Day started a little earlier, but not a lot. Junior tour members just a little slow in sorting out their body clocks. Again the weather is superb, seldom a cloud anywhere. After breakfast visited the small seaside suburb of Ambleside. Reuben rode in Bob's Porsche and thought this was very special. Spent a couple of hours just sitting on the beach looking out over the Lions Gate Bridge, Stanley Park and the wider harbour. Walked along the sea wall and watched the salmon leaping out of the water amongst the recreational fishing boats. The salmon seemed to be having the best of it as did not see any hooked but they were certainly there and very active. Caitlin rode in the Porsche on the way back and now both our kids are very disenchanted with our ... read more

Another stunning day! The day started with breakfast provided by our hosts. It is a very special breakfast smoothie that contained a variety of things, the only ones of which I recognised were bananas and water. It also had Hemp Hearts, literally the hearts of hemp seeds and a range of minerals, herbs, seeds and oils that really give a kick start to the day. Despite the appearance of engine oil it was surprisingly tasty and I look forward to another one. Slow start to the day! Caitlin was up and ready to go around 9....Reubs not so much, staggered out at 11am after a 12 hour period of true hibernation but the better for it. Sandy insisted on a return to Whole Foods for coffee and pastries and in the end it became lunch with ... read more

Arose on the morning of Saturday 15 January to another glorious day in southern California. The big fella had had a much better night and whilst still off was ready to travel. Slow morning, with a late breakfast and finalising packing while the kids kicked back. New flight is scheduled to depart 2330 hrs so no hurry to get moving as they are going to be moving all day and late into the night just to get aboard the flight. Cannot speak highly enough of the staff at Homewood Suites, Del Mar Heights. They were so helpful and assisted so readily with annoying jobs like scanning documents and sending faxes (trying to keep our travel insurance provider satisfied) and on top of that we never incurred any additional charges for these services. The Westin in particular ... read more

...rough night for Reubs with it ending up with us watching cartoons at 4 am. I just don't get Pokemon! Complaining now of tooth ache...suspected he was just misreading the pain from his ear and sinuses but the pain medications were not assisting. One good aspect to the start to the day was the travel insurance company emailled us e-tickets for our return home, Qantas on the 15th so only one more night here before we can get home and in particular get the little guy fixed up and comfortable at least in his own surroundings. Only downer, and not a significant one, is that the flight is at 11:30 pm so long day and long night - but it will get us home. If Reubs was 100% the delay would not be an issue but ... read more

...started the day out in Los Angeles after a good nights sleep for the patient. Only woke once for pain meds at 1.30 am and then went straight down again... Up at 7am and decision time... what to do! Travel agent is on New Zealand time, travel insurance is in Singapore (we think) so co-ordinating contact and planning is proving just a little difficult. Big ups to the travel agent, Fiona, she is doing an awesome job to help out. Situation is that the boy still ain;t up to travelling and both the doctor and the travel insurance people are advising against travelling for another couple of days and on top of that he is still in some discomfort. Decision made - we simply cannot travel. Having said that it will be frosty day in hell ... read more