April 19After leaving the Grand Canyon I took the highway toward Hoover Dam. As many of you may know they are building a new bridge over the river and it is supposed to be finished later on this year. It looked to me like they may be on schedule. It is an engineering wonder just like the dam itself I drove across the dam and am glad I had the chance. I don't know if once the new bridge i

Well we just got home and settled and it is 1130 already We have to be up in 6.5 hours so I will update the blog tomorrow before lunch Sorry for the delay I must be getting old...

Hey folksI have only 8 minutes to write this so I will highlight what we did in the first 3 days of our journey around Europe and North Africa.Day 12 Arrived at the airport in Montreal way too early. We walk around for 30 minutes and went to an expensive table to watch the first half of the Germany WC game.At the half we went in line for check in and some lady told us that we were upgrade to A

There was a lot more road construction on the Alaska side of the border than when we came through eleven days ago. Once we crossed the border back into Yukon Territory we had more than 4 miles of loose muddy gravel road. To make it even worse we were stuck behind a road grader going 4 to 5 miles an hour. After we got back onto paved road a coyote was standing in the middle of the road look

Matt Scottrsquos SouthWestern AdventureThis is the story of Scott and his son Matt who headed off to the wild southwest in search of Cowboys and Indians.It was to be an adventure like no other guns ammo and cowboy hats galore. Through the searing heat of the Nevada desert to the Ok coral Little Big Horn and the bright lights of Los Vegas. Nothing could stop them not even a 13 hour flig

So I'm sitting here listening to my mp3 while Terri is watching After the Catch on Discovery. I'm jones'n for a Coke something fierce....so bad that we are running to Walmart after the show. Can I just say that the Charlie Daniels Band makes me smile I lurve me some Devil music So I was rereading my blog and realized I'd left a few things out....Mimi is back at the nursing home from Corners

Today is my 24th birthday. Itrsquos awesome to get to celebrate it in Europe. Irsquove had a few odd birthdays including a birthday celebration at the Taos Indian Reservation in New Mexico but never in Europe. Itrsquos a nice treat.Despite the fact that I had an exam this morning international development law today was a fantastic day. The exam was in a different city Meersen so we ha

Well it is time for another exciting update in the Barrett family travels. Our last blog saw us packing the car with our tent and heading up to Cape Leveque to camp on the beach. The road up was pretty rough and left Jack feeling a bit car sick. Were however rewarded in our efforts when we arrived at Middle Lagoon. The water and beach was pristine. The kids absolutely loved the expansive shallow

Day 3 Tuesday I was in 7th grade Spanish class as my teacher Ms. Flynn went through her slides of her trip to Machu Picchu. She spoke of itrsquos magic and wonder all while teaching us about the Inkas. I remember right then I said to myself ldquoI am going to go there someday.rdquo Well the dreams of Erin at age 13 came true todayhellipI got to see Machu PicchuWe took a late mor

Tuesday Really nice weather today though really windy this afternoon. Finally got to see some wildlife today one coyote several swans including two adults that we saw on the way up with 4 signets that hatched since we came by on the way up and bright iridescent blue dragon flies. The coyote was a female that had obviously just had a litter she was on the road begging for a handout.

THE WEST COASTMonday 31 May Coral Bay to Karijini We left at 8am for the long drive to the Karijini National Park. It was a bit of a mission to leave as I lost my room key and the battery on the bus went flat. Luckily I found my room key John reminded me I'd taken it with me to the shower the day before and as for some reason our dorm room had been unlocked the whole night I'd not needed it a

Well it has been a few days since we last posted an update and we are actually now in Chiang Mai arrived yesterday afternoon. We took the local bus from Ayatthaya to Sukhothai on Sunday I think arriving around dinner time. That left us with a FULL day on Monday to explore the ruins in Sukhothai historical national park. We posted some pictures of the ruins below. We rented bikes for the day

It was rainy cold today but Dad I braved the weather headed toward Aachen Germany which is about an hour 10 minutes by bus from Maastricht. I figured that since I hadnrsquot been to Germany in my entire stay in the Netherlands I should definitely check it out while I still had the opportunity. I had only been to Germany once Hamburg but I wasnrsquot totally impressed so I was ho

Today I woke up felt like death. I literally didnrsquot sleep last night due to feverchillsheadachethroat ache the whole 9 yards. Truly awful. I was supposed to meet Adnan Carolina for lunch at 1130 because itrsquos Carolinarsquos last day in Maastricht however I had to cancel. Itrsquos really awful. I laid around for a while Dad came over we packed up most of my stuff c

Please excuse the spelling errors as I am writing this at 430 am on Wednesday morning I will soon go back and edit for grammarspelling p. I've decided to share some things that I have found odd or quite different from what I have been used to in Dubai. Below is that such list...Dubai has a way to many roundabouts. It is a little ridiculous that all the inner road intersections are roundabouts

I canrsquot believe I checked out of my Heilige Geest apartment today. So sentimental. The guy from the Guesthouse came today to inspect my room give me my security deposit back around 9 am. From there Dad I took a taxi to our hotel in Brussels. Since our flight leaves tomorrow at noon we figured it would be wisest to just get a room for the night before in order to not have to get up at

We flew from Shenzhen to Beijing early yesterday morning. Upon arrival Yoyo and Wonder039s friend Suzanna and her husband picked us from the airport to take us to our hotel. They only spoke Mandarin so it was real test of our nontranslational and body language reading skills. We had no idea what the hell was going on. We were turned away from the hotel that Binnson039s relatives had or

London first VisitDay1We decided to try a homestay for the first days in London. After the Mega Run from Bath to Oxford then London we thought it would be sa good time to have as lazy day. After a bit of a sleep in Kath remembered a tourist attraction that she had read about that was near Christinarsquos house our homestay host. The attraction was a series of caves that have been around sin

Irsquom writing this blog sitting at Gate B11 at the Brussels International Airport about to board my United Airlines flight to Washington. I cannot believe that my time in Europe is over . Itrsquos shocking how fast the past 5 months have passed. It feels like just yesterday that I was trying to manage around this airport with 2 giant heavy bags incredibly jetlagged overwhelmed by the

Marika was sad to say good bye to Vegas and all the shopping opportunities but onwards we go to Los Angeles and Santa Monica. We arrived at LAX and got a taxi to Santa Monica which took about 30 minutes. We checked in got settled and hit the shops and searched for coffee as usual. 3rd Street Promenade was one street behind out hotel and was about 4 blocks that was closed to traffic. Lots of sho