Final Post from La Paz

Click here for photos from our final days in La Paz, which included swimming with whale sharks, snorkeling at Balandra Beach, a round of golf, and sampling the local cuisine. Dinner at Las Tres Virgenes was the highlight meal of our trip, but Tostielotes from a street vendor was also a must-try. And of course, no beach vacation would be complete without Jake buried up to his neck in sand. 

Back in Portland now and wishing a Happy New Year to All! 

A Mexican Merry Christmas

 We spent Christmas Day 2016 at Cerritos Beach near Todos Santos. Click here for photos. 

Feliz Navidad Un Prospero Ano!

Balandra & Tecolote Beaches

We spent Christmas Eve Day exploring the beaches of La Paz. Balandra is pictured above, which ranks among the best beaches in Mexico, as does Tecolote, which is included in the album linked here. Photo credits go to Jake.  

The water at Balandra is shallow enough to walk across the bowl that makes up the beach in  any direction without getting wet more than waist/chest deep, which we did without the camera. 

Todos Santos

Still windy on the Sea of Cortez today, so we took a drive over to Todos Santos to see how the Pacific Ocean was doing. The boys caught some great waves at Cerritos Beach, and we got to see several whales at play as the sun was setting. Click here for photos. 

Balandra Beach and a Stroll on the Malecon

Pictured above is today's haul from our morning beach walk on El Mogote. 

Click here for photos from our visit to nearby Balandra Beach on Sunday and today's afternoon stroll along the Malecon. 

It's insanely windy here, so much so they closed the Port of La Paz. For those of us who are used to the Oregon Coast, it's just another day at the beach. 

Isla Espartu Santo, La Paz

Click here for photos from our first few days in La Paz, Mexico. The photo above is a view from the infinity pool at the place we are staying, Paraiso Del Mar, which is located on El Mogote, a peninsula off La Paz that sits in the midst of the Sea of Cortez. We take a short ferry ride to get to/from the town of La Paz. The photo below is from yesterday's visit to Isla Espartu Santo - a UNESCO World Heritage Site - where we snorkeled with sea lions and a had a crazy tour boat adventure to be detailed later. 

Best Wishes for the Holiday Season...

Click here for photos from the annual tree lighting in Portland's Pioneer Square, and click here to see a preview of our 2016 holiday card. 

Go Beavs...

Thanksgiving Weekend included a trip to Corvallis for the OSU/UO Civil War game. The Beavers won.. and looked a lot like lemmings as they surged the field to celebrate their first Civil War win since 2007. 

Thanksgiving

Click here for photos from our Friendsgiving gathering on Thanksgiving evening, plus this morning's Christmas Parade. And here for a few more photos from apple pressing this afternoon. Busy day... almost time for the annual tree lighting in Pioneer Square. 

Turkey Bowl 2016 (aka Soggy Soccer)

This Thanksgiving's Turkey Bowl was one for the record books. With the chance of rain accurately predicted at 100%, it was wetter than usual, but no less fun. Click here for photos. 

Thank you Tom, Megan and Ruby for organizing us. Happy Thanksgiving to all! 

Hallow-homecoming

There's a gothic vibe to tonight's Homecoming Dance at LHS.  Click this link for photos:

https://goo.gl/photos/c88Bt8UwVRKukKb78

Senior Year

Click here for a sampling of photos we had taken over the weekend for the occasion of Jake's and Emily's senior year. Thank you Robin Damore. Fast forward 5 days, and Drew is back at Oregon State for his sophomore year, Emily is off to a Planned Parenthood Teen Council retreat, and Jake has his first debate tournament of the season tomorrow. 

Drew's Uganda Adventure - Part 3 of 3

Click here for more photos from Drew's time in Uganda - teaching, spending time with members of the Terrewode community, and enjoying the local culture and flavors. 

Drew's Uganda Adventure - Part 2

Click here for more photos from Drew's time in rural Bululu, Uganda, working with Terrewode. This album includes the group from OSU learning to make paper beads and stuffed animals, the items Terrewode sells to help support its operations. Drew and his fellow volunteers also organized camps for kids from nearby schools. There are still more photos to come. 

1st Day of Senior Year

And so it begins... their last year of high school. 

