Caribbean Cruise (Our 100th Post !!)

So many of our friends keep asking, "When are you going to post photos of your cruise to your blog?"  and "We miss reading what you've been up to".  So I decided to try and catch up on the last few months.

After turning Balsa into Canine Companions for her Professional Training, we decided to take a week's cruise during the middle of March to the Eastern Caribbean, leaving from Ft. Lauderdale Florida, visiting the islands of Puerto Rico, St. Marrten, St. Thomas, and  Eleuthera, then back to Ft. Lauderdale.  Our first day was spent at sea, very relaxing - just sleeping, walking around the ship, eating good food, watching the shows and eating some more.

.Our 1st stop, Puerto Rico, it's 77 degrees today.  The ship docked in the evening hours, so we only had from 4pm until 10pm on the island.  We decided to take an Old Town New Town tour, (trying to see as much as possible in as short of time as possible).  Our guide drove through the new downtown section, (pointing out all the government buildings and hotels - pretty much all there was to New PR).  Then up the hill to the famous PR fort, build by the US to protect the southern US region from invasion.  Very impression how it was designed, (mostly under ground and in the mountain).

The views from the fort of the town of San Juan were spectacular!!  We had a 360 degree view.  Then down to the beach to watch the sun set, can we again say SPECTACULAR !!     Next stop - Old Town San Juan. 

The buildings were all very well constructed, and as is traditional in PR, very colorful all painted pastel.  I love viewing architecture from different countries when we travel.  Then when I come home, I can look at an area of town and say "aww - that's just like such as such a country"..

Next we were lucky enough for our guide to stop in the Old Town Square, where there was a crafts festival being held.  We did some shopping for souvenirs, then walked around popping in the old shops and purchasing more trinkets.  After an hour of browsing, we needed to head back to the tour bus so we could head for the ship to set sail for St. Maarten. 

 2nd stop on our trip - Phillipsburg, St. Maarten, (on the Dutch side), it's 77 degrees today.  We have most of the day on the island, and we signed up for a Segway tour.  We cruised up and down the boardwalk and along the beach.  Our tour guide took this photo of us on the beach with our ship in the background.

Afterwards we wandered around enjoying the beautiful beach, sampling the wonderful foods, people watching, and relaxing.  It is so amazing how blue the water is down here.  The beaches are so clean, just like paradise.

 Some more touring along the shops more trinkets to buy, and souvenirs to take home, more sampling of local foods.

Because the Dutch settlement population is 60% larger than the French population - and the Dutch side of the island is only 40% of the island the buildings are very crowded and there is not a lot of room for outward growth.  On our next visit I would very much like to visit the French side, even though it is said to be very "adult oriented" beaches.   The weather is beautiful and the people very friendly.

 Our next stop - Crown Bay, St. Thomas, (it's 84 degrees today).  The weather is perfect.  We pull into port, spend 2 hours doing some shopping, then catch a ferry over to St. John's island for a whole day of snorkeling at Trunk Bay, a Marine national park. 

Our ferry pulls up to the most beautiful island, and after just a short 15 minute van ride, we are at the beach.  We see the most breathtaking coral reefs and a colorful spectrum of marine life like no other.  And under the water are anchored lighted identification boards with photos and information about the different fish and marine life that live in the area.  It was great - but the water and sun sure do zap the energy out of you.

The ferry trip back to the dock was a quiet one, as everyone was so tired.  But our ferry captain pointed out the celebrity owned islands. This one is owned by Kenney Chesney.  Oprah has one, Madonna owns one, and for a mere sum of $11.5 million dollars there is a small island for sale close by St. Johns - anyone in the market for some real estate??       This was by far my most favorite stop on the cruise and I want to come back again.

Next we spent another relaxing day at sea - sleeping in, getting a couples massage up on the top deck, (this deck was reserved for adults - no kids running around).  Very peaceful and relaxing.  The weather was a beautiful 76 degrees today.  For dinner, we had the most wonderful steak and lobster dinners at the specialty steak and seafood house.  I have never had food so wonderfully good!!!

Our last stop was the island of Princess Cays (pronounced Keys), Eleuthera, today it's 79 degrees and there is just a slight breeze, a typical island day.  Eleuthera is a tiny island only 2 miles wide and 110 miles long.  Our tour will start at Bannerman Town, (which is part of Princess Cays), and travel to the northern tip of the island, to Tarpum Bay.  One of our 1st stops is at an elementary school to visit with the kindergarten class.  Education is very important on the island - the children start school at 4 years old and when they are ready to attend high school must take a ferry to the neighboring island.

