Pretty sure there was a pot of gold...

We went in to town on Wednesday and did all of our running around for new passports. I had done a little bit of research as to the price of passport photos, but I could only find one listing where they actually said the price online, and that was $18.25.

We ended up going to the photo studio that was attached to Walmart, simply assuming that they would be the cheapest.

Wrong!

The little blue car is 10 years old today!

Ten years ago today I signed the deal to buy the little blue car. I had been working at a contract position for GMAC financing at the time, and they offered us a deal for a brand new car at $500 over dealer invoice and 0% financing over four years.

We decided to go for it, and I put in our order for a brand new 2006 Pontiac Wave.

A visit to Bali, Indonesia

Bali is the most popular island for tourists who visit Indonesia. The country of Indonesia itself is actually made up of over 13,000 islands and is the fourth most populated country in the world, with over 260 million people! Only China, India, and the United States have a higher population of people.

And why do people visit Bali?

Time for a new passport!

Our current passports expire August 5th of this year. The last time we got new ones you could only get them renewed for a 5 year period, but this time we're able to go for the relatively new 10 year option.

Of course they're also slightly more money, at $160 for the 10 year versus $120 for a 5 year one.

Six weeks of Xplornet

Well, we've used our new Xplornet satellite internet service for just over six weeks now and so we thought we should give an early review.

So far...it's not perfect, and it's not the same as having high speed internet in the city. But it's far, far better than the cellular internet that we had the last two years.

RV'ing in Spain

We aren't going to be making much in the way of plans for our two month motorhome trip to Spain next January and February. It's all going to be new to us, so we'll simply drive when we want to and stop when we want to.

Fortunately, we've had a really good website forwarded on to us that's going to help us quite a lot with finding our overnight spots.

I think we'll just avoid the U.S.

I thought about booking our flight back to Europe yesterday. A deal came up at a decent price ($584 CAD, or $460 USD) from Ottawa to Paris leaving after Christmas and returning in April.

But, it connected in Philadelphia. That causes a minor problem.

Because my current U.S. "Waiver of Inadmissability" expires in November.

Okay, now we're starting to get a little jealous...

Yes, we received another postcard from Sherman. He's in Canmore, Alberta just at the base of the Canadian Rocky Mountains, and about to enter Banff National Park. We love that part of the country, and it's been quite a few years since we last visited that area. I think it was the end of August 2006, so almost ten years.

So, we're starting to get just a little jealous!

What's the earliest thing in your life that you vividly remember?

I had to drive into town last night, and my mind wanders all over the place while I'm out for a drive.

I was thinking about our grandchildren visiting last week and what a good time we all had. Then I wondered if they would even remember the trip when they're older, and I started thinking about the earliest thing in my life that  I can remember.

It's funny what you can remember so clearly.

Postcards from Sherman!

Sherman sent us a couple of postcards from his adventure. He says he's having a great time, and enjoying nice weather. He hasn't driven very far. The people who are driving him are in no rush and are just taking their time.

He says that today, they will be going to beautiful Banff, Alberta!

Lagostina comes through again!

A couple of weeks ago, I told you  about a frying pan that we had bought that where the coating went bad within six months. I think it had a ten year guarantee, but the company wanted us to send it back to them on our dime for their "inspection". I got through to someone who would listen to my story, and they sent us a prepaid courier bill so we could send it in free. We've owned Lagostina cookwear since my parents gave us a complete set as a wedding present 32 years ago...and we still use that same set today!

What's the best way to get rid of mice?

With a cat!

And that's what we got yesterday. Obviously we can't keep a cat full time, so the agreement was made that we've got the cat until September when we'll try and give it away. And if we can't give it away, the lady who gave it to us will take it back.

So now mice...look out!

Evergreen RV...out of business?

I spent two summer seasons running the parts department at an RV dealership. One of the brands that dealership sold was Evergreen RV's. Based on my time there, I always thought that they seemed like a well made trailer with some innovative ideas. I even think that they were one of the first ones to get away from that standard "white with stripes" color scheme that had been so common on a lot of trailers prior to their arrival on the scene in 2008.

 I read in the news this weekend that Evergreen RV has closed it's doors.

Goodbye Sherman!

See you in two months! Behave yourself, and be a good boy!

That's what I was thinking to myself as Sherman drove away with our motorhome exchange friends Graham and Tana. We had just finished doing an in depth tour of Sherman and detailed all of his different operations wth them, and they were ready to take off on their two month exploration of western Canada.

Miss them already

Boy, it sure was fun having Lindsey and the grandkids here for two weeks. They can be a handful, but we miss them already. The house seems just a little too quiet.

