Let it Go

Let’s look at some big future dates for me in Jiu-Jitsu.

The earliest I might get a Brown Belt is less than 8 months away, and a Black Belt is possible in 5 years.

What can I be doing right now to get ready for these two events?

For the further away evaluation, there isn’t much, but for a much closer Brown Belt there is a lot.

A Black Belt friend in North Vancouver would most likely be carrying out my Brown Belt evaluation. He has told me that he would expect a candidate to demonstrate any of the available curriculum that pertains to street self-defence. He has also said that students who have passed any of the relevant technical exams would not have to be tested on those aspects.

To me that means I either work like a lunatic on self-defence material, or make sure I have already passed all of the technical exams. Neither is an attractive prospect.

I think am perfectly competent in the area of self-defence, especially if my lifestyle is considered.

I have a Karate Black Belt, and a Jiu-Jitsu Purple Belt, earned during 36 years of martial arts training. I am involved in no high risk behaviours, and live in a very low-crime area.

However, to pass a one-shot, in-person exam covering the specific Gracie self-defence curriculum material, I’d have to train those techniques ad nauseam. I’d have to become almost perfect at the least entertaining part of Jiu-Jitsu.

If I work on the technical exams, there would actually me a lot more work involved. I’d have to be able to perform about 5 or 6 times as much material, including the all of the self-defence stuff. The difference is that the exams involved are neither one-shot, nor done in-person.

After training the levels and being able to correctly perform every technique, the candidate video records the precise exam material in chunks that take about 20 minutes to perform. If anything gets screwed up, a new attempt is started over with a fresh recording. This is quite unlike trying to demonstrate material at a live exam.

So what do I want to do? Shall I learn my least favourite part of the curriculum to the point of mastery, and then demonstrate all of that skill on test day, or learn the much broader curriculum to a point of competence and then record videos covering everything.

A point in favour of the video exam is that of the 4 test levels, I have already completed and passed the first, and that I have a partner lined up already to work with on the second.

How would either of these routes fit into the time-line for a Brown Belt about 8 months away?

The live-test self-defence route certainly could be done in that time. I’d need to get going on perfecting all of the material, and could use any other students who are willing to help.

The bigger video route is more difficult. In the coming 8 months, I will likely be unavailable for as much as 2.5 months, leaving only about 22 weeks to get all the work done. I would say that the second level would be the quickest to complete by far; perhaps 6 weeks. That would leave about 8 weeks per level for each of the other two.

However, for those two levels, I don’t even have a potential partner currently lined up. That’s a problem. It might well be that the hurdle will be insurmountable. No partner for a technical test renders it impossible.

It is a puzzle.

Or it was until I shifted my thinking.

Which of the two routes would actually make me better at Jiu-Jitsu?

Should I choose the video route, I would have to do tons more work than I do now. It would require that both I, and several partners, put in long hours on top of regular training. We would be honing a wide range of skills, across several levels, and in all chapters.

I would predict that at a minimum, doing the video route would add at least a hundred hours to my practise. That represents an approximate doubling of my training for the next 8 months.

Doing the self-defence test-day option would also see me doing many hours of work, but it would be a different sort of thing. Most would be grabbing other students before and after class to be my partner for whatever self-defence move I would be working on. This isn’t extra training, as it is currently time that gets used for other Jiu-Jitsu work. It is more of a redirecting. There may be some added time, but nothing like the video route.

This means that while my self-defence skill will certainly improve, in a very real way it will be at the expense of other Jiu-Jitsu skill. Doing the heavy-homework video route will improve my overall skill level, as there will be a huge amount of work done that would not be taken from existing mat time.

So, it boils down to getting better within a narrow spectrum, largely at the expense of my skill level in general, or a general, wide-spectrum improvement done outside of current mat time. This makes my decision clear.

Video seems like the answer.

There is a major flaw with doing the video route. It needs dedicated partners to be found. I already have level 1 completed, and a partner lined up for level 2. Getting 3 and 4 done look to be needing a lot more time that I have before possible Brown Belt evaluation.

A few years ago, I assumed that getting beyond a Purple Belt was highly unlikely. It is wonderful that I’ve made it this far. If I do the video route, and it takes me a few extra years, so what? I am actually a firm believer in the method that Gracie Jiu-Jitsu has used up until just this Christmas down at the headquarters school. A student’s next belt was awarded if and when they were ready. Ryron and Rener Gracie knew their local students so well that any sort of exam was superfluous.

I sort of got in on that for my Purple Belt evaluation. I went to LA for two weeks. On the first day, Rener Gracie rolled with me, and selected a couple of other people for me to spar with. After that, they may or may not have kept an eye on me for the time I was there training, and on the very last class of my visit gave me my new rank.

Now it is all about tests. Either I do the one-day test, and not actually improve overall, or I improve generally, do three massive video tests, and experience general improvement, but take several years doing it.

Best to just do what is right for my Jiu-Jitsu. So what if I do the superior-for-Jiu-Jitsu video route? Are there potential issues?

There sure are. If I could do it within 8 months, a Brown Belt on time could still happen, but completion that swiftly is extremely unlikely. If it takes longer, new instalments of curriculum will get released, and have to be worked up and video-tested as well, making the finish point recede farther into the distance.

