It has been ten months since we last updated the blog, so although we really have not been able to travel much, here is what we have been up to…
After missing Hunter’s birthday last year, we made sure to get home by October 10th for his sixth birthday party. It was great to see everyone again, especially the grandkids who are so fun at this age: 6, 4 and 3. Hunter is very smart (he already thinks he knows more than the adults) and tested at the top of the scale for starting kindergarten, Maverick is more of a pleaser and is a cutie pie, and darling Elderly is now very good at talking your ear off and telling you what to do.
We always come home to spend Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas with the family. This trip we helped Alex and Ashlee move into their new house, had a couple of overnights with the boys, babysat Mav when he was sick and helped with his 4th birthday party. We spent lots of time playing with all three of the grandkids as well as spending time with my Mom. We also took a one-week trip to Bill’s home town (Kitchener, Ontario) for his eldest nephew’s wedding. The wedding was fun, as was seeing the rest of his family.
Bill bought us a Groupon to a virtual reality place and we liked it so much he went home and ordered an Oculus Quest headset (if you haven’t tried it, you really should. It’s incredible). All the adults in the family had fun playing with his new toy. It’s not just games, it can be quite a work out, and it’s also about 360 experiences. My 90-year-old mother got to experience scuba diving and a tour of some National Parks she had previously visited in person.
Our plans for Thanksgiving got a last-minute change when Sami and Heath got viral pinkeye a week before the big day. They were quarantined for 2 weeks which meant we needed a new place to gather and they could no longer join us. I did most of the cooking for Thanksgiving at Alex’s house and managed to catch the oven (their brand-new oven, in their brand-new house) on fire by spilling Chex Mix into the bottom of the gas oven. It was total madness, with the fire alarms going off and two of the dogs running away when we opened the doors to try to clear the smoke. To top it off, Alex and Ashley have Nest cameras (that record to the cloud), so they watch the whole scene when they got home. They were very nice about it (of course we had to leave them most of the Chex Mix as payment).
Cooking all that food is a LOT of work (but worth it since it tasted great). (After the feast), We took a Thanksgiving dinner care package to Sami, Heath and Elderly, leaving it on their porch. By the time they were safe to be around, it was time for us to go to Grand Cayman for annual dive vacation, so we actually didn’t get to see them for more than 3 weeks.
The week after Thanksgiving, we took a one-week trip to Grand Cayman, to do some shore diving. We love to shore dive, because it is:
- much less expensive ($30 vs upwards of $100 each)
- Boat dives are often deeper (our shore dives are usually 60 feet or less) but they can be as short as 35 minutes.
- We aren’t tied to a boat schedule (which usually means getting up before 7am)
- We don’t waste time riding out to the reef, or waiting on other divers to gear up
- Finally, we can stay down as long as Bill’s air lasts, which is usually around 70 minutes (I think Dessa might actually have gills, since she often has 1/3 to 1/2 of her tank left when we surface).
Grand Cayman was once known as the banking capital of the Caribbean, with over 500 banks and $2 trillion in assets. It is a United Kingdom territory, so they speak English, and a very rich island, as opposed to some of the other islands we visit for diving (Bonaire has the best shore diving, but although it is a Dutch territory it is not highly developed).
The Airbnb condo we rented was one of the nicest we have stayed in and right on Seven Mile Beach. Two bed, two bath, a huge kitchen, large patio and it was spotlessly clean (which is probably the most important factor to Dessa). I really enjoyed having a residential fridge with ice maker, a dishwasher and a washer dryer. We have none of those in the RV. There were two beautiful pools and a white sand beach, both with lots of lounge chairs and umbrellas and a protected ocean swim area. They had canoes and standup paddle boards available, no charge. I had always wanted to try Stand Up Paddle boarding (SUP), so this was my chance and it was so fun. Mostly because Bill could not stay upright. He must have fallen off a dozen times at least. I took video and made a slow-motion movie of his fall ‘highlights’ (which she immediately shared with everyone in the family) and he was a really good sport about it. I’m sure this was the first athletic thing he ever tried and was not immediately good at. I had very little trouble staying on the board, probably due to the bit of yoga and Pilates I do (and weighing only 5 pounds may have been a factor).
