The Walter Blog

A month after the trip

cwalter328@gmail.com (Craig Walter) — Mon, 10 Sep 2012 03:49:00 +0000

I was getting some pictures off of the cards for the cameras and noticed that we never did a post on the blog for the day we got home. Here it goes as I remember it.

Our flight left around 3:00 from Heathrow. We took our time getting out of the hotel and made our way to the tube to get to Heathrow. We had to transfer from one rail line to a tube line that would take us to Heathrow. We were trying to avoid having to carry the bags up and down stairs so we asked someone who was working on the train and he gave us the best route. We did have to go up a long steep escalator and had a little incident while we were on it. Jarret went first, then me, then Rylee and Jill was last. When Rylee got on, she had one foot on one step, the other foot on the next step and her bag partway on the third step. As the escalator was moving, she lost her balance and fell into Jill. I heard the commotion and as I looked back, I could see Jill falling on the escalator. I handed Jarret my bag and hurried to get to Jill and Rylee. As I got to Jill, her feet were facing up towards the top of the escalator and two very nice British ladies were keeping her from falling down any farther. She was able to get herself turned around so that she could sit on the steps as it was moving until she could get her balance. I'm still not sure how we got the bags without them falling all the way down the steps. It was a scary moment because the escalator was still moving as all of this was happening. All Jill could think about was to try to get turned around. Needless to say, we managed to get everyone standing before we got to the top of the escalator and we got all of the baggage off without any more problems. Jill got her knee scraped up but we're lucky that she didn't have any more serious injuries. The whole thing happened so fast, from the time I saw her fall to the time we got to the top of the escalator was probably less than 1 minute, but it seemed a lot longer than that.

We managed to get to the airport in plenty of time. I had to turn in our personal wi-fi device and was going to try to get some of our VAT tax back from some of our purchases. The line was really long and since we didn't have that much, we decided to skip it. We got through security without any problem and decided to get a little lunch since we had some time. After lunch, we hit a small gift shop and decided to buy a couple of last minute items. We started to look for our gate, I thought we were in the right area for it, but found out that we still had a ways to go. We had to follow the way to a train that would take us to our section of the airport where we could board the plane. It turns out that it took us a while to get there and by the time we got to our gate they had already started boarding. I don't like to cut things so close but we made it on the plane and on our way back home.

The flight home was smoother than the flight over until we got to Seattle. We had just started our descent and looked like we were getting ready to land when all of a sudden they hit the gas and we started to climb again. After a few minutes they came on the speaker and said there was an issue that they had to take care of and that they had figured out the problem. The plane continued banking around the area until we could get back in line in order to land. The landing was a little hard but we made it home safely. We managed to get our bags, go through customs, and get back into our Honda chariot for the drive home.

The drive home was fine. We stopped in North Bend to get some food and then continued on our way. Once the kids finished their food, they went to sleep and slept the whole way home. I wasn't too tired until we got to about Moses Lake. We stopped for some gas and I tried one of those 5-hour energy drinks. Well it worked for about an hour and a half but it was long enough to get us safely back home. It was nice to get back and sleep in our own beds for a change.

It's been about a month since we got back and it's still hard to believe that we were there. We got to watch some of the Olympics on TV after we got home and it was really fun to see an event at a location that we had seen first hand. I've also caught things on TV where they're in England and I recognize some of the sites. I don't think I'll ever watch a show about England or Paris the same way again. I saw someone on the news that was in front of Buckingham Palace and I recognized where they were and how we had been at the same place. I also watched part of a documentary about WWII when Germany occupied France and they showed a picture of Hitler looking out over the Eiffel Tower. It looked like the vantage point was similar to the location when we first saw the Eiffel Tower. It sure gives things a different perspective, especially when you can directly relate to it in some manner.

We're so glad and fortunate to have taken this trip with our kids. They're just the right age so that they'll remember it for their entire life. Both of our kids loved London and I'll bet money on it that they'll go back there sometime. Now it's time to start planning for the next trip.....you'll have to wait to see where we end up....

Day 13 - Our last day in London

cwalter328@gmail.com (Craig Walter) — Fri, 03 Aug 2012 07:18:00 +0000

After the breakfast from the hotel, powdered scrambled eggs, sausage and some juice for me and cereal and toast for the rest of them, we started our day. I think we’re all ready for some home cooking. Rylee has had a hankering for some good ole Apple Pie. We told her she’d have to wait until we get home. We had a little time to kill before our Volleyball event at 2:45 so we decided to go back to Piccadilly Circus since Rylee really wanted to stop at one of the shops we had been to last time we were in London. We picked up some knickknacks but still hadn’t found a Christmas ornament for our tree. One of the things we try and do is to pick up an ornament for our Christmas tree when we go on a big family vacation. Every year as we’re putting up the tree, we remember where and when we got the ornament and it helps remind us of the trips we’ve been on. We haven’t been able to find one until we walked past a Lladro, or Lardo as Jarret pronounced it, store. They did have a 2012 ornament for 65 Pounds. It was a little spendy but we figured we’re only here once…..until we got the bill in US dollars - $106……oh that darn exchange rate that is so easy to forget about. You know we can’t change our mind at this point, the only benefit that we get is that if it breaks within the next year, we can get it replaced.

We walked to the tube stop and on the way came across a little market set up in the courtyard of an old church. They had some neat little items but nothing that we couldn’t do without.

It was now time to head to the Earls Court Arena where the volleyball was going to be played. We got to see two matches, the first was Russia vs Tunisia and Russia won the match pretty easily. Russia does have a 7 foot 2 inch middle that can really hit the ball. He was fun to watch. There were quite a few empty seats for the first game.

The second game was Poland vs Argentina and this was a much more rowdy game. The fans filled the stadium and I bet ¾ of them were rooting for Poland. They were yelling, singing, and making a lot of noise. Poland won the match in 3 games but it was fun to watch, especially with the crowd. We must have been the only Americans in a raucous sea of Polska fans. Needless to say, we quickly became Polish fans. After the game was over, the Polish fans continued with their singing as they were exiting the arena. I told Jarret he should start a USA chant but we would have been drowned out very easily.

We stopped for dinner on the way home at a place that wasn’t very good. As we got to the hotel, we figured that we’d better start repacking everything tonight. Our suitcases will be brimming with stinky, dirty clothes as the hotels here don’t offer do-it-yourself laundry. And we’re too close to the end of our trip to wash anything more in the bathroom sink! Besides, with the humidity here, nothing would dry in time. Hopefully we won’t need to purchase a new bag to bring our souvenirs home. We also did our last Skype session with Dave Cotton at KHQ.

Jill and I were talking and both of us would like to come back to London again someday. It really is a nice place to visit, even if it is a little more expensive than other towns. There is so much to do and see that you can’t begin to see it all in one trip. As much as we like London, we’re ready to come home. We’ve been on the go, non-stop, for about 2 weeks now. We pretty much figured we haven’t been more than 20 feet away from each other for any length of time in the last two weeks. Rylee and Jarret have done well on the trip but I think they’re tired of not being able to have their own space. Tomorrow we get on the plane and head back to the states. And then we have to drive back from Seattle. I don’t think we’re going to spend the night in Seattle. If we’re that close to home, we might as well load up on coffee and junk food and make the drive home. This has been the trip of a lifetime and I’m so glad that it has gone so well. It’s been especially nice to take the trip as a family and share it with all of you.

It’s always such a rush to be at a live Olympic event and witness the dedication and years of training these athletes have endured. When we sit in the arena and cheer for them all, there is just nothing like the spirit of it. But we have missed watching the Americans compete and reading about it. We’re glad there’s another week of competition so we can watch it from home.

Jill: I need to send a big shout-out to Craig for pretty much organizing this amazing trip. He has done the research, purchased all the tickets (Olympic, plane, tube, Metro, Eurostar), and has been our expert map-reader. He enjoys figuring out where we are, and how to get from point A to point B, and we follow along like little puppies. He was the keeper of the subway and light rail tickets, and always told us to go “right!” or “left!” or “straight ahead!” as we jumped off the subways and tried to find the exits. You made our trip great, thank you!

Where are we going next??

An outdoor market in the courtyard of an old church

Row of apartments as we walk towards Earl's Court

Earl's Court

Volleyball

Olympic Rings

7 ft 2 in middle - He can really get up there

Action in Russia - Tunisia game

Another one of the big middle

Olympic flag

Three trouble makers

Poland vs Argentina

More action

A wall

The crowd as we're leaving volleyball

Jarret wants this for his first car - it's a Ferrari

Day 12 - The Bad and The Good

cwalter328@gmail.com (Craig Walter) — Wed, 01 Aug 2012 23:14:00 +0000

We started the day by trying to get some tickets for an event in the Olympic Park that Jill and Rylee could attend. If you have a ticket, you can enter the Olympic park. If you don’t have a ticket, you can’t get in. It looks like the 2012 Olympic site releases tickets each day but we were unable to get any. Without two tickets, Jill and Rylee were going to have to go shopping at the big mall just outside the Olympic Park while Jarret and I went to the swimming event. I felt bad that we all couldn’t attend but we tried really hard to get some tickets and it just didn’t work out. There’s been a lot of negative press concerning the tickets and how they’re being distributed. It sounds like there are a lot of events where tickets are being unused and the arena is partially empty. Quite a few of these tickets went to sponsors and not the general public and now the public is upset. I don’t blame them. That was a bad.

