Ok, Ok. More photos and just an update that we went to church in Bideford, UK. We went to the address listed in the www.Mormon website. It gave us an address for the branch but that was replaced by another Christian group. The site mentioned a college called Bidford college. We asked a lady on the street how to get there and up we went. Got there, saw cars parked there and went inside the college. When Barb opened the door, a short, very friendly sister came up to us, Barb asked if this was an LDS meeting and she reached up and hugged Barb and welcomed us to church. We had walked into the RS meeting. They took me to the HP meeting and we made it to all three. After church, drove back to Parkham, changed and drove to Clovelly...a famous fishing town on a hillside that goes down into the ocean. Cobblestone walkways. You'll get the idea from the photos. Ate dinner up the street from our home and had Junket and Clotted Cream. Was sort of like an unsweetened thin custard and a big blob of butter on top. Clogged the veins but I think we could get used to it. The Cod and Chips was great, too. So, off we go tomorrow on a new adventure. Dad and Mom

Don't forget to pay attention to Alyssa doing back up!

What I meant to add was, after a good night's rest, as seen in the first photo, we drove down to Exeter to visit the Cathedral there as well as the city itself. Interesting listening to all the foreign languages as we sat for lunch in the courtyard just outside the cathedral.

It was a long day, from a driving point of view, with one car wide hedgerows, which we have to face anytime we leave here, to one lane highways to 3 lane speedways. I thought I was on the Autobaun. I was in the center lane driving 90 miles per hour (not kph) and having cars fly by me in the right lane. We had our times with the round abouts but managed to survive and have a nice dinner at home together.

We're off to church. Gotta go for now. Mom and Dad

By the way, just because we are posting daily doesn't mean the rest of you are off the hook.

Well, today, we were wise and took a cab to Paddington Station to catch the train to Devon. It was MUCH easier than hauling 50 lbs up and down stairs...especially since the down escalator at Marble Arch was broken and you had to walk down about 3 stories in one fell swoop. It was very scary for me on Thursday night with how sensitive I am to heights...but with my suitcase would have been impossible. So the decision was easy to take the cab. We had purchased a first class Railpass so we travelled in style with big windows looking out at the beautiful green countryside. It took about 2 hours to get to Exeter where we changed trains onto a train that was much more proletariat. That one we took out to Barnstaple. Not near so much distance but it probably took at least an hour. We saw many cows and sheep. The baby lambs were quite fun to watch scampering after their mothers.

When we arrived at Barnstaple we called Enterprise to come and pick us up. After getting back there to sign the papers, we started our adventure with right hand drive cars...and staying to the left. To say there was tension in the car is definitely an understatement. Marnie can appreciate this after driving in downtown Seattle trying to find a Holiday Inn Express with us! First, I got my left and rights mixed up. Since the right turn was like a left turn at home, I would say take a left when I meant a right. This was all made more difficult since the rental agency did not have any city maps! So I was trying to do my usual seat-of-the-pants navigation. Dad seemed to think I should know how to get to Bideford in spite of the fact that I had also never been here. We ended up on one street which was supposed to be only buses...and turned around on several others. We finally found the signs to Bideford but then turned too soon on a critical round-about. At that point we spotted a Pizza Hut and figured since we were hungry and had to find a bathroom in order to de-stress us a bit!

After a bit of refreshment, we finally tackled the roads again and successfully made it to Bideford. We were also out of Pounds so we stopped at a superstore to get cash and some food for our place so we didn't have to eat every meal out. The first thing that threw us was that you had to put a pound coin in to unlock the carts. We had no coin so we each got a basket and took off into the store. We bought some basics and then headed out to Parkham where our cottage actually is. The road out here was quite narrow...with the last one being a one laner that we needed to back down to give a truck coming the other way room to get down. We finally found it and it is quite lovely and comfortable. When we settled in, we took a walk around the village. We first took a "nature" walk around the grounds and determined that it was a little too isolated and bumpy with roots etc in order to use it for my run tomorrow. So we went and walked around the other homes in the area...some very old and some look like English tract homes. We found the parish church which looks VERY old. The oldest gravestones around the church were from the early 1800's but then there were many that were totally unreadable. This place where we are staying is from the 1700's ....I would guess the parish church is at least that old but I would guess it might be earlier. No one we asked seemed to know and we couldn't find a date on the outside. I found lots of possibilities for my run tomorrow morning. My plan has me going 9 miles.

