Island Tour and Beach Day

Quick post - will write more after dinner.

1. Island tour: only takes about an hour or so to drive all the way around. Highlights: Bloody Hill, or Point?, an old British Fort, peninsula where you can see both Caribbean and Atlantic oceans, villages, prime ministers house (not impressive).

2. Swimming in caribbean, lunch on the beach, caribbean beer. Ahhh.

3. Sunburn vs. Sunscreen: 1 point for the sunscreen today! Woot!

4. Dinner... Fisherman's Wharf. In 5 minutes. I'd better go.

Oh, and the ants are still eating my cereal. I hate them. Very much. I was advised to freeze my cereal for a couple of days, then keep in fridge and eat the dead ants with my cold cereal. Extra protein I suppose. Yay?

Finally in St. Kitts

Whew, I made it, and now I am officially exhausted.

Today was quite eventful, full of lots of activities, new people and a bit of culture shock. News update: Laura has never been to a 3rd world country, until now. More on that later.

Here is a quick review of today's activities:
-Boarded plane in Miami around 11am, arrived in St. Kitts around 2pm.
-Proceeded to get through immigration and customs, and be the only student to have their bags opened and inspected. I do look suspicious, you know.
-Waited until 4pm or so until everyone had retrieved their bags, or found that they would not have their bags today.
-Separated into a small group, went to Campus, retrieved bags and got my first look at my new room.
-Went to the grocery store, bought 1 bag full of essentials for $130 E.C. ($40ish US I believe)
-Came back, got new cell phone for island use, started to unpack.
-Pizza dinner with fellow students who arrived at the same time.
-Shower, finish unpacking, find ant nest in kitchen, decide it is time for internet and bed.

Meh, not so brief. Oh well.

No pictures today. Wish I could show you a picture of why not. Only one thing was damaged in the flight over here. One very tiny item. The USB cord for my camera. Sigh. Good thing mini USB to regular USB cords are easy to come by on a 65 square mile island... oh wait...

I think I'll finally go to sleep on that note.

Only in SFO, Tired already

My journey has begun. I am now sitting in the SFO airport, far inferior to PDX. No free internet, lack of outlets near chairs. Sigh. I am however, stationed right next to an employee lounge, with a cozy chair and an outlet (that works!) only feet away. Hopefully no one trips on my cord crossing a doorway...

Here is my stack of luggage, impressive, no?

Do I appear more excited or nervous? I'll let you decide that one.

I am saddened by these pictures. I can tell already my current camera is not as impressive as the one I was using only days ago. If only I had not broken the screen... sigh. There is something to be said for improved technology, that is for sure.

(Side note, beware) I am currently people watching at SFO right now. There are lots of interesting people who come through airports. This activity always reminds me of that movie I hate to love, and Matt would love to hate. Love Actually, is that right? Yes, I do believe so. Anyway, it has been so entertaining I have not yet even opened Netflix Watch now. Can you believe that?

Here is what you (read, I) have to look forward to: SFO to MIA at 11:20pm, then MIA to SKB at 10:45am (7:45am Oregon time)

Yes, and I am tired already.

Surprise! Well, sort of.

The backstory: Laura invited to dinner at Zoe's, night before, talking with Jayme, she wants to go too. Jayme talks to Zoe, becomes invited to dinner. Jayme offers to pick Laura up on the way over. Jayme and Laura arrive at Zoe's apartment after a little detour due to traffic and interesting GPS directions, then tackling parking between two very ominous looking columns.


Laura: Gina! (Laura runs up three flights of stairs like a stray dog, opens door) Gina!

Zoe, Gina (with Isaac!), Sarah, Matt: uh, Surprise?

Jayme (a minute later, after finding her way): I didn't know where I was going! You ran off like a stray dog!

HAHAHAHA.

Thank you everyone!!! I was super surprised. If it weren't for Gina's distinctive Betty Boop steering wheel and Isaac's car seat it would have been a perfect surprise through and through.

Marie, Beth, Kim and Kevin thank you muy mucho for coming too! I still can't believe Zoe and Matt were able to pull this all off. I am uber impressed. And the food was DELISH! (Its a new word, deal.) I think Zoe should come to St. Kitts if for no other reason than to cook meatballs for me.

Ah, good times. I am really thankful that I was able to see everyone before leaving in a few days for a whole new country. You guys rock.

And... Matt gave me my birthday present early while at the party! It is a GORGEOUS sapphire ring! (Picture to come soon) He is such a sweety.

Mmm, funfetti cake. There was cake, and it was wonderful. I think Jayme was almost more happy to see that it was funfetti than me though... mostly due to the frosting though. :)

I applaud all of your trickery, it made for an awesome evening that I will not forget. Thank you!!!

(Gina - if you get an extra free moment in your day sometime, could you send me a couple of the pictures from last night?? Thanks!)

A Lovely Vacation

Ahh, vacation. Sequim was cold, but gorgeous. The transition from 100 degree heat in Corvallis was difficult, but blankets and campfires helped to counter that. Pictured above is a view from the "Spit" which is a long stretch of beach with water on either side, stretching about 5 miles.

It was a busy week, we went hiking on two different days up in the mountains where there was much more sun (shorts and tank tops welcome). Two other days were spent in the water paddling in kayaks (jackets required). Overall it was very relaxing and enjoyable.

Mount Olympia as viewed from Hurricane Ridge in the Olympic National Park


Kayaking in a harbor near Sequim

I read "Water for Elephants" while I was there, it was so good I could hardly put it down! I stayed up late the last night with a headlamp to finish it just because I couldn't wait another day to hear the end. Turns out, I read the last chapter in the prologue, just didn't remember I had. Sort of amusing since I was working so hard to figure out how the story ended, even though I had already read the end but didn't know it.

We also went to see tide pools - you would not believe the size of the sea life there! The pictures really don't do them any justice. We walked out at low tide (of course) over these HUGE muscles that were just plastering the rocks everywhere. It has hard to not cringe at every step worried you're hurting them. Its sort of like walking on a bed of nails though, so it really was not damaging, but hard to believe it was not.



Time to start packing, unpacking, and repacking again. Sigh.