only served twice, very little cabin space, etc.) but we got there alright and the weather in Iceland was beautiful so we had an awesome view.

We arrived in Seattle but only stayed there for a night. Driving through Washington state is beautiful - all the mountains, trees, lakes, ... sigh. Our first campground was at a beautiful lake and there weren't many campers. Germany is a pretty crowded country so having lots of space around us feels heavenly. Our first destination was the Yellowstone National Park so we made our way through Washington, Idaho and Montana rather quickly.

Yellowstone was... well, big.

The landscapes are incredible. I've traveled a lot and I've been to many countries and national parks but everything in Yellowstone is mind blowing. Geysirs, hot springs, huge trees, big meadows, high mountains, thousands of animals, etc. It was a lot to take in. Thankfully we had planned six full days in the park which was just about the right amount of time to see & explore everything without being bored.

We had booked the campgrounds several months in advance. We stayed three nights at the Fishing Bridge Campground and another two nights at the Canyon Village Campground. We loved the Fishing Bridge Campground - we had the best campsite with a view over Lake Yellowstone. We were very lucky to have a great neighbour who camped there all summer and knew a lot about Yellowstone because he had worked there several years. Having an experienced guide with insider tips was really helpful because there is SO much to do and see in Yellowstone that it can be rather overwhelming.

For all of you who are wondering how you can camp in a tent at an elevation of almost 8000 feet (about 2.400m)... well, it was cold during the night (not freezing but rather close...) but we were prepared and brought warm clothes and sleeping bags, hot water bottles, etc. Campfires were also very helpful to keep us warm.

I was very lucky and found an organic supermarket in Missoula, MT that sold vegan marshmallows. I'm 'just' a vegetarian but I don't eat gelatine so it's been over a decade since I ate a marshmallow. Gelatine-free marshmallows are almost impossible to find in Germany so I was so happy to find them in the US!
Sitting by the campfire, making s'mores and knitting was one of my highlights of the trip.

Yellowstone is a great place to watch animals. During the couple of days we were there, we saw thousands of bisons, a bear, many deers and elks, squirrels, eagles, and so many more.

(Although bisons look fluffy their fur is very scratchy and wouldn't be a lot of fun to spin/knit with - I thought about it, too!)

What we found especially surprising is that these animals are used to humans; we frequently saw bisons walking on the streets and they weren't bothered by all the cars, trucks and trailers going by. Actually bisons on the road are the #1 reason for traffic jams in Yellowstone so the rangers would follow the bisons and honk at them until they left the street. At first I found it rather cruel to honk at animals but when you're trying to get from point A to point B and you're stuck in traffic because the bisons keep walking in front of your car that's no fun.

There was a ranger program at the campgrounds every evening where we went a couple of times. It was really interesting to learn about wild fires in Yellowstone (in 1988 over 1/3 of the park burned down) because still today you see lots of dead trees everywhere. But as you can see in the picture above, the forests are regrowing. When I think of Wyoming, heat and wildfires are usually not the first thing that comes to my mind.

At our second campground, I met Lois Linn, owner of Serendip Designs Jewel. She's an incredibly nice and interesting person and a talented artist. She gave me this cute ring - I saw it at the General Store where she had a booth and fell in love. I wanted to buy it but she insisted that I'd keep it for free. I've been wearing the ring pretty much every day since and I'm even thinking about buying another one. She has a wide selection of pearls in her etsy shop and these rings are custom made. She made the ring I bought in the Yellowstone NP; now I don't only have a wearable souvenir of our trip to the Yellowstone, but also a handmade one!

After we left the Yellowstone, we headed up north to the Glaciar National Park. Unfortunately, it was pouring rain and we didn't get to see much because the entire park was drowning (or so it felt) and visibility was around 0. We drove through the park but only stopped for one short hike to a waterfall. It was beautiful but also very wet. The second we left the park the sky was clearing up and the sun came out. Hopefully I'll have a chance to go back there one day and enjoy the park and the hikes on a beautiful and dry day.

the sunshine state

I'm back from a much needed vacation. My roomie Julia and I went to the Sunshine State for two weeks to soak up some Vitamin D. A road trip to Key West, sandy beaches, good food, the Everglades, lots of TimerCam pictures, boat tours, an American-sized rental, dodgy motels, perfect weather, knitting underneath palm trees, catching up with old friends & making new friends sums up our vacation. It was so good.

the wollmeise shop

When I lived in Vancouver, I got to meet lots of knitters. Whenever a 'modern' knitter(as in someone who is familiar with ravelry) found out I was German the inevitable question would be whether I knit with Wollmeise yarn and wether I've been to their shop. I declined (it wasn't until the summer after I moved back to Germany that I purchased my first skein of Wollmeise) and thought how strange the whole 'Wollmeise hype' was - even 'down to earth' Canadian knitters seemed to start drooling as soon as they heard the word Wollmeise.

Fast forward a year and I've knitted through one skein of fingering weight Wollmeise but let's be honest, I'm not a fan. I prefer more fluffy, 'natural looking' fibers like alpaca and wool over the Wollmeise's merino. But my mom bought a one month unlimited rail ticket for two persons. Considering it doesn't even take four hours to go to the Wollmeise shop in Pfaffenhofen, Bavaria we had the stupid idea of going there... just to have a look and see what the hype is all about. Also eight hours on the train means lots of time to knit :)

It was a ca.15 minute walk from the train station. Not a problem. Unless it's 35°C (95°F) outside and there's no shade and it's about noon. Oh well, I guess someone who's crazy enough to go on a four hour trip to a yarn store across the country can't complain about the weather. August isn't the most popular yarn shopping season for a reason.

Once inside you're greeted by some strings of hearts. I'm not allowed to post pictures of strangers so I can't show you a picture of the entire store but it's a decent sized yarn store with shelves on three sides stuffed with colorful yarn and two couches and a coffee table in the middle. There were about 15 customers when we got there, including Austrians and French people.

If you're not familiar with Wollmeise yarn, it's hand dyed yarn that is dyed in Bavaria. It's famous for the great colors, as you can see above.

They had lots of 'Nobody is Perfect' skeins - meaning either the weight is off or there's a knot somewhere.

The shop is nicely decorated with lots of knitted samples. The name of the colorway of the dressed up skein is 'young mouse' - very cute idea(and gorgeous color!)

Of course we couldn't go to a yarn shop halfway across the country without buying at least one skein each. Well we ended up buying for than just one skein each but you'll have to wait until next week because I didn't get a chance to take any decent pictures of our yarn yet. In the picture above my mom is winding a skein of lace that I bought - the name of the color is 'Ruby Thursday'; isn't it a great color for a Christmas cardigan?

If there are some Wollmeise fanatics out there who haven't had the pleasure of visiting their store yet - I hope this gave you an impression of what it looks like. If you're in the area I definitely recommend visiting their little shop - the staff is really nice and helpful, their selection of colors and yarn weights is great and it's a nice place to meet knitters. Not to mention that it's pretty entertaining to see how people bring empty suitcases to the store and try to fit as many skeins in there as possible :)