BACK BLOGGING

After a long  silence, I decided to return to my blog.  Now that I have I am unsure of where to start.  Start where I left off some 6-7 months ago or start from now.  

First up I decided to change my original picture.  I wish now that I hadn't, as I haven't had any success with the resizing of my new photo and now I have deleted it.  Help?  Shall need assistance from my tutors.

What's Around My Corner?  The beginning of a new phase in our lives.  2013 was certainly a different and challenging year in a lot of respects.  My husband Barry finished his working life in April and after taking his long service and holiday leave he officially retired in October.  During this time we had another enjoyable trip to America and Canada for 6 weeks, which included a road trip from New York through West Virginia, Ohio, Indiana and finishing in Chicago. 

The Bean-Chicago

 From there we flew to Quebec visited Montreal and Toronto before returning to New York for an extra 4 days.    Although we had visited New York for 4 days in 2010, we really only saw the main tourist attractions, so this time we did a lot more exploring through the different neighbourhoods.  Even after a total of 10 days of constantly being on the sight seeing trail I could have had another week or two in N.Y.    I think this could be said for any city you visit when on holidays, if only we had more time.   My ideal US holiday would be to travel there for 6 months but I know I would miss my special grandsons too much, and the Gold Lotto people have obviously lost my telephone number.  

What's Around My Corner in Quebec?

Coming back to reality land was a little hard as I now had to share my time, space and freedom each day with an extra person.  Why do men have to have morning and afternoon tea.  I survived all these years without this.
Although Barry hasn't missed going to work, for a period of time he missed the social contact with his ex-staff and colleagues, but has been able to catch up with some of them for coffee or lunch.  I personally think he missed the chocolate bar box and his afternoon cherry ripe treat, which isn't available from my pantry.  He has now thrown himself into the Boonah Gliding Club, been elected as Vice President which keeps him more than occupied, and the 1st Friday of each month is now Flying Friday, he is able to enjoy his soaring with no students or people wanting to experience a glider flight.  We both hope for fine weather and good flying conditions on these days.  Hopefully, he will do his next challenge of competing in the 2014 Easter Comps at Goondiwindi.  Something he hasn't competed in for a few years.

Gliding over Boonah area.

He had lessons at Apple on how to use his new Ipad, and after some frustrating weeks for him as well as myself, he finally made a few picture slide albums of our holiday photos and was able to add music as well. Very clever indeed.  I'm still trying to come to grips with my new laptop (bought on impulse) and unbeknown to me has Windows 8.  Argh, but I am getting there.  New toys like Ipads and Samsung smartphones seem to be very addictive.  

As we are planning a trip to France and beyond this year, I  purchased a "Learn French in 15 minutes a  Day". So far he hasn't got very far but did skip to page 49 to start at the beverage page.  He now knows the difference between wine and beer.  I am going to download this to my Ipod so when I go for my morning walk I can listen and hopefully learn some common words and phrases as well..

Oh yes 2014, we have numerous challenges to tackle  (as well as neglected household and yard maintenance) ahead of us so we shall be keeping busy and active  before we head off on our next trip but after that then our biggest challenge starts. 

Au revoir, a la prochaine.

(Goodbye, until next time)

START OF THE ROAD TRIP

Time to leave New York and start our next leg of tripping USA.  Barry was quite anxious about driving out of New York, as I am not the greatest of navigators, but we did have a borrowed Tom Tom with American maps installed, which would help guide us, as well as written directions to get us out of New York and the correct highways to take to Gettysburg. 

After collecting the car and loading the suitcases, time came to set up the Tom Tom with the directions and the damn thing wouldn't work.  No maps to navigate us through Manhattan, the Lincoln Tunnel, New Jersey Turnpike and various interstate highway changes.  Then Barry remembered his Samsung Smartphone.  On the previous Saturday night he met up with a work colleague also holidaying in New York, and he gave Barry some tuition on how to use his phone for navigating.  So out with the smart phone, finding the navigation app, entered the destination by voice command and away we went.  The drive out of Manhattan was really easy, straight down 83rd street across all the avenues until we came to the FDR which runs along the East River.  Although we had to cross 4 lanes of traffic to get on the New Jersey turnpike nobody blasted their horns at us.  What a relief, it must have been the different state plates on the car.  We cruised down the I 78 keeping up with the traffic at 80mph, when the battery on the phone went flat after a few hours.  So now we resorted to our written directions and finally found the next highway and sign that lead us to Gettysburg.  

After arriving at the motel we went for a walk down the main street to the town centre.  Gettysburg is interesting but definitely aimed at the tourist market.  The town was preparing for the 150th anniversary of the Civil War so was adorned with flags.  Lots of military and tourist shops, as well as many historic homes and lovely old churches.  Barry was keen to buy a Civil War revolver and thought we were going into a gun shop, until I steered him around the corner to a far more interesting shop.    

Day one of sightseeing the motel owner gave us a cd to use in the car, which allowed us to do our own tour by following the directions as well as learning the history of the battlefields, which consist of 10,000 acres, more than 1450 monuments, markers and plagues on the fields and all criss-crossed by more than 40 miles of avenues.  For the size of this area everything is very well maintained.  I find the monuments remarkable, not only for their size but the detail in the figures.

ONE OF THE MANY AVENUES

       

Day two we visited the museum and visitor center, where we saw a cyclorama light and sound show.  The was an amazing show, as the original painting was by a French artist and completed in 1883.  The story about the cyclorama painting is very interesting and can  found on Wikipedia.  

  

Barry's photos of the amazing Cyclorama painting  

                   Outside the visitor centre Barry made a new friend called Abe.

We completed our drive around the battlefields and came across this imposing monument.  

The Pennsylvania Memorial stands 110 feet plus the statue on top adds an extra 21 foot.  The monument was dedicated in 1910 to the 34,000 Pennsylvania men who fought in this battle.
Gettysburg also has a well established college which started in 1832, and was called Pennsylvania College. 





The above hall was used as a hospital during the Civil War and Pennsylvania College was later renamed in 1921 to Gettysburg College.  What an impressive college.





A DAY AT THE BEACH

Last Monday I went to Currumbin Beach on the Gold Coast to meet up with members from Logan U3A Camera Club.  I found many of the members on the rocks where Currumbin Creek meets the ocean. 

While I was walking along the rocks a whale suddenly appeared.  Although it seemed close it would have been out beyond the shark nets.  At this time of year the whales are heading back south after spending time in the warmer waters up north, having their young or maybe finding a new mate.  Too far for a photo.

The tallest building in the background of the above photo is where I stay for long weekends with my scrap booking friends.  It is a fantastic location and Royal Palms Resort is right on the beach.

Our project for today was beach photography, and it was a glorious winter's day with the temperature in the high 20s, a day more akin to early summer weather and the scenery was like a postcard.  With water, sand and sun it was really glary and as I had only taken the point and shoot camera (with no eye view), I found it difficult to see what I was photographing.  So that's what I did, pointed and clicked and hoped for the best, just like this fisherman.  I don't know if he was successful.



 The group headed to the Beach Shack café for coffee and along the way there was this great sculpture.  I believe that every year there is a competition held for beach sculpture.

 

As I had morning tea I really wasn't ready for lunch so I headed back home, but called into the park at Palm Beach to look back to where I had been.  Palm Beach Playground is an excellent family park and is themed on all things pirate.  There is a lot on offer in this park, and is great for young children to splash around in the creek.   Just like these little water babies.



With such great weather at the moment I could have stayed all week, but am counting down the days until September when I shall return for another long weekend away.