We have now just finished a stir fry dinner here and have some rice pudding here for dessert and have been watching Britain's Got Talent.

We'll post some more pictures....or I'll have Kenn do that...

Love,
Mom
(ps. for Kim, the gate for the stairway is under the stairs at the front on the kitchen side of the coat closet)

Mom asked me to blog our trip as she is still trying to get back into the norm on her sleep/awake cycle. We left Portland on the 15th (Weds) and flew to Denver. Waited there 2 hrs and flew non-stop to London over the next 8-9 hours. Not a bad trip, just didn't sleep much as I watched the people in Business class recline those wonderful chairs and sleep the entire trip. Oh well.

We arrived about noon, London time, which was about 3 am the next morning, Portland time. Ugh. We took trains and the tube to our final destination. Little did we know that there are not always escalators or lifts in the subway (tube). We dragged our 50 lb bags up and down stairs with hundreds of people trying to get around us to get to the trains. One particular event was when I came down the last flight of stairs, there was the train ahead with the doors wide open. I made a dash for the train and looked back for Mom. She wasn't down to the bottom yet. I was going to jump out but, egads, out of the blue, this flash of khaki and pink made a flying leap, tossed her 50 lb sack like a lateral pass in football, into the doorway, catching the doors and sending out alarms throughout the train, made the four point landing across the threshold on her belly and slide into the center of the train car like she was making the final home run of the World Series......"SAFE".....and she won the game. She actually made it aboard and on we went. A little red in the face, but, by George, "I made it". And, by golly, because of her antics, a man and his two children made it aboard, too. They thanked her for her great efforts in their behalf.

So, off we went to our hotel near Marble Arch. Little did we know that we were nestled in the center of the Middle East of London. It was no problem for us, but the Army shirt I was wearing probably didn't make me a lot of friends. I know most of them were Taliban. I could tell by their looks. Isn't this fun. Mom and I are having a good laugh over this, so far. Are you?

Now, we're in our Marriott room (free for points) and then strike out for another venture around town, half asleep. After a visit to Winchester Cathedral, where we attended a choir program called Evensong, a evening service with a choir from Cambridge University...absolutely wonderful with the echoing of voices and organ in the cathedral nave. It was about an hour long but so well worth the trip. We just heard about it when a woman from an unrecognized country asked if we know when it started. We looked around and found the way in. Wonderful. We noted the graves of Issac Newton, Charles Darwin, and other famous individuals. We know that many kings are buried there but we were only there for the service and they wouldn't let us walk around. That is available at other times.

Then, down past St. James Park, over to Trafalgar Square, The Horse Parade Grounds near Churchill's War Rooms (will catch that on our return two days at the end of our stay per Mike's suggestion), viewed The Eye (didn't ride it), had dinner at Garfunkle's (fish and chips for me..great), then went back to our room to collapse about 9 pm. Woke up at 4 am and here we are. So, today, we take the train to Devon at 9 am and start the rest of the journey. We will not be taking the tube as we don't want the trouble with the stairs and Mom already won the Series for us as well as performing her wonderful humanitarian service to that family of three. Love you guys, Dad and Mom

Check out slickdeals.net today if anyone is looking for a new PC. That is a phenomenal deal for 499. Talking about the Dell Vostro tower with 22 inch LCD.


-- Post From My iPhone

Here is a video of Noah in his bumbo seat. I am in the background explaining rules to Dominion. I laugh everytime I watch it.

(The island with the volcano in the middle)
Well, race day has come and gone and we had a phenomenal time. “Ie Jima” is Japanese for “Ie Island” (pronounced E-A), an island significantly smaller than Okinawa that was a 30-minute ferry ride from a port that was about an hour from our house.

