Arrg! There be PIRATES on the Colorado!

For our last bit of excitement of the summer, we went camping with our fabulous neighbors.  I have to say that throughout my life I have been blessed with some of the best neighbors anyone could ever hope for - and our current neighbors are no exception.  They are some of the best people I know!  We are so lucky. 

Our neighbors Hayden and Lindsay participate in an annual "Pirate Float" down the Colorado with a bunch of their friends, and we elected to tag along this year.  Our other neighbors Travis and Sarah also went.  It was fantastic!  We traveled about three hours west of Centennial, to BLM land and a campground called Radium, which is right along the Colorado River.  Our little Cherry Dr. group camped together, which was great.  In total there were about 40 people in the big group, most of whom were very skilled rafters - and then there was the five of us - clueless.   But boy did we have fun!

The boys went fishing on the first run of the day.  We all went on the second run - we had the raft quite full - the five of us, Travis and Sarah from next door with their bulldog, and Hayden as our captain with his golden retriever.

Michael was the hood ornament!

Lindsay is a master standup paddle-boarder.  The woman is amazing.  Here she is heading down the river trying to straddle their golden retriever and somehow still standing upright.  That adorable dog wanted so badly to be with Lindsay that she kept leaping out of the raft and swimming to her - made the experience a bit more challenging for Lindsay - but left me super impressed. 

 We had the opportunity to go cliff jumping on that run - and everyone in our family jumped except Gabi.  I was probably the most scared - but I couldn't let my six year old think her mommy wasn't as brave as she was!

 It was REALLY, REALLY cold!

The second day we rode in a paddle boat with Sarah and captain Mac and his wife Jenny (who are the fabulous master planners for the whole shebang) - we stopped at the hot spring along the way and Luke had the chance to try the SUP.   Travis paddled and Luke stood up.  Luke thought it was awesome.

Sarah made sure that he got back into the boat.  It was super fabulous to have six people parenting three kids!

Then it was Michael's turn.  He paddled down the rest of the way to where we stopped - fell three or four times, but did really well - and he loved it! 

We saw lots of beautiful bald eagles flying around.  This one cooperated and perched so I could take its picture.

Because Michael was on the SUP, the girls had the opportunity to paddle.  They thought that was so exciting, and managed to help a little!

Our summer officially ends tomorrow, as Michael reports back to work in the morning, but what a amazing way to end it!  We are so blessed to have such wonderful friends!

Vacation Statistics

Here are this year's vacation statistics!

2013 Alvidrez Family "Wet and Wild" Vacation

Vacation Length:  53 days

Miles Driven: 7,700 +

Average gas mileage:  10 MPG (without using the generator)/8.5 (using the generator)

States Traveled:  27 plus the District of Columbia

We printed this out in Arizona, hung it in the RV,  and had the kids take turns coloring the states as we traveled.  It gave them a good idea of where we were and gave us all a good geography lesson.

Worst Roads:  Louisiana!  I suspect the government has some kind of side deal with tow trucks and tire shops in the state because those roads are ridiculous

Junior Ranger Programs Completed:  4 (Hunting Island, Yorktown, Wright Brothers, Acadia)

Wild Animals seen:  alligator, shark, hermit crab, horseshoe crab, blue crab, raccoon, Chincoteague ponies, deer, minke whale, harbor porpoise, fin whale, harbor seal, gray seal, sea snails, black bear, turtle, wild turkey, daddy long-legs, about a zillion mosquitoes, biting horseflies,  and more bugs than I would care to think about

Cumulative insect bites:  I stopped counting this year - it got depressing after 100

Number of children still immune to insect bites:  1 (Luke), though to be fair Isa was only bitten once or twice while the rest of us were a mess

Favorite Places we Ate: Boondocks in South Carolina, Stewmann's Lobster Pound in Bar Harbor, Maine, Fezzo's in Crowley, Louisiana

Scariest Moment:  The Kansas thunderstorm that shook the RV back and forth next to a rock cliff.

Scariest Moment Runner Up: Nearly being trampled by wild horses

Most unexpected fun:  Seeing the mommy and baby alligator

Worst medical issue: My bike crash in Greenbelt Park where I flew over my handlebars and whacked my head and face into the dirt, pulled a muscle in my leg, and shredded the bottom of my palm.  (And then got back on the bike and rode to the train station and went to the National Zoo, so obviously it wasn't THAT bad)

Parts replaced on the RV:  Six tires, speed sensor, starter, starter solenoid, coil

Places we hiked:  New Orleans, South Carolina, North Carolina, Washington DC, Maine, Kentucky, Kansas

Places we biked:  Maryland, Washington DC, New Jersey

Number of hours spent on a boat: 4 1/2

Funniest Kids Quotes:

Luke:  (After I tried to sneak him a piece of a chocolate bar while riding in the Metro in DC where it was posted that no eating or drinking was allowed)  "It was hard trying to decide if I should follow the law or follow the commandment to honor my mother....."

