I am not sure when we started talking about this trip, I know it was more than a year ago, and my mom & dad, who are the reason for the trip (they will be celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary there) have probably been thinking about it much longer.

And not only do I get to celebrate such an awesome day with them, I get to spend two weeks with them, my brother and sister-in-law, and their three beautiful little girls.

We will be staying at the Honua Kai Resort and Spa where we will essentially have condos with full kitchens so we won’t have to eat every meal at restaurants and can more easily satisfy the “I’m hungry” demands that come regularly from the little ones.

Other than the renewal vows (set for sunset on the actual day of the 19th on the beach at Kapalua) we have a luau set at Old Lahaina Luau for Friday the 11th. As of now there is nothing else specific planned though I do intend to get around quite a bit (in addition to sitting by the pool and or ocean – with plenty of sun block) and am hoping to

• Drive (well I’ll probably ride) “The Road to Hana”
• Go Ziplining
• Attempt to Surf (with lessons)
• Snorkel (probably more than once)
• Go Horseback Riding
• Hike (again more than once)
• Shop (was there any doubt)

In the early stages of planning I was hoping to do the bike ride down from Haleakala, however that has gotten too popular and now the biking starts outside of the park so it might not be worth the money.

Since I will only have my iPad with me, and will likely be doing lots of other things, I likely won’t be posting much during the trip. I will, however, try to get some pictures on facebook and will add more detailed posts after I return.

Since I was traveling every week for work she actually had quite a visit joining me on my travels.

The day she arrived, I had tickets to the Wisconsin football game against Northern Iliinois at Soldier Field.

I had very little phone reception but was glad I had my phone as I was able to snap some photos of the band under the Chicago skyline. And I was able to get a few text messages with score updates out to my brother who had to work during the game.

While I am sure Flat Roxie would have loved to see both the Wisconsin Band and Football Team in action, it was quite exciting to come home form the game just in time for her arrival.

After spending the rest of the weekend in Chicago, she joined me on my weekly trek to Calgary for work. In the short time that she was there, we were able to hang out on the balcony as well as the couch.

We also played some new tunes on the piano, and cooked some good eats.

As usual it was a busy week and I couldn’t take any time off so we had to make due with the views of the mountains that we saw from the plane and while driving around town. Hopefully someday Roxie herself will get to visit that magical place and enjoy the freshness of a new mountain snow.

The next weekend was a trip to Madison for yet another Wisconsin Football game as it was Alumni Band day and I had planned on making my annual trek to my college town to be part of the action. While here again Flat Roxie was unable to join me at the game itself, she was able to watch the festivities on TV with my friends Steve and Leigh.

After the game we had a lovely dinner and conversation before a great nights sleep, at least for me with my tired marching muscles.

Of course Monday came too soon and it was back to Calgary for another week of work, and once again no mountains. And it was time for Flat Roxie to head to my parents’ house for the next part of her adventure.

To wet your appetite I have included the photo from my 2011 Christmas card which I snapped in southern Spain last summer in one of the many sunflower fields that dotted the landscape.

In some ways I am ready to be back home, even if it is only for one day, not quite ready to face the fact that work awaits me again on Monday with it’s normal weekly jaunts between Chicago and Calgary. At least there is a 3 day weekend in a couple of weeks to help remind me what it is like to relax.

Stay tuned over the weeks to come as I actually write up the details of our adventures in addition to the pictures I have already shared on Facebook.

And that morning came a bit too soon and very cloudy yet it was off to breakfast and to the bus to get to our first

During our short walk to the bus stop the clouds turned into rain and that prompted a quick stop at a shop near the church to purchase umbrella, for yes, you guessed it, 5 euros. And those 5 euros were put to good use throughout the day as the rain came and went regularly as we meandered the streets both by bus and on foot.

The worst of the rain actually came at a very good time while we were sitting at a cafe on sipping some very large sangrias. During this time I actually had a small river running down the back of my chair. Thankfully I had quick dry pants on and was only a bit chilled from the experience.
That said, we are looking forward to more sunny climates in the days ahead.

