Sailing Tarka: 2013

Friday, August 2, 2013

California Life

Well, I have been slacking- Again! We are loving California. We've made a lot of amazing friends. Here are a few snapshots of the last four months.

Ahh, good old Las Vegas. Toriann's graduation. She was Valedictorian. And Nicolette on the right has taken up engineering at Colorado State. I know what your thinking, "Smart and beautiful? Just stop already!" : )

Joe, Jameson and Rosada. We get to live near these guys and I get to hang out with that little cutie, could we be any luckier??

I bought a vacuum. I was and still am very excited about this. Barf right?

Mountain Boarding. It's like skateboarding or snowboarding, only you go UP mountains. I like the flat.

The Kinetic Sculpture Race in Arcata. This art car breaths fire.

Our friend Robin took Jon fishing in Shelter Cove. He is a very serious fisherman.

Jon, Ben and Robin at the Humboldt Homebrew Festival. These guys are very serious about beer... maybe Robin is more serious about fishing.

Alitia and baby Jameson. Alitia is a skilled practicing acupuncturist.

Carl and Tonya at the Benbow Arts Festival. You want some good energy, there it is!

Meadows, Hossannia and Brittney. Northern California seems to be a hub for beautiful people.

Tuesday, May 21, 2013

Photo Journalism for the Lazy Blogger

Ok, so I have allowed far too much time to pass since our last entry. The photos below will bring us to the end of March. Enjoy!!

Red Rock in January. This picture was taken after a 3 hour approach we did with Lorenzo to the base of Black Dagger. It began snowing but we started up anyway and in the middle of the second pitch we were officially snowed off.

February in Las Vegas. Antie Cheryl whipped this double layer chocolate cake with home made frosting up before she headed off to work. Tori (the artist in the family) did the decorating :)

Putting our road bikes to good use riding the 14 mile loop in Red Rock.

Leaving Las Vegas. Jon was a little concerned about our increasing amount of 'stuff' we are traveling with. I was less concerned since most of the additions are things like my new black dress and sexy black heels. I told him we could get rid of the 12 pack of beer to make more room but he decided we could make it work.

Our first stop after leaving Las Vegas was Bend OR to visit friends. They work at Mount Bachelor which is where we spent five our our seven days there. Jon taught me how to snow board, here I am on my second day.

This is the beginning of March, we are flying out of Arcata headed for Anchorage.

Our most favorite, amazing, influential, adventuresome Alaskan friends; Judy and Kenn. We have them to thank for all of our incredible travels in that beautiful state.

Here we are at the Anchorage start of the Iditarod Dog Sled Race. Our dear Norwegian friend Joar is coming by at this moment. We are holding the Norwegian flag we made from scratch with Judy's sewing machine.

Guest appearance!! Sarah and I at the Willow start with a little Alaskan husky pup.

Jon getting ready for the 1000 mile journey to Nome.

A little cross country skiing in Kenn and Judy's back yard.

Celia and her brother Don took us to Kincaid Park for some of the best groomed trail action ever! And the wild life wasn't bad either.

Snow shoeing high above Eagle River.

NOME!! Day one of seven where we stayed at the historic Nugget Inn.

Cross Country skiing on the Bearing Sea.

Yup.

Minutes away from Joar crossing the finish line. The banner I added to the flag reads, " Joar * Iditarod * 2013 "
I was referred to as 'flag girl' and asked to come stand under the arch for his arrival.

7th place finisher and "Rookie of the Year" Joar Ulsome at the awards banquet. His cool handmade Norwegian Flag with personalized banner is in the plastic bag :)

Tuesday, January 29, 2013

Back at it

I know it's been a long time but I'll do my best to keep this short.

We arrived in Minnesota to a warm welcome from Jon's family. Between visiting friends and family, a week at Lake Vermilion, sailing with our friend Art, and the Minnesota State Fair, six weeks was gone in the blink of an eye.

Parting was sad and exciting just as before. We headed west toward the promise of work... so we took our sweet time. We stopped as often as possible: Minnesota's Largest Candy Store, the South Dakota Bad Lands, Mt. Rushmore, Devils Tower, Yellowstone National Park, Grand Teton National Park, and finally Salt Lake City.

Our favorite stop was Devils Tower. Our least favorite was Mt. Rushmore. Although it is cool, the only view is one that must be paid for... there is no "entrance fee" (which our National Park Pass would have covered), but the $11 mandatory parking permit (which our National Park Pass does not cover) is good for unlimited entry for the entire calendar year. Now I don't mean to sound like a cheapskate but COME ON!! They know damn well that the majority of people will not be back again in the same year. How about the $2 twenty minute snap-a-photo-and-leave pass. Yeah, we were not happy. But we got our photo and that was that.

After Salt Lake City we blasted straight through Nevada and entered California. Beautiful California. Just under three months we worked. We did have Thanksgiving off which we spent in San Francisco with Jacob and Leah at their sweet pad where their amazing chef friend Jay prepared a Turducken (a chicken inside of a duck inside of a turkey), a very memorable meal indeed. We drove from San Fran to Yosemite for a few days of climbing then back to work. As Winter approached the work dried up. Lucky for us we must have made a good impression, because we were invited back in the Spring.

This brings us to about December 15th of 2012. I'll end it here and resume with leaving California on the next blog entry. Thanks for reading, we've missed you...