Today we had time in the morning and the afternoon to kill before the swimming event in the evening. We didn’t want to go too far so we found that there was a Live London site where they have music and activities and show the games on a big screen TV. It was at a place called Victoria Park that wasn’t too far from either our hotel or the Olympic park. We took the rail and tube to get there and then started following the signs. At one point, there was a sign that said – to London Live via the Floating Market, so we decided to take this route. It was a nice little walk along a canal that eventually leads to the Limehouse Basin with the houseboats that is near our hotel. The interesting thing about the Floating Market is that in the canal are boats that sell things. Books, hats and different types of food are the ones that we saw. There wasn’t much activity. I don’t know if it was because it was a weekday or because the weather wasn’t that good. It would be a unique experience to see when everything was open.

We worked our way into the park to where the Live London site was and had to go through security. One of the questions the person asked me was do I have any deodorant? Not understanding exactly what he was asking I said “ Do I need it?” and he took a sniff as a joke. What he really meant was do we have any aerosol cans. The other thing that actually did cause us a problem was our video camera. It turns out that you can’t take a video camera into the London Live site. He was polite and asked his supervisor but they said no even though I said I wouldn’t use it and that we didn’t have any place that we could leave it. I did ask about cell phones that take video and they said those are fine. It really ticked us off. It makes no sense that a video taken by cell is fine but one taken by a video camera isn’t. That was the bad.

We did manage to see the mayor of London and I thought Jill was going to go up to him and ask him if he knew about that policy. We just decided to go on our merry way and not spend any money with them.

As we headed back, it was getting around lunch time and we had passed a restaurant called the Greedy Cow. Since Rylee’s into cows, she wanted to go there. The place was really small but it was mainly a hamburger place in the afternoon. Man they made a great burger, in fact it was probably one of the best ones I’ve had in a long time. The waiter said they were very happy to hear that Americans like their hamburgers since the hamburger was basically created in the states. If we had gotten into London Live, we probably would have never gone to this restaurant. That was a good.

After lunch we had more time to kill. We took a train to Canary Wharf. We’d heard it was famous but we weren’t sure why. I pictured something like the piers in Seattle. It was totally different. Our previous excursions in London were mainly in the older part. Big buildings, old monuments, and large bridges were what we had been accustomed to seeing. This wasn’t the case at Canary Wharf. You could get down to the water but it was mainly a big business and financial area with lots of professionals and new buildings. We walked around a little bit and caught part of a cycling event on a big screen. Bradley Wiggins won gold in his race and the crowd cheered and then slowly drifted off back to work. It was fun to watch. This was good.

We finally headed back to the Olympic Park so that Jarret and I could attend swimming. Before we headed out, we got our game plan on where to meet up after it was over. We also were going to Skype with KHQ again but it didn’t work out because I guess there was a grass fire in Spokane that they were covering. Jarret and I headed to the swimming event and Rylee and Jill were going to spend time in the mall. All four of us not being able to see the event was bad.

The Aquatics Centre has been built with temporary seating so that they can get as many people as they can in there to watch the event. We ended up sitting 4 rows from the top. We’ve been on some climbs this trip and this one was as hard as any of them. Maybe it was because I was lugging the backpack this time or because I’m just tired of going up stairs, either way I’m glad I went to the bathroom and got some food before the climb since there is nothing up there other than seats. It was a long distance between where we were and the pool but you could still see all of the lanes in the pool. Once the Olympics are over, I think I’ve heard they’ll remove the temporary seats so that it’s quite a bit smaller. One other thing that was frustrating was that the two seats next to me were empty the whole time. That’s pretty ironic that we’ve been looking for two seats for over a year and they ended up being right next to me. That was bad.

The actual event was fantastic. When one of the British swimmers took second, the crowd exploded. It was really fun to be a part of it. In the middle of one of the events, I got a Skype call from KHQ. I couldn’t hear him. I just answered the phone and turned up the volume so that they could hear the crowd roar. I think they got a kick out of it but I was able to hear that they wanted to try it again at 12:00 PM Pacific Time. He did call and we did Skype for just a minute because it got noisy again and I couldn’t hear what he was saying. In two of the races, Americans won gold and it was really fun to watch. Both the race and the reaction of the crowd were very fun. After the final race, they awarded the gold, silver and bronze medals to the winners. It’s really quite special to see the athletes from your country win a gold medal and be able to hear your national anthem. In all of the commercialism of sports, it’s heartwarming to see that playing for their country still means something to them. It also make us fans feel special too. Thanks to all the athletes for their hard work and thanks to Jill and Rylee for taking one for the team. It was also special to share that event with Jarret. This was really good.

Today the good outweighed the bad. We’ve only got a couple days left and we’re starting to get that “It’ll be good to be home” feeling. I’ll probably post some pictures tomorrow since it’s so late now. Heading to sleep and looking forward to Volleyball tomorrow.

Woke up and posted the pictures from yesterday.

Floating Market with boats that sell foods and goods

Check out the giant spoon

A pretty picture along the canal

Victoria Park

The Mayor of London

Great Burger

Jarret's unique way of holding on to something on the subway

View from Canary Wharf

The family

View of central London from Canary Wharf

Another one

Trying to get a picture of the kids

Still trying.....

Finally

Businessmen watching Bradley Wiggins win his gold medal

Unique taxi

The Aquatics Centre

Rings at the Aquatics Centre

Proof that we were actually there

View from the cheap seats

It's a start

Men's USA gold medal winner

Women relay team on the podium

Picture of the diving boards

Jarret at the arena

Night picture of Olympic Stadium and the orbit bathed in Red, White and Blue just for us

The Aquatics Centre

The Orbit

Day 11 - Canoeing and the rain

cwalter328@gmail.com (Craig Walter) — Tue, 31 Jul 2012 22:39:00 +0000

We’ve been extremely lucky with the weather on our trip and despite our little rain storm today, I’d say we’re still on a good streak. Our adventure today began in our little “Closet” as we like to call it. After we had breakfast we headed to the Lee Valley Whitewater Center to watch Canoe Slalom. We ended up having to take a train to one station, a second train and then a third train to where we got to walk. From the final train station to the event entrance, it was probably a 25 minute walk through a field along a lake. It was actually a pretty walk but it seemed longer than it should have been. Along the way was a giant chair where we got a picture of Jarret sitting on it. Once we got to the event, we had pretty good seats. It was a little far from where they finish but you could still see all the action on one of the 2 giant TV’s. It’s pretty amazing how those guys can maneuver a kayak or canoe around a series of gates without touching them. The US participant didn’t make it out of the rounds yesterday so we had to root for Great Britain. As Great Britain’s racer came up, the crowd cheered the whole way. Unfortunately, he didn’t make the second cut and couldn’t race for a medal. The winner was from France and he has won it for the last 3 Olympics, I think. 12 men started in the first round and it was cut down to the top 8. From there it was basically a sudden death situation, the fastest one down the course wins. You get one run, winner takes it all.

Right after the race was over and before the Victory Ceremony began, the rain started. First it was just spitting a little bit and then all of a sudden it started to downpour. Up went the umbrellas and on went the raincoats. After about 10 minutes, it slowed down and then stopped. We stayed mostly dry, all except Rylee who got her pants wet and we had to listen to her wanting to go and change them at the hotel for another couple hours. You’d think with her AP bio class she’d learn that wet things eventually dry….oh well.

One of the nice things about this event was that it was a medal event. Because of this, we got to see the Gold, Silver and Bronze medals awarded after the race was over. It is always neat to see the flags raised for the three winners as the national anthem for the winner is played. Even if your country isn’t on the stand, it’s very special.

We headed back home along the long walk with the throngs of people all moving in the same direction. There was a helicopter above use hovering, I’m guessing taking some pictures. It would have made for a good picture to see a string of people probably a mile and a half long.

There have been tons of volunteers and they’re always happy, laughing and keeping the crowd in a good mood. I’m not sure they all know what’s going on however. We’ve asked a number of questions from being able to get tickets to the Olympic Park to transportation questions. The more I ask, the more I have the feeling that I should just get the information on the internet and trust what I learn. They mean well but they don’t always give you the correct answer. We did get to our event and get home with their help so it can’t be too bad.

As we were heading home, we tried to stop at a ticket office by the Olympic Park only to find out they don’t sell tickets. They just issue them from people that buy them over the internet. You can’t get into the Olympic Park unless you either have a ticket for an event there or a ticket for just the Olympic Park. Since both are hard to get now, Jill and Rylee may end up at the mall that’s just by the Olympic Park while Jarret and I go to the swimming event tomorrow. I’m not giving up hope but it’s looking more and more like that will be the plan. One thing we haven’t seen is people selling tickets at the venue. It sounds like there can be a pretty big fine if they do so they must be selling them some other way. Either way, I think it’s going to be hard for us to pick up a couple at this late date.

We headed back to the hotel with just enough time to send KHQ some pictures for a Skype session we were going to do. We found a place right by the hotel that is a dock area for boats and houseboats that is attached to the river Thames. It’s a really quaint area that is very nice even though it used to be very run down. We got a recommendation from someone telling us we should go to the Grapes Pub. Apparently Sir Ian McKellan is part owner of it. We thought was a great idea so we walked in with the kids and all heads turned to us. It turns out this establishment doesn’t have a license to allow anyone under 18 years old. It was a little odd but we went on our way. As we were walking back, there was an area where a couple bike paths come together. So we looked right and left and right and still almost got hit by a couple of bikes. At one other point a bicyclist had to veer off his path so he wouldn’t run into us. I just yelled “American In The Road”, I heard him laugh as he rode on so it must not have been that bad. We finished up with dinner at an Indian Italian restaurant. We just ordered some appetizers for all of us to split. When they brought finger bowls for us to use, the kids didn’t believe us. The waiter also put Rylee’s napkin on her lap for her. The look on her face was priceless. During the meal at one point in the discussion, Rylee turned to Jarret and in a half joking manner said “It makes me sad when you plug your ears when I talk to you”, and in a split instant Jarret lays out “ Well, it makes me happy when you’re sad” That’s kind of how this trip has gone. They needle each other quite a bit but in the end, they can laugh about it.