I think the only plan is to work away at things, and forget about Brown Belt altogether. I’ve made it to Purple as I had hoped. It might be fun to refuse to do an exam for a new belt.

Maybe after a few years or decades they’ll give me one anyhow.

Maybe not.

Renaissance Jiu-Jitsu

It is Christmas Break time again, which is always good for reflection. It would seem that I’m in a bit of a Golden Age of Jiu-Jitsu.

Normal full-time training for somebody of my level around here would be 3 advanced classes per week. I attend all of that, plus all the beginner sessions. I also go into the Big City, and pick up another of each type of class.

We haven’t had any open sessions at all, or anything else “off the timetable” for a long time. I was happy enough with the way it was going, but did dream a bit about more.

And then the Jiu-Jitsu Renaissance started to roll into action.

Shawn Phillips, our instructor, wanted to get his third level completed on his technical exams. We really only had one section left to work through (only isn’t really the right word, as it is a bloody great heap of work) and I was the logical partner.

We got busy, meeting maybe a dozen times, and cranked that puppy out.

Then, we kept going and plowed right into level four. This time, Shawn decided to copy a formula that other instructors have adopted, and recruited another partner into the mix. Rob Henley became our third guy. He is a long-time serous student, and a Purple Belt.

Somehow in all that training, Rob and I started working on his first-level technical exam; meeting on top of everything else to progress down that track. Than, our manager and business head was great with all of this extra training and allowed us all the access we needed.

It seems that meet-ups for any kind of serious training goals are now on-the-table anytime. Still nothing exists for less formal work, but that will be changing greatly soon, too.

My wife and I decided to move into some form of strata living situation, and attacked the downsizing required with gusto. When we finally found the perfect new home, it turned out to be a massively-large town-house. Suddenly, we were living with tons more unused space than we’d ever had. Helen claimed a chunk for her sewing and quilting hobbies, and I grabbed another for my very own Jiu-Jitsu training space.

The mat will be arriving in about a week, and there will be a place for anybody who wants to work on anything at all, and it comes with an enthusiastic Purple Belt ready to help, and maybe a coffee pot, and facilities for tea.

There is also a lot happening to which I am only an observer.

Two of our guys are working towards instructor certification, which we desperately need. The programs that we follow are carefully constructed, and qualified people are needed to handle the many details.

Our White Belt class, which a year ago seemed about to vanish into the mist, has started growing and growing, and now totally fills our mat space. I think that the last class saw about 18 students working away with enthusiasm. This is no flash-in-the-pan, as the growth has been steady, and fed by solid word-of-mouth.

Students who were part of the early growth of our White Belt class have reached the point of evaluation, and will soon be members of our advanced group. This will continue, and accelerate as the later, larger numbers reach a level of readiness.

In summery, more technical training, my own mat space, more certified instructors, and a lot more students are the highlights of this Golden Age of Jiu-Jitsu in our little town of Gibsons.

Hugs

Recently, on Facebook, there was a bit of a discussion about staff at schools hugging children. It all seemed to revolve around school and district policy, rather than on the individuals own practice.

I’d just like to share my own experience in this matter.

Keep in mind that I started out with certain suppositions, that you might totally disagree with. I really never cared what the policy was about physical contact with students. My policy was my own, and seemed like common sense to me.

The first is, that the school world exists for the benefit of the kids, period. It doesn’t matter at all what the adult is feeling about a hug. It doesn’t matter if a kid is as cute as the dickens, and you feel an urge to hug the little fellah.

There are many kids out there for whom a hug from any adult is not a positive event. Imagine some young person who has been sexually exploited. Should you walk up and hug that kid? Should anybody? One unwelcome embrace of that nature more than counters a hundred neutral ones. There are more kids out there living that sort of life than we want to imagine.

Asking a kid if they want a hug doesn’t isn’t a solution. In the school setting, the adult has tremendous power over the student. They may not feel able to say no.

Thinking that a kid needs a hug shouldn’t act as permission to do so. Suppose that child is upset precisely because of sexual exploitation, and that the event started with a hug from the exploiter.

I am nothing like a Saint, but somehow managed to figure that out all on my own. Also, keep in mind that I like hugs, very much.

So decades ago, I resolved to avoid the possibility of harming a student in this way.

I taught kids in grades 8 through 12. With every new group, somehow I would slip in that I was not a hugging kind of person. I wouldn’t make it a big deal, maybe some wee mention of hugging, and a shudder. The kids would laugh, but get the idea. I was saying that I don’t like contact, and asking them to avoid touching me.

I was asking for my space, and clearly expecting this to be respected. This in itself is a powerful message.

Keeping with this clear statement, which would be reinforced occasionally throughout the year, I never attempted to initiate an embrace with a student, ever. I did not place my hands on their shoulders, or high-five them, or anything else. I would ignore accidental contact. Sometimes stuff happens.

The kids always accepted this. Other staff members would sometimes express their discomfort with getting hugged by students. For me, student-initiated hugs were incredibly rare; happening perhaps once every year or two. Some of my colleagues considered my method to be genius, and copied it. I never preached about it, but shared when appropriate.

Whenever I did receive a student hug, I didn’t make a big deal out of it, but did clearly express discomfort.