I will try to post a few updates during the trip and will post more when I return since I don’t want to spend the whole trip wriiting instead of doing things to write about.

Itinery is: Barcelona, Grenada, Zueheros, Ronda, Arcos, Jerez.

Wendy

Finally, after nearly a year of waiting, I had a second chance to go curling in Canada, and this time I was determined not to miss it. The last time I had a conflict and had to live vicariously through the pictures that my co-workers shared the next day.

This time, despite fighting a nasty sinus infection, I managed up the energy to get out on the ice without a pair of skates and a broom instead of a stick!

While I will admit to watching curling every so often during the Olympics and thus having a bit of an idea of the rules I realized quickly that there was a lot I hadn’t picked up by just observing. Such things as each of the four players delivers two stones during each end and that only two players are allowed to sweep that being reduced to one player after the stone crosses the tee line (line drawn through the target or house across the short width of the ice).

So, to give you a little bit more of an idea of what goes on during this game, here is a bit of a play-by-play.

Get The Stone

Set Up In The Hack

After selected the next stone and if in a real competition inspecting and cleaning it, the thrower dons a slider sole to be able to glide further with the stone during delivery (though many of us opted to not use the sliders rather keeping our bones in tact) and gets situated in the hack with the stone in their throwing hand and their broom (or brush) upside down in the other hand for balance.

Then the idea is to as you raise the hip on the same side of your body as your throwing hand to glide forward on the slider sole with the stone in your hand releasing it at just the right moment to obtain the desired velocity. And don’t forget about aiming in a pre-determined direction and gently twisting the stone one way or another to allow it to curl as it makes its way down the ice.

All of that without falling over.

Thankfully there are a few shortcuts for beginners, one being to not wear the slider as I mentioned earlier. Another is to gain the momentum lost by not sliding one’s body by sliding the stone for and aft before releasing it using its weight on one of the forward cycles to aid you in raising that hip.

It really is a lot harder than it looks on TV.

Anyway, at this point in time you should have a stone gliding nicely towards the house at the other end of the ice sheet.

Rise & Release

Slide & Glide

Wobble & Watch

Coach & Hope

Then it is time for the sweepers to take over and try to change the speed and/or direction of the stone and eliciting comments from one observer about how this is the most sweeping her husband has ever done.

In The House - Barely

One That Didn't Get There

Sometimes things go well and the stone winds up in the house, other times it has to be guided to the end of the ice having missed its mark by the proverbial mile. Yes, Virginia, sometimes no amount of sweeping is going to help..

Coming Up Short

Of course it is always best to use caution when walking on the ice because it is slippery out there.

Walk With Caution

Hey Aaron - It's Slippery Out There

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All in all it was quite a fun evening and I could see doing this again, maybe I will even get enough gumption to try using a slider sole.

For those keeping score, I think we are at 2-0 for sports tried for the first time in Canada with last year the win going to snow boarding and this year curling. I still hope that next up will be bobsledding.

Wendy

One thing all of the travel has not been good for is my waistline. Partly because I tend to eat out more than I should and when I don’t I am often eating quite late and food that is quick to prepare and not always healthy. In addition, it always seems harder to work out on the road than at home, or at least to get to a gym.

Looking at all of this back in October I decided that it was time to start running again. I ran cross country and track back in high school and have run on and off since then, recently more off than on. So I looked around for training information and being in the mobile world now found an iPhone app that I could use as a guide. Then I picked a target race on New Year’s Day, figuring that would be a good way to force myself not to stay out too late on New Year’s Eve.

My first day out as I started my “Couch Potato to 5K” program was to walk 1 minute, run 3, and repeat until 10 minutes. I was so out of shape that that was hard and I really needed those 1 minute walk breaks to get through the work out. Little by little I built up my times and distances yet partly due to being sick over Christmas on race day I had yet to run 5K, so I wasn’t sure what would happen. Well, I was pretty sure I would finish, just wasn’t sure if I was going to have to take some walking breaks. OK, to end the suspense, I finished without walking, I wasn’t fast, but I didn’t care.