 The class of students sang 4 songs for us, (Welcome to our Class, Days of the Week, Colors, and ABC).  Then after coming around the room to shake our hands, they split up into small groups to visit with us.  The 2 girls and 2 boys who visited with Dave and I, were very interested in my camera and how I could take photos and instantly see them on the display screen.  It was so cute to visit with these little ones.

After a couple more stops to tour government buildings, and tour the small little towns along our route, (learning the history of the island), We stopped by Whiteland Beach, one of the more exclusive areas.  The water was so blue, as it was at all the islands on our cruise.  Watching the sailboats was so peaceful to the soul.

Then we stopped at Four Points Restaurant for lunch, the center of town had this make shift destination marker.  The town was so small the police officer, (a cousin of our tour guide), drove a little motor scooter.  Gave everyone on the bus quite a chuckle.

 Next stop Tarpum Bay.  Dave wandered out to the ocean.  Now I know Dave well enough to know exactly what he's thinking...  "How can I gather up enough conch, and where can I find someone to make me some conch salad.  And, can Barbara watch them make it and learn, so she can make it at home"  Oh yea - you know he's thinking that....

Well, what do you know, leave it to Dave to find a couple of women who actually know how to make conch salad right there on the beach.  With fresh, out of the sea, conch!!!  And they explain the process in great detail.  Only 2 problems - we don't have conch in Utah and if we did who's going to shuck it??

Well Dave scores some freshly make conch salad and here's the proof...  But, how does it taste??

Well it must be good, Dave gives it a thumbs up.  I got one bite and indeed it was good.  Sort of like seafood salad.

Then a couple of Dave's girlfriends come over and tell him "Man, if you be eating our conch salad - then you better be doing the Junkanoo Dance with us to pay for it"...  Dave says, "OK, Let's do it !!"

By then it was time to climb back on our bus and head back down South to Princess Cays and board our ship.  Tomorrow we dock back in Ft Lauderdale and that means tonight we have to get all our treasures packed up and be ready for a 7:00 am disembarking.  When we got home, Trevor loved his Bob Marley T-Shirt, Audra oohed over her handmade bag, Ian's tropical shirt was a perfect fit and he said "thumbs up, good job Grams".  Durell, (one of my co-workers), was all smiles that I found his special rum cake that we asked for.  

Our memories are sweet and our bodies were tanned and tired.  Guess it truly was a good trip.

SEATTLE

 The week before Christmas, Dave and I took a quick weekend trip to Seattle - (or what can also be called another Stephenless trip).  I needed to take a short trip to keep my medallion level, Dave has been working long hours and needs a break - and since I've never been to Seattle and the price was right, we thought, why not fly up on Friday night spend the weekend and come back on Monday afternoon.  We got a room just 2 blocks from the Space Needle and this was the night time view from our room. 

The weather was great the whole weekend.

Early Saturday morning after breakfast, we walked the 2 blocks over to the monorail station and rode the train downtown.  The monorail was built in 1962 for the World's Fair and only has two stops, one at each end.  It is very clean and well maintained.  We met a couple that moved from Florida to Seattle because after vacationing in Seattle they loved the area so much they moved there to retire.  They gave us several great tips.  One was on your first monorail ride, sit up front with the conductor.

 We did!!  And this is the view as you are traveling at a high speed into the city.  The city is composed of lots of high rises and very closely built together and the monorail runs between everything.  It was lots of fun.  The train stop is inside a large mall downtown.  Very convenient. 

We had signed up for a "Taste of Seattle" tour of Pike Place Market.  This was a GREAT tour and if you ever go to Seattle, we recommend you take the tour BEFORE you try to shop the marketplace.  We were given a brief history of the marketplace, and lots of background on shops and experienced bites and sips from many of the market's vendors, (including crab cakes, chowder, cheese, salmon, tea, chocolates, coffees, macaroni & cheese, fruits, etc.)

Every stop we made at the market, the vendors were friendly and told us stories about their shop and were eager to share their samples with us.  The sights were very delightful to the eyes, noses, and taste buds.

We saw Christmas wreaths that were very different from what we would see in Salt Lake, very flowerful, lovely to behold.  The flower prices were very cheap - after all, this is where the growers sell directly to the public at the marketplace, (no middleman to mark up the price!).