The last excitement for the night was at 11:00 PM, I’m writing the blog, Jarret is almost asleep, Jill’s almost ready for bed and Rylee is just getting out of the shower and all of a sudden the hotel alarm goes off. Rylee comes out of the shower in a towel and says let’s go! I tell Rylee she has time to put on some clothes, Jill and Jarret get dressed quick and I grab the backpack with all our info in it. The hotel can burn to the ground but I’m going to make sure we can get to our next event. Jill poked her head out into the hallway, as did several other guests. No one was running for the stairs. A call to the front desk allayed our fears that no, the hotel was not burning down. A guest accidentally pushed the alarm. Needless to say, we’re having a good time laughing about it. Rylee said she’s never gotten ready so quickly…..maybe tomorrow we’ll have them set off a fire alarm about the time that we want to leave. Rylee might just be ready on time for once…. Oh well, it was just a false alarm. Hopefully it won’t happen again tonight as we’re sleeping.

Awards ceremony. Winners on the podium

View of boats in the harbor by our hotel

Just a railing

Picture up the Thames

Jarret in a big chair

Lake on our walk from the train station to the canoeing event

Whitewater course

Red, White and Blue

Day 10 - Our first event

cwalter328@gmail.com (Craig Walter) — Tue, 31 Jul 2012 08:18:00 +0000

We had another great day. First of all, we had an American type of breakfast. At the hotel, they have a breakfast that's complimentary and they had cereal, sausage, eggs and toast. It was really nice to have some normal food for a change. We decided to go to the Olympic Park, where our event was, so that we could enjoy it as long as we could. You have to have a ticket to get into the Olympic Park, either for an event or just a single Olympic Park ticket. This may be the only time all four of us can get into the Olympic park so we wanted to take advantage of it.

First of all, the transportation to the Olympic venues is really easy and convenient. There are also hundreds of volunteers helping you get to where you're going. The trains are so much nicer and cleaner than they were in Paris. Once you get to the train station by the Olympic Park, it's a little bit of a walk before you can get in. You only have to go through security once, which is really nice. The Olympic Park is really large. We never got to see the whole thing. There are also thousands of people in it. For as many people as were there, we still were able to get around without any problem. The walkways are very wide and it's easy to get where you want to go.

We started by looking at a big map and Jarret found where the Today show was taping....so we decided to go take a look. We got there about 11:30 and the sign said they were taping at 12:00. There was nobody waiting so we decided to wait it out. One of the employees told us where a good place to stand was and another employee gave us something to make a sign. We waited and and the stars of the Today came trickling out. It was fun to see them and get to talk to them briefly. I'm sure they do this every show but it was nice to see them banter with the crowd. Also, there were some US Olympic medal winners that walked around the crowd. Brendan Hansen, a swimmer who won a bronze medal, walked through the crowd and let people touch and hold his medal. It was a really neat thing for him to do. Rylee even got to hold the medal and we got a picture with them both.

Jill has always liked Matt Lauer and she finally got to meet him and talk to him for a minute. Al Roker worked the crowd as did Natalie Morales and Savannah Guthrie. Also, Ryan Seacrest was there and we got to shake his hand. Meredith Viera was there also. Jill really likes her as well so she gave her one of the pens I made. We were very fortunate to be in the right place at the right time to watch the Today show. It's happened that way quite a few times on this trip.

We needed some food so we hit one of the vendors. After getting some Pizza, we headed up to the lawn area where we could watch the big screen TV with thousands of other fans. We also tried to Skype with KHQ at this point. We were almost ready to do it live when we lost our signal. It was too bad but we figured we'd try later.

We headed to the London 2012 Megastore to buy some gifts. There was a long line where you wind back and forth before you get into the store. We kept walking and didn't have to wait but probably had to walk in the queue line for about 5 minutes. The store had a ton of stuff but there were many sizes of shirts that weren't there because they couldn't stock the shelves as fast as things were disappearing. We also noticed that a little bit when we were trying to order food. It seems like they were caught off guard with the number of people but I'm not sure how you prepare for an onslaught of that many people. I'm just guessing but there were probably over 100000 people in the park.

After the store, we got a message from KHQ and that's when we did the Skype session. It worked out pretty good except it was a little hard to hear. Also, it would have been nice if I combed my hair but the wind was blowing anyway so it didn't matter.

We headed off to our event, the Men's Hockey game. When we got there and I took a close look at the tickets, I discovered that one of the tickets was in a different area. When I got the tickets, I didn't look that close at them. They're all in the same section, they were just in a different row. When we go to Canoeing today, we'll also have to sit apart. However, it looks like we'll only be one row and 6 seats apart this time. The rest of the events, our tickets are together.

Hockey is an interesting sport. They play it on Astroturf that they keep wet. It helps make the ball go faster. The ball can't hit another players foot. If it hits another players foot inside of the half round circle by the net, the team gets a Penalty Corner. For that, the team guarding the net has players that put on some protective gear, helmets, pads and cups, and then the other team gets a shot at scoring. It's a fast paced game with a very hard ball. We saw one guy get hit in the head with the ball and they took him off in a stretcher. I hope he was OK. The first game we saw was Great Britian versus Argentina. It was fun because we were watching the home team. Great Britian won 4-1. At the second game, a lot of people left so Jill and the kids came down where I was sitting so we all got to enjoy it together. Jill ended up sitting next to someone from the US that sounded like he was helping the US team, maybe with some scouting of opponents.

The event finally ended, we made our way out of the park and back to our "Closet" as we like to call it. It was a another great day.

Olympic rings from the side of the Aquatic Centre

Boat might have been used to haul the Olympic flame

Olympic Stadium and the Orbit

Savannah Guthrie from the Today show

Matt Lauer talking to Jill....she finally got to talk to him....he's her favorite...I'm not jealous but did you know he doesn't wear socks!

Al Roker

Natalie Morales

Ryan Seacrest

Meredith Viera signing Jarret's sign.

The Basketball Arena

Olympic Rings on the Basketball Arena

Velodrome

Family Pic

Go USA!

Big Screen for people to watch

US Flag at the Riverbank Arena

Hockey

Nice sunset at Hockey arena

Getting ready for a Penalty Corner

Coca-Cola exhibit at night

Basketball Arena at night

View of the Water Polo and Aquatics Centre

The Olympic Stadium and Orbit

Rylee holding Brendan Hansen's Bronze 2012 Medal

Day 9 - Back to London

cwalter328@gmail.com (Craig Walter) — Sun, 29 Jul 2012 21:03:00 +0000

Day 9

London Bound

I was a little premature on the Perfect Day in Paris post… I had two glasses of Cabernet and that ended the day with perfection…

I’m writing this as we are on the Eurostar, heading back to London. We have seats with a table in the middle, so it makes it a little easier, even though it’s only a two hour train ride. I got one last look at the Eiffel Tower as we were in the countryside; it’s a little hard to spot, but it’s there. We started the day by getting up a little early, since we wanted to do a couple of things before we had to leave. First off it was time to find some food. We really didn’t want a sit down restaurant since that would take too much time. Yes, we should be drawn and quartered, but we decided on McDonald’s at about 9:30 AM because it was the only thing open. We walked in to order a couple Egg McMuffins only to find out it would be a 20 minute wait, but then they said they couldn’t make them. We figured if they couldn’t make them, we’d go somewhere else. There was a Quick restaurant, but we found out they didn’t open until 11:00. We discovered that on a Sunday morning there’s not much open. We did find a market, though, and settled on bananas, Special K bars and some juice or yogurt drink….the breakfast of champions. From there we boarded the Metro to Notre Dame. Once we got back up to street level, we found an interesting thing for the Olympics. They were showing some events live in a square on a giant television. They had chairs and big bean bag chairs that you could plop down on and watch the events as they unfold. We consumed our morning meal as we watched Table Tennis.

Notre Dame was a special moment on the trip. I had read somewhere that Notre Dame didn’t compare to some of the other churches, but we caught it at a special time. You can walk into the church for free, and we discovered that there was a service going on at the same time. You can take pictures as long as there is no flash, which was unique compared to the other churches we visited. Most don’t allow you to take pictures at all. Anyway, we were able to hear the priest talk and sing, and we were also able to hear the organ. It was an amazing experience to hear it in that giant church. There were incredible stained glass windows throughout and the tall arches were spectacular. I hope I was able to take some pictures that capture it a little bit. I was also able to take a little video on my iPhone that I hope can let you hear what it was like. We saw a sign that Notre Dame was celebrating it’s 850^th anniversary…..no I didn’t type that incorrectly. We feel so lucky that we decided to make a trip there to see it.

We walked around Notre Dame a little bit and saw some street performers, flower markets, pet stores, and plant shops. All the little things that people that live there need for their daily lives. We also walked along the Seine river and crossed the Pont Neuf bridge on foot so that we could take in the sites. The Pont Neuf bridge is the oldest in Paris and has survived numerous floods from the river Seine. At this point, it was time to go back to the hotel and get checked out. We still had a little time before we had to get to the train station, but we needed to relinquish our room.