In the past we have had one of the best weeks of diving ever here in Grand Cayman (this is our fourth trip) but this time it was pretty average. It was still wonderful; the water was warm and the fish were plentiful (like being in an aquarium full of fish). We always search for something special and we really did not find anything on this trip but sometimes I think we forget to just relax and really look at the common things. So many fish!! and we saw several large green Moray eels. They always seem to be big, like 12-18 inches in diameter, with rows of pointed teeth. I have never seen a small one, not sure where they are when they’re small. I usually find them by swimming over them and it is a moment of “oh shit”, because they see me first and seem to be saying “don’t come any closer or I will bite you”. In addition to lots of common fish we saw plenty of banded coral shrimp, arrow crabs, puffer fish, lion fish (they have black and white ‘feathers’ exactly like a bird), garden eels, yellow-head jaw fish and tarpon. No lobsters, no octopus, one turtle, a couple of rays and a few tiny crabs. On a night dive we did see a coral head that appeared to be smoking. We waved the smoke away, thinking there would be something to see but there was nothing there and the smoke just kept coming out. Coral spawning? (it was a full moon)
Even though the diving was not spectacular, we really were able to relax and just float. At the condo, I was able to catch up on our final summer blog and create movies from Mav’s birthday and our standup paddle boarding. I went to the pool everyday while Bill played with his new VR headset. We cooked every meal except for the first dinner and the final lunch. I only put on shorts once on the whole trip, for a couple of hours, the rest of the time I was in a bikini or lounge wear. We were busy but also got a lot of much needed rest. The temps were perfect, 85 was the high and 78 was the low, with no rain. I can see why people want to live here.
As soon as we got back we were finally able to go visit Sami, Heath and Elderly again and get focused on Christmas. I spent many hours decorating our RV for Christmas by hanging lights and all the ornaments from our ceiling (there is no room in the trailer for a tree but I think I like the decorations on the ceiling better anyway). I love how it looks and this year I must have put them closer together because we had to buy quite a few new ones. I also made a wreath, decorated some garland and added tiny lights to a little house, all to decorate my Mom’s door at her assisted living complex. Bill and I both made Gingerbread Houses for his family’s annual competition. I think we stepped up our game this year but when we saw the pictures from Canada, it was clear that everyone else had as well.
With Christmas only two weeks away and our departure to Florida three days after that it was time to get serious about shopping. Thank you Amazon! Love how easy it is to find what we want without going around to a bunch of different stores. Our RV park got pretty grumpy about all the packages but who can blame them when they had to handle the packages for a couple hundred RV families. We were back to being super busy: shopping, returning, wrapping, visiting, entertaining the little ones, final medical visits and prepping to leave.
Family Christmas was celebrated on the 22nd, at Sami’s house. We had a nice lunch, opened gifts and played in the backyard, kids jumping on the mini trampoline and having a fake snowball fight. Afterwards, Bill and I took my mom to see Cats, the movie was ok but not as good as we had hoped, so mom and I napped during part of the movie. On Christmas Day, we got up early so Bill could get dressed as Santa and we went to Alex’s house before the boys got up. Hunter knew it was Bilbo in the Santa suit but Maverick wasn’t so sure. He opened his bedroom door a few inches, looked up at the stranger in the red suit and then he slowly closed the door again. Bill really did make a great Santa. He stayed in his suit the whole time while the boys opened their gifts and he helped them with all their toys. Just before lunch we drove to Sami’s where Santa surprised Elderly and handed out more gifts, then he played with her in her new playhouse and I snuggled with her in the cozy corner Sami and Heath made for her surrounded with curtains and a door on a pulley. Santa peeked in and tried to get us but we beat him back. It was a wonderful Christmas.