Since that race I have continued to build up my times and distances and have now ran for an hour without walking and actually consider a 30-45 minute run easy. I’m not ready for a marathon, I am actually signed up for another 5K and then might look at a 10K. I’m not saying I’m not tempted by the marathon concept, I am, I just think I need to build up to it slowly.

And the idea of having a way to exercise without a gym has actually worked quite well, despite living in two cold cities. Yes, there are days that it has been too cold or too snowy to get out and run, however overall between the chinooks in Calgary and a few warm weeks while I was just back in Chicago I have generally been able to get out a few times a week. This week may be a sad exception as the warmest day is supposed to be Thursday with a high of -9C. Brrr. Of course that might also mean that I need a gym option as well, sigh.

Wendy

Hoping to make it to the annual reunion of the Wisconsin Marching Band I had carted my saxophone to Calgary at the beginning of the week and to the office and airport that day.

Since I knew I had only about 40 minutes to make the bus from O’Hare to Madison after landing I was carrying the sax on which meant I had to pack very lightly so that even with the sax I wouldn’t have to check any bags and given that this was a business trip I also had my computer. One way that I achieved this was to wear the shoes that I would need during the game on the flight thus making it unnecessary to pack any shoes as they take up a lot of space.

So after sitting through a delay due to malfunctioning restroom that turned into taking a 3+ hour flight without said restroom (and the associated mad dash to make one last pit stop before boarding) that turned into them not being able to pressurize the cabin that turned into a cancellation I headed back through Canadian customs (in Canada you clear US customs before boarding flights to the US) along with the rest of the fliers to find out how we were going to get to Chicago.

While it was a little chaotic, United did a good job of accommodating their most travelled and I wound up getting on a flight to LA that night connecting to a red-eye to Chicago. It wouldn’t get me to Madison in time for rehearsal, but it would get me home.

So I headed back through US customs (my third customs clearance in less than the same number of hours), and security (for the second time that night). Now, remember those shoes, well – they were aerobic shoes that meant that they tied – what a pain, one I had planned on dealing with once that night, and now I had to take them off and get them back on a second time. Normally I wear slip-ons when I fly to avoid that very hassle.

Upon getting to LAX I was quickly reminded about what I hate about that airport. The Air Canada gates are in terminal 1 and the United gates are in terminals 7&8 and these locations are at least half a mile apart. Plus you have to leave security to catch the bus between terminals. So, for the third time in one day I was going through security once again with those gym shoes.

Given the distance that I had to cover and the third pass through security, I was concerned that the upgrade I had gotten texted about during the flight from Calgary would be given to someone else, so I really needed to move fast to get to the gate and get my new boarding pass.  Not that it was a great upgrade given that it was a red-eye, as it was a 757 so just had the slightly bigger seats, that is there weren’t even footrests to get your legs up to sleep a bit more easily. Nevertheless, after some food and wine I was able to get a bit of sleep.

With mixed blessings, the flight actually arrived in Chicago early, so it might have been possible to make it to Madison if I had a car available and had not checked my sax. Now, that was not possible, especially since while I was able to cover half a mile at LAX and make my flight, my sax was not and would be delivered to me at home later that day. However, it did mean that I was able to get a little bit of quality sleep before taking advantage of being home unexpectedly and going to my French class.

Actually, I went to two classes for a total of 3.5 hours of French, which I had not been using much in Brazil and was a bit too tired to focus on. My reasoning was that between the time I registered and this, the first day of class they added a class that was closer to the level I needed. However, the school was not open when I discovered this so I could not change before the class I had signed up for and thus wound up going to both that day to see which was the better fit. In the end I wound up changing, which was nice as that class is at 11 while the other one was at 0 so I can go to the gym before class and get to at least one aerobics class per week.