We have had lots of visitors already - Caleb and his girlfriend Claire came for a week and then headed off to see more of USA before Claire headed back to Oz. Caleb, Chris, Sue and Katie came back for about 10 days so our days were filled with skiing, snowboarding, snowshoeing, restaurants and much hilarity! Traditionally Doug holds a party for all of his staff and so we had a soup and sangers night for about 45 people - great night complete with trivia, kookaburra imitations and a few spicks and specks games . We ended up sitting around and chatting till about 3.00 am - great stuff.
We all got into this came called Sequence and Caleb made a huge board so that we could all play and of course everyone got into skiing, snow shoeing and snowboarding! We met up with the guys from the Western State basketball team - 3 were Aussies who we had met when we went for dinner at our neighbours house
We have had lots of visitors already - Caleb and his girlfriend Claire came for a week and then headed off to see more of USA before Claire headed back to Oz. Caleb, Chris, Sue and Katie came back for about 10 days so our days were filled with skiing, snowboarding, snowshoeing, restaurants and much hilarity! Traditionally Doug holds a party for all of his staff and so we had a soup and sangers night for about 45 people - great night complete with trivia, kookaburra imitations and a few spicks and specks games . We ended up sitting around and chatting till about 3.00 am - great stuff.
As soon as Chris and Sue left I drove Caleb over to Denver to catch his plane to oz and I was off travelling through Colorado visiting universities and talking about ICMS - good fun but tiring especially as on the homeward drive I hit a whiteout...........white road (no snow plough through) white mountain and a wall of white blowing snow.......lovely! Glad to be home that night!
A few days home and then off to Denver, Boston, Salem, New York state again talking to Faculty groups, taking " classes" and running information meetings. Boston was freezing......a huge dump of snow and it was back to 2 pairs of thermals etc and still cold! we were lucky as ours was one of the last planes in...............not so lucky with no buses and taxis refusing to go out of city limits as they were worried they would get stuck.
Stayed in Salem "Witch city" which in the rare times I was not teaching I rushed around trying to see as much as I could. About ten minutes out in the freezing cold was enough I have to say!
Lovely working with students again. Endicott is a rich private college with gorgeous old buildings and fantastic modern accommodation for students, huge drama, visual arts theatre wow! The restaurant overlooks the ocean with stunning views. Would be great to visit this area again.
The flight from Boston to Plattsburgh was a bit of a shock - a small 8 seater plane - 3 passengers - fantastic - amazing view over the ice flows. I must admit I had been so focussed on my schedule and had not thought about the trip there.
Full schedule in Plattsburgh and so only had time for a short walk on the first evening ----------discovered frozen wind. Not snow just the moisture in the wind frozen and blowing. It sticks to the cars (and any exposed area of the skin!) I have one more class at Plattsburgh this morning and then I catch the Amtrak train down to New York to meet Roger. 8 hrs - supposed to be spectacular views. We have a week there and then back to Gunnison where we get ready for our next flow of visitors. Really looking forward to theatre, dance, music and trying out new restaurants - no wonder we are poor!!!!
Caleb is back in Oz, he is staying in the B & B until the 16th. The tenant in our unit has just given notice (what timing) and as it needs a really good paint and a few jobs doing on it he will probably move in and do that.........will need to get a flatmate though to help pay the rent. His boss has offered him his job back but he is ready to move on and so is just working on a casual basis while he puts in his cv's. Think it will take him a while to readjust to being in one place after all his travels. He packed it all in visiting, Japan, Holland, England, Germany, Denmark, Switzerland, Belgium, France and of course USA - New York, GUNNISON, San fran, San Diego, LAs Vega ...and much more.
Roger is still loving his job, but REALLY ready for a break. It has been full on for him too especially as he went straight into work when he arrived.
Doug and Kaylonn seem to be happy in Manly and adjusting to morning swims, walks on the beach and bushwalking rather than ice climbing, mountain bike riding and cross country skiing.
SO we are all fit, well and enjoying life.........hope you all are too. Love hearing from from you all - sorry I am so slow in responding...........hope this brings you up to date and will be in touch in a couple of weeks when I get back to Gunnison
Cheers Julie
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