Today’s Highlights: Visiting with a friend in San Francisco, walking on the Golden Gate Bridge, driving down Lombard Street, having a raccoon steal our bread at 3000 feet up Mount Diablo. I woke very early in order to attend a conference call. Once it was over, I slept for another hour and then we all…
Category: Visiting
Out West Trip: Day 16 (Capitola, CA to Half Moon Bay, CA)
Today’s Highlights: Meeting up with “Aunt Suze” and her friends at the Winchester Mystery House, driving tour of Google and ILOG history, lunch at a crepe place in Palo Alto, new books, spotting dolphins in the bay! We woke before 7. The girls took showers while Rob and I packed up the van. The road…
Out West Trip: Day 15 (Morro Bay, CA to Capitola, CA)
Today’s Highlights: Bagels and wi-fi at a coffee shop overlooking the Pacific, listening to a kindie band at the Monterey Bay Aquarium, ice cream in the no longer flooded coastal town of Capitola. We woke to the sounds of the ocean. Once we were changed and packed up in the drizzling rain, we headed to…
Out West Trip: Day 14 (Barstow, CA to Morro Bay, CA)
Today’s Highlights: Visiting a ghost town, going down into an old silver mine, camping at the beach in Morro Bay. I got up early to do some more uploading of photos and other things on the computer. Everyone else got up a little later, and we packed up and left the KOA just a bit…
Out West Trip: Day 13 (Grand Canyon, AZ to Barstow, CA)
Today’s Highlights: Watching the sun rise over the Grand Canyon, stopping for lunch at a diner on Route 66 in Kingman, AZ, walking across the London Bridge, not surrendering our apples to the state of CA. I got up around 5am and walked out to the rim to watch the sun come up. Along the…
Out West Trip: Day 12 (Grand Canyon, AZ)
Today’s Highlights: Explored the south rim of the Grand Canyon, Rob hiked the Bright Angel Trail, Gwyneth and the girls watched the sunset. We slept in a little bit, then had a quick breakfast before walking over to the shuttle bus to the rim shuttle bus. We spent the entire morning riding the bus, walking…
Out West Trip: Day 11 (Mesa Verde, CO to Grand Canyon, AZ)
Today’s Highlights: Navajo Pizza at Twin Rocks Cafe in Bluff, Utah, driving off-road to see Mexican Hat, making up names for the rocks in Monument Valley, seeing the Grand Canyon! We got up around 7am and cooked breakfast with the “oldest” food from the cooler, then packed up and said goodbye to Mesa Verde. Instead…
Out West Trip: Day 10 (Holbrook, AZ to Mesa Verde, CO)
Today’s Highlights: Standing in four states all at the same time, climbing down a ladder into a kiva in a cliff dwelling at Mesa Verde, finally getting to make smores. The sun rose *very* early because of MST. I worked for a bit while Rob and the girls got pancakes and eggs from the KOA…
Out West Trip: Day 9 (Silver City, NM to Holbrook, AZ)
Today’s Highlights: Exploring a catwalk high over a river, walking on a swinging bridge, looking at 225 million year old trees, entering Mountain STANDARD Time. We got up later than we had hoped and tried to quickly get ready to head out the the Catwalk National Recreation Trail. The drive up was a little slow….
Out West Trip: Day 8 (Silver City, NM)
Today’s Highlights: Climbed up to the Gila Cliff Dwellings, watched a lizard eat a centipede, found a Hawaii license plate. We slept in a little in the morning and then decided to have the KOA breakfast. It was still quite windy, so our plates and napkins kept trying to fly away. We headed out of…
Out West Trip: Day 7 (Carrizozo, NM to Silver City, NM)
Today’s Highlights: Waiting 1.25 hours at a train crossing, seeing 1000 year old petroglyphs, sledding on the dunes at White Sands. After an easy breakfast, we hit the road. On the way to Alamogordo, we decided to take a short detour to see some 1000 year old petroglyphs at Three Rivers. We had to wait…
Out West Trip: Day 6 (Carlsbad, NM to Carrizozo, NM)
Today’s Highlights: Alien encounters, eating in the UFO McD, walking on old lava flows. After breakfast, we worked on cleaning and packing up. We hit the road a little after nine and headed right for Roswell. On the way out, we could see the place where the brush fire had been the previous evening. In…
Out West Trip: Day 5 (Carlsbad, NM)
Today’s Highlights: A tortoise trying to eat corn at the Living Desert Zoo, Carlsbad Caverns, seeing a wildfire across the lake I woke up as the sun rose to work. Despite record high temperatures during the day (hitting 100), the morning was frigid. I wore my heavy fleece with the hood up and was still…
Out West Trip: Day 4 (Georgetown TX to Carlsbad, NM)
And, we’re off! (yet again…but this time for real! After some last minute work and packing, we hit the road. Last night, we decided to take the backroads instead of the highway. As we left Georgetown, we did have to get on the interstate — for one mile — our one mile of interstate all…
Out West Trip: Day 3 (Georgetown, TX)
Today was a working day for everyone. The girls had a “feast” of whole wheat waffles with flax for breakfast first. Since Chloe got her homeschooling done very quickly, she and Phil took a trip down to the river while Rob, Camille and I kept working. In the afternoon, The girls and I went shopping…
Out West Trip: Day 2 (Georgetown, TX)
Though we are on our “out west trip”, today was more of a hang out at grandma and grandpa’s house kind of the day. I worked for about ten hours straight, trying to get a good head start on the week. Rob and the girls decided to go do something fun, so they decided to…
Out West Trip: Day 1 (Atlanta to Georgetown, TX)
900 miles and 16 hours later we have finished the first full day of our “epic road trip out west”! We’re going to take a couple of days here at my parents’ house to stock up on anything that we felt we were missing (so far all that list includes is a hat for me)…
Monday in Manhattan
While in NYC a couple of weeks ago, I offered the girls the choice between a trip on the Circle Line or a visit to the top of the Empire State Building. The unanimous response was in favor of the Empire State Building. I don’t quite get the reasoning, but I think it had to…
packing it all in
Chloe and I spent the morning buying food and getting ready to get ready. We picked up around the house, ran to the store and organized. Rob and Camille got home and we all got to work. Everyone pitching in and running down the packing list in order, we had everything pulled together quickly. I…
Out West Trip: Day -1 (Packing)
Yikes! We are just about all set now! All the lists have been taken care of and now the family is relaxing, playing games and having fun for the evening. We leave bright and early in the morning!! Today’s preparations included: Chloe and I went shopping for “road trip food”. We did a final load…



















