9 posts tagged “trip”

Pete was invited to present a paper at a conference last week, and, sadly for him, it was in Europe.  So poor Pete had to spend several days there, which I know he just hated.  Yeah, right.  He had a great time, both at the conference and sight-seeing in the Netherlands and Germany.  The conference was sponsored by the United Nations University World Institutue for Development Economics Research, and there were apparently people from all different countries there -- in fact, Pete was one of the only 2 Americans present.  He was very interested to hear the perspectives of presenters from developing countries, especially in Africa.  (If anyone wants to know more about this conference, here's the link to the main page.  He got some great feedback on the paper he and his colleague wrote, and I know he's anxious to explore more in this academic (and practical) area.

We're happy to have him home now, and are thankful he had a great time!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For the rest of our stay in sometimes-sunny CA, we went to the best bed-and-breakfast we've ever been to:  Chez Wray  (aka John and Keiko's house).  The Monterey/Pacific Grove area is beautiful this time of year (don't I sound like an expert from all of my many trips out there?  No.... but all the locals were saying this was the best time to be there) and we saw plenty of sun and warm weather.  But we also got a kick out of how fast the temperature can swing wildly -- just by driving 5 minutes in a particular direction!  For instance, we drove down to Point Lobos State Park, and for the whole drive, and even as we went in through the entrance of the park, it was very warm and sunny.  But then, suddenly, about 100 yards into the park, it got very foggy and chilly!  (This happened BOTH times we went to this park)  And by the time we were hiking out on the top of some of the cliffs by the water, it was downright freezing.  As John says, you have to employ "modular dressing" out there - for the rest of us, this means "layering" your clothing.

John and Keiko graciously took us around to all their local sights:  the Monterey aquarium, Cannery Row, Carmel-by-the-Sea, Pebble Beach, 17 Mile Drive, the Monarch Sanctuary, etc.  And we ate quite well -- Keiko's homecooked meals, John's waffle specialty, and several yummy restaurants, including Dad's favorite place in the whole world:  Stix, the bar/restaurant overlooking Pebble Beach golf course and the ocean.  It was a delightful experience to have a whole weekend to be with just adults, having long conversations without interruptions, feeling free to make decisions without the pressure of a bedtime schedule, etc.  I felt very free the whole time!  Thanks to Mom and Dad, the kids at home were well cared-for and having a great time, so we just enjoyed ourselves -- and were very thankful.

Thanks, John and Keiko (and Mom and Dad), for a fantastic trip!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This past Thursday, Pete and I had the unique pleasure of waking up in time to see the sunrise here in North Carolina, and then watching the sunset that evening over the Pacific Ocean.

And in between we had very fun, sight-full day!  We arrived in San Francisco and spent several hours meandering around the city, seeing some of the touristy things.  Then we drove down to Half Moon Bay, enjoying the coast, and the beautiful town there once we arrived.  We stayed at a great Bed-and-Breakfast there (with some awesome ameneties!) and loved walking around and exploring.

It was an amazing first day of our California getaway... and the fun didn't end then!  But... you'll have to wait until later for the rest of the story (if you don't catch it from Paul Harvey on the radio), as I'm still in re-entry mode here and will have to write more later!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Oh -- and one highlight this evening was getting to see a WHALE for the first time!  It was out just past where Pete is standing...

Last week we were quite happy to leave the kiln that is North Carolina in August, and head North.  Our main destination last week was beautiful Keuka Lake, one of the Finger Lakes in NY, and the site of our Frank Family Reunion.  All 22.5 of us trekked in from 5 different states to spend the week on the shores of the lake -- and it was definitely a great place to be.  We were amazed by how cool it was -- we actually had to wear sweatshirts at times! -- and Pete was overjoyed by the lack of humidity.  We felt not one ounce of air conditioning for the entire time, and loved that.  And, really, how could you be anything but thankful to wake up each morning with this view?

