Hodge Podge Trip to the States Part I

The middle of September we put the boat on the hard in Virgin Gorda and prepared her for hurricane season.  We flew back to St. Louis for a few days, just long enough for Leslie to trade in our 2004 Prius for a 2010 Prius, then we drove to R.I. 

Leslie and the "new" Prius

 

 While there, we packed up our storage shed into a POD to ship to St. Louis and went to the boat show in Newport to buy stuff.  We met our friend Diane at the boat show and filled the needs for this coming years boat projects!.

We meet Dave and Jan at the show

Diane at the helm of a new Lagoon 450

 

Dinner at Tamar's House

Neighbors and friends get together

We stayed at cousin Alice and John’s house and had a great time. We also had a dinner party, thrown by Tamar, at our old neighborhood. Time to visit was limited in RI and NY, where we visited with Carl’s dad and cousins Wray and Cindy, as day care was closed for a week in St. Louis and we were going to take care of Tali and Cloe.

Eric runs to the first set of targets!

Eric engaging various targets

We drove back to St. Louis to play with the kids for a week which is one of our favorite things. While there, Carl got to do some shooting with Eric.  Eric is still with Boeing and Kelly is now a high school librarian.

snow storm at Ally's house

Leslie, Mom, and Ally

We drove west to Cody Wyoming stopping to visit Leslie’s Aunt Helen in Nebraska before continuing on  through a snow storm to spend a week with Leslie’s sister Ally and visit her mother. It was a fun visit and we got to do some activities with Ally as well as take mom on some outings. We also hooked up with other friends there and had a great time at the Buffalo Jump Winery.

We stopped leaving Nebraska

Leslie in cousin Melody's garden

It was then back, stopping at Leslie’s cousin Melody in Nebraska where Carl went on a Combine ride to harvest corn.



Tali and Cloe relax at the water feature

we prepare to release turtles on the beach

The turtles are off!

Then off  to St. Louis to repack and go to Mexico with Eric and family.  A fun time of surfing, water slides, pools and aquacise.

Eric Surfing

Cloe, Tali, and Eric put in sun block

one of the slides at Mexico

More to come but the computer is complaining.