Ah....Paris!

Yes. We saw Paris yesterday. Glorious sunshine, mild temps and exciting sights and sounds. And then some. There were so many things to see and enjoy, but here are some of the beautiful buildings we saw:

A refurbished building. That's 24 carat gold.

A selfie in front of the Eiffel Tower

So big, too hard to photograph!

Notre-Dame

City Hall

We enjoyed lunch at a sidewalk cafe, Quiche Lorraine, salad and delicious bread and butter. Excellent. Later, a cappuccino and meringue cookie, too.

During the night, our ship sailed up the Seine to Vernon, near Monet's village of Giverny. My, his gardens were beautiful. We learned he felt very successful with his gardening expertise, but often was not satified with his paintings. Isn't that the way we are? How many artists, writers, photographers, musicians not satisfied with what we've produced! Here are just a few photos from our morning today. 

Later this afternoon, we'll walk through the village of Vernon. Tomorrow, we head for Normandy and the D-Day beaches.

The food is excellent and tasty, the service on the Viking Cruise impeccable. We most likely will do it again. But right now, we're heading for the salon where we'll play some dominoes!

Catcha later!

To Seattle-Paris-Normandy

On to Seattle!

Yes, we are bound for Seattle. For a trip to Paris. We’re take a cruise from Paris to Normandy. Why would we leave so close to our previous trip? We decided to do both many months ago and did not realize they were so close together. Twenty three hours after pulling the SQ into our driveway, we left for Seattle. Whew!

Note, the destination

This trip will be different—someone else will be in charge of our itinerary. We’ll be traveling with my sister and brother-in-law, Joyce and Dick. Of course we packed dominoes to play Mexican train, our favorite game to play with family.

We’ll see Paris the first day, and continue along the Seine River, stopping at various ports along the way. 

And we need to read up about the history of Normandy.

That’s it for now. I’m going to sit back and enjoy the more than nine hour flight. Our first transcontinental flight together. I’ve traveled by myself and with a spouse. I like the latter better. 

Catch later!

Final Day of our Grand Tour

Almost home!

We drove 614 miles on Thursday, and we decided that was a maximum day of travel, arriving in Nampa—near Boise. This gave us plenty of time to have dinner with our grandson, Tucker, who’s attending college here at Northwest Nazarene University on a baseball scholarship. It was good visiting with him, seeing the beautiful NWN campus and catching up.

The drive was beautiful as it has been every day we’ve traveled. The Rocky Mountains were right in front of us as we drove west through Wyoming, Utah, and Idaho. As each mile whizzed by, the terrain evolved from soft dark green sagebrush contrasting with bright green pasturelands. Sculpted red rocks that looked like castles.

Devil's Slide

We had a bit of a false start this morning. We spent the night in a Walmart parking lot—they give permission, and welcome RV-ers and trucks to park in their lots for free—but unfortunately, we left our headlights on and found a dead battery when it was time to start up and head home. No problem, we have AAA and soon our trusty SQ’s battery was re-charged and we were off.

Eastern Oregon

When we get home, we’ll have driven more than 5,140 miles—98 hours and 45 minutes at the wheel. We’ve traveled through Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Montana, South Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, Iowa, Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska, Wyoming, Utah, and back through Idaho, Oregon, and finally, our home state, Washington!! It has been wonderful. We have a beautiful country, and we’re grateful to God for the wonderful opportunities He’s given us. 

This morning, we read our usual Love Language Minute Devotional. The verse the author, Gary Chapman, quoted from Ecclesiastes 4:9-10

“Two people are better off than one, for they can help each other succeed. If one person falls, the other can reach out and help. But someone who falls alone is in real trouble.”

Jim and I have found that to be so true. God has truly blessed us with each other. Often Jim tells people we have 84 years of married experience between the two of us. And we do. We’ve learned so many things really don’t matter and we both take the high road on who’s at fault. So, this morning, instead of becoming frustrated with one another over a dead battery, we simply called the AAA number on one phone, while the other looked up our location on the other phone and made some coffee while we waited for the jump. We also realize each day is precious for we don’t know how many days we have left together so we try to make the most of each and every day—with problems and without. 

Our kitty, Shiver, is waiting for us at home in Vancouver. Little does she know we have another adventure, straight ahead. More about that later.

Catcha later…

Homeward Bound!

Going Home!

I’ve been speaking at four Women’s Connection groups in the Omaha/Council Bluffs area and I’ve enjoyed making new friendships with women in the Midwest.

During the four days in Omaha, we enjoyed visiting with Aunt Ruth and Uncle Russ who are seasoned citizens with class and spunk. We listened, asked questions about the past, and played Mexican train—in that order.  

We’ve had a fantastic trip these two 1/2 weeks. This morning is the first day we did not have blue skies. We had gray, high cirrus clouds across the big skies of Nebraska. We entered the Great Plains and drove past beautiful farms with clusters of grain silos, neat farmhouses surrounded with oak trees. Westward bound, we headed to Wyoming and started climbing, reaching more than 8200 feet—almost as high as Mt St Helens. No wonder the temps dropped to 39 degrees.

We’re looking forward to stopping tonight in Rawlings, Wyoming. We’re starting to get the urge to return home, if only for a short time. More about that later.

Thanks for traveling with us. It’s been so much fun. Jim and I’ve decided we’ll continue these road trips. We do well together.

We're on our way now to Boise. Looking forward to meeting up with Tucker, Jim's grandson. And then it's homeward bound.

Catcha later!!