We enjoyed spending some quality time with all the different family members, and happily embarked on various activties, such as boating, tubing, water skiing (not me -- Pete), swimming (again, not me -- way too cold for me), hiking (on one of the 7 most scenic trails in the Northeastern US!), blueberry picking, lunching at a winery, dining on the lake, playing the Bowl Game and euchre, and washing all our dishes and utensils by hand (no dishwasher -- which is good for the soul once in awhile so we can appreciate the appliance more when we get home).  One of the other fun aspects for the kids was seeing Amish carriages everywhere -- the local grocery store even had a parking garage/stable(?) for them!   We also ate a LOT of cake over 5 days because we had several different occasions to celebrate, including Jane's 70th birthday and Rayna's 6th.  So, that of course made it a good week.  :) 

Here are some of my favorite pictures from our time there:

 

Pete's parents, Bud and Jane, celebrated their 40th wedding anniversary on February 10th this year.  So to surprise them, we had a big party for them 6 months (exactly) later in Rochester, NY -- the town they lived in for many years.  It ended up being a really great afternoon -- I think they were truly surprised and the party was fun.  The most amazing part was seeing how many friends of theirs came, many of whom Bud and Jane hadn't even seen for a long time.  My in-laws are great examples to me in their capacity for friendships.  People love them!

 

As part of the "program" for the party, the grandkids reprised a song they worked on last year, called "If I weren't a Grandkid."  I'll put a short clip of it below.... Since you probably won't understand most of the words, the basic idea is that each verse is about something Bud or Jane like to do (volunteer, ski, drive the tractor, etc).

 

 

One of the memorable stops for me on our big trip was the partial-day we spent in the town I grew up in, Spencerport.  I couldn't believe it had been almost 8 years since I had been back for a visit -- way too long.  So it was wonderful to go around and see everything that had changed -- or stayed the same.  We also loved going to my old church -- everyone there seemed the same!  Definitely felt like coming "home."  I took a bunch of pictures that I will post below for the viewing pleasure of my family who may enjoy seeing some of the developments...

And we also spent the night in Buffalo, visiting some very good Spencerport friends who have relocated there.  It was soooo nice to see Melanie, one of my favoritest people ever, and to visit her home and her office at UB, and we also enjoyed an all-too-brief visit with Mark and Rebecca Lenz and their adorable kids.  Seeing these old friends always makes me miss them more.... and always makes so grateful for the decades-long friendships we've kept.

 

Yay for Spencerport memories!

We arrived home last night from our 10-day trip to Upstate New York, thankful for a very good trip, and thankful to be home.  Of the 10 days we were gone, 5 of them were spent traveling to multiple locations, giving us many opportunities to reflect on the "joy of the journey" -- and to try to convince the kids that this was possible.  We drove over 1800 miles, and according to Pete's new GPS toy, with all of our stops along the way, we averaged 46 miles per hour, so you can do the math to calculate how many hours that meant in the car.  I'll just say it was a LOT.

It was also a lot of snacks -- I think I need to schedule a special chiropractor appointment this week to get the crick out of my neck from swiveling to the left 4,654 times to hand someone some food or drink in the car.  It was also WAY too many stops at nasty restrooms to take kids to the bathroom.  The trip also afforded time for multiple games of Car Bingo and the Alphabet game, as well plenty of time to listen to some books on CD (interrupted about every 20 seconds by someone), as well as several rounds of singing songs.

There were many moments of aggravation -- such as when Colsen would get mad at us for not letting him do something (such as wiggle his way out of the car seat), and to punish us, he would throw his pacifier to a spot in the car no one could reach.  Then we would all get to hear him cry in anger as if we did it.  There were also moments of frustration, such as when we were trying to help Rayna achieve one of her "summer goals" which is to memorize the books of the New Testament.  I wanted to pull my hair out on several occasions.... like when she kept insisting "July" comes after "Jude."   And there were some moments of amusement, like when Strider announced to us, after a conversation with one of his cousins, "Did you know that Barry Bonds takes Asteroids???"   And for the last 20 minutes of yesterday's 8 hour trip, we all ended up having a major laughing fest -- mostly to ward off a crying fest.

One of our favorite stops to break up long days of driving has become the New River Gorge in West Virginia.  We stop to see a huge bridge that is something like the world's largest single arch steel bridge or something.  It's 847 feet above the river -- a fact I try to forget when we have to drive over it -- and it looks like really cool from the little park that we stop at.  Some of us ventured down 181 steps to an overlook with a beautiful view of the river and bridge...  This place definitely beats stopping at a yucky rest area or McDonalds!