After checking the bags, we decided to take one last walk along a canal that was a couple blocks from our hotel. It was very interesting to see. There were a series of locks that allowed boats to travel on the canal……Oh we just entered our trip in the Chunnel…… We were lucky in that we were able to follow one boat as it went through the locks. The boat entered, tied up to the side, and then was lowered to the next level as the water was released into the lower lock. Once the water was level, the big gates opened up and the boat could continue on. The last point we saw was the boat going into a tunnel that was still part of the canal. From there I don’t know where the boat would end up because 100 feet on the other side of the street was a park where the canal should be. We finally decided we had to leave Paris and headed for the train stop. No issues (which if you know me and border crossings – is a good thing), other than not being able to understand the English speaking border agent. We’ll head to our London hotel for the remaining 5 days of our trip.

Jill and I were both talking on the train and have come to the same point of view. Paris is an amazing place that we’re so fortunate to experience but I don’t think we’d go back just to see it again. While there’s so much amazing history and sites, it’s a really dirty and crowded city. I think there would be more places that we’d like to go and experience. Despite the person that tried to scold Jarret because he must have cut her off as we’re taking our luggage to the Metro (he didn’t know what he did and I think she was just in a bad mood), the people there were very nice. I’d heard a lot about the attitudes of Parisians towards Americans, but we just didn’t experience any of it. Maybe it was because we had kids along with us or because we tried to speak the language a little bit. Also, nobody got their pockets picked.

There was one funny moment that the kids keep bringing up when we ordered dinner the other night. The waiter came up, I threw out a “Bonjour” and felt pretty good about myself……until he rattled off something in French that I had no idea about. The kids said the look on my face was priceless until the waiter said “English?” and we gratefully nodded. Maybe my “Bonjour” was so authentic that he couldn’t tell I was an American…at least that’s what I’m going with.

The other funny thing is that the kids have nicknamed each other. Rylee has named Jarret “No Finish Jarret” because whatever he orders he doesn’t finish. Can’t eat the fries, can’t finish the crust, or can’t drink all of his pop. I finally told Jarret he doesn’t get to order pop anymore because he doesn’t finish it. Jarret on the other hand has nicknamed Rylee “No Try Ry” because she won’t try anything new. She’s sick of ham and cheese sandwiches, but won’t branch out to anything else (no escargot for me!). In fact, by mistake on the train, she got another ham and cheese pretzel. Oh well, maybe someday she’ll learn trying new things isn’t all that bad.

Oh, just popped out on the other side of the English Channel and are now in England.

As I’m thinking about our adventure, Jarret did something funny as we’re using the Metro. We have these little tickets that you put into the machine, it pops out the other end, and you grab it before you exit into the subway. As Jarret was getting his ticket ready he sang “ I’ve got a golden ticket…..” which you probably know is a reference to Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.

Jarret did come up with our Walter Emergency Plan in regards to riding the subways. Ever the thinker and problem-solver, he came up with this plan about our second day in London. If one of us doesn’t make it on to the subway (which, if you’ve ever ridden the tube or the Metro, this will make sense), then whoever is on the subway will get off at the next stop. Whoever got left behind will get on the next subway and get off at the next stop, so we would all be together again. Smart huh? Thankfully, we haven’t had to put his plan into use yet. Our Walter routine is to enter the subway as quickly as possible, sit or stand as close to a door as possible, then get off quickly and run to the wall for our Walter family meeting. We would come up with our game plan, then break, and off we’d go. It’s been working well so far. But I do wish they had more lifts or escalators so we wouldn’t have to lug our big, heavy bags up all those stairs.

Some of the keys to traveling together and keeping the kids happy are to always feed them, separate them whenever possible, and say things like, “we’ll be there soon” or “I think it’s just around this corner”. Hmm, these are some of the things we did when they were toddlers…

Well, au revoir, Paris! And hello London again J

We just got into our hotel, did some laundry to get us through the rest of the week and are having a pizza delivered. Our hotel room is really small by our standards but it’s clean and should be comfortable enough. Jarret might end up sleeping on the floor on a cushion instead of the sofa hide-a-bed but we’ll see how that goes. Also, I did a Skype session tonight with Dave Cotton from KHQ. We’re going to send in a few pictures and Skype with him on the 6 AM news broadcast tomorrow morning. He said we’d be on between 6 and 6:15 so keep an eye out for us. Not sure where we’ll be but hopefully we’ll be somewhere interesting.

Notre Dame

Inside the church

Performing the service

Beautiful stained glass

Point Zero at Notre Dame. The point where all places are measured from the city of Paris

Notre Dame

Street performer by Notre Dame - pretty amazing and had to leave some money for him

Pont Neuf bridge

Statue in front of our hotel that is in the midst of renovation. Check out the graffiti on the lion and statue

The canal where we walked

The canal

Olympic rings at St Pancras station where the Eurostar arrived.

In St Pancras station

Day 8 Perfect Day in Paris

cwalter328@gmail.com (Craig Walter) — Sat, 28 Jul 2012 20:13:00 +0000

Today was a great day. The weather was just perfect, it was probably in the low 70’s and a little overcast. We decided today to take the hop-on hop-off bus through Paris. We did this in London and really enjoyed it. It was also very good in Paris. It allows you to see the major sites of the city without having to walk a lot or use the subway. The subway is very efficient but you don’t see much since you’re underground. The only thing is we wished it moved along a little more quickly. At times we had to wait 5-10 minutes at a stop. I think the buses in London run a better schedule. Anyway, we started on one loop that took us around the Louvre, Eiffel Tower, Arc De Triomphe. Place de la Concorde, and Notre Dame. Jill and I both are amazed at the age of everything. Buildings, squares and monuments are all hundreds of years old. When the oldest thing in Spokane is maybe 150 years old, it just doesn’t compare. Every street we see has buildings that are older than anything we have in Spokane.

We only got off the bus a couple times today. The first time was to get some lunch on the Champs-Elyees and get a close look at the Arc de Triomphe. We found a restaurant called Quick, which had hamburgers. It was the first hamburger I’ve had since we left and it was very good. It was also quick and easy because you order at a counter and get your food. Getting served at a sit down restaurant is a little different. First of all, it’s harder to navigate your way through the menu although many of them have them in both French and English. After you are done, you need to get the waiter’s attention to let them know you’re ready to pay. Sometimes it takes a while and when you’re in a hurry to get going, it gets a little frustrating. It probably says more about the way we’re used to having a meal. Get in, get your food, eat and get out. It probably would be better absorbing the French way by taking time with your meal but as a tourist, I want to get going so I can get to the next site. Food is just fuel in the tank at this point. One thing that amazed me was at the Arc de Triomphe, there is a roundabout surrounding the Arc and there are no lane markers and I’m not sure if there are any traffic lights. Cars, bicycles and buses were going every which way. A couple people ran across the street to get to the Arc and I was amazed nobody got hit. It almost reminded me of a game of Frogger, where you move the frog back and forth across the street to keep from getting hit. I have some video but I don’t think I can post it on the blog.

The next stop was at Montmartre. At the top is the Basilique du Sacre-Couer (Basilica of Sacred Heart), it’s an amazing church that we walked through. It was only built in 1857, I think, but it was beautiful. The artwork in the ceilings, the stained glass and the huge organ all were very unique. You can’t take pictures because it’s still a place of worship even though thousands of people walk through it every day. The church sits at the top of a hill so that you get a great view of Paris. For an additional charge, you can climb 300 steps to get to the top of the dome to get an even better view. Jarret and I took the challenge. Up to the top we went up a narrow spiral staircase. 25 steps – 50 steps and a landing – 75 steps – 100 steps and a landing to take a breather – 150 steps and out of breath – 200 steps heart beating, sweating and Jarret giving me the look like what’s taking you so long – 250 steps what was I thinking! – 290 steps had to take another break even though I could see the end – 300 steps and the view was priceless. You could see the whole city of Paris as you walk around the dome. We finally spotted Jill and Rylee at the street waiting for us. After enjoying the view for a while, we started the hike down. We headed back to the bus along a street that’s filled with tourist shops. It was nice because the prices were fairly reasonable. We picked up a few trinkets, hopped the bus and headed back to our hotel. Jarret, thanks for making the trip up with me even though you really didn’t want to. He did say something like “ I don’t want dad to have to go up alone” and I appreciated that. We’ll always be able to say we did that together.

A couple of impressions today:

First of all, we had the male – female age-old discussion about asking directions. In my world, I like to find things on my own. It helps me figure out where we’re at and how things are laid out. We walked around a little bit before finding the place where we got our tickets for the bus tour. Jill finally had enough and asked a person on the street. Although I would have found it, Jill confirmed my suspicions on where we had to go. (Jill probably has a different take which I’m sure she’ll share when she reads this). Jill’s take: Although I value initiative and self-motivation in trying to locate a destination, it soon became clear we had no idea where the bus office was. After walking in a complete circle and still not finding the office, and realizing I really don’t need to find my own way because I’ll never be here again and don’t need to memorize the route, I did the smart thing: I asked directions, gasp! In less than 1 minute, we had found the office. Which route would you rather take? J Craig – my way.

Second, A little extra sleep does us all a little good. We stopped a little earlier than normal yesterday so that we could rest. We’ve been on the go for a week now and it was taking its toll. The kids were crabby and we were about to join them. Also, I think the change in the weather helped us a little bit. It’s nice not being so hot and tired all the time.

Next, Paris is a dirty city. The subways aren’t that clean, there is graffiti everywhere, even up by the Basilique du Sacre-Couer. More than once we got a whiff of the bathroom even though there wasn’t a bathroom nearby. I guess it’s because of the number of people that are in the city every day but it would be nice if they picked up after themselves a little better. It’s just sad to see the amount of trash everywhere, even around the beautiful monuments.