There was one other interesting side effect upon my relationships with students. Staff members would hear from students how I disliked physical contact. As a result, I became the least hugged person in the staff room. I never corrected this misunderstanding. Why would I? A single casual mention by a single staffer to a single student could have undone all of my non-contact groundwork.

As mentioned earlier, I did get touched sometimes, but would try and fend it off if I could. Every so often, I was surprised. Even then, the student would often apologize. I would never make them feel bad.

Now I am retired, and don’t have to worry about this sort of thing. I am not in a position of power over anybody. My years as a potentially damaging hugger are done.

The Toughest Student

Who do you think is the most bad-ass student at your Jiu-Jitsu academy?

My opinion might be very different than yours, but even if you disagree with me, I think that you’ll have to agree with my findings somewhat based on the actual evidence.

At the two school where I regularly train, there are all sorts. There’s a huge cop, and an even bigger gentle giant. We have slender dudes, and muscular ones, young ones, and even a few geezers like me.

There are also a fair number of female students. Of these, most are somewhere in the 120 to 140 pound range, but there are a few even smaller.

I would contend that the toughest student in the school has to be amongst the smallest females.

Why? Isn’t it obvious?

Let’s forget about my schools, and even yours, and make up a new one.

Let’s say you are male, and a raw beginner, are 6’1” tall, and weigh in at 200 pounds.

At this particular school all of the other students are quite different from you physically.

Their average height is 6’5”, and their average weight is 312 pounds. They all have a significantly lower percentage of body fat than you, meaning that each pound of those guys is more muscular than every pound of you.

If you need help visualizing this, the stats I’ve chosen for the other students are what is average for NFL linesmen.

You start out, and maybe half are pleasant to work with, but the rest are dicks.

They do everything possible to make your training miserable. They crush you hard enough that you sometimes tap from the pressure alone. They use their superior strength and mass to shut down every move you attempt, no matter how well, and to force through their own, no matter how crappy.

You end up getting hurt much, much more than any other student at the school. You also are regularly insulted for your size and lesser strength. Some of your partners openly express the opinion that there is no place for you at the school.

You continue regardless, taking your lumps, and doing all that you can to progress in such a negative environment. Some people are happy to work with you, and somehow magically manage to make their size and mass go away, but they are few and far between.

There's nobody that you can ever hope to out muscle. You try and learn every movement perfectly, and become somewhat of an expert in surviving discomfort, and pain, and being unable to breathe. You do not develop any sort of swollen ego, as you tap more often than anybody else.

Eventually, it becomes promotion time, and you are awarded your new belt at the same time as a couple of your peers, some of whom openly scoff, and consider it an insult to their own, superior performance.

Who is the toughest student at that school? Who has taken the most abuse? Who has suffered the most physical pain? As a result, who is the actually has the most perfect technique.

Clearly, you are the toughest, and are your schools pound-for-pound champion, and you care the least about suffering pain or injury.

You would be a big time bad-ass. But not as much as a 110 pound female who regularly trains with 200 pound men. To match the size disadvantage that she would be facing, your school would have to be full of students 50 pounds larger than the average for NFL players.

While your large partners average 56% bigger than you, the ones she regularly faces out mass her by 81%.

We used to have a dedicated young woman training with us who was well under 110 pounds, and she often rolled with our biggest guy, who at that time weighed about 235. For him to face a similar challenge, he would need to stand up to an adult male mountain gorilla.

Buck up, Buttercup, she’s tougher than you.

Third Version

People usually say that there are two types of Jiu-Jitsu training that they classify as being either Sport, or Self-Defence.

I contend that there are actually three versions.

A Self-Defence focused curriculum would be such as Ryron and Rener Gracie have developed for their beginner program, that they call Combatives.

The students in this program NEVER free-roll. Every technique and every bit of practice goes into developing the skills necessary to survive the most common forms of street attack. Students are not there to learn how to defeat trained Jiu-Jitsu people, but rather people with the fight characteristics most likely to arise in a real life confrontation.

Conversely, a true Sport school wouldn’t work on this sort of thing at all. They would be working on the types of things that they are most likely to experience in a tournament setting. They would have a complete understanding of the rule set, and develop strategies to get the maximum advantage out of it. They would not be concerned with striking defences at all, as these are forbidden within a sportive context.

Most schools are somewhere in between, at least a little bit.

Even at Gracie University, once the totally self-defence beginner course is completed, the students join the main advanced class. There they start to free-roll, and many of the techniques taught are geared not for a street fight, but rather for a roll with another trained Jiu-Jitsu person.

So what is this third type of which I spoke.

The third is the type of rolling that goes on between two Jiu-Jitsu people after a normal Jiu-Jitsu instructional session. Almost every class ends with free-rolling.

Nobody is worried about getting punched, or body-slammed, or scoring either points or advantages. They are just rolling.

Perhaps they end up in a position where the person on the bottom traps the person on the top’s arm, whilst the person on the top’s other arm is quite free, and able to strike.

If they are concerned with self-defence, the person on the bottom would need to respect the danger more than get excited about the possibilities of the trapped arm, and could well decide to release the trap and move on.

If they were thinking about competition, the person on the bottom would ignore the potential strikes, and try and use that arm for control, or perhaps to try and work it towards a submission, or to advance their position.

If they are doing neither, the person on the bottom could well use a bit of pressure against the wrist of the person on top to form a wrist lock, to which their partner would likely tap, before they moved on to something else.