Had an email back from Asus, the company who made Ruth's laptop. No idea what they've done to finx the problem, but they're shipping it back to her repaired. At least we hope it's repaired. I guess we'll see whan it shows up next Wednesday.

Stupid. Forgot to put money in the meter!

Took off yesterday morning at 10:30am for the three hour drive to Regina airport with Lindsey and the kids. Uneventful drive, and not the most scenic. The Trans Canada highway is probably the most boring part of Saskatchewan.

We stopped once for lunch at a picnic rest area, and made it to the airport at about 2:15pm with lots of time to spare for their 3:15pm flight.

Off to Regina airport!

The stars were obviously aligned when our daughter was booking her flights here. She picked the exact return date that the motorhome exchange people are coming to pick up Sherman.

So I'm driving to Regina airport this morning to drop off Lindsey and the kids, and then I've got about two hours to waste before Tana and Graham's flight arrives and then I'll bring them back to the park for Sherman.

Sad that we're not going with him!

We worked into the evening yesterday getting Sherman ready to go on his adventure. Our motorhome exchange people arrive Wednesday evening. They'll spent a couple of days here familiarizing themselves with Sherman, and then they'll be off for two months of touring the Rocky Mountains west of here.

We are definitely sad that it's not us going with him!  However, we get to look forward to two months exploring Spain next January and February.

Still using a paper map

I have to admit, I love our GPS system for driving anywhere. I like knowing all the details, like how far it is to our destination, and our average speed, and how far it is to the next turn. And, I really like having the free mapping program on our iPhone that we can use even when we're offline. I also like checking things out on google maps online, and using the streetview version for details.

But really...we also love traveling with a good old fashioned paper map!

5 Jobs For People Who Love To Travel

Most of us, probably once in our lives, dreamed of how it would be nice if you could have a job that also let you travel to different parts of the world. While some dream about it, others actually make such dreams come true and leave everything behind to pursue their dreams.

If you want to belong to the last group, and you have always dreamed of traveling the world and earning money for it, below we and travel enthusiasts from Travel Ticker are going to share a list of five best jobs you can try out as well. Who knows, maybe thanks to these jobs you will never in your life hate Mondays ever again!

Do you know your family history?

My father's family lineage came to Canada from Yorkshire, England as part of the Yorkshire migration to Nova Scotia that took place between 1772 and 1775. I was lucky, in that most of that family history has been passed from generation to generation including dates and occupations.

That history has been traced all the way back to Stephen Read who was born in 1734 in Yorkshire, England. He went on to become a Colonel in the British Army prior to moving to Nova Scotia in the 1770's.

They're back...and they're hungry!

Up until Thursday I hadn't seen any mosquitos. Ruth says that she had seen one or two. But I'll tell you, by Thursday morning it seemed as if all the eggs had hatched all at once!

Remind me again...why didn't Noah squash at least one those two mosquitoes??

The spooky house...

Every time grandson Cameron drives by an old abandoned house, he calls it a "spooky" house. Well, there's an old abandoned farm house on the road towards the park and we've driven by it several times while Cameron has been here.

He said that he wanted to see the inside, so yesterday, we stopped by for a visit!

Warranty claim update...

Ruth and Lindsey took the kids in to Swift Current yesterday to do the weekly shopping. While there, Lindsey and the kids went to the local swimming pool and had some fun in the water for an hour while Ruth went and did a few errands on her own.

She stopped in at the Salvation Army thrift store to see if they had a decent used pot for the house here at the park, but couldn't find anything worthwhile. However, while she was there, she did find something worthwhile!

May Expenses

Wow, another month bites the dust. May has come and gone, just like that. And, we're already 1/5th of the way through our time here this season! Not that anybody is counting...ha ha.

Expenses wise, we spent quite a lot of money! But a big chunk of it won't get expensed right away. We bought the plane tickets for our fall flight to Romania, but they will only get included in our expenses once we take the flight. We find it gives a truer picture of how much we spend on a trip when all the bills for that trip are in the month that we actually do the trip.

(Note: The following figures are in Canadian dollars. For U.S. dollar equivalent, you can subtract about 25%.)

Warranty problems

It's no good buying a product with a warranty if it breaks and then the manufacturer makes it too difficult to make a claim.

Such is the case with my camera bag. The bag is made by a subsidiary (Ape Case) of a company called Norazza...a company with it's world headquarters and distribution center located in Buffalo, New York.

A little dirt never hurt anyone...

The lake level has begun to rise...but the long term forecast doesn't look good. It's unlikely that people will be able to use our boat launch this year, and we probably won't have a swimming area either.

But that doesn't stop kids from having fun! Our grandkids proved yesterday that mud can be as much fun as water!