Next, there is a restaurant on every corner for any kind of taste in food that you can think of. Trying to please four people is very hard but pretty much everything we’ve had from a sit down restaurant to a small shop has been very good.

Last, many of the buildings and sites were designed 150+ years ago with strict guidelines so that they were similar in size and design. This foresight made for a very unique and striking city.

Tomorrow we have the morning in Paris and then head back to London to start the last few days of our vacation. I can hardly believe it’s already half over and we only have 6 days left. We got a free drink ticket when we checked in and Jill and I are going to take advantage of it in a little bit. A good glass of French wine sounds just about right!

A view of the Louvre from our tour bus

The Eiffel Tower in the distance

Notre Dame

The kids at Arc de Triomphe

Champs Elyees

The Eiffel Tower - too easy not to take another picture

A Metro Sign

Up the hill to Montmartre

Basilique du Sacre-Couer

Jarret climbing the steps to the dome

Almost to the top

At the top of the dome

What a view

Picture of Jill, she's the one under the tree waving her hand

Jarret and I at the top

Another view with the Eiffel Tower in the distance

Another Metro sign

Day 7 We walked. The End

cwalter328@gmail.com (Craig Walter) — Fri, 27 Jul 2012 19:44:00 +0000

Ok, here’s where we walked and what we saw: We started the day at 9:30 by meeting our Paris Greeter, Louie. Louie was born in Vietnam, and lived there for 13 years, then moved to France. He’s probably in his sixties, but still retains much of his Vietnamese accent. To say the least, it was a bit of a challenge to understand our Vietnamese/French tour guide. We stayed in the 12^th arrondissement, and he shared with us so much information and history about the local markets and shops. It was amazing to us how noisy and busy the streets were, but then he would open a door and we thought we’d be heading into a shop, but it would be a courtyard to 3 or 4 apartment buildings. You could barely hear the noise of the city while in the courtyard. We walked by a children’s park where an orphanage had stood years ago. Needless to say, we are very spoiled to live where we do. Our beautiful Corbin Park doesn’t compare to this tiny park that was sandwiched between busy streets and high apartment buildings.

Many of the original apartment buildings were built in the mid 1800s, and the ruler at the time ordered these buildings to always have the 2^nd and 6^th floor balconies be one continuous balcony that goes the length of the building. Odd, but when we looked at the buildings, we could identify these particular sites. We asked how much an apartment would rent for, and for a very small studio (one room), it was 850-950 Euros per month, or at least 1 million to buy one. Not today, thank you.

The population in Paris is 2 million in the city, and another 10 million in the suburbs. No wonder it seems like people are everywhere all the time.

Louie pointed out a flea market to us. With his accent I thought he said “free market”, so I asked a question about it being a free market….how embarrassing. Craig, Rylee and Jarret all knew he said flea market though. Oh well, so I made one little mistake… J.

We walked past open markets where meat and cheese were being sold, and other fruit and vegetable markets. Many shops and markets weren’t open as this is “holiday” season. July and August is when people leave and go on vacation.

There is a walkway above the city street that used to be a railway. They’ve paved it and planted flowers. It’s a really nice place to take a walk or jog in the middle of the big city. Since Craig is Catholic, family joke for those that didn’t know, we had to visit a Catholic Church on the way. Our guide opened a double door off the street and we walked into a very large church with high ceilings and an organist playing in the background. It’s amazing that something so big and beautiful lies right in the middle of a city block. It’s one of the things that made this walking trip special. We got to see things that we never would have seen. Louie also pointed out historical sites like the Bastille monument, which is also a tomb for the people who were killed who revolted and overthrew the jail.

We ended our walk by thanking Louie and giving him a pen that Craig made. Craig brought several pens on this trip, and he’s been handing them out to those who have been very nice and helpful to us. The first pen went to our Romanian waitress in London, the second pen went to a worker at the Harry Potter Studios who stopped us to ask what we thought of the studio, and we ended up visiting with him for a long time, and then Louie got the third pen. Who will get the next one?

We rested at the hotel for a bit, and then we rode the Metro to Trocadero where we viewed the Eiffel Tower for the first time! Oh my, I wish you could see it if you haven’t already. It’s huge and beautiful. We chose not to go up in it as the line was a mile long, and it would have been a 2 hour wait probably. I of course was up for climbing the stairs to the top, but the rest of the family refused. Truthfully, there would be no way I would do that after looking at the stairs! It started to rain but it didn’t rain very hard, just mostly sprinkling. It cooled down a little, but it was still warm.

We’re doing pretty well with the language barrier. Thank goodness most Parisians speak English. Usually they begin talking to us in French, see the blank look on our faces, then start speaking English. We do try and order food in French, and get as far as we can. A “merci” always seems to be appreciated.

We usually end our night by writing postcards. The kids decided to write one to a random person in Spokane as a joke. Can you imagine receiving one from someone you don’t know, talking about their trip, and then not knowing who the heck it’s from? If you receive one from Helga, it could be from Jarret. We’ll chalk this up to being extremely tired.

We’re getting ready to watch the opening ceremonies tonight! We’re really enjoying Paris, but I have to say, it’s not as clean as what we’re used to. They have such beautiful buildings and monuments, yet I think, “could you please just pick up some of this litter and clean the streets a bit?”

Tomorrow we’re going to take a tour bus all over the city and see the popular sites including Montmarte. It could be a little rainy, but that’s ok, we will trudge on!

Opening into a courtyard. They're doing a little construction there.

Handmade wood inlaid desk for sale around 36,000 Euro. Any takers?

Shot of building on our walk

Outdoor market

Along the walkway that used to be a railway

Catholic church

Us in front of the Bastille monument

Where we've had more than one meal. The croissant chocolate is very tasty.

Eiffel Tower

Some poor soul locked up his bike. They took everything else

Eiffel Tower through the trees

Where Napoleon is buried

Postcar Jarret is sending.

Day 6 - Battle with the mouse

cwalter328@gmail.com (Craig Walter) — Thu, 26 Jul 2012 21:40:00 +0000

We conquered the mouse today. Our journey consisted of a short metro ride and a longer train ride to Disneyland. We loaded up before with a couple of croissants for the road. Disneyland Paris has some of the same rides, like Phantom Manor (Haunted House), Pirates of the Caribbean, Buzz Lightyear and Thunder Mountain Railroad. There are a few differences like Sleeping Beauty’s Castle, which seems bigger and there are some rides that don’t exist here. The park is smaller but still has the Disney charm. They have an attached park called Walt Disney Studio Park (like California Adventure) that had more restaurants, the Tower of Terror, a cool stunt car/motorcycle show, and a cinema presentation. Along the lines of Downtown Disney, Paris’s version is Disney Village that had Planet Hollywood and more shopping. There seemed to be a lot of people, however, our longest wait for any ride was probably 30 minutes, with 20 minutes being the average wait time. We did notice that it’s not quite as clean as the one in the states.

It was HOT today and we really worked up a sweat. It was probably 90 degrees with 90% humidity. We managed to keep drinking water. They did have drinking fountains that we used to refill the water bottles, which was nice. The food in the park was pretty expensive but we expected that anyway.

One funny thing that happened today was when we were tired and eating dinner. Jarret asked Rylee if she could see out of her left eye, held up two fingers and asked “Close your right eye. How many fingers do you see?” She blurted back “Two and I see one idiot”….got us all laughing a bit.

The kids are rummy, we all stink from sweating the whole day and we’re tired. However we had a really great day. We are trying to get the kids to limit their complaining and appreciate what they are seeing. They need to learn to fight through being tired and hot and hungry in order to appreciate what they’re actually experiencing. I guess it’s part of being a teenager but we’re working on it. We’re getting cleaned up so that we can get a good night’s sleep. Tomorrow morning we‘re meeting someone from the Paris Greeters program who is going to take us on a walking tour for a couple hours.

Skull Rock

Sleeping Beauty's Castle

Phantom Manor

Thunder Mountain - we did see a train get stuck at the top and they had to walk all the people down the track.

Tombstones as Phantom Manor

Family pic at Walt Disney Studios

Stunt show

Disneyland Paris 20 year Anniversary

The Castle

Rylee behind the wheel

Jarret behind the wheel

Day 5: Louvre 1 - Walters 0

cwalter328@gmail.com (Craig Walter) — Wed, 25 Jul 2012 20:12:00 +0000

The Louvre kicked our butt today…a little bit more about that later. We started the day early, getting up about 4:30 so we could get packed and ready to go for our 7:54 departure on the Eurostar. The trip on the Eurostar went very well. The train just flies and, despite the water coming in the train as we went under the English Channel, we got there all dry. Just kidding! But seriously, you hardly know you’re under the channel. It goes into a tunnel and before you know it, you’re out the other end in France. The only way you know you’re in France is that they start making the train announcements in French first. It’s quite an easy way to travel.

We got into Paris and found our way to the Metro subway. It’s a little harder here because we had to lug our luggage up and down the stairs, as they didn’t have many escalators in the station. I was breaking a sweat just getting back and forth from the subway. After finding our hotel, we checked in and relaxed for a little bit.

The language barrier notwithstanding, we’re finding Paris quite different than London. As we were getting to our hotel we noticed a lot of graffiti on buildings and signs, and it almost seems like we’re in a more rundown area of town. I’m not sure we feel quite as safe walking around like we did in London, but maybe it will just take a little time to get used to things.

