AAAAUUUGGH! I just deleted a big post again. Stupid frickin' frackin' touch pad. Oh, that makes me angry. Oh well, I guess I'll just type it out again.
Â
So, I was looking for my Mexico pictures and couldn't for the life of me find them. I have them on CD somewhere, but I sure can't find them. I told my sister that I had just spent about 45 minutes looking for them, and she said, "I think you sent me a copy of some of those . . . yeah, here they are." It was funny. She found MY pictures in about 30 seconds, while I still haven't found them here, in 2 days . . . although I gave up in frustration and stopped looking. And I would use the excuse that I've moved since I stashed them away, but she's moved too. Twice. Methinks I might be disorganized. Anyway, I intended to show you all pictures from our two big trips, but since I could only find a few, I'll mostly just show you ones from our Morroco-Spain-Britain trip in January-March 2010.
Â
Most of these were taken by my friend Jerm, because our camera broke. I just want to give him the credit, because he's a good photographer . . . and I didn't include the best ones, because I don't feel like I'm allowed to distribute them on the internet . . . since they're his.
Â
Â
Those are goats, in a tree. I can't tell you how cheery it made me, every single time we saw them. I would yell, "Goats in a tree! Goats in a tree!" and make everyone stop their bikes and look at them. The trees are spiky (maybe acacias? I have no idea) but the goats are tough. We figured out that the goat herders would wedge rocks into the forks at the bases of the trees to make them grow more horizontally - then the goats could climb them more easily and get delicious food - as you can see, there isn't a whole lot else to eat for them here.
Â
Â
This is my husband and I riding camels in the Sahara desert. We rode our bikes from Marrakesh to the Sahara desert, over the high atlas mountains, the tallest mountains in North Africa! I felt pretty tough . . . even if I did have to push my bike a goodly bit of the way up the mountain on the second-last day. If anyone is ever considering going to Morroco (and I recommend it, it's beautiful), send me a PM and I can tell you about the many ways that Moroccans are proud to screw you out of your money. I thought that was just some culturally-biased nonsense before we went there. And it is culturally-biased, but it's not nonsense. The guy leading the camels was the most frustrating example of us getting screwed out of our money. Nonetheless, we got to ride camels in the Sahara desert! So even though it was a bit of a gong show, I'm still really pleased that we got that fantastic experience. Also, riding camels gives you saddle sores in a very different way that riding a horse does. By the end of the first three hours on the camels, I had burning raw areas on my butt. By the end of the next three hours they were oozing, and that afternoon (off the camels) they scabbed over. Yikes! Anyway, the Sahara! When we got to the parts with bigger dunes, I was surprised at just how much it looks like the pictures you see in magazines. That's the only time I've ever gone someplace, looked at it, and thought, "You know, this isn't that different than looking at pictures of it". It was still fantastic, but if I had to choose the Sahara or the Redwoods, I would choose the Redwoods - they are impossible to convey in pictures!
Â
We got very few pictures in Spain, because it was raining nearly the whole time, and because we're none of us very good at taking pictures of architecture, which was what we were doing in Spain. So I didn't include any.
Â
Â
This is Erik and I on top of a "Munro" (mountain) in Scotland. We had left our camping stuff behind before we discovered that we were too cheap for the hostel nearby (prices were twice what it said on the website - but it said "starting at" . . . curses). So we spent one night sleeping under a bush in a churchyard. The next night we spent in a little railway hut. We stuffed garbage bags with newspapers to use as sleeping bags. It was cold, and we didn't get a whole lot of sleep. And then we hiked up this mountain! I wasn't at my fastest due to the lack of sleep, so another guy who started way after us caught up to us just as we neared the top. He was friendly and took this picture for us (Jerm had left after magically fixing our camera). The guy was a "Munro-bagger" which means that he's trying to climb every peak above 3000 ft in Scotland. There's 283 of them. He was doing a string of three that day, but we left after the first two because we were getting cold and tired, and wanted to make the train back to Edinborough. Anyway, even though we were exhausted it was amazing, and as you can see, it wasn't cloudy or rainy. There was also virtually NO wind, which is completely unheard of in Scotland. It was a perfect day!
Â
Â
This was taken on the way down from the Munros. There was this steep snow-covered hillside, and Erik wanted to go vloshing (I have no idea how to spell that, since I think it's a word that he made up) down it, which is like skiing but just on your hiking boots. He's really good at it, I'm not. The track on the left is from his first run, and you can kind of see his fancy s-turns - not bad for on his boots. I tried for a bit, but my boots have really good grip, and I have less-than-fantastic balance, and I'm a bit of a scaredy-cat. So I thought it would be fun to slide down on my butt, like I was sledding. I had a walking stick to dig in if I needed a brake. Well, I was wearing rainpants. Turns out, they were really slippery. That track on the right that goes straight down? That was my track. It's so dark because I was leaning all of my weight on my walking stick (which was wedged under my arm), digging it in to try to slow myself. I was FLYING down that hill. As I neared the end I was trying to figure out where would be the safest place to land, because there were some rocks after the snow stopped. Fortunately, Erik was ready and tackled me about 6 feet before the rocks, and that stopped me. It was . . . exciting. Anyway, he likes vloshing so much that he hiked back up the hill to do it again!