Isa:  (After looking at the belly of a horse)  Oh, yeah, its a boy.

Gabi:  (After bobbing up and down in Grandma Chris's pool) I'm getting my bottom and my penis wet.   (so much discussion about equine gender and yet...)   :)

Michael's favorites:  Whale watching, playing in the ocean in South Carolina, The National Air and Space Museums

Debbie's favorites:  Whale watching, the horses on Assateague Island, seeing pandas, the beach/ocean, the Statue of Liberty/Staten Island Ferry

Luke's favorites:  Ocean fishing, hearing the canon fire in Yorktown, the National Air and Space Museums, wild horses, whale watching, Washington DC, beignets at Cafe Du Monde

Isa's favorites:  Wild horses on Assateague, Kentucky Horse Park, whale watching, learning to swim, Washington DC

Gabi's favorites:  The fire station, seeing wild horses on Assateague, the Kentucky Horse Park, seeing the alligator, playing in the ocean

In truth, narrowing it down to just a few favorites is simply impossible.  We loved seeing so many of our friends and family, though sometimes briefly, and exploring the variety this great country has to offer.  Michael and I have now traveled in 47 of our country's fifty states (and I think the kids are up to 37), and we are looking forward to conquering North Dakota, Alaska, and Hawaii in the next few years.

Happy travels everyone!

Oddities

There are always things that we do and see on every vacation that strike us as odd.  They don't come up in conversations often, but we do notice them.  One of these things is our new understanding of the "golf cart" camper.  This is the camper that generally drives a gigantic RV with a toy hauler pulled behind it in which they have their precious golf cart, which saves them the need of actually walking anywhere.  While this idea is energy saving for some, we have decided that we are not going to become golf cart people.  I actually enjoy walking with my kids and taking the time to stop and notice the little wildflowers growing or the butterflies!  In Kentucky we witnessed the aftermath of a golf cart collision - and though that almost sounds funny, it certainly wasn't after the fire truck and ambulance came to haul off the teenager who got hurt.  That pretty much cemented our decision!

Here are some other odd things we saw and did!

The cutest doughnuts I have ever seen we found at a Walmart in West Virginia.  Aren't these just adorable!  (Way too much frosting to actually eat on the doughnut though)

Lightning Bug/Firefly hunts are mandatory on vacation, aren't they?  What they were called depended on the part of the country we were in - and we hunted for them all over the country. Everyone successfully caught one and then they became little temporary friends.  Never thought I would see my girls playing with bugs.

A sunset rainbow during a thunderstorm in New Jersey - looks like I photo shopped it, doesn't it!  It was a amazing sky.







Sophie after her horrible incident with the hornets' nest - she was totally drugged with Benadryl and we about had to carry her around.  Its the most I've ever seen her hold still.

A blue crab from down in South Carolina - I never realized that they were really that blue!



 When we were in DC at the Museum of Natural History Gabi insisted that I take pictures of all the National Geographic photograph winners.  So this is one of the couple dozen pictures of pictures I had to take.  I felt like an idiot. 

But they are SO CUTE.

We went to the DiVinci Science Center in Pennsylvania and they had the Grossology exhibit there.  My kids learned about things that I had no desire to talk about - and then after learning them they insisted on discussing them.  Oh goody......

Is it possible for children to have too much information?

 This is a climbing wall modeled off a magnification of human skin.  Pimples, warts, lacerations, bruises, etc.  The kids loved it. 

 The untold story of Michael's poor feet... The day we had the bike hitch problem (see June's Louisiana post) he was standing in tall grass for about 5-7 minutes while we got the bikes into the RV.  Then next day when we woke up we discovered these bite marks all over his feet. 

These pictures were taken about 4 days later and look at how bad they still are.  A ranger in South Carolina told him that the bites were likely from No-See-Ums - which neither of us had ever heard of, but when I looked on our bug spray, they were listed.  We certainly didn't see them, so they are aptly named.  The ranger described them as a gnat (they are less than 1/8 of an inch long) with big teeth.  I have no idea if that is accurate, but Michael was miserable.

