For the 4th of July festivities, we went to Tustin High School. In order to get parking and field level seating, we got there around 6:30.  We had Subway sandwiches for dinner along with crackers, hummus and white peach sangria.  Thanks to Bobby Flay for the sangria recipe!

About an hour before the fireworks started, the field filled up.

I took about 20 shots of the fireworks and only one came out pretty good!

Now that school is out, the kids are at the pool or beach almost every day.  Here they are at Corona Del Mar beach with their friends.

The boys graduated from elementary school on Tuesday. Here are some pictures from the morning ceremonies.

Here is Vikram receiving his diploma. I don’t recall such pomp and circumstance when I graduated from 5th grade!

Nikhil and his group were selected to give the graduation speech. Listen to his wise words…. never knew he was so mature!

The kids had their end of year awards ceremony this week. Annika got a Reading award in the school Reading Counts Program.

Nikhil got awards for Science, Reading and a couple of Field Day Awards (one for track and one for long jump).

Vikram raked in a few for Math Olympiad and Reading.

The kids wished their grandparents were there to see them. Maybe for their graduation next week!

Last weekend (both Saturday and Sunday), Nikhil ran at the Junior Olympics Association Meet in Gardena. On Saturday, he ran the 1500M and on Sunday the 800M. He got close to his PR’s on both days but the caliber of the other kids in his heats was outstanding.

Here is his Equalizer team for an end of the year shot.

It was a great season with a lot of learning (for both of us) and a huge improvement for Nikhil. He will start up again in August for Cross Country and be back next year for another season of Track.

Last week Annika and her friends performed in the school talent show.

Here they are after getting their makeup and costumes done.

Here’s their performance. It is a song by Smash Mouth called All Star.

And here are the glamour girls after their fine performance.

Today was the State Meet in Downey at Warren High School. There were about 600 kids from the Bay Area all the way down thru San Diego county. Nikhil ran the 800M. He got another huge PR improvement to 2:45 - a seven second improvement over his time from the County meet last month. He placed 4th overall for his age group among about 15 kids. The full meet results are here.

Here he is at the final 100M chasing down the 3rd place finisher.

Here are Nikhil and his teammate Anthony, sharing their medals and matching icees.

Next weekend is the Junior Olympics Association meet where he will be running the 1500M and the 800M. Stay tuned.

Annika had a school project called Flat Stanley. She sent her Stanley to Madhura maushi in Melbourne Australia.

With Madhura, Stanley travelled the city and visited many special places.

When Stanley returned, Annika got to present Stanley’s adventures to her class. She now wants to go visit Australia!

Nikhil has had a few more meets since the SCMAF County meet. Two weeks ago he participated in the Pasadena Running Roses meet. This had to be the worst organized of the season. All of the Equalizer runners were incorrectly grouped - I think intentionally. The meet organizers should be ashamed of themselves. Despite that and 95 degree heat, Nikhil did well in the 1500M and 800M. He PR’d his 1500M by 7 seconds to a 5:43.

Last weekend over Memorial Day, we went for a two day meet up in LA sponsored by the LA Jets Track Club. This was a very competitive meet with runners from all over the West Coast. Nikhil ran his first 3000M meet on one day and a 1500M on the second. He ran a bit too conservatively in the 3000M and had too much left over at the end. Now he has a PR to beat and learned about how to better pace the race.

This weekend he has an 800M at the SCMAF State Championship meet. I’ll let you know how it goes.

On the second day of our Zion trip, Doug, Denis and I took a hike along the lower Subway route. This is about a 10 mile hike that took us a little over 7 hours round trip with a lot of climbing in and out of the canyon.

Here we are at the start of the hike. You have to read to the end to see why it is called the Subway!

The entire hike is along an ancient riverbed with steep canyons along each side. We saw some dinosaur tracks part way thru the hike.

Here are Doug and I getting our feet wet.

Here is a picture of one of the sandstone overhangs.

Finally, here is the Subway. This water carved formation extends for about a 1/4 mile and dead ends in a deep pool of water that requires rapelling gear to continue.

This is the end of the trail for us!

Here is Doug climbing through the canyon.

And one last look at the awesome Subway!

After that, it is another 5 mile hike back to the top of the canyon.

Last week I went on a bike trip with some of my mountain bike riding buddies to Gooseberry in Zion National Park.

The first day we did the entire south rim as well as several of the more technical trails.

Here is a picture of our group at The Point.

Here I am going up one of the technical trails (no assist needed)!.

Check out the beautiful scenery.

There were some hardcore bikers on this pretty technical set of trails. (this is Morgan’s license plate… the guy that founded the trail system).

And here is one of the riders from our group - named Bracken.

