Thank you for joining us on this journey. We (KC and I) have been home a week and unfortunately falling back into our same Rancho Murieta routines. However I am going to try and change it in subtle ways - for example in the next week I will be doing two photo trips half day to a full day in length. I will of course have my photo dog with me (he does not do staying behind well). KC is doing much better, still hates being left alone either at home or in the car, but seems more comfortable and less [View Full Entry]

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Wild Horses Here we are traveling across Nevada. It is about 9 AM when we turn on to the Extraterrestrial Highway which runs along the side of Area 51. I am unable to provide the route number per instructions when I turned on the highway. Yes this information is on a “need to know basis” and I am not sure you need to know. The highway entrance has multiple sets of retractable spikes (parking garage style) that are not retraced until the driver provides verbal confirmation to accept the rules of Area 51. All communications is controlled from another location and [View Full Entry]

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After our whistlestop trip back up to San Fran for the Alcatraz tour we headed to Sacramento for a night, choosing this as a stop on our way to Yosemite. We arrived at the YHA late in the evening and the hostel was amazing. It is in a huge old mansion building and decorated with antique-looking pieces like huge gold edged mirrors, kitsch sofas and other things. Very atmospheric. The hostel wasn't very busy and Leanne ended up being the last one up so it was up to her to turn off the lights. It was really spooky and there were [View Full Entry]

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This the first entry in the Betty's Fall Tribute Trip and will be entered before we leave. Now a good writer strives to have a great opening sentence or a way of capturing the readers attention. Even though “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times...” fits, I will not borrow from Mr.Dickens. Instead I will start with a little piece KC and I wrote while we were camping In Lassen Volcanic National Park. Now you may wonder how a dog was able to participate in the this writing, but since we have been spending so much [View Full Entry]

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My memory bank is working overtime today remembering the road trips of my youth. My mother was a high school English teacher with the summers off. Our summers in the 50's and 60's - for my mother, my sister Claire and myself - were filled with road trips all over the Northeast, visiting friends and family, and exploring new places. Getting ready was a multi day process. In an era before clothes dryers you had to be sure that you left an extra day to do the laundry in case it was raining outside and you couldn't hang the laundry out. [View Full Entry]

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Alyssa and Neal's East Africa Trip! COUNTDOWN: Here is what our current itinerary looks like: May 13: Fly from Sacramento, CA to Hartford, CT. Stay at hotel there overnight. May 14: Take Greyhound bus from Hartford to New York City, and then take a shuttle to JFK. We fly out at 8:05pm on British Airways flight 0116 to London. May 15: Arrive in London at 8:10 am. Get on flight to Nairobi leaving at 10:20am. Arrive in Nairobi at 8:55pm. Taxi to six-eighty hotel. May 16: Explore Nairobi and meet with Lena (the woman who's children's home we are [View Full Entry]

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The capital of the golden state. Very different from the majority of other major cities in California. People in Nor.Cal walk around with less of a chip on their shoulder than people do in Southern Cal. A very spread out city design. Not so ultra liberal also. The vegetation and trees here is what forms this unique landscape here. The suburbs are nestled into quiet little communities. The aura and atmosphere here is very laid back and quiet. I love this place. [View Full Entry]

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As you know from reading the first two lines of this blog, our trip was on Betty’s Bucket List. Our oncologist suggested we make the trip and start Betty’s second bout of chemotherapy treatment when we returned. We completed our trip October 1, 2008 and Betty had her first treatment October 7th. Betty never had another chemotherapy treatment, as the ugly unpredictable growth of Cancer created problems that lead to 3 hospitalizations and 2 radiation treatments (10 session each) to shrink pain causing tumors. Betty died December 29,2008 at home surrounded by her family. The [View Full Entry]

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Its Friday morning here. Its been a great week. TJ and Bri have been cooking up some great dinners. Bri has made taco salad and clam chowder. YUM! Definitely getting the recipes for those. TJ made corned beef and I made up some white sauce for it. They said they had never heard of it and they usually only serve corned beef with mustard. Turns out white sauce is gravy to them, as in the gravy they use for breakfast biscuits and gravy. So Bri made that for breakfast as well. Wednesday night, Bri organised a girls night out. It was [View Full Entry]

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I'm finally here!! The flights were interesting, but not too bad. On the flight from Sydney to Taipei, there were a lot of kids. One that screamed most of the way and two behind me that kept kicking my seat and fighting. But overall, no dramas. I was glad to finally get off and be able to stand for longer than a couple of miutes! San Francisco was nice, although we missed our reservation at the Stinking Rose for dinner. We ended up going to Pelligrini, a really nice Italian restaurant. Its been good to see the girls again. Both Riley [View Full Entry]

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