A Self-Defence person watching might be horrified, as the danger of the strike should have taken priority, and a Sport person would decry the clear violation of the rule forbidding wrist locks.

They reach another point, and the person on the bottom, gets his a hands into a crappy collar choke, and the much bigger person in their guard, stands up. The bottom person releases their legs and drops gently to the ground and lets the now useless collar go.

A Self-Defence person would say that the combatant on top should have started throwing big punches once the bottom opponent’s hands were tangled in the choke, but that if they did stand up, the bottom person did the exact right thing by aborting before they could be body slammed.

The Sport person would say that the bottom guy did the wrong thing by aborting, and should have kept the position as they were lifted, and worked to sink the choke in better, as both punches and body slams are against tournament rules.

These disagreements would continue throughout the roll; Self-Defence decrying any use of spider guard, or de la Riva, or deep halfguard, while the Sport guy would be cheering those self same moves, while critical of any consideration being given to punch defence, or rule-illegal moves no matter how effective they are.

The two guys actually rolling are ignoring this debate. Likely they are from a school that is more balanced than either strictly Self Defence or strictly.

I think a good name for the third type of Jiu-Jitsu would be to call it Fun.

This is pretty much the situation within Ryron and Rener’s organization. In free rolling, usually the participants act much as I’ve described in the examples. Students are usually encouraged to try anything within the parameters of a safe environment.

Usually, but not always, punches are not allowed, nor body slams. Sometimes they are. Biting, eye gouging, and things of that ilk do not happen, but not due to any enforced outside set of rules. The unspoken rule is that everyone is expected follow is, “don’t be an asshole.”

I have been training for seven years within their umbrella, and have no idea about how tournament points are scored at all.

If asked what the most important aspects of free rolling are, most of the students there would say that it is a good general way to practice whatever you want to work on, and that it is fun.

Fun is important.

Up Down

August 2

This has been a challenging year so far for my weight.

Please don’t think that I consider myself to be heavy by any means. It’s just that I function best at a certain size, and try and keep myself in that zone.

If for nothing else, doing this lowers the pressure that my knees have to undergo in my favourite fun activity; Jiu-Jitsu. I also like to run, which is even harder on the knees.

My joints have already had issues with osteoarthritis. Being a few pounds over for a younger person is not as important as it is for me. If I treat myself badly, I could end my Jiu-Jitsu and my running permanently.

So I try and keep my weight within the range of 173-175 pounds. This is where things feel the best.

The trouble is, while staying in my target range is easy to do while at home, we travel very often. When away, a big part of life’s enjoyment is food (even more so than when at home), and I choose to partake. Weight always increases during travel.

This year has been absolutely fantastic for travel, and for food, but not so much for weight, or for how my body feels.

That has meant it’s been weight reduction time whenever we weren’t away.

The first trip of 2018 was over a month in South-East Asia, most of it on a cruise ship. I kept myself from going really crazy with the fabulous food, and ran on the stupid treadmills, but still came home in the neighbourhood of 188 pounds.

Less than a week after returning home, we were off for a month-and-a-half in California. Not as dangerous as cruising, but still very foodie. I took my fancy scale along, and kept an eye on things. Did plenty of desert runs, and a fair bit of Jiu-Jitsu. Still did plenty of piggy eating. Came home after that at around 184 pounds.

Managed to claw that down to within my target range, and then we promptly did a two-week cruise to Alaska. That put me back to 185.

In July, we spent three weeks on Vancouver Island with family, which slowed but didn’t stop my progress. Ran a lot while there. Came home at 179.

That was only a week ago, and in that time it’s been dropping nicely. Today’s weigh in was 175 pounds. Huzzah.

That doesn’t mean relaxation quite yet. I’ll have to hit 173 before that can happen, but it shouldn’t take long. Then I just have to keep my eye on things and experience some stability.

There is a lovely, long period of home time.

I love travel, but it does come with a lot of calories.

To enjoy it fully, the food must be eaten. I am lucky in that I do not hate the exercise that helps making a bit of overeating less critical.

On cruises, I run in the gym, and on shore. When near an appropriate Jiu-Jitsu academy, I train. Very many miles get run when holidaying on land.

I don’t begrudge myself fabulous meals when abroad, but I restrict my eating during other times.

At home, there is and even greater amount of running, and a constant flood of Jiu-Jitsu training sessions. Eating is whatever is appropriate to maintain weight.

Written in the Woods

I am not the world’s best camper, and yet we are camping.

Helen loves everything about it, so here we are. There is no actual pain involved for me, just a use of a bit of time. It’s easy enough to do this for her.

It isn’t my thing. There is so very much nothing going on, broken by spurts of chores.

Consider the camping activities for a minute. All of them are available at home, and yet we don’t do them when we’re there. The things that we do choose to do back home are better.

Yesterday I watched my 13-year-old nephew playing with a chunk of firewood. He tipped it over, then flipped it again, then kicked it, and flipped it some more, then ground it into the earth. He did this for about 15 minutes. Somehow, I think he’d find something more mentally stimulating back in civilization. Watching him wasn’t that entertaining either, but I had nothing better to do. I suppose I could have grabbed my own log but wasn’t so inclined.

I have a whole woodpile back home anyhow. It doesn’t get played with much.