Listening to Wisdom

We're taking the next four days off to visit family. I'm speaking at several Women's Connection groups in the Omaha area, giving my talk. This weekend, we're staying with my last surviving aunt and uncle in their retirement home in Omaha. They are senior citizens who have much grace. Russ and Ruth Jones have been married for 67 years and their marriage still shows romance, love, and respect. 

Last evening, after dinner, while sitting in their living room, Jim posed a question to Uncle Russ. Russell Jones taught at a Bible School his entire professional career and was also a pastor of several churches. Jim asked, “What have you learned about God in your latter years?”

 Uncle Russ sat there, pausing before his answer and replied, “I’ve come to realize that God wants us to practice His presence. By that I mean, contemplate WHO He is, what He’s done.”

Jim, wanting to understand, asked, “Can you give me a specific example of what you mean by that?”

Uncle Russ said, “Sometimes now, I just sit, and acknowledge what God has done for me. His creation and who He is. As Christians we want to DO. And they’re not bad things, but we don’t really appreciate our God or take the time to quietly be aware of our relationship with Him and His desire to be with us. 

Jim responded by saying, “I learned after the deaths of my daughter and wife, that I couldn’t always make things happen—and my nature does try to make them happen—but God wanted me to be totally dependent on Him and He would and has always done what’s best for me.” Uncle Russ nodded in agreement. 

That was one of many conversations we had this weekend. I want to fully enjoy this time, for I know things change quickly. I’ve experienced that already, for my mother has been gone for nearly five years, and my dad, 24 years. 

As I listened to my uncle, Psalm 46:10 came to my mind: “Be still, and know that I am God.”

I think I’m going to try to do that more. 

Uncle Russ Jones and Jim

Nebraska, Here We Come

Omaha or bust!!

We've enjoyed visiting both the Truman and Eisenhower Presidential Libraries and Museums. The grounds in Abilene, Kansas, where Eisenhower's boyhood home and Library are located is not as green and quite frankly, as beautiful. The Library was ornate on the inside with Italian marble throughout the building, where it contains 3 million pieces of correspondence and photos from his two decades as a world leader. First as Supreme Allied Commander. President of Columbia University, and then, President of the United States. Eisenhower grew up with five other brothers, all who made their mark in the world. When Ike's mother was asked, "Are you proud of your son?" 

She responded with, "Which one?" I thought that was an apt reply. I remember as a child watching the Republican convention (the Democratic as well) and his nomination and later election. 

Boyhood Home, located on the grounds

While in the gift shop, we had to buy an "I like Ike" booster pin. 

We enjoyed strolling through the Museum, full of artifacts with much about World War II. I liked several of Eisenhower's quotes:

"God help the nation when it has a President who doesn't know as much about the military as I do." DDE

And another:

"Tell the truth, the whole truth, don't try to conceal anything." DDE

A bigger-than-life statue of the President

We finished the day with dinner at the Brookville Hotel. They have only one thing on the menu: fried chicken with all the fixings. The restaurant - hotel received the James Beard Award. 

Dinner (note the I Like Ike pin on Jim)

The dinner was as good as it looks in the photo and we'll have enough for lunch, too!

That's it for now. On to Omaha, to visit family. I'll be speaking tomorrow to a Women's Connection in LeVista, Nebraska which is near Omaha.

Catcha later!

Abilene, Kansas

Missouri to Kansas

We really enjoyed our time in Independence driving through the neighborhood with many Victorian homes. Everything is older here--not like the few older homes in our neighborhoods in Vancouver.  We chose not to tour the Truman House, but stopped by to see it from the outside. You could see busy volunteers raking the large city lot. A corner house, it was situated in a quiet neighborhood with "normal" houses right across the street.

Bingham-Waggoner Estate, j near our campground

Truman House

Outside the Truman House

Truman's Aunt lived here--right across from the Truman House

After driving by the 33rd President's home, we headed west to Abilene, with plans to visit the Eisenhower Library and birthplace. More about that tomorrow. 

Of course we had to stop at Cracker Barrel

Scenes from Kansas

Kansas is a pretty state. It has rolling hills and I can imagine before farming began the prairie grasses blowing freely. There was a lot of farming going on with crops I couldn't identify. 

More tomorrow. President Eisenhower's Library and Museum. With a stop at his birthplace home. 

Catcha later!

Kansas City Here We Come!

On to Independence!!

We are set to leave our little spot here at the Graybill's. Our little RV was comfy, here among the oaks and laurels. Just across the way, Greg and Caytie's homey farmhouse lights winked welcomely to us. 

We had a few days free from long distance driving while we got to know the two grand babies, one three years old, the other three weeks. 

We attended Greg’s church while there and enjoyed meeting the congregation. It was evident they loved their pastor and his family.

Today we'll drive across part of Iowa and head south to Missouri. We'll take most of the day to get there and tomorrow, we'll head over to the Truman Library and learn some more history. 

There were more farms along the way and we saw many combines harvesting corn. 

We had strong wind gusts for the more than 300 miles, and I declined my time to drive—too scary for me. Jim did a great job driving our SQ and we drove by an accident that just happened where it appeared a gust of wind tipped a large pick-up truck and its trailer down an embankment. 

Next day.....

We visited the Truman Library and Museum. The expansive green lawns and established trees contrasted with the bright blue sky. 

Later this afternoon, we'll walk the neighborhood  and see President Truman’s home. It is located in what is called Old Independence. There are many Victorian style homes in this neighborhood.

 Tomorrow, we head out to Kansas. Eisenhower Library and Museum are next on the list.

Catcha later!