I'll write later about our adventures at our actual destinations, but for now will just say we're thankful the journeying went well, and it was good to stop and see family, friends and attractions, and attractive friends and family, along the way.  Now that we are home again, though, I have to agree, "East, West, home's best."   And I'll be happy to not get into car again with squirmy kids, juice boxes and trail mix, for at least a few weeks.  :)

(Strider just read this and says he disagrees.  He's been walking around chanting, "Vacation's best!  Vacation's best!"  But he made me laugh last night when we came home and he was trying to find something and, after spending over a week in very small quarters, said, "Man, this house seems so big now!")

 

(At the New River Gorge) 

I (Pete) don’t post very often on this blog, but we traveled to Minneapolis this past weekend for a visit with my sister Sue and her family and we had an awesome time -- it's worthy of my entering blog-land to talk about it.

 

Here are some of the many highlights:

 

·         Tubing and skiing on two of the 10,000 plus lakes

·         Jumping on the trampoline

·         Playing the Wii (guitar hero, golf, marble mania)

·         A Twins game (versus the Diamondbacks in inter-league play)

·         Pool/water park

·         Cousin David’s baseball game

·         Visiting my friend Soup

·         Rides at the Mall of America

·         An outdoor Church service

 

·       Some quotes from the weekend:

 

Strider to Amy: Today I went tubing and got some serious air

 

Rayna arriving home just off the plane, in a sad tone: I just miss Aunt Sue, Uncle Al, Maggie [the dog], David and Krista.

 

Strider: Did you know that with your plane ticket on the way there and the way back you get a free cup of juice?  A free cup of juice if you have a ticket!

 

Me: Maybe we should spend the whole summer in Minnesota some year.

Pete and I arrived home late last night after a fantastic few days in Chicago!  We were so thankful to have a chance to take a trip by ourselves.... and as it turned out, the Windy City was a great place to go -- and it wasn't too windy.  Pete was presenting a paper with a very long title at a conference with an unpronounceable acronym name, attended by 3500 other academics in sport coats.  But the beauty of it (believe it or not) was that it was held at a great hotel right downtown, so I tagged along to do some exploring.  Here's how the trip broke down:

• 2 airplane rides, 3 bus rides and 3 train rides (including some stretches on the "El" which made me think of the movie "The Fugitive")
• 2 nights at The Palmer House, which boasts being the oldest, continuously operating hotel in North America.  Don't think that didn't scare me more than once as we were going up the elevator to our room on the 18th floor...  Exactly how were they doing all the maintenance and checks by engineers it must need when it was continuously operating all these years?
• 4 great restaurants... and I have a new favorite of all-time:  Big Bowl.  Thanks for the rec, Karin!
• 9 stories in the Macy's I shopped at!  Yes, 9!  It was overwhelming, to say the least.
• 6 seminars attended at the conference by Pete.  He seems to have enjoyed them, but I'm glad I was out walking around instead.
• 1 walk on "Magnificent Mile"... which Pete kept calling Miracle Mile by mistake... or Magical Mile... or...
• 2 famous deep-dish pizza places we tried.  Giordano's was our favorite.
• 5 wonderful hours with my friend Jen.  We were able to talk about all kinds of good things.... and as I walked away after she boarded her train I realized how uplifted and encouraged I felt.  And how much more I loved Pete!  It's funny... after Pete spends time with her husband Bryan, he feels the same way.  These must be signs that they are good friends.
• And speaking of friends.... 1 very handsome, strong and smart man I got to spend many hours with!  I was very proud to be his guest for the weekend -- and he spoiled me.
• Some other miscellaneous highlights.... 1 chocolate cafe; 1 huge new Trump building -- way to go, Bill!; 1 fun used bookstore and 2 nice parks.
• And finally.......Countless long, uninterruped conversations for 3 days:  Priceless!

 

Thank you Mom and Dad, for watching our kids for us!!!  You handled 50% more of them than you did last time (when there were only 2) and did great!