You can also check out this video of Bracken doing some trick riding.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=81-gR7GxWdk&fmt=18

Pretty awesome day on the trails.

Nikhil had three more meets in the last couple of weeks. He had a meet last Sunday in Hawthorne (1500M and 800M), one yesterday (400M) and one today (800M and 400M).

At the Quiet Fire meet last weekend in Hawthorne, he improved on his times considerably and ran the 1500M in 5:50 and the 800M in 2:55. Both were PR’s.

Yesterday, he ran at the Long Beach Sprinters meet in Cerritos and ran a 76 second 400M, another PR.

Today, he ran in the SCMAF Orange County finals. The top four finishers in each age group move on to the state meet. Nikhil improved his 400M time to 75 sec and his 800M time to 2:52. Again both times were PR’s for him. The latter time qualified him to represent Orange County in the state championships in June!

Here he is at the start of the race.

And here he is with his 3rd place medal:

There are now four weeks remaining until the state meet in Downey on June 1. Looks like we’ll be doing a lot more practice between now and then!

Terry and Kriss came down from Seattle this weekend and hosted a fun evening at the Wine Cellar in Irvine. It is actually a wine storage building that we used for our private party. The Bordeaux was flowing from about 5pm until closing. Following are a couple of the “G” rated pictures from early in the evening.

Here are the 3 birthday girls: Joy, Kriss and Kim.

And here are the Real Housewives!

It was a very fun evening albeit a bit chilly in the 57 degree temperature controlled wine locker but a wonderful relief from the 90 plus degree temperatures in SoCal this weekend.

The boys had their 11th birthday this past week and we celebrated by taking them out to Champagne Bakery (their choice).  They ate strawberry crepes for dinner.

They also had a sleep over with their friends and had homemade chocolate fondue (again their choice).  Are you sensing a French theme here?

They then stayed up and played video games until two in the morning!

Nikhil is continuing with his track workouts during the week and has started participating in meets on the weekends. This is his first season of track and field.

Last weekend he participated at the Swift Invitational Track meet in Gardena. He ran his fastest 800M at 3:09 (in his second meet) and his first 1500M at 6:20.

On Friday, he ran at the Newport Beach City meet and ran a 400M and 800M. His 400M time was 86 seconds and his 800M was 3:12. He placed third in both of his heats and qualifies to run in the SCMAF (Southern California Championship meet) in June. Lots of time to practice until then!

So we are back to our daily routine. The boys had a campout this weekend for Boy Scouts and Annika had a softball game.

Anjali took the boys and I went with Annika.

I got a lucky picture of her hitting the ball!

On our last two days in Ecuador, we headed south of Quito on the Pan American highway to the village of Banos. It is known for its Tungurahua volcano which is an active 5000m high volcano site. It last erupted in Nov. 2006 and was said to have released steam on the days that we were there.

Fortunately, all we saw was a peaceful mountain and amazing views.

Here is a picture of the “spa” we stayed at in Banos at the base of the mountain. It is in a picturesque location underneath a waterfall.

The spa itself is a cheesy motel about the quality of a Motel 6 or worse but is was the best in town.

As you can see, the kids can have fun anywhere.

In the morning, we took a ride on the “terabithia” which is essentially a tram that goes across a gorge and ends in a waterfall. Banos is known for these “cascadas” that sit at the edge of the rainforest.

The one that we rode was 500m long and 100m above the ground. Check out the video of the ride. They stopped the tram about 2/3 of the ride and just before the waterfall.

After the ride, we headed back to Quito. On the way, we stopped off for some ice cream in the town of Salcedo which is known for its ice-cream. There must have been 100 ice cream vendors in the town.

After about a 4 hour ride back to Quito, we had a quick dinner at our favorite restaurant called the Magic Bean and were entertained by our little angel!

It was an amazing experience overall and one we will remember forever. Special thanks to Anjali for researching and arranging the whole trip!

On one of the few remaining days after the Amazon, we went to the equator, also known as the middle of the world.

Here are the kids on the equator line.

We visited a museum that had a water demonstration supposedly showing the coriolis effects. On the equator line, the water drained from the sink straight out. On either side of the equator line, the water drained out with a whirlpool effect. It was even clockwise on one side and counter clockwise on the other. Pretty cool demonstration, but I find it hard to believe how just a few feet on either side of the equator can make a difference.

Here we all are posing for the Tustin News. We had our picture taken for the “Where in the World” section of the paper.

Another interesting feature of the equator is that one can balance an egg on a nail head. Supposedly, the gravitational forces at the equator are neutral allowing one to balance the egg. Once again, I’m not sure I buy the logic, but sure enough, it did work and it sure impressed the kids! We should now try it at home to disprove this theory. Any physicists in the house with a hypothesis as to why this works?

