::7.3.11:: NewZealand.

These next two pictures were taken within two hours of each other....just goes to show how drastically the scenery changes around here. You almost feel as though you are driving through different countries.

The pictures of New Zealand don't even begin to do it justice....we pulled over on our drive to snap this picture, and it felt like we were driving through a Hidden Valley Ranch commercial! We've also decided that if someone actually wanted to go cow tipping, this would be the place to do it.....today we passed many cows grazing on the sides of cliffs, and some lining mountains.....we think all it would take would be a little nudge....or perhaps a strong breeze. Just an FYI to anyone that's interested...

Yes, it's July. (I have to keep reminding myself...) July 3rd actually.....Happy Anniversary to us! :) LoVe.

Here Andy is crossing the bridge to get to our jump point yesterday. Our jump was not a true bungy, in that we didn't dive head first, it was swing style, so we started off with a free fall...pretty much face first, and then moved into a swinging motion that seemed to be barreling us at the mountain range in front of us. Quite the rush...pics to come, we purchased all photos and the video from our jump company. One of my favorite moments....a split second before we were released the lady asked if we were ready...I replied,

"Yes", and Andy replied, "No"....and then we were free falling.
LOVED IT!!! :)


Tomorrow we are back to Christchurch to catch our flight up to Auckland. We will spend one night in Auckland before heading back home. On the way here it was bizarre, we never had a Saturday due to the time change, but on the way home, we leave Tuesday evening Auckland time and arrive home Tuesday evening Minneapolis time, despite the 20 hours of plane trips.... So I guess it all evens out.

Another random thing that we learned about New Zealand...motels are not the same as at home. I am currently sitting at the computer next to a super nice flat screen TV, our kitchen has heated floor tiles, bathroom is amazing, the couch is comfortable, and Andy is resting on the King Sized bed....in the morning, we will probably have coffee on the balcony...oh wait, it's winter....scratch that. You get the picture...no complaints here! :)

Love from New Zealand

J&A

Stories from NZ....

Well, if we came to New Zealand looking for adventure, we were successful!

The following pictures/stories will include: blinkers, sheep, driving, scarves, Milford Sound, gas stations, and high anxiety moments!

Holy sh!t, look at all the sheep!! :) They were lining the mountainsides and roads everywhere...

On our drive to Milford Sound, these clouds were lingering in all of the valleys.




YES....

1)I am driving...

2) On the right hand side of the car...

3)On the left side of the road...

4) With a winter hat & scarf on...

(After the first few roundabouts, and windshieldwashers instead of blinkers, I was feeling pretty comfortable.....with the driving, not the cold!)






I'm ducking down because these rocks are in a riverbed just below a one lane bridge in the mountains near Milford Sound. Nothing scarier than turning the corner and preparing to cross the bridge hoping another car doesn't come barreling around from the other direction!

The drive there was full of anxiety due to the road conditions and gas tank issues.....but the views at Milford Sound were worth the drive. It was like an area of serenity surrounded by the chaos of the rugged mountain terrain.

Andy took this shot on his own...Sunset at Milford Sound.

I'd say I'm doing pretty well with all the nature stuff for a city girl...I know I know, most people probably wouldn't hike around carrying their purse....but hey, I was out there hiking right??! Someone needs to be the "mule" and carry all of our crap around....Maps (check) Sunglasses x2 (check) Passports when needed (check) Camera/iPhone (check) Kleenex (check) Credit Card/local currency (check) granola bars...water bottle (check) rental car key (check)......so actually, now that I think about it, let's not call it my purse....let's just call it our lives.....so yes, I carried our lives around while we were hiking! :)


Now, if you ever travel to NZ and plan to rent a car...here's a little rule of thumb.

LITERALLY, fill the gas tank whenever you see a gas station. No joke. Because there will probably not be another one on the road for a few hours....and if there is....it may not be attended/in working condition/accept cash/your credit cards...

You know there's a story behind this....I'll give you the short version because I need to get some sleep.

