Went to the Granby Zoo today. Nothing like visiting a Zoo in January when it’s 20 below zero. The Granby Zoo has a winter program until February and since they have a few animals that can stay outside even in the cold we thought we’d drive out to enjoy the Zoo; we had gone in the summer time but since DD and I both had the day off together she thought it would be fun to go to the zoo!

We first stopped to see the Elephants. They were in their indoor shelter due to the extreme cold. It resembled a surreal prison with large wide white bars caging in the two Elephants; one is named Doudoune and the younger one is Sarah. When we got there it was feeding time and the keeper stretched what looked like a slinky between the elephants. This is an electric fence to keep the elephants from grabbing the other ones bale of hay.

They both looked kind of bored which makes sense since they were inside and they looked much happier when we saw them in the summer outside. The Granby Zoo has an awesome outdoor area for the elephants and giraffes so the winter must be hard on them.

The keeper told us how they try and give the elephants things to do to keep them stimulated; they tie apparatus to the ceiling, bring in new toys for the elephants and give them special snacks of carrots and at Halloween they get pumpkins! Those lucky buddies!!

We went upstairs to see the giraffes. There was a new baby giraffe born at the Granby Zoo and he was just a tiny thing compared to the three adult giraffes in the pen. We were on a second floor viewing platform so we had a nice face level view of the giraffes as they chewed their cuds and checked us out! Again, they looked kind of lethargic but they only have a few more monthes before tthey can be out on the savannah!

They zoo is having a name the baby giraffe contest so DD and I both submitted a name; I chose Jasper after our brown Burmese cat and DD chose Kirikoo after that animated movie we saw about the little African boy. We found out later that the choice of names will be a random draw and when we checked on the Granby Zoo website they had a list of names submitted so far and so the poor giraffe could end up with a name like Ti’Claude or Stretch!

Outside we walked through Africa and saw the Zebras in the snow which was quite odd to see! The last place I’d expect to see a herd of zebras would be galloping through snowbanks! It was fun to stroll the the zoo with no crowds, it was like walking in a deserted theme park like an episode of The Twilight Zone. We saw the Flamingoes in their mirrored hot house all shiny so the flamingoes think they are in a big crowd to encourage reproduction and the formation of couples! Quack!

The little meerkats were in their heated winter shelter and so we could really get up close to the glass to see them; they are so cute! We went to Asia after that and saw the bears and then the Tigers; we got there just in time to see snack-time and so there were twenty of us right beside the tiger, on the other side of the dence naturally, and the tiger keeper had a bowl of meat and was tossing little tiger meatballs into the cage.

The tiger was growling and meowing like only a big pussy-cat can and it was impressive to be so close to the tiger. When we were there in the summer it was so hot and the tigers were just sprawled out in the shade sleeping but in this wintery wonderland they were walking around striking with their orange and brown coats against the snowy background!

The best moment was in the Hippopotamus tank. There is a dark cavernous room with a giant hippopotamus aquarium and glass walls so we can see the huge grey beasts, looking much like Manatees, swimming. If you stand on one of the bleachers you can just peek over the surface of the tank and see the huge heads, eyes and nostrils poking out of the water. They were blowing bubbles under water and opening their gaping mouths at each other and it was quite thrilling.

In the summer the viewing area was too crowded and the hippos didn’t move about too much or maybe they were outside but today we had the whole viewing cave to ourselves and the huge animals were quite active. At one point I walked to the corner of the tank and there was a huge hippos staring at me sitting there behind the glass and I had a primitive shiver of fear run through me being so close to such a dangerous animal!

Even though we had the glass between us it was crazy to see the fangs and face of that whiskered brute so close. The hippo just sat there on the massive rock shelf in the corner and DD came for a peek and we were both wide-eyed in amazement!

Then the big hippo swam away and DD walked down to the middle of the tank and the hippo came to her and started circling in the tank against the glass with DD walking in synchronicity with the hippo.

He looked at her and swam close to the glass and gently rolled over and went to the corner and then swam back to the middle pane of glass where DD was waiting and they did their little hippo dance again and again! The hippos was really having fun and DD was quite excited to be playing a game of hide-and-seek or peek-a-boo with a hippopotamus!

That was the highlight of the day but the whole walk was is so nice and the winter trip was so different! The zoo had little firepits all over the place with gently fires burning so we could stop and warm up; that was so nice, I can see why the Granby Zoo is one of the best zoos in North America! Next year we will buy seasons passes so we can just go to the Zoo anytime because there is always things new going on and it’s so nice to be in a place where animals are given such respect...I just hope the giraffe is not named Spunky Winterbean!!

Have you met Alaska & Jasper? Maybe not but they are the newest additions to our family! We love being surrounded by creatures and when we lost our dear pussy cat Pauline we went through an emptiness and mourning that only cat lovers can comprehend.

With the loss of Pauline, who had been with DD for over a decade we decided that we wanted to adopt a pair of kittens and we found a lovely pair from a breeder here in Quebec. More pictures of our Burmese Cats

I'm not sure why we were drawn towards the Burmese breed but after much research we decided that we wanted to have two Burmese kittens as we felt that their charachter attributes well-matched our own ideals and we were drawn to them.