Of course Dave's favorite stands were the fish stands.  I had seen the shows about the flying fish, but to see it in person was great.  These vendors work so fast getting the orders out, and once again the food is so fresh and the prices are great.  Dave of course had to have his oyster shooter right there on the spot.  His comment  -  DELISH !!

 I loved the pepper ornamental, (and edible) wreaths.  We purchased a small hanging  pepper display for our kitchen that has garlic, purple statis and other dried flowers in it.  Now the green peppers are all turning red and it is very vibrant.  Too bad we didn't have room to bring back a large wreath.  We did pick up several holiday gifts during this trip for friends and family.

And of course the Christmas carolers was delightful to watch and listen to.  Seattle was fun.  And the best part was, even though we walked all day, we didn't get rained on once.  Our tour was 2 hours long and afterwards we had a good idea where to eat lunch and where to do our shopping.  The web site for the company is:  www.SavorSeattleTours.com   They have several types of tours, if you take this tour, take the morning tour - then your can pick where to do lunch afterwards.  Plus you give you a card good for 10-15% off purchases at vendors for the next 7 days.!!  Good deal.  We used our card several times on Saturday and again on Monday.

 On Sunday morning it was lightly raining, we walked over to McDonald's to grab a quick breakfast then back to the hotel to meet up with our tour guide.  We had a tour of the Seattle area wineries, Snoqualmie Falls, and a chocolate candy factory.  The first stop was Chateau St. Michelle.  A lovely winery.  The grapes for all the wineries are all grown on eastern Washington and then bottled in the Western plants.  The inside of the wineries were lovely and very majestic.

Next we visited Novelty Hill / Januk, (this winery was started by one of the St. Michelle's head winemakers who left to venture out on his own).  It was very modernistic.  Very update and different from the traditional wineries most people are used to seeing.

 Our last stop was to Columbia Winery, which was started by three Washington University professors who used to have a wine tasting club and decided to band together buy a winery and produce their own wines.  This was also a very lovely and traditional style winery.  We ate our lunch here and enjoyed the chance to relax a little.

 Then on to Snoqualmie Falls.  Unfortunately the trip north took us through some more rain, and by the time we reached the area where the falls are located, the fog was so heavy that we could NOT see the falls.  We could hear them, but couldn't see anything.  So on to Boehm's Chocolate Factory.  A lovely old hand dipping factory.  We learned how chocolate is hand dipped and also molded.  Purchased a couple boxes of hand dipped chocolates for gifts then started the trip back to our hotel.  Our tour was 6 hours, and we had reservations at the Space Needle that evening for dinner.

Monday we had 1/2 day to kill before catching our plane, so Dave and I took the monorail back downtown and strolled through the marketplace again shopping and eating.  Enjoying the sights, smells, sounds, and wishing I had an empty suitcase to bring home a large amount of purchases.  If I lived in Seattle I would be shopping for fresh produce at the market every week.

We enjoyed our trip.  And no, Stephen, we did not miss not having you with us, (gosh did I just say that out loud - sorry Stephen! ).

Hand Bell Ringers

Last Sunday, (December 11th), Dave and I got a chance to finally see my friend Karen and her group, (the Utah Valley Hand Bell Choir) perform at the Springville Art Museum.  Karen is the founder, (18 years ago), and one of the directors of this marvelous group. 

 They perform only a few times a year, (Easter, 4th of July, and Christmas).  Most of their performances are at Christmas.  They are all volunteers and they are excellent performers.  If you get the chance, I would highly recommend going to see one of their performances, and buy one of their CDs. A very professional group!  And everyone of them also play another instrument.

Karen and her husband Neil have vacationed with Dave and I a couple of times and they are such a fun couple - we laugh so much when we are with them.  We are so glad we finally got the chance to hear Karen's group.  They are in high demand during the holidays, and this performance was sold out. 

SO - What do you think ??

Is this look me ?   Should I get one of these hats ?   

I just couldn't resist trying it on -  it was too funny....

Our Newest Family Member

On Thursday night, (October 13th), the newest member of our family arrived !!    I am so pleased to introduced to everyone my new great-granddaughter,  Miss Autumn Raine Long.   She was born @ 11:43pm.   6lbs, 7 oz,  19 inches.  She has black wavy hair and hazel eyes.   She has very long fingers, (going to be a piano player), and long toes.

 As you can probably tell by the look on my face - she is the most beautiful baby girl in the world.  Everyone thinks grandparents are wonderful, but only the best grand parents get to be called GREAT-grandparents !!