Most of what we do in camping isn’t for me. If it was, I’d do it at home.

I suspect that for many people it is a way to enjoy simpler things than in their everyday life. I get that, but there is no appeal for me. I adore my everyday life. It’s swell.

Then, of course, there are the less pleasant aspects of being so deeply outdoors. The mosquitos this year are pretty thick. None of us seem to enjoy them. Some years there are clouds of wasps. They’re even more exciting than the mosquitos.

We were visited by a cute little squirrel, which was pleasant. He stayed for maybe a minute, and didn’t balance out the bugs. As we sit about we are forever trying to identify which flying pests are mosquitos, and which are harmless.

Before we went to the campsite we were in Victoria. It is much more civilized, but even so, during our one day there, I saw about a half-dozen deer, and a rabbit, and no creepy bugs. Somehow there is more wildlife in the city than there is in the woods, so that must not be the draw.

At the campsite, we aren’t really even roughing it, as they have washroom buildings with showers.

These have lovely concrete walls and floors, and cold running water, and we get to share them with a good number of quite disgusting slobs. They contain a type of toilet paper that is only slightly less substantial than fog.

I think part of the appeal is that people like to pretend that they are living in the wilds as our ancestors did. My time in the infantry had me getting enough real roughing it to last at least several lifetimes, and I was only a part time soldier in peace time.

For me, the only reason to ever camp is that Helen adores it, and we get to go with a bunch of family members who are amongst the best people I’ve ever known. Nothing to complain about on that front.

Anyhow, the “suffering,” I put up with on these little expeditions is tiny and trivial. Helen never, ever complains about my Jiu-Jitsu focused times; which include a few out-of-town seminars, and at least a couple of weeks in Los Angeles every year.

Camping is no big sacrifice. It barely even counts as a small one.

Cruise June 2018

For this cruise my bag got bigger. Usually, Helen and I choose to travel with airline-acceptable carry-on luggage even when no flying is involved.

This system limits us to what we have on our bodies, one ridiculously small rolling bag, with one even smaller item strapped on the top. This gets us onto planes without any checking or collecting of suitcases. When we do this when not flying, it gives us an extreme level of mobility climbing aboard buses, or trains.

Our current trip is a two-week cruise to Alaska. The ship doesn’t care about how much luggage  that guests show up with, and there is no flying involved for us. There are, however, a crazy number of buses and ferries.

I decided to leave my small bag with a tiny bag on top system at home, and haul a single, large rolling bag instead.

This gave me tons more carrying capacity than I am used to. This meant that I could take a few extra shirts, and formal shoes, and my favourite sandals. I also had lots of bag volume I could share with Helen. She stuck to her small luggage system.

So off we went on Sunday morning. I drove Helen to the bus stop near our neighbourhood school, and dumped her and our bags off, and took the car back home. I then walked back to the bus stop.

The driver was super nice, and informed us that he was going all the way to the ferry. Sometimes we have to transfer buses at the mall in town, so this was a pleasant surprise. About an hour later we were aboard the 8:40am ferry headed to Vancouver.

We were the first foot passengers off on the other side, and power-walked to the waiting city bus so briskly that we managed to get seats. This is a huge deal when riding with luggage.

Rode to downtown in relative comfort. That was followed by a few blocks of walking to get to Canada Place cruise ship terminal.

About a week earlier we had received an unusual notice from our cruise line. It told of the boarding times for different groups of passengers. This part is nothing special, but they said that it was expected that the terminal would be seriously overcrowded, and that passengers would be denied entry until their allocated time.

I interpreted this to be an attempt by the cruise line to make the process easier for themselves by spreading the guest arrivals out through the day, and to do so by lying to their customers. I checked, and there would only be two ships present that day. It is quite normal for Canada Place to handle 3 ships with ease. Clearly there would be no serious overcrowding.

I also didn’t think the cruise line would try and bar entry to their customers, who are all paying premium fares. The final clue to this all being nonsense was a referral in the warning communication to “suggested arrival times.”

Anyhow, we ignored it all, and showed up at our convenience instead of theirs. There were no issues, or crowds, and nothing was even said.

We were through all the steps; security, cruise line check in, and US customs, and aboard with minimal waiting by about 11am. We headed straight to the buffet on deck 9 for the first of many chow-downs.

Our travel buddies, Lola, Bernie, and Phyllis were a bit behind us in the process, but showed up very soon. 

After a lovely lunch, we headed off to our various cabins for naps, while some went exploring.

This ship was a lovely surprise. This is a mid-sized vessel, as modern cruise ships go. Her name is Westerdam, and she is about 81,000 tons.

A very nice feature was that this ship was totally refitted in 2017. Usually, when this happens it means that the ship has gotten some needed repairs, and gets a few minor real changes. The Westerdam’s refit was a complete redesign.

This line, Holland America, is known for distinguished decor that strongly emphasizes dark wood tones, and a total lack of pizzaz. This is no longer true of the Westerdam. She has become a beacon of bright, tasteful colours, and an airy feel. There is a great deal of chrome, and brass. The new furnishings are stylish and comfortable.

Lately ship casinos have been loosing popularity. For many years ships vied to have them bigger and bigger. These two factors have combined into making the casinos seem abandoned, tired, and sad.