Â
Â
This was taken by my best friend when she and I went on a horsepacking trip in the Yukon. Maybe summer 2006? I thought our guide was among the best people I've ever casually met. Our horses caused a bit of trouble trying to make their way back towards home (even with hobbles on) when we camped for the night, and she jumped on her saddle-horse (who wasn't trying to leave) and rounded them back up. Once she had tethered them, she took the saddle off of her horse, and had to get it back across a little stream to our camp. She was 70 years old. She tried to hop across the stream with the saddle in her hands, but she slipped and fell in. She was fine, but her pants got wet. So she took them off. Then she stood out on the deck of the little cabin we were spending the night at, pantsless, and looked to see if she could see any fun wildlife up in the hills with the binoculars. Mostly bears. After a bit she said, "Well, too cold for me out here without any pants on, I'm going to bed. Goodnight," and she went to bed. I loved her matter-of-fact way of dealing with the wet pants . . . she just took them off and then continued on like nothing had changed. She was great.
Â
Â
This was taken on our Oregon-Mexico-Guatemala-Belize trip in 2008. I think this was taken just as we approached the coast in California. Since I can't find the CD's, I'm not 100% sure. Anyway, if it's where I was thinking of, this was at the top of a long hard uphill and just before the last major downhill to the coast. The hill had a 10% grade! I've never even seen anything like that! And us, on the tandem bike, with an overloaded trailer behind us . . . we went fast, even with the brakes on nearly full-force. We had to stop to let the brakes cool multiple times, and to stop Erik had to drag his feet. It was fun, though! ZOOM! And when we got to the coast we were pleased, because it was our first glimpse of the ocean on this trip. I like this picture because Erik looks so happy! He's a hard one to get a good photo of, because he's not very exciteable and doesn't smile all that often . . . or frown either, but he always looks so serious. Anyway, I love this picture, he's grinning!
Â
Â
I don't remember for sure if this was taken in Belize or Guatemala. We met an artist from Santa Fe in a cave, and he took this picture. He had followed a path into a cave, and it had a little rope handrail for most of the length, and he had forgotten to bring a light (the cave was at the back of a fairly long trail). We had been sitting in the cave for a while, with our lights off, listening to the creek. When we started back out, we were startled by the guy crouching in the shadows. I think he was trying to figure out how to get our attention without startling us, when we saw him anyway. He sounded really sheepish and explained that he was using his camera's focus light to try to light his way. We offered our services as people who had a headlamp, and took him to the end of the path (which wasn't much farther). We got to talking and he offered to drive us to the coast of Belize, which sounded good, as it was getting way too hot to ride our bike during the days, and I didn't feel safe riding at night. We spent a few days with him in Belize and Guatemala, looking at historic sites, hiking, and snorkeling. The above picture was taken by our new companion on a little day hike, when we found a nice little pool to go swimming in.
Â
I hope that those help . . . if you can't go on a vacation right now, it's nice to look at photos of vacations and imagine you're there. Thanks for the photos, Taxlady and Ramzubo! I like the one of the little Wallaby (that is a Wallaby, right?), and the underwater fish picture - we've tried to take snorkeling pictures but they never look that good! And Taxlady, I like the one with Mount St Michel in the background - is that ever impressive! And the coast of Spain, too. Also, your dad is enormous!
  The power finally came back on last Thursday, so the outage lasted four nights.  Our neighborhood was literally the last in Toledo to have power restored.  One of my best friends flew in for a visit on Thursday night, so they got it on just in time.
 to everyone still trying.
  Your pizza sounds delicious! 
 Also, if she raised DH and he's a little OCD then she already knows that you guys like things neat and tidy.  Don't worry, I really do think you are a great DIL.  And I loved your pictures.. I'm going to find some too, but I have to do them from a different computer.
 they have much fairer prices.  I have always loved sheep 
 Do yours do that??  I'm into roosters now.. do you have any of those.  Livingsky do you?
 I hear you on having some problems, but there has been great success here, so hopefully joining is all you need.  GOOD LUCK!!  
  Also, I forgot to mention, I think is sort of funny that you are Birdie.Bee on the other site (I'm not a knitter) because I sometimes call you birdie.bee and it reminds me of Birds and Bees.. how we were taught in school.  
 I'll be stalking your chart 
  Thank goodness I know a few of our next generation are getting a good education. 
 P.S. it's really nice to wake up and get such nice compliments.. each time you all send me one, my heart fills.. seriously.. what a neat group of ladies.  Who was it that said they still have friends from their destination wedding blog?  I hope that I can remain friends with you all.. this has truly been a blessing.  
  You're right, the women who contribute to this thread are completely and utterly awesome.  And my goodness, don't wear yourself out!  My dad is a CPA, so he's working crazy hours right now too.  It always worries me.
you guys!
 As far as, sleeping in a little.. well, your brain will work so much better after more sleep.  Also..my sister had a "bubbly tummy" (that's exactly what she called it), when she got pregnant with my nephew.  
 You can also tell that I really like orange (or my orange fleece).  The year we went on the ski trip, I bought everyone a monogrammed fleece.. but didn't buy myself one.  DH secretly ordered me one and he had no idea I had gotten him an orange one so you can imagine our surprised when we both got orange!  MEANT TO BE!!  