Naturally, when our cat Pauline passed away we were heartbroken. As we mourned and grieved, and began living without our pet who had spent so many years with us in our country retirement home, we realized that we wanted to adopt some pussy-cats to fill the gaping void Pauline, our sweetie, had left with her passing.

We were attracted to the Burmese breed due to their characteristics and sheer beauty. We were lucky enough to find a local breeder after much searching and once we began correspondence with the breeder it became clear that this was the right thing to do...there were so many odd connections that tied us to these kittens and brought us full circle with our mourning of dear Pauline.

Jasper and Alaska were both born on the 29th of February 2008 which was interesting because they both had different mothers yet they were both born on the same day! Not only that but they were born on the exact same day as Pauline was cremated. Our new kittens came in to the world the same day our Pauline, who was 15 years old, was cremated. On top of that the mother of Alaska, Sally, was born on the same date as DAMI, April 20th. All these connections created an incredible happiness within us!

Meet the Burmese Babies! If you need a theme song then just think of Brittney singing: Burmalizer Burmilzer Burmalizer!

On The Road!

TripSister.com is the website of DD and DAMI; partners and friends who both love to travel! We decided to start this website to help document our camping trips, vacations and holidays.

We find that the more we travel the more pictures we have and the more pages of diaries we fill. Each trip we take, whether it is a camping trip to the Florida Keys or a stay in a luxury resort hotel in Hawaii, we end up with hundreds of stories to tell and twice as many pictures to show!

It is tough to share our stories and photos with our families and friends, who are spread around the world, so we decided to start this website so people we knew and friends we met on our travels could come to one website to read and see new pictures when it was convenient.

Visit our travel photo collection

TripSister.com is the name we chose for our website to share our stories and pictures from our travels, holidays and vacations; we chose the name because...well...we like to trip! We're not sisters but at times we can fight like sisters! No...we just liked the name because it's casual, like us!

We love doing everything from backpacking to car-camping to staying in luxury hotels. Every trip we take we try and make different...something new and exciting to a different destination so we can learn more about the world...and ourselves!

DD is a great diary enthusiast and keeps detailed notes on our trips including budgets, sights, special moments and other details that, if they hadn't been written down, would be lost! Both DD and myself, DAMI take pictures, and while neither of us are professional photographers, we sometimes are very happy with the results!

We both like to write and take pictures so we started this website to share our adventures, pictures, hotel reviews or whatever leaves an impression on us with our friends and family.

If you have come to our website by accident we welcome you! If you want to send your comments we'd love to hear your voice! You can post a comment on most pages or send an email to us at dd@tripsister.com.

Our trip to the Hawaiian Islands was a fantastic vacation where we spent just over two weeks visiting Kauai, Oahu and the Big Island! We spent time in Waikiki but wanted to explore the oldest Hawaiian Island which is Kauai and the island named Hawaii which is the biggest island of the island group which is often aptly referred to as The Big Island, so we quickly flew to Kauai, The Garden Island, and after a week there flew to The Big Island to explore the newest and still growing volcanic big island of Hawaii!

Coming from Canada we found everything about the trip was “Big”! Wow...it was our first trip so far away from home and it was unbelievable!

We had discovered that instead of flying out of Montreal, which was closer to our home in Knowlton, Quebec, it would be much cheaper to fly out of Burlington, Vermont which is only a short drive over the border between Canada and the USA. From Burlington we took a quick flight to Newark, New Jersey where we transferred onto a direct flight into Honolulu. We flew Continental Airlines and, while they weren't the cheapest, they did have the direct flight we were looking for as we didn't want to take chances with flights into hubs like Chicago or Seattle or Los Angeles. Continental Airlines also had great service and friendly staff.

We used TripAdvisor.com to help us choose our accommodations. We reserved in advance but sometimes had to find new places to stay because the reserved hotel or bed and breakfast didn't quite measure up. Most places we stayed at on our trip to Hawaii were awesome and left us wanting to stay longer and linger in the peace and luxury of the friendly Aloha State!

Some of the places we stayed in are the Aqua Aloha Surf & Spa in Waikiki, The Plantation Hale on Kauai, The Resort Quest Islander on the Beach in Kauai, The Volcano Cottages on The Big Island, Aaaah The Views Bed & Breakfast in Waimea, and The Jacaranda Inn also in Waimea on the Big Island. We wrote reviews and took pictures at each place and also promised to put some reviews on TripAdvisor.com since we used them to make our decisions and want to share our experiences...you know...give back to the travel community!

We visited the beaches of Kona and Kapaa, snorkelled with Green Sea Turtles and Butterflyfish, saw the volcanoes and craters of Kilohana and the Calderas of Kilaua, hiked the canyons of Waimea and the trails of the beautiful Na Pali Coast...there was so much to do and see in this vast ecosystem and we absolutely loved it all!

We flew Hawaiian Airlines on our inter-island flights and with Continental Airlines for our long flight to Hawaii and then home again. Both carriers were great!