The race on Saturday afternoon so we left early Friday morning, caught the ferry and spent the day exploring the island and our beach resort. We arrived at our resort before check-in time but that didn’t stop us from unloading and diving in the pool (which was actually freezing cold) and then walking down to the beach (which was gorgeous!) After a few hours of that we headed off to explore the island where we found lots of sweet potato farms, some caves, beach cliffs, lilly fields and drink machines dropped in the middle of fields (here in Okinawa you can find drink machines on every corner, I don’t even know how they had power cords running out to the machines on the edges of the fields! Imagine seeing a Coke machine on a rural farm and you get the idea. We joked that we would take yen in our running shorts in case we needed more water on the run)




There were no other hotels or restaurants but luckily we found a fabulous dinner at the country club. We were the only people there so it didn’t matter that we had a ton of kids. They were so nice to cook for us. I do wish we knew more Japanese but we squeaked by and the food was great. Hayden had real Japanese food for the first time and actually liked it despite the tantrum he threw when he realized there was no Burger King on the island. Then we went back to the resort, struggled threw putting the kids to bed and then played cards on the balcony. The resort was great, but in true Japanese fashion everything was really small and it’s hard to really say it was a “resort” other than the high price but we had a great time.
(The view from the hotel room)
The next morning we spent more time swimming (well I say “we” but the adults didn’t get in the pool because it was too cold!) While the kids swam the adults ate breakfast at the resort restaurant. Fortunately they had a few American choices like fruit, pancakes and scrambled eggs because I don’t think I would have been ready for the race based on the Japanese choices of salad, tofu, fish, pickles, spring rolls, and tons of stuff I didn’t recognize. We have very different ideas of breakfast! After breakfast we checked out and drove to the starting line of the race to get checked in. Then we drove to the volcano in the middle of the island and “hiked” up to the top. It probably wasn’t the best idea prerace but Danica actually went up all the stairs by herself so how hard could it have been? She was sooo proud of herself and kept declaring “I did it! My legs are so strong!” The view from the top was phenomenal!


From there we went down to some cliffs and explored the tide pools. We saw tons of crabs, brittle stars and fish. Toward the end an octopus was spotted and we had fun watching it swim around. By this point I was starting to get nervous for the race. It was HOT and late in the day when we went into the little bathroom at the cliffs and changed into our race gear. We made up PB&J for lunch and headed over to the start line. I ate a bowl of Quaker Oatmeal Squares on the way over because that is what I eat every morning right before I head out running so I figured I would try to keep things as routine as possible. The kids played on the playground while we lathered in sunscreen and energy bars. Our group was Tom and I, Rick and Randy. Melanie and Wendy, the wives of the other two runners were so awesome and watched all of the kids while we ran. They even had to go and park the cars down at the port and then walk back to the race since the roads would be closed during the race and we had to catch the last ferry right after the race so we could be home on Saturday night. Okay, back to the point: we got ready, lined up and waited for the guy to fire the gun. It was easy to spot Tom and Rick at the starting line because they were so much taller than the Japanese runners! We didn’t see very many Americans but there were a few.


The shot was fired and we started down the road. The race went around the entire island and was beautiful! They called it a marathon but it was only a half marathon, about 13 miles. There were lots of people sitting outside their farms cheering us on and pounding Japanese drums, lots of water stations with ice cold water and cold wet sponges that felt great. They also offered salt and brown sugar cubes for energy. It was a fabulous race and I felt great. My foot was sore at the beginning and I over compensated and got a side ached but both pains were gone by mile 3. Tom felt sluggish and tired and his iPod died so he had no music (he used mine for a few miles but it didn’t work very well) but he manage to power through it. There were a few more hills than we had anticipated but I think that’s always the case!! The late hour and the heat took it’s toll on us but we did really well and had a fabulous time.

(The finish line was lined with flowers!)
After the race the offered big bowls of hot Soba (noodle soup!) I opted for some water and sno-cone! We didn’t have much to linger since we had to hurry to catch the ferry but it all went really smoothly. The kids fell asleep on the drive home and our great adventure came to an end!

(The runners after the race, on the ferry again!)

I just decided I am running the Deseret News Marathon in Utah on July 24th, anyone want to join me?

McKenzie is a fast crawler and now pulls herself up on EVERYTHING! Even our pant legs when I am doing dishes or cooking. She knows when Melia is in the bathroom going potty and crawls as fast as she can through the kitchen to get there. She makes us laugh daily! Easter pictures to come... I am tired and need to sleep so I can pack all day tomorrow... 3 more days until we move!