Masquerade Night at The Escape

Emily and some friends are off to The Escape to dance the night away before alarm clocks and school bells kick-in on Monday.  Click here for photos. 

Oneonta Gorge

To commemorate the last weekend before school starts for the twins (heavy sigh) we hiked in the Oneonta Gorge, which included a trip to Triple Falls, pictured above, as well as Oneonta Falls. Click here for photos.

The hike to Oneonta was a short one but required climbing over the pile of logs pictured below, then following a creek bed for about 1/2 mile, through water ranging from ankle to chest deep. 

Drew's Uganda Adventure - Part 1

Murchison Falls pictured above is one of the places Drew has visited while in Uganda with fellow OSU entrepreneurship club students who are working with the non-profit Terrewode. 

Click here for more photos. He has two more weeks in Kampala, so there will be more to come when he has reliable WiFi and/or after he returns to Portland. 

Click here for a video documentary from last year's OSU trip. The program Drew is a part of has made a multi-year commitment to help Terrewode with business development. 

Here are some excerpts from his travel journal:

Entry 1... The trip started off with grilled fish (the whole fish) and ginger soda on the shores of Lake Victoria shortly after arriving at the airport. After checking out the lake and walking briefly we went further into Entebbe to find some pool to play. We found a nice bar with a table and after searching for 10 minutes and trying to get the white ball unstuck, we proceeded to play pool - some by the light and some by the lights of our phone flashlights balanced atop the regular light because the power went out.

Once picking up Calvin at the airport just after dark we headed for Kampala where the rest of the group was staying. We arrived an hour or so later after widely weaving through the dusty dirt roads and streets of Kampala, only seeming like we were going to get in a dozen or more accidents (note: Jeff is a Mad Man on the road). I will say though driving like that with Jeff made things a lot more interesting than US driving, if we drove like that back home we would not have people falling asleep at the wheel for sure.

We spent the night in Kampala only to wake up and spend the entire next day traveling to Paraa Resort Lodge, where we were going on a Safari. We had a really great time taking many tours of the park and a nice boat ride up the Nile seeing hippo, crocodiles, and elephants along the way.

It was very interesting to start the trip off with the Safari. The Safari as part of this trip adds to the overall cultural experience  we get while in country. While in country we experience the two different worlds of Uganda, the tourist world and the authentic Uganda in Kampala and the Rural Villages.

The resort world and the authentic view of the country contrast each other and provide a greater understanding and appreciation for the place we are in. If the resort life was all you saw you would leave with an idea that Uganda was right out of Tarzan and old Victorian Africa, and if the authentic Uganda was all you saw you might leave with the idea that it was just poor and impoverished. But with both you see the the country more fully and while getting to know the people you understand they are happy and lively people.

Entry 2... Now that we have left the safari and entered the rural part of the country out in Bululu, things have both slowed down and sped up. The work has become more a part of our everyday. It has started to feel like class a bit (I forgot I was getting credit for this.) Uganda has its own sense of time and everything is at a slower pace. We still wake up early but when we are suppose to leave is usually two or three hours after the set time.

Yesterday with the kids' camp we were suppose to be meeting the kids at 8, and the kids were supposed to be picked up at 7. It was 7:45 when the driver left the compound. It was 9 when we started walking to the school. The whole thing runs on Ugandan time. The kids' camp was amazing - so many little kids running all over the place. We played games, read them books, and played soccer. However soccer with 60 Ugandan Kids is basically just one ball and 60kids running until they all pass out from running so much.

I was drawn to and connected with this one kid Mukisa who was the only kid who was in a wheel chair from the 4 schools.  We couldn't talk much past how are you? and how old are you? But we shared the day together and ate with each other. It was very interesting to think about how hard it must be for a kid like Mukisa because of his condition. Getting around on all of these dirt roads, and getting to school every day. His wheel chair was built to last but the wheels had both fallen a part a bit, one with a very flat tire and the other the rim packed with dirt from the road from pushing him to and from.

We also attended a church service in the local community, which was very lively and an interesting cultural experience. We were welcomed very warmly with music and the choir. The service consisted of two sermons one in English and the other which we attended was spoken in Kuman the local language. There was an auction for goods that the community brought. The purpose was to make some money for the church and spread the goods people had around the community for those lacking those goods. We were warmly welcomed to the community. It is things like this that are making me feel more connected to the people.