On the 28th, we left for south Florida with a stop in New Orleans for New Year’s Eve. We spent a day exploring on our bicycles, visiting the main tourist sites, including the St. Louis Cemetery No.1, where we accidentally snuck in. When we got there, we could see there were tour groups clustered outside, so we walked past them all, joined a group entering the cemetery, and started wandering around taking photos. After about fifteen minutes an employee approached to ask if we were with a tour group, and then escort us out. While we did not intend to sneak in, we had our pics, so no need to pay for a tour. Who knew the only way to get in was to buy a tour? It’s a cemetery. The beignets from Café Beignet on Royal St were as wonderful as we expected (and served with about a pound of powdered sugar). While wandering the French Quarter, we saw how small the venues were for the New Year’s Eve celebrations, even though they look like large crowds on TV. Being old fogies that don’t really like crowds, we bailed on going back downtown for the evening and were snoozing on the couch by 9pm, although we did revive later to watch the various and surprisingly large fireworks displays that surrounded our RV park. The next day was New Year’s Day, so we went to the Sugar Bowl parade and enjoyed catching beads thrown from the floats. The parade was great, huge floats, and the team bands, cheerleaders, and flag bearers were amazing. There must have been at least a hundred each from Baylor and the Georgia Bulldogs.
January was spent in Fort Myers and February we were in Orlando. We really did not do any sightseeing, since we spent winter in these towns last year. Mostly we enjoyed the wonderful warm, sunny weather, went to the gym, and read our books by the pool most days, and I took up puzzling. We took a day trip to Tampa, to visit the Florida State Fair, which was tiny by Texas standards, but it was free to get in and all the entertainment was also free, and pretty good. We saw pig races, a bird show, a circus, a daredevil show, and some guys doing tricks on pogo sticks and mini trampolines. In Orlando, we went to Disney Springs several times, since the movie theater was there, and we caught a baseball spring training game between the Houston Astro’s and the Detroit Tiger’s. It happened to be the first game they played since the cheating scandal broke, and the Astro took quite a verbal beating. The booing and heckling was so bad it made national news. Needless to say, we didn’t mention to anyone that we were even from Texas, since we didn’t want to get booed. We are not baseball fans in general, and it did not even occur to us that we were going to their first post scandal game. Apparently, the yelling did not bother the Astro’s because they beat Detroit like a drum.
By March 6th we were back home, and Bill signed us up for a Six Flags season pass so we could take the boys as much as we wanted. Unfortunately, it was just in time for the Corona Virus “shelter in place” orders to be announced. It wasn’t long before the assisted living, where my mom lives, was locked down so we could not visit her and she could not leave. Our daughter-in-law is a paramedic with the fire department, so when Hunter’s elementary school shut down, we started watching the boys every third day so she, and my son Alex, could keep working. On the days we did not have them, Bill started obsessively playing World of WarCraft, and I continued puzzling (even though the price of puzzles tripled during the pandemic). I was actually grateful we both had something to keep us busy so we didn’t go crazy.
It became pretty obvious that we were not going to be able to take the two-month trip to Europe we had spent days designing and booking. Bummer!! Our plan was to visit multiple cities in Germany and Spain, as well as Amsterdam and Brussels, with several flights and a dozen Airbnb rentals. Slowly but surely, we were able to get refunds, or credits for all of these prepaid arrangements. Hopefully next year we can rebook it all.
In the meantime, I convinced Bill to look at new motorcycles, thinking he would be safer on something newer. I love my new Indian Scout so much more than the Sportster I rode for ten years, and was glad to get a bike with ABS brakes. After not too much looking around he chose a 2019 Honda Fury, with ABS. I was worried he would regret giving up his Warrior, but luckily he really likes the new bike. This of course set in motion a lot of shopping for upgrades for both of our bikes, completely normal with new motorcycles.
Our summer plans included a return to Sturgis for the 80th anniversary motorcycle rally but with Covid-19, we decided that spending several days with 700,000 plus strangers might not be a great idea so we cancelled those plans as well. We’re still going to visit the area before the rally (which the city has refused to cancel) to ride in the Black Hills.
Except for a four-day trip to Fayetteville, Arkansas to ride our motorcycles on the Pig Trail, we have been home for four straight months (our longest stretch ever in one spot and we started to feel a little bored and cramped in our 400 sq ft), but we are now back on the road, and heading north to escape the blistering summer heat in Texas. For the next three and a half months, we will wind our way north and east before heading home via the Blue Ridge Mountain parkway for more riding (we were supposed to visit my family for my niece’s wedding but again Covid-19 has meant some re-planning). Blogs to follow from the cities, National Parks, and roads we will ride between here and there.
Back in the saddle
…Bill and Dessa
You can find our photos and videos here.