Westerdam’s has gone the opposite way. It has been all re-newed, and halved in size. This has put the gamblers into a more vibrant atmosphere which is attractive to other passers-by. The reclaimed casino space has been utilized into a very popular duelling pianos bar. It, and the casino seem joined. If this does nothing else, it makes more space available for the non-gamblers, but I am convinced that there is actually significantly more money being earned by the casino.

This is just one of a number of innovations.

There is an actual, small museum on board that is also popular. An under-utilized top deck lounge has been transformed into a very high-tech information station full of computer table maps, a small library in the middle of the action, and a lecture area, and a Starbucks-like coffee bar. It is all intensely popular.

This is a beautifully re-designed ship that has had a great deal of thought put into every space and every bit of decor. Already on day two Bernie was proclaiming this his favourite ship ever.

Ships typically have two seatings for dinner, early and late, and have an open-seating restaurant style choice as well. We booked this trip very late, just a couple of weeks ago. As a result, couldn’t get our preferred early dinner seating, and so all ended up as open-seating people. This means you can make dinner reservations ahead, or just line up at the door, as at most land restaurants.

We kind of cheated the system. We were nice and early at our first dinner, and Lola got to work on the reservation people. We ended up with a gorgeous table right at the big stern window, and had it booked for 5pm for every day of the next two weeks. You really aren’t supposed to be able to do that, especially as next week counts as an entirely separate voyage; not that I’m complaining.

Lola and Bernie also signed up for access to all the fancy spa steam, sauna, and therapeutic pool for the first week. Helen and I didn’t think we’d use it all that much, so didn’t. It isn’t Phyllis’s kind of thing at all. The fee is reasonable if you will use it, but silly if you won’t.

I like the production shows on board, and there was a shortened one on the first day. The singers and dancers were all there to show off in wonderfully edgy costumes, with zingy dancing and singing.

Over the years we have cruised a great many times. All of the food has been wonderful with no clear standouts amongst all the vessels, until this cruise.

The food on this ship is the best and most consistent of any we’ve travelled with. Holland America has always had the reputation of being a bit above the others, but we haven’t seen that on earlier voyages. This time it is really true.

We boarded on Sunday, and sailed about 4:30pm. The rest of that day and all of the next was spent at sea. We did the nicer inside passage trip north.

Our first port of call came on Tuesday. We docked at Ketchikan early. Phyllis stayed on board, but the rest of us did various wanderings ashore. Helen and I did a walk to the Totem park, and back to Creek Street.

We also looked into a fur and taxidermy store, a jewelry place, a couple of tourist junk shops, a fabric store, and the Tongas clothing emporium. There was also a thrift store, and a stationary store where Helen bought some crazy glue to fix her shoes.

We were all back aboard by lunchtime, followed by nap time. Before supper I put in a few kilometres on a treadmill in the gym. It was another fine meal.

As the main show was a magician, Helen went by herself while I camped out in the duo-piano lounge. Lola and Bernie visited me there with Phyllis before wandering off again. That left two of us to hang out listening to the fun chatter, nice singing, and impressive finger work by the pair of entertainers. Helen joined us after her show. She held my seat as I escorted Phyllis back to her cabin. She is remarkably spry, but as she is 95 years old she deserves a little extra care.

Helen and I stayed at the piano show until it ended, and then called it a night.

Now, I am up once more and seated with coffee up on deck nine in the buffet area. This is the top full deck. It is a little after 5am, and Bernie should be joining me soon. That is our usual morning ritual. We just hang about at a window, drinking coffee, and having a bit to eat once things here get rolling. Afterwards, we go to pick up the rest of our companions for a dining-room breakfast.

It is our third morning aboard, and Wednesday, and Juneau day. None us do anything like organized tours. It will likely just be a walk-about into the tiny downtown. This is always a pleasant way to handle port days, and doesn’t interfere with all the shipboard eating. One thing I’ll never understand is all the people who race ashore looking for a place to eat. The meals they have already paid for aboard are far better than what they can find along the docks, but those places are always packed with seemingly happy cruisers.

It is also my resolution to crank out more miles. I only ran for a half-hour yesterday on a treadmill, and would like to do double that in Juneau. After Helen and I did a bunch of shop visiting, I got changed and ran south along a coastal road. It is nothing special, but better than running nowhere. Went 4km out, and then turned back.

I really like cruising, and a top feature of this super trip is that it will last more than the normal one-week length. We will be aboard for 14 days.

Almost all of my favourite cruises have been long ones; Europe for 14 days, Caribbean for 15 days, and Asia for 4 weeks. I am always on the lookout for new places to go, and the longer the better.

At the top end of the scale are the round-the-world voyages. These have two drawbacks. The first is that they actually hurry too much, with too few stops. The other is that the price per day is way out of line with other sailings. You think you’d get a deal buying your days in bulk, so to speak, but the exact opposite is true.

Other long cruises often have better prices per day, and normally run on some kind of theme. They might go around South America, or circle the edge of the Pacific; that sort of thing. Bernie has his eye wistfully on a round-the-Pacific one that is coming up for 80-something days. It sounds very nice, but is just a fantasy at this point.

The days roll by gently. Thursday it was Skagway. It is a tiny place nestled at the mouth of a river. Long ago it was the gateway to the Yukon Gold Rush, and had a big part in history for a very short while. Now it is nothing more than a cruise ship stop, but a good one.