And then there was this in New Orleans.  The kids giggled so much over this nude statue I had to put it in somewhere.  Isa and Gabi were positively scandalized and doubled over in laughter.  Now I love art, and I even like nude sculpture, but this one isn't a favorite of mine - no offense intended to the sculptor or the lovely city of New Orleans - but it just doesn't do it for me.....


I may add to this post as I go through the 5000 + pictures I took on this vacation!  We saw some strange things.....

East or West, HOME is best!

We made it home!  Oh my glorious bed!  Hooray for solid floors, cell phone coverage, internet access, and walls that do not shake in the night! 

Oh how I love my house. 

Here are a few random pictures of RV living.

Our full size bed in the back was one of the biggest treats - because the kids felt that they could actually stretch out! 

This is a good picture to see how much room we had - Luke is sitting directly behind the driver and the window on the far left is the end of the RV.  Not a lot of living space, but not much to clean either!

I have two more posts to finish now that we are home - a vacation stats one and a random odd things around the country one, but those will have to wait until I finish getting all this LAUNDRY put away!

Kansas

We left Kentucky on Sunday morning - and it was such a beautiful day to drive - that we kept on going until we reached Topeka, Kansas!   We were thrilled to wake up Monday morning and only have a couple of hours to drive before we arrived at our last campsite in Wilson State Park between Salina and Hays in Kansas.

It was a lovely site - right by the lake and the views were great.  Luke took the opportunity to fish with his new rooster tail lure - and actually caught a fish!  He was elated!

Our campsite was literally right next to the lake - there was about a 15 foot drop onto a rocky shore - so sitting inside the RV or at the picnic table was just wonderful.

That evening there was a great sunset that Michael and I watched while the kids slept.  Everything was peaceful and serene.

That should always be my clue that something crazy is about to happen.

Shortly after it got dark the Kansas thunderstorms began.  The lightening was really high up in the clouds; it looked a bit like a strobe light with a gray blanket over it.  It went on and on.  Then the rain started.  POURING RAIN.  Then the hail came and with it came the WIND.  Now I can handle lightening and thunder, and the RV is pretty water tight so rain isn't an issue.  Hail is obnoxious, but I could have lived with it.  The big problem was the wind.  It was really strong - the RV was rocking back and forth so hard that the metal window blinds were smacking into the walls.  It was really, really scary.  Remember the lovely campsite with the 15 foot drop to the rocky shore of the lake.  Not so ideal when your "house" is rocking back and forth towards and away from that drop.

The storms took short breaks, but pretty much it was like that ALL NIGHT.  I didn't sleep much and in fact I finally understood the story in the New Testament where the apostles are on the boat with Christ and the storm comes and they start freaking out and ask Him "Master, carest thou not that we perish?"  I had a very similar conversation that night because I literally was praying most of the night for the winds to calm and for our safety.

The next morning we were SO READY to get out of Kansas.  Especially because another wind storm showed up shortly after the kids woke up and then they started getting scared.  (Lucky things slept all night despite the crazy rocking)  Michael and I decided we were bugging out and going home so around 6:30 am we hurriedly got everything all packed away and went to turn on the RV and it WOULDN'T START!

We had already had the issue in Maryland where the starter wouldn't turn off after the car started, and that was fixed but now we couldn't get it to start at all.  Thank goodness for Roadside Assistance.  It took until almost  2 pm to get everything all taken care of (it ended being the coil for all my car fixing friends) - and then FINALLY we were leaving Kansas and going home.

Michael says we aren't going back to that lovely state park, and I have to agree.  :)

Kentucky Horse Park! - by Gabi

We went to the Kentucky Horse Park.  We saw a lot of horses.  There were horses everywhere!  We walked by Rolex Stadium where mom says they were having the National Junior and Young Rider 2013 Championships.  We watched Dressage yesterday and today they were jumping.  It was cool to watch them because they jumped high! 

We went to ride ponies.  They were nice.  

We watched a bunch of horse shows today.  We saw famous racehorses today.    

Funny Cide

Cigar

We also saw the Horses of the World show.  My favorites were the Appaloosa, the white Thoroughbred, and the Chincoteague Pony! From Assateague Island where we went!

A White Thoroughbred!

The Appaloosa

Bluegrass - the Chincoteague Pony

They had lots and lots of other kinds of horses too.

Luke with a Black Clydesdale

In the kids’ barn there were horses and all sorts of things to play and learn with.  

We went to the Mare and Foal show – they had Miniature horse foals.

This is one is a colt.

This one is a filly.

We watched a new horseshoe be put on a Fjord

 

We walked to the horse park and back.  It was a lot hot.  

I love the horse park – it is a big, happy place!