Both DD and myself wrote diaries on our Hawaiian vacation and took a lot of pictures so you can find all of our favourite places and sights described in more detail here on the website. You can also use the site search to find hotel reviews or specifics on towns and places we visited or any topics of interest including any pictures you may want to see.

DAMI WRITES:
Burlington Vermont - On The Road To Hawaii
Newark New Jersey - The Stepping Stone
Waikiki - A Day On Oahu
Honolulu Airport - Bound For Kauai
Kauai Arrival - From Heaven To Hell
Kauai Day 2 - Changing Hotels for Resort Quest and Seeking Poipu Beach
Kauai Adventures - Beyond the Na`Poli Coast


Pictures of Kauai
Kauai, The Napali Coast, Waimea Canyon, Kapa'a. All our favorite hikes and sights on Hawai'is oldest island.

Pictures of Oahu and Waikiki
Honolulu, Waikiki & the sights we saw on our short trip to Oahu.

Pictures of Hawai'i The Big Island
Volcano, Mauna Kea, Waimea, Kona, Hilo & the incredible Big Island of Hawai'i.

Unusual, odd and strange pictures from Hawaii
Strange and unusual pictures that need a special category. Fun stuff and the beauty of Hawai'i that is hard to define. The artsy side of our trip to Hawai'i!

There's nothing like a three week road trip to change your outlook and when we drove to Florida for an escape from the winter in Canada we had the time of our lives! The best thing about driving instead of flying is you get a chance to see the changing scenery and as we drove South on I-95, passing through New York State, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, The Carolina's and Georgia we were better able to appreciate the size and beauty of the area.

Of course the highway doesn't always have the best views for sight-seeing but since we only had three weeks for the trip we decided to take the main road and get to Florida where we were planning to do our car-camping and exploring.

When we saw our first palm tree it was really exciting! The temperatures had been steadily rising as we drove South and by the time we hit the free orange juice stand at the Florida Visitors Center we were bathed in sunshine under blue skies and a warm wind we rarely feel up in Quebec in January!

We stayed in hotels on the drive down but once we hit Florida we started the camping! Our Salsa Vibe had all of our belongings and the comforts of home that made this car-camping so different from our backpacking trips. We had our camping gear and coolers and hiking gear and even our beloved espresso machine so we could have a morning Cappuccino at the campsite picnic tables!

We did a basic counter-clockwise route through the entire state, stopping first at Fernandina Beach then driving West to Lake City and the Osceola State Park on our way to Apalachicola on the Gulf of Mexico. We camped and explored, hiked and swam and saw so many different birds and creatures along the way that we were constantly stopping to take pictures. In the evenings, as we sat around the campfire or watched the sunsets we could talk about all the sights we had seen that day before we tucked ourselves into our small tent for the night.

We then made our way back East across the Suwannee River towards Bald Point on Ochlocknee Bay and Manatee Springs State Park before crossing Central Florida and driving down the East Coast towards the Canaveral National Seashore. The drive down highway 95 between West Palm Beach and Miami was a bit crazy and while it was neat to pass the colorful homes, surf shops, golf courses, beaches and typical Florida retirement villas in Boynton Beach, Boca Raton, Pompano Beach and Fort Lauderdale, it was also the most stressful part of the trip due to the traffic and when we got a bit lost in Miami we felt like we could have used the help of Horatio Kane and the CSI team for protection in some of the rough neighbourhoods we accidentally found! Gulp!!

We drove to the Keys and made a short trip to Key West but found it a bit touristy and preferred the snorkeling and laid-back areas near Key Largo where we saw some awesome corals at Pennekamp State Park before heading into Everglades National Park and the Shark Valley Slough where we came face to face with alligators, huge birds,
and incredible lush swampland and open fields!

Our last night of camping the temperatures were unseasonably cold and approaching the freezing level so we were actually a bit glad to know that it was time leave Rainbow Springs to start the drive home to Canada. After that cold night we were glad to spend the last few nights of our return trip in hotels where we could have hot showers and sleep on fluffy mattresses and pillows instead of lying on a thin inflatable mattress and brushing our teeth with pond water!

The drive from Florida to Quebec took us about three days so we enjoyed two nights of hotel continental breakfasts and take-out suppers instead camp cooking and as we got further North we started seeing more and more snow reminding us that even though it's hot and sunny back on the beach, February is approaching and we enter Canada where it is certainly winter and we were back to the land of tuques and mittens!

What a great 21 days we had! The driving was fun and DD and I really bonded as we got to spend a lot of time in the car chatting, listening to the local radio stations and only occasionally coming to blows over map directions!!

Pictures of Northern Florida
Fort Clinch State Park, Ocean Pond Campground, The Big Gum Swamp and Ochlockonee State Park

Pictures of The Gulf Coast and The Panhandle of Florida
Bald Point, The Forgotten Coast Line and Manatee Springs

Pictures of Southern Florida
The Everglades and the Keys

Unusual, odd and strange pictures from the Sunshine State
Strange and unusual pictures that need a special category. Fun stuff and the beauty of Florida that is hard to define. The artsy side of our trip!