Vikram got to shoot a blow gun. See the arrow in the cactus.

After the equatorial museum, we headed off to the Otovalo market. On the way, we stopped off for lunch at a restaurant at Lake San Pablo with a wonderful view of the Imbabura volcano in the background at 8000 feet.

Otavalo is about two hours north of Quito on the Pan American highway (also known as the Avenue of the Volcanoes) . Otavalo is one of the oldest and most famous markets in the world. The Indians make and sell their handicrafts at the market.

This is a real hagglers paradise. Be warned though, as I bought two large size T-shirts that both shrunk to a youth size!

We have two more days left in Ecuador and tomorrow, I’ll post some more pictures from our trip to Banos and a different rainforest.

Each day, we went on a canoe ride and did some hiking. Here is a video of one of the canoe rides. Listen to the sounds of the jungle and see the amazing variety of plant and animal life.

On one of the days, we climbed up to the top of a 135 foot (40 meter) kapok tree and viewing platform. It sits just above the rainforest canopy and provides the opportunity to view the birds and monkeys from a different vantage point.

Here are the boys looking thru the telescope at the birds.

Here is a picture Nikhil took of a toucan thru the telescope.

The next day, we went to the top of a 90 foot (30 meter) suspension bridge. Here is a video of the walk across the bridge.

At the top, we saw more toucans just sitting on the bridge. Six in all.

Here is a picture from back down at the bottom, looking up at the suspension bridge. It looks scarier than it is.

Ont the way back to the lodge, we saw a fungus called a champagne cup.

Here is a school of squirrel monkeys. They traveled in packs. If you look closely, you can see 3 of them. We saw several of them up close and personal.

And here is me and my better half taking a break.

On the ride back to the lodge, we were surprised by a fast approaching thunder and lightning storm.

We made it safely back to the lodge and enjoyed another wonderful meal.

The Amazon is a truly awesome experience and Sacha Lodge was a great place to see all that it has to offer.

I still have a couple more posts of the equator trip and a trip we took to a volcano in Banos. Stay tuned!

All of our hikes and tours were led by 2 guides. One was a native Indian guide (on the left below - named Segundo) and the other was a high school professor by training that acted as translator and story teller (named Oscar).

The kids really took a liking to Segundo. Even though he spoke no English, he showed them special jungle trees, birds and bugs and cleared the path for them on all our hikes with his super machette.

Here is Vikram with a millipede on his hand.

Here is Nikhil with some of the butterflies that seemed to be attracted to him.

And here is Annika by the nut trees.

Here is Annika in front of one of the millions of odd looking trees. It is said that 10 acres of Amazon jungle have more species of wildlife than the entire United States. This picture is in the middle of the day, but because the jungle is so dense it seems almost dark and requires the use of a flash.

One of the kids’ favorite trees was Sangre de Drago or dragon’s blood tree. When pierced by a knife, the tree oozes a red sap that is medicinal in it properties and is said to treat everything from cuts and bites to cancer. It is one of the magical herbs in the jungle. Our guide also showed us the trees used to make everything from pitocin (from the cecropia tree), jungle viagra, the rubber plant (used to make chewing gum), jungle peanuts, and all kinds of magic mushrooms.

Here is Vikram looking inside a bat hole.

The bats are hiding inside the tree trunk (this picture again uses a flash). One of the evenings, we did a night-time canoe ride and saw (and felt) whole flocks of bats flying around.

One of the hundreds of unique spiders.

Here is a picture of a termite nest. There were thousands of these huge nests along the trails.

Here is a picture of a couple of vultures hanging out at the top of a tree.

We saw so many birds that the guides pointed out including euphonias, macaws, toucans, herons, crested owls, tanagers, woodpeckers, hawks and hummingbirds.

We also saw many different types of monkeys including the tiny pygmy marmoset, night monkey, squirrel monkeys, capuchins and howler monkeys. The monkeys were particularly fun to watch as they traveled in packs and were extremely loud and disruptive.

One of the afternoons, the boys went fishing in the lake for live piranha. They were extremely aggressive and devoured the bait as soon as it went in the water. Our Indian guide with lots of skill caught one and showed off the piranha’s razor sharp teeth. There were dozens of these red bellied and white bellied piranhas swimming in the lake.

The boys then went swimming in the same lake! It is said that although the piranha are vicious, they only attack if there are open wounds and they can smell blood. In the same lake at night, we saw a caiman. Again, the guide said they only come out at night. In fact, the last evening we were there, there was a group of kids still swimming at the dock and the guide ushered them to come out of the water.

I will add one more post with some additional videos and pictures from the suspension bridge and the tree house in the kapok tree. These were some of the best features of the lodge.