I am way behind on my blog. I do plan to add some blog posts on our French Canal Boat trip. But if I wait til I have time for that before I post anything else, I'll be even further behind.

We flew back from Ramstein Air Force Base on Tuesday night on a C-17 cargo plane. It has a big cargo hold with bench seats along each side. We were the only cargo, though. So we were able to lay a blanket on the floor of the cargo hold and get some sleep. But it was cold and noisy--not as nice as the C-5 we flew over on, but still got us there.


While we were waiting in Ramstein, we saw a whole planeload of troops heading for Kuwait, presumably to be deployed in Iraq or Afganistan. Our hearts are with all those fine young people.

On Weds night we stopped off in Jacksonville to visit cruising friend Tom Service, who's anchored out off Julington Creek Marina.

Yesterday, we thankfully pulled into Satellite Beach.

This afternoon we set off again for Eustis, FL, where we will be attending Dave's high school reunion. He is excited about seeing old friends after so long.

On Sunday we have a golf game scheduled with a couple of Dave's Naval Academy friends.

Next week Dave has Jury Duty in Clearwater, but he's going to drop me off in Satellite Beach before he returns to Clearwater to do his civic duty. We are hoping his commitment is short!

Labels: Europe 2009, USA 2009

(Catching up from our Europe trip)

Some people take a week or more to visit the museums and coastal towns of Normandy. We did it in a day trip from Paris, with a 3 hour drive each way to get there. But we were able to see most of what we wanted to see. For anyone interested in a short synopsis of the logistic issues that the Allies overcame when planning the invasion, see this website: http://www.usmm.org/felknordday.html

We started at the Memorial de Caen, which was originally a WWII museum, but has since morphed into also covering the Cold War, 9/11, etc. We then went to Juno Beach, where the Canadian forces came ashore for the Normandy Invasion on June 6, 1944.


We drove for about 30 miles down the coast through the little French beach towns, and ended up at Omaha Beach and the American Cemetery. We stopped at several small museums along the way, and had a 'stand up' lunch of fresh quiche at a patisserie.

It was a very moving day--full of history and sadness for all the soldiers who died, all the French townspeople whose homes and lives were destroyed. But all this set in the beautiful French countryside, full of flowers and quaint little seaside towns.

A Small Sample of the Monuments

When they kicked us out of the Cemetary at 5pm, we drove down onto the beach.

Dave and Sam Examining a Shipwreck on Omaha Beach
On the return drive, we were running late and starved, so we actually went to McDonalds. McDonalds is kind of a sacriledge here in France, but it does have its place when you're hungry and don't have 3 hours to enjoy a 3 course meal.


We hit heavy traffic going through Paris, and then found that the freeway back to our hotel was closed! We spent another hour driving around in circles (thankfully following the GPS) before we managed to get back on the freeway north of the blockage. It looked like they were just working on the road, but didn't have any 'detour' signs out. If we'd not had the GPS to help us figure out where we were, we'd still be out driving around!

Labels: Europe 2009

We are in Gay Paree!! We had a fun 2 days in Germany (hopefully I'll have time to post a few pictures on this). But now it's time for France.

The four of us (John and Sandy Delappa and Dave and I) took the fast train from Kaiserslautern to Paris yesterday afternoon. Sam and Nancy were supposed to pick up a rental car and come meet us at the railway station. We eventually made contact, just a little late. They ran into horrid Saturday afternoon traffic on their way from the car pickup to the Gare de Est railway station... apparently some big music event/parade in Paris totally snarled traffic.

After they had collected us, it took us another hour of heavy traffic city driving to get back out to the Marriot, which is near Disneyland Paris, about 20 miles east of Paris.

Fortunately, Sam and Nancy have a family friend who lives in Paris, and who helped them find the car rental place, the railway station, and helped guide us around the traffic as we left the station.

More later, we're off to explore Paris!

Labels: Europe 2009

They finally got a C5 flight off to Ramstein AFB last night, and it had 75 seats on it (and no Top Secret cargo). We made it aboard with room to spare--there was even a couple of empty seats on the flight.

We had real seats almost like an passenger airplane. The C5 has a huge cargo hold like a warehouse, and a separate passenger cabin. It was pretty comfortable, considering. The seats reclined like normal airline seats. We got a 'box lunch' (which we paid for). Other than an 'inflight fueling exercise', which introduced some turbulence, it was almost like a normal airline flight.

We landed at Ramstein about 3:30 pm local time, and processed quicly through German immigration and customs.







Now that we're here, the next problem is lodging. We didn't make reservations ahead, because we weren't sure where we'd end up. At the time we were confirmed on the flight, we got on the list, but not with confirmed reservations. Getting here, we got one room, but John and Sandy were next in line and there were no more rooms. They are on standby for a room here, and have a room at Vogelwehn, another Air Force lodging facility, but it's a $30 taxi ride away. We now have a car rented, and plan on 2 nights in Germany, and we have train tickets (79 Euros/$118) to Paris on Saturday.

Labels: Europe 2009

We've been too busy with friends, doctors, and shopping to make updates on Facebook or our blog. But we're setting out today on the first leg of our journey to the canals of France.

We drive from Satellite Beach to Charleston today. Hopefully we will get on the military flight leaving Charleston AFB this afternoon for Ramstein AFB in Germany. Then we have a couple of days to get to Paris, where we have a timeshare for a week (thanks to friends Sam and Nancy). We hope to see a little of Paris and some WWII sites as well.

Then on Sep 26, we pick up our 'canal boat' from Le Boat, for a week on the Gray to Branges segment of the canals in Burgundy (Gray is SW of Dijon about 50 miles). We are sharing a 6-person boat with 2 other couples, so the expense is reasonable. We have rented 4 bikes for the week, and only have about 10-15 miles to go per day. So there's plenty of time for sightseeing and wineries.

I'll do my best to keep up with the posts on my blog (which also post on Facebook).

We'll be back in the U.S. around Oct 8.

Labels: Europe 2009, USA 2009