We’ve heard from some people that French people aren’t very warm or helpful. Fortunately for us, we’ve found just the opposite. Once in the subway, we must have looked very lost, and a lady just stopped and asked if she could help. I knew where we needed to go, I was just looking for an escalator so that I didn’t have to carry the bags down the stairs. She didn’t make an escalator magically appear, but she did make sure I was headed the right way. On another occasion, we were having problems getting the gates to work at the Metro. We have these tickets where you put them in one end of the machine and it kicks them out at the other end and then unlocks the gate. Well, Jarret was having problems with his, so me, being the thoughtful dad, gave him mine. He, Rylee and Jill all got through without any problem. I, however, was stuck on the other side with Jarret’s bad ticket. I tried it in a couple machines and it still didn’t work. I tried to squeeze myself through the gate and although I could have done that when I was 20—the extra 27 years made this impossible. I looked at Jill and the kids, and they were laughing hysterically. Some stranger behind me must have been watching the same scene, and he generously used his card to let me through. I think I yelled out my first “Merci” at that point. At least all the cards worked the next time we went through the Metro.

We checked in to the hotel and the person that brought up the bags gave us some helpful tips. The most important was about the pickpockets. He said to keep our bags in front of us because the pickpocketers are very good. As we were in the Louvre, we also saw signs warning about the pickpockets. Needless to say, we’re being very careful.

After a little rest, we made our way down to the Louvre but we had to get something to eat first. We didn’t haggle much and found a café that was across from the Louvre. Probably not the best deal we could find but it was close, fairly quick and pretty good. I’ll post a picture of the dish Jill had, it came on a wooden platter and we started laughing as they placed it on the table. Jarret had a hamburger, yes all the way to Paris to get a hamburger that wasn’t that good. Maybe he’ll learn someday although at least it wasn’t the most expensive dish on the menu. I had a ham and cheese sandwich and Rylee had some fruit.

After lunch we headed to the Louvre. Now people have told me that it’s big and others have said you won’t be able to see everything in a week. Now I believed them but wasn’t prepared for what I saw. This place is amazing, huge, humongous, one of a kind, awesome, unbelievable, crowded, tiring, and on and on and on. We walked and walked and walked for probably 4 hours and still didn’t see at least 2/3 of it. I was so in awe of the building itself, not to mention all the paintings, sculptures, and everything else. We saw a few of the big things, like the Mona Lisa and Venus Di Milo (not sure if I spelled that right). But the ceilings in the Louvre were the things that impressed me the most. As you go from one room to the next, the ceilings are painted or decorated with the most amazing paintings that I’ve ever seen. We got a little turned around at times or walked down to hallways that were dead-ends but eventually found our way back. We did run across an area of the ancient Louvre which looks like it was some of the original part of the building. One thing that made it a little quicker for us was that the descriptions were all in French so we didn’t spend much time reading over these.

Louvre, you kicked our inexperienced travelers collective butts. We bow down to superiority and hope we have a rematch sometime in the future. We headed back to the hotel beaten and broken. We replenished ourselves with Jambon and Fromage Baguettes, Poulet and Fromage Baguettes and Jambone and Fromage Quiche purchased from the Boulangerie across the street. We navigated a couple of meals in a foreign country without any incidents. (Michele, you would be proud!) Bonsoir!

Tomorrow we head to Disneyland; if the mouse kicks our butt, we’re coming home!

Paris Train Station

The Louvre

Chalk painter outside the Louvre

Outside of the Louvre

One of the ceilings

Down a hall

In the room with the Mona Lisa, can you count the people?

The lady herself

One small room that was empty. Took that chance to get a family pic

The best room

The ancient Louvre

Venus Di Milo

Another statue

Day 4 - British Museum and Hogwarts`

cwalter328@gmail.com (Craig Walter) — Tue, 24 Jul 2012 21:23:00 +0000

We had a long day today but it was really good. The weather has been great, I just hope it holds up for the rest of the vacation. We started the day by getting some food. Finding places to eat is always a challenge. Usually breakfast isn't so bad, we just try and grab something quick and cheap. As the day wears on, it gets increasingly difficult. We can't quite eat when we're hungry because we're doing something else at the time, we can't find a place to go, or we can't all agree on what we want. It makes it worse in the evening because we're hot and tired and just want some food. Despite that, we've had some pretty good meals. It's more expensive than home, especially with the exchange rate but the food has been good.

After breakfast, we headed to the British Museum. It's an amazing place packed with history. There's ancient Greece, Roman, Chinese, Korean, American, etc. There's so much that you can't see it in any depth in the time that we were there. A couple of my highlights were the display from the Parthenon, the Rosetta Stone, and some of the Egyptian mummies. There was one display of a person that died about 3500 BC and was laying in a fetal position. The body was in the display about the same way that they found it. It was so well preserved that you could still see some hairs on it's head and and it's teeth. It was odd to see it but amazing at the same time. To think you could get a glimpse of something that happened over 5000 years ago is awesome. There were big pieces of the Parthenon that they had received ( or stolen depending on the point of view) that were there for all to see. It was really amazing place to visit.

After our tour of world history, we ventured to the fantasy land of Hogwarts. We caught a tube and then a train and then a taxi to get there. Riding in the taxi was an experience. It's one where two of us had our backs to the driver and the other two faced the driver. The taxi drove through the streets pretty fast and it was strange because we went through a neighborhood pretty much the whole way. There wasn't an arterial that I could see. The Harry Potter Studio Tour was a lot of fun. We watched a small movie to begin with and then the curtain opens and you see the doors to the great hall. As you walk into the great hall, they have it setup like they did in the movie, with long tables and dishes on the table. At the front is the table the teachers sat at along with the podium that Dumbledore used when he spoke. They spent quite a bit of time in the details, things that you don't even notice on camera. We saw even more evidence of the details as we walked through the exhibit. There were a lot of people but it didn't seem too crowded so we were able to take quite a few pictures. I think Rylee took probably 200 pictures herself. We saw the different creatures that they created for the movie, props, costumes and so many other things I can't remember them all. We did end up resting a little bit with some butterbeers, that actually were pretty good.

The big things were #4 Privet Drive, the Knight Bus, the big chess pieces, the bridge to Hogwarts, Dumbledore's office, the Burrow and Diagon Alley. All of these were displayed so well but the best piece was probably the last. They had created a 1/24 scale model of Hogwarts that they used for filming some pieces of the movie. It was amazing. A tour guide that we talked to said that this wasn't the original location for it. They had stored it somewhere else and it was starting to get run down, water damaged, and he said there was a fox that was living in it for a while. It took 40 days to dismantle it so that they could rebuild it for the display. It was truly amazing in it's detail.

After that, we headed home but the shuttle we were taking overheated and broke down. We waited for another bus and continued on our journey. It was nice taking the train as we got to see more of the outer parts of London. When we got back to London we walked around looking for a place to eat and finally came to a decision, more based on fatigue than on how the menu looked. We lucked out and it was a good meal.

Tomorrow we head to Paris on the Eurostar that will go under the English Channel. We have to get up early but we should be in Paris around noon. Enough time to take in a few sights before turning in for the night. Wish us luck. Bon Voyage!

British Museum

Remains of person that died in 3500 BC

The Great Hall

Broken down bus

Day 3

cwalter328@gmail.com (Craig Walter) — Mon, 23 Jul 2012 23:41:00 +0000

We started the day by accidentally sleeping in for 2.5 hours. Apparently Craig’s alarm on his watch didn’t go off, or we didn’t hear it. We must have needed the sleep! Rylee has been struggling more than the rest of us with jet lag. She’s been very tired, and just hasn’t felt very well. But tomorrow we go to the Harry Potter Studio Tour, so maybe that will perk her up a bit!

Our first venture was riding the tube to the Tower of London and taking a tour. We have been lucky so far in that we really haven’t been bothered too much by the crowds. There are a lot of people, but the lines into places have been reasonable. We followed a tour guide for the first part, then went off on our own. The Tower of London is just so incredible to see. Is it possible to “feel” history? I think we did today. You can see the carvings into the stone walls by the prisoners hundreds of years ago. And seeing the Crown Jewels was so impressive. All the crowns of the kings and queens dating back to the 1600’s, plus scepters, gold plates and challis’s were all displayed, and in such pristine condition.

We also had tickets for the Ceremony of the Keys. You have to get tickets far in advance; I think we got ours 6-8 months ago. This takes place every night at 9:30pm (9:53 to be exact), and has since the 1300’s! It was a 40 minute presentation, very serious and traditional. There is an exchange of the keys, soldiers marching, precise words spoken, bugles playing, and a little audience participation. Afterward, we walked a bit and took a spectacular picture of the Tower Bridge, all lit up with the Olympic rings.

Between the Tower of London tour and the Ceremony of the Keys, we rested at the hotel and rehydrated. We walked through Green Park and St. James Park on our way to catch the tube again for the key ceremony. St. James Park is right near Buckingham Palace. There’s a lake in it with weeping willow trees and lots of ducks and pigeons that reminded us of Manito Park.

By the way, I think we have crossing the street figured out: It really doesn’t matter if it’s a marked crossing or not, people generally just run for it. On most streets there’s an island or landing in the middle of the street. You run really fast to the island, gather your wits, then run again to the other side, thereby completing your journey. I can’t believe more people don’t get hit. The streets are narrow, and the cars drive fast. A lot of streets do have walk/don’t walk signs, but a lot don’t. Also, on most streets if you look down, “look right” or “look left” is printed on the street (no doubt for the ignorant tourists who still look the opposite direction for oncoming traffic).

