Why the disappearing act? What we’ve been up to…

Well hello there!

It’s been a while since we’ve published a post on this site – over two weeks in fact. I think this might be the longest gap between posts since we started this blog back in early 2009.

Why the disappearing act?

It actually was not intentional. We’ve been traveling quite a bit recently and decided to give ourselves some laptop down time.

As Baby B grows into a full blown toddler without an off switch, it’s become more important to embrace our travel experiences together (read – we don’t have time to work on the blog when traveling with the wee man).

We often joke that the worst thing for our travel blog is actually traveling – case in point.

We’ve now returned to the comforts of our home in Vancouver, having completed a whirlwind of trips in British Columbia and Ontario.

A few weeks ago we shared some photos from our time in Parksville, a quintessential Pacific Northwest beach town on the eastern coast of Vancouver island.

Stay tuned – we will start publishing our stories from that trip in the coming weeks.

After that trip, we packed our bags and boarded a flight to Toronto, a flight that turned out to be one of the worst flights we’ve had in years – more on that later.

The primary purpose of visiting Toronto was to attend TBEX 2013 (Travel Blog Exchange), the world’s largest gathering of travel bloggers and industry professionals.

We missed last year’s conference in Colorado because Baby B was only a few months old at the time. But not this time around. If you attended the show, you likely saw a blond, curly-haired toddler running around the convention centre. That’s our little man!

The below picture is Baby B tackling the vertigo-inducing glass floor in the CN Tower.

We love attending TBEX because it’s the perfect opportunity to connect with our digital friends and make new off-line friendships. We always leave these events feeling inspired and re-energized. It’s fun being around so many like minded people that are doing such awesome things with their lives.

The event has drastically changed over the years, growing from a simple meeting of travel enthusiasts to a big ticket event that attracted more than 1,300 participants this year.

Our time in Toronto was fun but exhausting, as is often the case when attending conferences. Toronto Tourism hosted a variety of fantastic city tours and Expedia hosted a great social event on Toronto Island.

As the photo below illustrates, one of the tours had me hanging out with the legendary Stanley Cup and sitting in the Toronto Maple Leafs locker room. I felt like a little kid on Christmas morning!

The conference was only 3 days but we decided to extend our trip an additional week to visit with friends and family.

Many people don’t know that I (Cam) grew up in the Toronto suburbs, so we still have a lot of family and friends living in the area. It’s very important that we introduce Baby B to these friends and family before he gets too big and loses his toddler cuteness.

And, of course, it’s always fun returning to the old stomping grounds!

After Toronto, our travels continued north to Ontario’s “cottage country” in the Muskoka area, arguably the best slice of Ontario. We stayed with good friends at their family cottage, located directly on Loon Lake about 20 minutes outside the town of Gravenhurst.

The weather was unseasonably wet and cool, but it did deliver some fantastic sunsets. It was so nice to just relax with friends and enjoy some craft beers by the campfire.

So there you have it. That’s the quick version of where we’ve been hiding lately. Of course, there’s much more to follow, so check back with us in a few days.

Cheers!

Cam, Nicole and Baby B