New Zealand was Amazing!

My wonderful friend Charyse and I drove a sleeper van around the north island of New Zealand. 

We had so much fun!

Swimming with whales in Tonga!

This was an amazing trip! 

For 10 days I was on a boat in the beautiful, clear, Tongan waters where I had the privileged to swim with humpback whales. 

Thank you Karim Iliya, our trusty guide and photographer for the invite and the opportunity. 

I made life-long friends here and memories I will never forget. 

Here are two videos: one from land and one from sea.

Enjoy, I know I did :)

Donating my Hair!

Every other year I am able to donate my hair. My hair grows really long and throughout my life time I have been able to donate about 5 feet of hair. My fantastic sister Suzi helped to cut and trim my hair. 

Off with the ponytail! 

Tah-dah!

St. Louis Missouri

“I think St. Louis is right about here somewhere, maybe, kind of in this general area, possibly,” I said pointing to the map on my laptop. Let’s be honest, I really didn’t have a clue where St. Louis was. But I do now.

St. Louis was an interesting city. I liked the various architecture, the Arch, the old industrial buildings, the rivers, the variety in culture, food, slang and people. I enjoyed the nice weather, the murky rivers, the firefly glittered nights, the brick stone streets, pork steaks, the weekend park festivals and my wonderful co-workers I came to know and love. I will miss the Katy Trail, Forest Park, the fantastic trinket shops, gooey butter cake, the Lewis and Clark statues, the City Museum, the Frontier Park festivals, Fitz Root Beer and the friends I made during my time there.

Thanks St. Louis for the memories and farewell to my friends. Until we meet again.

Island Park Family Reunion!

(The song is "Toys" by Life of Dillon)

Carthage and Nauvoo Illinois

“This is the loveliest place and the best people under the heavens little do they know the trials that await them” is what Joseph said to Hyrum as they rode towards Carthage Illinois.

Carthage and Nauvoo Illinois are two historical sites of the Mormon church which I was privilege to visit last week. The preservation of the city, the houses, the monuments and the memories of the people who lived and died there are amazing. It’s one thing to read about a place and hear stories about a people but it’s another to actually visit the houses they lived in, the temple they built and to stand in the place where they lived and died.

I learned a lot while I was there and it kind of brought the stories I had read about to real life.

I walked down Parley Street which is the road where hundreds of covered wagons drove down after being forced out of their homes with the mentality in mind of “don’t look back” as they headed into an unknown future.

 

I stood in the second story window where Joseph fell after being shot several times the day of the Martyrdom.

 

I listened to the church bell chime while standing atop the hill where the Nauvoo temple stands looking out over the valley.

I stood in the room where Brigham planned and prepared for the journey across the now mid-west to the Salt Lake Valley.

I took a picture of the bullet hole which hit Hyrum in the face killing him the day the mob came for him and his younger brother.

I rode a horse drawn wagon past the Jonathan Browning Gunsmith house.

I found my ancestor’s name on the memorial of those who left Nauvoo to find a safer and better life out west.

It was really amazing to see all this in person. It’s all free and open to anyone who wants to visit. It can be a day trip or a whole weekend depending on how much of the sites one wants to see.

I currently live in St. Louis Missouri which is on the Missouri-Illinois border. I’m about 2.5 hours from Nauvoo, 3.5 hours from Independence, 2 hours from Carthage and 3.5 hours from Haun’s Mill. All of these are significant LDS historical sites yet when people find out I’m Mormon the first place their mind goes is Utah. I’m a little confused by this for they are surrounded by so much Mormon history. Tragically, it is the more darker part of our Mormon history. Yet, the church has preserved the towns of Carthage and Nauvoo is such a positive and beautiful manner.

It was a memorable weekend. I love going to historical places and these two sites are definitely worth the visit.

Farewell to Florida

I had a great time in Florida. The people were nice, the beaches were great and the weather was awesome.  

I thought the birds and flowers in Florida were absolutely stunning. The beaches were what I call sugar-sand beaches meaning very few rocks and barefoot friendly. It was a pretty blue-green color and the ocean breeze really set a paradise feel. The ocean here is warm and the waves are actually quite small. If you are looking to surf big waves, you have to know where you are going because most places the ocean is quite calm.

A lot of people here are scuba divers. In fact, learning to scuba dive here is like learning to ride bikes in most other places. There are some amazing dive spots which I have posted quite a few videos about. (See previous posts).

There are a LOT of people here however. Getting away from crowds is a difficult thing to do. There are also a lot of what I call “silver people” here. Snowbirds are everywhere starting around October to about April. Also during these months, a lot of athletes come to Florida. Sports teams and equestrians team come here to train during the winter. Like I said, lots of people in Florida.

There are some amazing cities here and there is a lot of money here. Million dollar yachts and beach front second homes are everywhere.

There is one thing I found not so much fun about Florida. Everything is designated because there are so many people here. This is where one parks for this part of town. This beach from here to here is only for resort owners. This park is for pets but it ends here and this park is for non-pet owners. This board walk is for hotel guests only, this parking lot is for platinum members only and so on. I found myself being politely told on more than one occasion I wasn’t allowed to be here.

People here are friendly enough and most places are safe and clean. Of course, every big city like Tampa, Orlando and Miami all have those certain spots one really shouldn’t walk through alone at night.

The weather here was a bit bipolar. In the morning it would be cold, windy and rainy at 60 degrees and then 4 hours later in the afternoon it was high 70’s and sunny. I did find the humidity here to be more bearable than in South Carolina and Texas on most days because I lived only ¾ of a mile from the ocean so there was almost always a nice ocean breeze.  That little breeze would make all the difference when it comes to humidity.

I really enjoyed Florida. There are so many things to do and so many different ways to play. Disney World and Busch Gardens, scuba diving and jet skiing, hiking and fan boat tours and so on.

It was really a fun place to visit.