On our bus tour yesterday we learned what the cute little children’s song “Ring Around the Rosie” really means. Do you know? It has to do with the plague and people dying. I was silently referencing the book “World Without End”, the sequel to “The Pillars of the Earth” (for those who have read it).

We are all really loving London. It’s a huge city with so much to do. It’s so rooted in history, we just don’t have that kind of history where we live! I was thinking before we got here that we’ll probably be here just long enough to feel like it wasn’t long enough, and it’s starting to feel that way. It’s a good sign when I have to keep asking what day it is.

Tower of London Pics

The White Tower

Another tower

Cool Elephant

Where the Crown Jewels are kept

Yes, it's a little crooked but that's how we roll!

Inside the White Tower

Through the window toward the Tower Bridge

Jarret as a Beefeater

Photo Bombed!

Lots of small winding staircases

To help keep the bad people out

What do you do when part of your white fork is missing in your fish and chips?

A walk through St. James Park

In St James Park looking back at Buckingham Palace

Another park picture

The Tower of London at night

The Tower Bridge at night

A group shot

The Tower Bridge

Jarret in the subway

Some pictures from yesterday

cwalter328@gmail.com (Craig Walter) — Mon, 23 Jul 2012 17:13:00 +0000

Taking a rest before heading off to the Ceremony of the Keys tonight at the Tower of London. Here are some pictures from yesterday.

Rylee and Jarret on the tour bus...what angels...

A street in the older part of London

The London Eye from the tour bus

The happy couple... as the kids took the picture Rylee stated "Only time can come between you!"

Kids mugging for the camera

Picture of Big Ben and Parliament. Did you know Big Ben is actually the name of the bell in the tower?

The Tower Bridge with the Olympic rings on it.

Close up of the Olympic rings

Big Ben

The Whole Fam Damily

Nice picture with the London Eye and Big Ben in the background

Just a neat building

Part of the Parliament building

Night shot of Piccadilly Circus

Monument by Christopher Wren commemorating the fire in 1666

Big Ben

Picture of Big Ben through the London Eye

Art on the wall

Driving down the Tower Bridge. It does open for big ships.

Shot of a building at night.

Day 2

cwalter328@gmail.com (Craig Walter) — Sun, 22 Jul 2012 22:43:00 +0000

We had a good but tiring day today. We started with a hearty Starbuck breakfast since it’s right across the street. Jill did enjoy a nice cup of coffee as we got the morning started. The nice advantage was that Starbucks also has free wifi, which is now a necessity. After breakfast we boarded a sightseeing bus that takes you to all of the sites. They provide live commentary on some of the buses and you can get off the bus and then later get back on a different one. We drove by Buckingham Palace, Hyde Park, Baker Street, Piccadilly Circus, Trafalgar Square, Westminster Abbey and Big Ben before we finally decided to walk a little bit. As part of the package, we were able to take a boat down the River Thames. The views from the river were very spectacular, especially the ones of the Tower Bridge and Parliament. There were only a few people when we started but the crowds grew throughout the day. The boat ride down and back took about an hour.

After the ride on the boat, we got out and walked around the Parliament building and Westminster Abbey a little bit. It just boggles the mind to think of how many of these buildings were built hundreds of years ago. We did learn that the city of London is only 1 square mile and maintains its independence from the neighboring cities. The city of Westminster houses most of the big areas like Buckingham Palace but the city of London is where the oldest buildings are. A fire in 1666 wiped out 4/5ths of the city in 4 days. The first place that burned down was memorialized by a structure created by Christopher Wren who built St. Paul’s Cathedral. We did walk into St Paul’s but they were having Sunday services so we only got a quick glimpse of the church. It is one amazing place. You can’t take pictures there but it was spectacular.

After having lunch (at the Earl of Sandwich no less!) and walking around St Paul’s Cathedral, we got back on the bus and continued on the journey through the rest of the sites. It’s just amazing that there are so many old buildings. We decided to come back to the hotel, rest for a little bit and then head out to dinner. For dinner, we just walked down to Piccadilly Circus and looked for someplace that we could all agree on. We found a nice Italian restaurant that looked good. We all had a good meal and it was nice to sit down for a while and enjoy it. We met a nice waitress from Romania that had recently lived in Chicago. We ended up giving her a pen that I made, took six to give away when we wanted, and she even gave us her phone number and email address. One thing that amazes me is the number of people from different countries. There are so many languages that you hear as you walk down the street.

Jarret is enthralled with the number of nice cars that we’ve seen. There were 10 Mercedes, he counted, parked on the street of our hotel. In the same mix was a Ferrari and we saw a convertible Rolls Royce driving down the road. As for the rest of the drivers, I’m surprised I haven’t seen a tourist run over by a car. The cars are going every which way and people just cross the street at random. I think there is a method to keep from getting run over but I still haven’t figured it out for sure. For now I’m trying to rely on waiting for the walk sign. However, at one small park with a Winston Churchill statue in it by Westminser Abbey, it turns out that all the crosswalks were out of order, we just had to brave the traffic on that one. It would be one thing if all the streets were straight and traffic was coming from only two directions but there are some crosswalks where I don’t even see where the cars are coming from.

One thing that happened yesterday that I forgot about was that I was dive bombed by a pigeon. We were walking down a busy street and all of a sudden a pigeon flies right by my head, so close that I actually felt his feathers on my forehead. I duck and everyone else laughs…

Today the weather was great, it’s a little humid but the sun was out the whole day and it was just about perfect. It looks like we’ll be lucky and the weather will hold up through the rest of this week.

Tomorrow we’re headed to the Tower of London and the British Museum. I’m still dealing with internet issues….too cheap to pay 16 pounds for internet for a day….so I’ll have to post some pictures later.

WE MADE IT!

cwalter328@gmail.com (Craig Walter) — Sat, 21 Jul 2012 20:10:00 +0000

We got in to London today after the plane was delayed about 1/2 an hour. The flight was good even though we had a bumpy stretch about 2 hours before landing. The food wasn't that great however. Neither of the kids really liked the pasta and the chicken curry wasn't that great either. The good side was that you didn't have to pay for the drinks, whether is was pop, wine or hard liquor. There were a couple people that we noticed took advantage of that. We found our way through the various checkpoints and customs agents and found all of our bags.

One problem we did have was with the personal wifi device that I was going to use to hook up all our internet devices. They didn't have mine ready and it looks like I won't get it until Monday or Tuesday since they don't do anything on Sunday. So now I'm stuck either paying 16 pounds per day or trying to use the internet hotspot from Starbucks across the street.

We boarded the tube and headed towards our hotel. It was pretty easy to get there but at one point, Jill, Rylee and Jarret all had their eyes closed on the tube. Jarret even had some pretty serious head bobs. I was worried if I fell asleep too, who know where we would have ended up. When we got to our hotel, our room wasn't ready so we went to the lounge and had a light meal. Once our room was done, we headed up and a few of us took a little nap.

We finally had enough energy to venture out into the big city. We walked through along the edge of Green Park and got our first sight of Buckingham Palace. It's a really majestic building, especially with the ornate fences and memorial honoring Queen Victoria. I think the thing that's really impressed us is all of the old buildings you see.

Here is our first view of Buckingham Palace.

And the guard

The royal kids

One other thing that was really surprising was the number of buses that are everywhere. Below is picture from the street where they were just all lined up in traffic. By the way, I have no idea how they drive down here. Besides the wheel being on the wrong side of the car, people are going in lanes that I didn't think existed.

We ran across this odd shaped thing, we finally figured out what it was, do you have any ideas?

After we walked to Buckingham Palace, we headed off towards Picadilly Circus. It was very interesting to see the mixture of modern led signs with the old style of buildings. This place was packed with people going to different shows or restaurants. I think it would be really interesting to see it at night. We might just have to make a trip after dark, especially since it's not that far away.

This is one of the Olympic mascots that's right out in front of our hotel. So naturally we had to bribe Rylee and Jarret to strike a pose.

View of Green Park from our hotel window

Well, it's 9:03 PM London Time, which puts it at 1:03 PM Spokane time which means I've been up pretty much for 30 hours straight. I did get a few brief naps on the plane but not very much. Can't wait for a little sleep and to wake up tomorrow ready to tackle the day. I think we're going to go on one of the hop-on hop-off buses so that we can see as many sights as we can. One last note. We found a little grocery store right across the street from our hotel so our dinner was pre-done sandwiches, chips, water and some chocolate. Probably turned out to be the best meal of the day.

5 days to go

cwalter328@gmail.com (Craig Walter) — Mon, 16 Jul 2012 05:27:00 +0000

We're trying to get all of our ducks in a row before we take off. Today we all got together and started making some lists of things we need to do. It's going to be a busy few days and we don't want to forget anything. Last week, we did get our Olympic tickets for the events that we'll be attending.

We're still short two Swimming tickets but I think we'll do without them. Our plan is for me to take one of the kids to the event. Jill and the other one will just stay in the Olympic Park. There are things that they can do and it looks like they might be able to watch the event on one of the big screens that they'll have there. I did try and get two tickets last night on Ebay but was unsuccessful. After thinking about it and watching this video, we just decided that we didn't want to spend so much money for tickets that would end up being so far from the actual pool. Our seats are going to be on the far side by diving boards, way up towards the top. The only way we'll try and get a couple more tickets would be if we could purchase them at about the face value.

We're going to leave Friday morning and drive to Seattle, leave our car at a park and ride lot, and then head to the airport. Our flight leaves about 6:45 PM.