I think Dave is pretty happy with this little girl also.  She snuggles into him so contently - everyone loves his warmth.  She looks so tiny next to him.   Welcome to our family little Autumn.  You are going to be so loved with so many grandparents.

Potatoes Harvested

Some of Dave's co-workers have been asking him about our potatoes that we've been growing and how they are doing.  Some of my friends have also emailed and said why don't you put a photo of your potatoes on the blog so we can see what they look like when you dig them up.  OK - here is the 5th and last harvest that we dug up.  We have have some pretty good eating for only have a few potatoes planted.  Dave has that big monster in the basket earmarked with his name.  I guess I need to chop him up quick for dinner.    OH - by the way remember those old cucumber seeds that I planted, these are some of the last of the harvest off the vines.  I gave a small bag of cukes away to our puppy sitter and a small bag to one of the security guards at work, and we have been eating cucumbers everynight for the last 2 weeks.  Not bad for old seeds that I just threw out in the garden.  They didn't cost us anything!!  And we have lots of little pinky size cukes on the vines - as long as the frost doesn't get them, I will keep picking them.

S J O R

This year Dave decided that as part of his  birthday gift, he wanted to attend a smooth jazz concert in Sedona, Arizona.  It was the SEDONA JAZZ ON THE ROCKS - (S J O R), held the weekend of October 7th and 8th.  So, we left late Thursday afternoon and drove down to Page, Arizona and spent the night, then got up  and drove the couple of hours into Sedona.  Dave has been to Sedona several times, but this was my first trip.

The first thing we did when we arrived into town was go to the Arizona Pink Jeep Tours.  This company has been in business for 51 years, and if you ever get the chance to go to Sedona you have to do the Pink Jeep tour, it is so worth the trip.  They have several different tours packages that you can sign up for and they are a blast.  We did the Diamondback Gulch tour, which was about 3 hours - but some of them are all day tours if you are that adventurous.

The terrain was both breath taking, sometimes a little dangerous, very rugged and only reachable by our 4X4 tour jeep, always thrilling, and sometimes heart pounding as you looked down over the side of the ravines and up the side of the cliffs.

The scenery was breath taking, and being the high desert terrain very much like South Western Utah.  But still very lovely to look at.  Our tour guide did not disappoint one bit.

 At one stop in the tour, Mike the tour guide / driver, pulled over and pointed out the prickly pear cactus and described the fruit and got out and cut one of the fruit off the plant, brought it back to the jeep, opened it up and showed us how delicious it was.  He told us the different restaurants in town that served prickly pear ice cream, Magarita's,and  jellies and jams with their breakfast items.  The prickly pear has a taste that is a cross between a cherry and a strawberry.  It is very sweet but very good.  At lunchtime we made sure to have some.

As you can see, our little jeep was very trustworthy and could easily maneuver any terrain, no matter what the incline.

Even rocks did not deter our path !!

And when we stopped for photos, the sights were glorious for the eye to behold.

That afternoon, we checked into the Junipine Resort, and we were able to sit and watch the Oak Creek off of our bedroom deck.  Dave was wishing that there was a bed on the deck, so he could sleep to the sound of the creek.  It was such a contrast to the desert we had just been through. 

That evening and all day Saturday, we listened to Smooth Jazz artists.  The cool autumn air and the warm sun made for a great weekend.  My favorite smooth jazz artist, Dave Koz was featured on Friday night and Dave's favorite smooth jazz artist, Mindi Abair, was featured on Saturday.  Along with many other artists, (Los Lobos, The Rippingtons, Maxi Priest, Jeff Golub, Hiroshima, Sahnas Brothers, Billy Mitchell, Will Donato, Isaac Valenzuela, Tony Exum Jr. andd The Rhythm Keepers).  Probably the most exciting surprise was on Saturday when Mindi announced that Dave Koz has stayed over and was going to do a special number on stage with her.  Dave and I have been to a lot of Mindi's concerts and Dave's concerts and never have they played together.  It was great to hear them both play their saxophones together.  And to hear Jeff Golub on stage with Mindi so soon after losing his eyesight was amazing.  The venue was so great, (the lighting was horrible, the microphones didn't always work, the food vendors weren't all that great, the golf course grounds weren't that well taken care of), but the music made up for it.  And we were back home by 8:30 on Sunday, so we weren't too tired and worn out.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAVE - Hope you enjoyed it, I did.