My life in a suitcase

This is my suitcase. Sitting. Waiting. Just outside my bedroom door.  

 She's been with me on a girl's trip to Coronado Island and . . .

Laura, Julie, Joyce and me.  Love these girls!  We had so much fun.  singing revolution

on our 24th annual Hale-May Memorial Day week-end trip, this time to the four corners area of Colorado where we stayed in cabins, went river-running, road the single gauge railway from Silverton to Durango and visited the Anasazi ruins at Mesa Verde.

Posing for a picture before we went for a river run.  Can't remember which river we were on but it was a good (and freezing cold) ride!  The kids were troopers.  Regular little river rats!

Steve and Kalli announced (over lunch) that they're expecting their first baby.  We've since found out that it's a boy!  Expected in January.

Noah and Landon in their cool lookin' shades.

 On the train between Silverton and Durango.  It was an absolutely beautiful ride that was unfortunately cut short when the train derailed on some falling rocks! Seriously.  The conductor said that in the sixteen years he'd been making that run he'd never had a derailment.  That's because he'd never had the Hales riding on the train before.  We just seem to invite that kind of stuff with our very presence.  

Annie and Joey in Durango

Scott, Rachel and Adelaide.  Scott and Rach are expecting their second baby . . . announced it on this trip!  They're having another girl!

Steve, Annie and Joey with some of the May family.  We've been doing these Memorial Day trips with the May's for 24 years.  So much fun . . . such good people.

Abbie and Landon at the Mesa Verde ruins.

The Mesa Verde ruins.

So moving along, the next place that my suitcase took me was ...

 beautiful Norway for a five day road trip across the country to the western fjords.  Fantastic.

 These little cluster hamlets were everywhere along the fjords.

 Had to have a photo with this traditional looking troll.

 Water, water, EVERYWHERE!  Streams, rivers, fjords, lakes, waterfalls, cascades . . . so much water.  When you come from the deserts of Utah, you really notice the water and greenery in other places.

 The town of Stavanger.  I love the brooding sky.  We had a lot of rain and cool weather while we were on this trip.

 A Stave church . . . a unique form of architecture found in Norway.  These churches were built in the 13th century.  Note the brooding sky again.

 My suitcase came with me as we boarded the Emerald Princess for a twelve day Baltic Sea cruise.  We drove back to Oslo from the fjords, caught a flight to Copenhagen, boarded the ship, sailed through the night and woke up in . . . Oslo!  The cruise took us to Oslo, Norway ... Aarhus, Denmark ... Tallinn, Estonia ... St. Petersburg, Russia ... Warnemunde, Germany . . . Helsinki, Finland . . . Stockholm, Sweden . . . Copenhagen, Denmark.  As is the case with all cruise excursions, you just get a few rushed hours in these beautiful places.  A tantalizing taste of many places.

 I had to have a photo of these hollyhocks in a little town in Denmark.

 I loved watching the pilot boats as they delivered local pilots to guide our big cruise ship in and out of their ports.

 In Warnemunde, Germany we happened upon the 1st annual surf championship . . . a gathering of lifeguard teams from all over Europe.  They were crazy strong swimmers and paddle-boarders.  Lots of fun to watch.

 The amazing town of Tallinn, Estonia where we learned about the singing revolution.  The story of this extraordinary phenomenon of hundreds of thousands of people gathering to sing the songs of their hearts, in the face of Soviet oppression, brought me to tears.  Music has brought such hope and solace to my soul in times of real despair.  I can only imagine what it was like as the Estonians joined their voices to sing the forbidden anthems and hymns that gave them such hope for freedom.

 Peterhof . . . a series of palaces and gardens in St. Petersburg laid out by order of Peter the Great.

 An evening at the Russian Ballet . . . we saw a perfomance of Swan Lake.

 Our great friends, Bob and Julie May.  We were all struggling to stay awake, even though the performance was fabulous.  The touring schedule was pretty rugged!

 The Russian Orthodox cathedral of St. Peter and St. Paul.  Also called the church of the spilled blood in honor of one of the Tsars who was assassinated on this spot.  Of all the churches and palaces we visited on this trip, this was my favorite.

 Finnish Evangelical Lutheran cathedral in Helsinki.  This is the most prominent architectural feature of Helsinki.  Helsinki had a much more austere feeling to it than did some of the other Scandinavian cities that we visited.

What I really loved in Helsinki was the farmer's market. Check out all this beautiful fresh produce.  Speaks to my heart (and my stomach!)

 These photos are of the restored warship, the Vasa, in the Vasa museum in Stockholm Sweden.  The story of the  Vasa  is remarkable. Check out the link.  The Baltic Sea is a mostly fresh water sea so the particular worm that flourishes in salty ocean water (and eats wood) isn't found in the Baltic.  This is what allowed this ship to be submerged for something like three hundred years and remain largely intact.  The black oak in this ship is like 97 percent original!

 Couldn't resist another shot of a little red pilot boat.  I want one of these for my birthday, okay?

 Buildings along one of the canals of Copenhagen.  I loved the colors.

 The famous Little Mermaid statue in Copenhagen.  Note the family of swans.  There were swans everywhere in the Baltic sea ports.

Our last night aboard the Emerald Princess.  The sun didn't set until close to midnight.  

Our little hotel room in Copenhagen. Doesn't it look like we could be in an Ikea showroom?

We returned from our cruise on July 29th and I had a day and a half to unpack my suitcase, wash my clothes, do some weeding in my yard and then repack my suitcase before I headed for Denver, Colorado to see the beautiful new baby granddaughter who was born while we were gone!  This is just a sneak preview.  More to come, including a visit from Laura, Jordan and Lucy before we left for our cruise.  But you'll have to wait . . . til' next time!