10 Days to go

cwalter328@gmail.com (Craig Walter) — Wed, 11 Jul 2012 05:01:00 +0000

Can't believe we're leaving in 10 days. Today I converted some US currency to British Pounds and Euro. The exchange rate is really bad. They say London is one of the most expensive cities in the world and I'm starting to understand why. Hopefully we can get through it without spending too much.

We still only have 2 tickets to swimming. There have been a few tickets that have sold through Ebay for the same event. It's outrageous that they are going for 5 times the face value. It makes me mad that people buy them just so that they can resell them for a profit. I understand the free market system but I wish someone could develop a way to prevent that from happening. I'm still not sure what we're going to do. It may be that we'll have to wait until the last minute...which is totally opposite from my comfort zone.

The picture above is of the Lee Valley Whitewater Centre where the Canoe Slalom event will take place. It's a manmade whitewater course that should be fun to see.

By the way, I've had some panic dreams about the trip recently. In one of the dreams, Jill got sidetracked by a perfume store at the airport and I couldn't find her. The plane ended up driving down a neighborhood street with cars on the shoulder as we were waiting for her. It's so odd to wake up mad at someone even though they didn't do anything. It's totally doesn't make any sense but if we happen to go by a perfume store at one of the airports, I may need to get between Jill and the perfume.....

Paris Greeters

cwalter328@gmail.com (Craig Walter) — Thu, 28 Jun 2012 04:55:00 +0000

We finally got set up with a Paris Greeter. We're going to meet our guide on the 27th of July and he's going to take us on a walking tour of the 12th Arrondissement, which is an area of Paris. This area has some old furniture workshops, Aligre Market, a garden on a former railway line, art craft shops, and the Place de la Bastille which sounds like it's a symbol of the storming of the Bastille during the French Revolution. We're going to meet him at 9:30 in front of a tourist office. We have his picture and he has ours so it will be an interesting way to meet each other. It will be really nice to see a part of Paris that isn't just a tourist area.

The more I think about it, I wish I had built in a little more time in Paris. There is so much to see that I almost don't know where to start. I know I want to see the Louvre, Notre Dame, Montmartre, the Eiffel Tower and Versailles. I just hope we can see these things without missing too much.

By the way, we're still short 2 tickets for the swimming event. I don't think any more have been released. We almost got 4 tickets for a different swimming event earlier in the day but I was just a few minutes too late and they were gone by the time I got back to it. We're starting to see more things on TV concerning the Olympic trials. I watched a little bit of Diving, Track and Field and some Swimming. It's really getting close and I can't believe it's less than a month before we leave.

Only a month away

cwalter328@gmail.com (Craig Walter) — Thu, 21 Jun 2012 04:50:00 +0000

Can't believe we're only a month a way from leaving on our trip. I'm starting to get a little nervous and worried that I might have missed something critical in the planning.

Hotel Rooms - check
Transportation to, from and around London and Paris - check
Passports - check
Tickets to Disneyland and Harry Potter - check
The feeling that you've forgotten something - check

I still haven't gotten two tickets to the swimming event so we might be forced to try and get them when we're there. I did rent a personal wi-fi hotspot that we can take with us around London. It will allow us to use our iPhones while we're around the city to check a webpage, do a search or iMessage someone else that has an iPhone. It's going to be cheaper in the long run than signing up with an international data plan through AT&T and it will allow all of us to be connected at the same time. One thing we will have to turn off while we're there is text messaging. It's like .50 per message whether you send one or receive one so if you send any of us a text, we won't get it.

Last Chance for Swimming Tickets

cwalter328@gmail.com (Craig Walter) — Wed, 13 Jun 2012 06:11:00 +0000

Tomorrow is the last chance I think I'll get to pick up two swimming tickets through the official Olympic ticket website. It looks like they're releasing their remaining tickets all at the same time at 9:00 AM. If I don't pick two up here, I'll have to resort to the secondary market and that means the price will probably go up. I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

On another note, I talked to someone from KHQ about sharing our view of the Olympics while we're there. We might be using Skype or sending them pictures or movies that we take. We'll have to wait and see. I'll keep you posted on what's going to happen

Watching Harry Potter

cwalter328@gmail.com (Craig Walter) — Sun, 10 Jun 2012 05:30:00 +0000

We're watching one of the Harry Potter movies tonight and just thought I'd pass on that on July 24th, we have plans to go to the Warner Bros Studio Tour outside of London. This is the actual studio where the Harry Potter movies were shot. We'll get to go see the Great Hall, Diagon Alley, Hagrid's Hut and other scenes from the movie. It sounds like they kept the original sets and then built a tourist attraction around them all. The studio tour opened earlier this year and we ordered our tickets a couple months ago. When you order the tickets, you need to select a specific time. For a family that's watched our fair share of Harry Potter movies, I think this will be a really fun side trip. I do know that Rylee was really excited after learning that we were going to go there. She's a really big Harry Potter fan.

Ceremony of the Keys

cwalter328@gmail.com (Craig Walter) — Tue, 05 Jun 2012 04:23:00 +0000

On July 23rd, a couple of days after we arrive in London, we're going to go to the Tower of London and watch the Ceremony of the Keys. For over 700 years, they've been doing this nightly ceremony. We had to order the tickets early because they are free but issued on a first come first serve basis. We put in the order at the end of December and received them some time in January. Jeff and Kari observed this ceremony on one of their visits and recommended it. If any of you have ideas on what we should see or do, let me know.

Paris Greeters Program

cwalter328@gmail.com (Craig Walter) — Mon, 04 Jun 2012 00:45:00 +0000

A couple of weeks ago, I ran across a Paris Greeters program on the Rick Steves website. The way it works is that there are people in Paris (and other locations as well) that volunteer to take tourists to areas of the city that they are familiar with and might be less "touristy". They don't charge for the tours but they do take donations that are passed on to the program that puts the volunteers in touch with the tourists. I looked at a few sites and this program received some really good reviews. I thought this might be a way to experience Paris in a different way, through the eyes of someone that lives there.

We submitted a request and I did hear back today that they accepted it. However, they don't start putting us in touch with a volunteer any earlier than 6 weeks from the trip. They also mention that it might be possible that we wouldn't hear anything definite until just before our trip. I'm looking at this as an added bonus. If we can make it work, great! If it doesn't work, we'll just head out on our own.

By the way, we're taking some French lessons from a neighbor. Michele Lamb is teaching us a little bit of the language and how the French and English language are connected. It's amazing how many of our words are similar to the French words. Michele was born in France and lived in or around Cherbourg and has studied languages. We're fortunate that she's willing and has the time to give us a few pointers. We're just hoping to pick up a little bit of the language that will help us feel a little more comfortable while we're in France. It's only 47 days now until we leave. I can't believe that it's getting this close.

Disneyland and Paris Visite Pass

cwalter328@gmail.com (Craig Walter) — Tue, 29 May 2012 04:16:00 +0000

Before we left for Seattle, I received the Disneyland Paris tickets and the Paris Visite passes in the mail. I was pretty surprised because they only took a couple of days to get here from France. Disneyland Paris is celebrating their 20th Anniversary ( Just like Jill and I) this year. They've add a new nighttime show that looks really cool. You can check it out here if you want. They had a promotion for the two parks (Disneyland and Walt Disney Studios) for one day at 25% off. It was amazing there were different prices depending on the site I visited - US Disneyland Paris site vs UK Disneyland Paris site vs the Pairs Info (official Paris Tourism site). The official tourism site ended up being the best deal.

Also we got the Paris Visite pass which allows 5 days of unlimited travel using the Metro (Subway), RER (train) and buses throughout the Paris area. This will include transportation to Disneyland, which is in the farthest travel zone that we can go. It also will allow us to get to Versailles, which Rylee wants to visit. The Visite pass will also allow us to get back and forth from the Eurostar to the hotel. I'm hoping that we won't need to pay for any other form of transportation while we're there. In things I read, it might not be the cheapest way to go but I didn't want to have purchase individual tickets especially right after we get there. I think it's going to be intimidating enough just to get around. I just wanted one less thing to worry about.

It looks like most of the museums are free to kids under 18. There is a pass called the Paris Museum Pass that I haven't decided if I'm going to get. We'd be able to get into some the the main attractions, the Louvre, Notre Dame, Arc de Triomphe, and the Palace of Versailles to name a few. I'm not sure if it would be worth it. The biggest attraction to me would be that it would allow us to bypass some of the lines. I can always pick one up when we get to Paris but I'll have to think about that a little bit. I'm not sure how many of these things we'll be able to see. We get to Paris on Wed before noon and leave on Sunday at about 5:00 PM. During this time, one day will be spent in Disneyland and most of another day will be in Versailles. That gives us one full day and two half days for sightseeing. At least the day we get there, the Louvre is open late so we might be able to spend some extra time there.

Our Annual Mariners Game

cwalter328@gmail.com (Craig Walter) — Sun, 27 May 2012 04:37:00 +0000

Went to Seattle to take mom to a Mariners game. They ended up losing but we had a blast. We got a suite this time, they cost less this weekend because of the holiday. It was really nice to be able to move around and visit with everyone. Eric, Shanah and Jackson joined us and it was fun to catch up.

Made it back to the hotel and we're all tired. I'm a little worried because in a couple months we'll be doing this for 2 weeks straight. On another note, at our hotel this weekend is a Horror and Paranormal Conference. People are dressed up and tonight is the Masquerade Ball. Could be an interesting night to people watch. We did go to the vendor area and saw some interesting things. I was hoping to get a couple ideas for Halloween but didn't see much. There were a couple of actors and actresses from some horror movies. Richard Kiehl was there, he was Jaws in the James Bond series and he was also in Happy Gilmore. Anyway, it was a fun day.