There is a railroad built up an impossible route that used to transport mining essentials, but now exists solely to show the area off for tourists. The cute and kitschy main street has all the jewelry and tourist attire such a place can manage to flog.

This is the first town on the Alaska run that I started running in, and is still my favourite.

We arrived very early, at about 5am. The train arrived about 40 minutes later, pulling right alongside. Guests taking that excursion don’t even have to leave the wharf to get aboard.

After breakfast, we split up into couples, and Phyllis stayed aboard. Helen and I walked to town. We walked and shopped, buying mostly nothing. On the way back we swooped over to the Disney Wonder cruise ship and took some pictures.

Altogether there were four cruise ships crammed into this tiny town today.

Back aboard in time to all meet up for lunch on the buffet.

My afternoon consisted of part of a movie, a nap, and 8 km on a treadmill. The day turned too darn cold and wet to run out in the Alaskan wilds.

Supper struck, and a comedian in the theatre, and then the very pleasant evening wound down into slumber.

Woke up even earlier than what is normal for me. Coffee in the upper-deck buffet wasn’t ready, and I caught a team of electricians changing out a whole zone of ceiling pot lights.

Today is Friday and also Glacier Bay day. A crew of park rangers comes aboard to provide commentary, nature talks, and I suspect to make sure the ship follows all the park restrictions. For example; deck sports like basketball and ping pong are forbidden due to the risk of a ball going overboard and into the environment.

My arm got hurt at Jiu-Jitsu quite a while back, and I have been counting on these two weeks as healing time. Woke up this morning, and am back to square one. I really hate old person sleep injuries.

The weather cleared up nicely for Glacier Bay. Bernie and I met up stupid early at the buffet on deck 9, like always, and watched the approach for a few hours and then met up with the whole group for dining room breakfast about 8am.

We found a great indoor viewing window nearby where we settled in after the meal. The ship slowly danced about in front of two glaciers, and finished in perfect time for lunch. We had a huge window there to watch our glaciers shrink from sight as we ate.

We then split up, and I enjoyed a shortie nap before Helen and. I headed off to a talk about Glacier Bay.

Really, the glacier day is a sea day, and that was followed by a sea day. I love those the best. There is lots of activities, and naps, and eating with no shore visits to mess up the rhythm.

And then it was the town of Seward. It is a couple of hundred road kilometres from Anchorage. This is where most of the passengers end their ship voyage and either fly home, or continue to explore Alaska by land. A new load of shipmates get loaded aboard, but a few like us stay aboard for the trip back to Vancouver.

We had booked this trip pretty late, and so none of us were able to book the same cabins for the back-to-back trips and so had to pack and be moved to our new ones.

The process always has snags, but it all went as good as we could have hoped.

Helen and I went ashore and took a town shuttle on a sort of unofficial tour. We walked the downtown and Helen bought a few trifles. We were back aboard for a late lunch.

The new people all dribbled aboard throughout the day.

As returning guests we didn’t have to line up on deck for the disaster drill, but instead gathered in Phyllis’s room like a bunch of kids skipping school.

Helen had been battling a cold for the previous couple of days, but by evening time it had gone full-blown. She skipped her usual tour of the evening entertainment offerings and stayed in our cabin.

Monday was a sea day in the Gulf of Alaska. Going north had been rough, but things were even bumpier going back.

In Seward we had ridden the shuttle with a couple who had both been really sick during the earlier rough stretch. I always wonder how many people have a bad time with this kind of thing.

The sequence of this week will all be exactly backwards from our northern leg. The only difference is that we won’t be visiting Skagway, and will be in a really tiny place called Haines instead. A really, really tiny place.

Cruises are very wonderful things. Even so, they sometimes seem to run in counter-productive ways. They seem to be constantly chasing a clientelle of a shrinking demographic. It would make much more sense to tailor their product to a younger crowd instead.

A crowning example of this is their internet policies. All ships now have it, but they charge gold-standard prices. To get full access on this ship, it costs thirty bucks per day. Keep in mind, that cheap motels provide free wifi, as do coffee shops and McDonalds. People my age consider this vastly overpriced, and anybody under 30 considers free wifi to be a birthright. A cruise line that embraces cheap or free wifi will gain a huge leg up on the rest of the industry.

We have mostly sailed with Royal Caribbean, Celebrity, Princess, and Holland America. They all have high-priced internet, although they have finally set things up so that people can text within the ship while onboard. All their ships have roughly the same fare structure for their cruises.

In many ways, Princess is my least favourite. Their buffets are old-fashioned. The decor is very much also out of date, and their ships have some strange design flaws. However, Princess has done one thing that catapulted them to the top of my preferred list. They provide a small quantity of free wifi to anybody who has sailed with them more than 5 times. We qualify, and this one silly little thing has taken them from the bottom of our favourites list to the very top.

Keep in mind that I am only moderately addicted to the internet. Yes, I could buy some, but that goes against the grain. When we are planning a cruise, a price difference of a couple of hundred bucks has no bearing at all. A ration of internet at no additional cost does. It is quite possible that Princess will gain a disproportionate amount of my business all due to wrapping internet into the price. I am very sure that I am not alone in this.