Weekend in Leavenworth, WA

We just finished a long-weekend home exchange in Leavenworth, WA. It was our first trip to this Bavarian Village, just east of Steven's Pass, along the Wenatchee River.  We were in the water most of the weekend, but still managed a few photos, including some from a pit-stop at Mt. St. Helens. We floated the rapids on the Wenatchee River through Leavenworth on Saturday, then visited Lake Wenatchee near Plain, WA, on Sunday to float and paddle board. 

This is Jake preparing for our big float down the Wenatchee...

Lift As We Climb Conference

Emily and other representatives from her teen council are off to the 2016 National Planned Parent Conference, Lift as We Climb, in Washington DC. 

NW String Summit

Joy Now performed today, along with March Fourth Marching Band, at the Northwest String Summit at Hornings Hideout in Forest Grove. Click here for photos.  In case anyone has trouble spotting the new Emily, she's the blond. 

Comedy Club

Tonight was open-mic night at Comedy Copper. Click here to take a peek inside this NW Portland hot spot... as well as inside the Lava River Cave we visited in Bend earlier this week. 

Oregon's Painted Hills

We visited the Painted Hills of John Day Fossil Beds National Monument today, near Mitchell, Oregon.  Click here for photos of one of Oregon's Seven Wonders. Can't believe it took us so long to get out to this amazing place. 6 wonders down... 1 to go. We still have to visit the Wallowas. 

The Big Float

We celebrated our friend Eli's #16 birthday from the water today.  It was the annual Willamette River Big Float, which brought out watercraft of every possible variety. Click here for photos. 

Drew was busy sailing Thistles this weekend and took 2nd place in the Yale Lake Regatta.  

4th of July on the Waterfront

We spent much of the 4th of July weekend docked at River Place Marina, just south of the Hawthorne Bridge, with up close views of the BluesFest and last night's fireworks show. Click here for photos. 

Sumer Joy

It's one of Emily's favorite times of year... Joy Now summer camp. Click here for photos from their performance at the Last Thursday on Alberta Street Fair.

Silver Anniversary

Celebrating 25 years... time flies. 

Ramona Falls

We celebrated the first day of summer vacation with a hike to Ramona Falls, near Mt. Hood. Click here for photos. We also managed to squeeze in a couple of awkward family photos while playing croquet and hanging out at the Resort at the Mountain. 

Memorial Day at the Coast

We spent Memorial Day at Short Sands Beach. Click here for photos of the tide pools and Pat's and Drew's surfing adventures. Jake was nearby in Pacific City with some friends. Everyone is counting the days til summer vacation... 8! 

Memorial Day Weekend Entertainment Preview

Memorial Day Weekend started with a Mackelmore concert for Emily and Pat. Last night was Arab Culture Night at Lincoln where Emily danced, and tonight Comedy Club where Jake performed a 10-minute stand-up set (PG13/R). Click on the links for photos and videos. 

Also, Drew and some of his fellow OSU/Weatherford students are preparing for a social entrepreneurship trip to Uganda in August to assist the nonprofit Terrewode, which supports women who are survivors of fistula. Click here for a video about their trip. The cute stuffed elephants pictured above, hand-made by fistula survivors, are for sale as part of their fundraising effort.

Birthday x2

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JAKE & EMILY... 
17 Years of Hugs and Fun. 

Click here for a few then and now photos.  
And good news... just 18 more days of school til summer vacation!

Prom Night

Emily and friends are off to the LHS Prom this evening. Click here for photos.  Jake opted for surfing. 

Qatar Debate

Jake and his LHS Arabic Class Qatar Debate Team are off to Doha for an international debate tournament sponsored by Qatar Debate, where they'll be debating in Arabic. 

Click here for photos, which include a few pre-travel shots and those he sent us during his first day in Doha. 

Go Cards!

Taking Flight

We spent Easter afternoon at Portland's new IFly Indoor Skydiving Venue.  Thank you Easter Bunny. Videos follow.

Click here to see Jake fly 

Click here to see Drew's flight. 

Click here for Emily.

Joanna's flight video. 

Pat's flight video.