If my otherwise favourite line, Royal Caribbean, provided a similar amount of internet to its loyalty program guests, they would secure a majority of my return business. If they actually included unlimited free internet to everybody, they would get 100% of my loyalty, but enough of that.

It is currently early afternoon on a sea day. The weather is overcast, and raining, and as rough as we’ve ever had in Alaskan waters.

Helen’s cold has reached a nasty level, and she avoided breakfast. She made it out of the room for lunch, but went straight back afterwards. Lola also has some sort of virus, but is holding up well.

I like our new room more than the other one. The bed runs parallel to the very large window. It is much like a veranda (balcony) room, except the window does not open, and there is no balcony, and we have a lifeboat smack centre of our view.

Today the crew opened the boat up, and tested the engine and electrical, and inspected all the other stuff. I watched. Inside it were two tiers of seating, intensely packed together. The upper tier wouldn’t be too bad. Even skinny people would be sharing butt-cheek space, but the lower is worse. It is just as packed, but also has the legs of the upper folk crammed in somehow as well. It would be bad.

The lifeboats are exactly that; tools to keep you alive. Miserable, but alive. If, in a disaster, your rescue craft is instead one of the tenders, you’ll have it good. The seating is tight, but still not as much as the lifeboats, and nobody’s legs will be beside your face.

I did a little sink laundry. I brought about enough clothes for about half of the cruise, and so do a bit of washing as we go. Helen is doing about the same thing.

I like mine to feel easier towards the end, so I brought a slightly asymmetrical load. I have enough socks along that I stopped washing those several days ago. Now, I no longer need to do underpants. All that I need wash are shirts, and soon not even those. Luxury indeed.

Now, in order that Helen can rest undisturbed, I have moved to the deck 10 lounge to do mostly nothing.

Glacier day starts in fog. The ship’s horn is sounding as the ship creeps along. The early morning crowd in the deck 9 buffet is missing altogether. It is only 5am, and I am happy that the coffee is on. Sometimes it isn’t at this hour. A beauty of the north at this time of day in June is that all is in full daylight, fog or no.

As we travelled towards Glacier Bay, the fog broke into patches. We had full sun, and fog, then sun again. Entering the Bay itself, visibility dropped to a consistent low level, but we plowed on.

Eventually, the sky opened up and everybody had a perfect day for viewing the scenery.

The next port was the town of Haines. It is small, and not very touristy at all compared to the other stops.

It was day 11 of the cruise. In the second 7 day half, I hadn’t run a single step. Week one was bad enough, but I did manage 8km in Juneau, and 3 sessions on the treadmill. It is a method for balancing some small portion of all the eating.

The only other way to do the same thing would be to cut food intake. On a cruise that is hard to do, and spoils a lot of the fun. I unofficially resolved to cut the chow down a notch, and to run ashore whenever the weather let me, and even to....shudder...get back onto the treadmills.

I have never gained at the mythological cruise rate of a pound per day, but the gains are always terrifying enough. This summer we have enough other travel that getting down to my chosen weight range will be difficult to achieve. I might still be packing some of it into the fall.

Each week at home will have about ten hours of Jiu-Jitsu along with restricted eating, and running on my preferred forest trails. Knocking off 2 pounds per week is not unrealistic. This will only be possible during times at home, which will be shockingly rare. During our many upcoming small travels weight will not drop. It will creep higher if anything.

During our Haines Alaska day I started the campaign. Breakfast was a bowl of muesli and two sticky buns, and I ate nothing more until supper. I had wonderful grilled fish. The accompanying items were not inspiring, so I ignored them. Desert was a splurge with deadly chocolate cake and a cherries jubilee sundae.

In terms of activity, Helen and I clocked a big walk all over the tiny town, after which I ran 10k through the forest. My fitbit said that my wee sprint burned off 800 calories.

Instead of gorging like Henry the VIII, My food plan was to eat like a regular fat king.

On the second Juneau day Helen and I rode the city bus out to Mendenhall Glacier. The nearest stop is still a 2.4km distance from the park. It made a nice walk, and we experienced some pony-sized mosquitos along the road.

We like all the Alaskan ports we visit, but seeing them twice within 2 weeks is overkill. In the second  Ketchikan day, we hopped a shuttle to Walmart. We are very sophisticated travellers.

There was even time for a run south down the coast road.

A very cool thing is that during dinner the captain made a string of announcements. It seemed that one of the two azipod propulsion units on the ship was broken and being worked on. Our departure was significantly delayed, and when we finally got underway it was at half power.

It has been a dream of mine to be on a ship beset with troubles. Nothing major, mind you. Just enough that they refund us in full, and we get a future cruise for free.

No such luck, as in within an hour the troublesome azipod was back in operation.

Our last full day came with very few decisions. There were no ports. We sailed well out at sea and at high speed on the now fully-functional propulsion system. Later in the day we funnelled between Vancouver Island and the rest of North America. I always find this the most scenic part of the trip.

The last day we had time for breakfast, and then did our hugs and waddled ashore. For Helen and me it was then a city walk, a bus, a ferry, and then more buses. We were home by about 3pm, which might just be a home-from-cruise record.

I got started on the big pile of laundry from the trip and we both did some other chores. We were both very tired, and were happy to mostly do nothing. We have been away from a home a great deal already in 2018, and just being here is great.

And restful.