We left at 6:45 am to make the drive to Milford Sound. We had 1/4 tank of gas, so we stopped in town at the gas station, but it wasn't open and "pay at the pump" didn't exist, so we started our journey and decided we would get gas in the next town. It was dark out still, so navigating through the winding roads was stressful enough. There were no towns in sight...... We approached the big mountain pass and our drive became even more difficult...our little rental car didn't go up the mountain roads too quickly....anyhow as we were making our way through the mountain, I glanced over at the gas gauge when Andy was driving and out of the corner of my eye, noticed that it was near E....my heart was racing, but I didn't say anything, because really, what is saying anything going to do in that situation?? Make a BP Station appear? I think not. You could have cut the tension in the car with a knife!

Andy asked me to look and see how far the next town was from the mountain pass. I looked and found "Terras" listed on our map, but really being listed doesn't mean anything, because the town we stayed that night in was HUGE on the map and it only had 216 residents....I told him it seemed like it would be 30km after the pass to Terras. (Sidenote: I failed a few "map tests" in geography in middle school....) So we kept on chugging along.....my heart was racing....in fact, if we could have hooked my heart up to the car, we would have had no problem flying up all of the mountain roads!!

Andy and I both felt better after clearing the mountains, but we decided we better start looking for a good place to stop and ask for help because we knew we were going to run out of gas any second. At the sight of any farm, you could see us both process if we should stop the car there...we decided to keep going and eventually saw the sign for Terras!! Woohoo civilization....maybe. We found one gas station.....

Andy and I were both so excited to see this ghetto old gas pump and credit card machine next to it!!! Woooohooo! HOWEVER....of course, our cards did not work....and the shop that this gas tank was located outside of....didn't open for three more hours....

and this was what our gas gauge looked like....literally on E.

Amazingly, within five minutes a car pulled up a young girl about our age rushing to work. I told her I had $20 cash and asked if she would use her card to get us some gas. Because she is the nicest person ever, like all the Kiwis are (NZ residents...) she said NO WORRIES. Thank God!!!

The $20 in gas got us to the next town (about 35 km away) where there was a real gas station and we paid about $65 more to fill up the rest of the tank....

Oh yes, just another adventure on this crazy New Zealand holiday....

By the way, tonight we are back at the little one room cabin in the middle of nowhere. We loved it so much, we came back!

xoxo more stories to come...

J&A

Update from the top of the mountains....we survived!

We survived the Nevis Swing! :) LOVED it!

Just wanted to let you know so you weren't worried!


XoXo
J&A

Are you scared of heights? I sure hope not.....

I promised my Mom I wouldn't tell her if we were going bungy jumping in NZ until after we went. Well, we are sitting at the tour place waiting to go, and because I know she is up north for the 4th, and she won't read this until afterwards, I just wanted everyone else to know what we are about to do! We will be doing what is called the Nevis Swing, from the highest bungy point in New Zealand!! We're in it together, tandem style. Wooohooo! 160meters above the river.....

Wish us luck!!

Love from Queenstown, NZ.....Nevis Swing :)

xoxo jen and andy

NZ Adventure Begins

Well, where do I start? It is Thursday night....I am sitting in a one room cabin with the heater cranked, in one of the "big towns" of South Island New Zealand.....give me an hour, and I'm pretty sure I could introduce myself to all 216 residents!! But hey, I have NO complaints whatsoever. We pulled into this place at 10pm, and a woman came walking out to the parking lot to help us, even though they closed an hour before hand. She gave us a cabin, towels for the shower, and a coupon for three hours of free wifi (the first free internet during this entire vacation) all for $50.

Hell, at this point, I would have paid $50-$100 for a hot shower and the internet alone. Let's flashback to how we ended up here.....


SYDNEY: Wednesday at 1:30pm (Flight departure time 6:35) as we went online to check in for our flight before leaving for the airport, Andy and I were confused to not find our flight listed online. However, this has happened already on this trip (Thank you United Internet debacle) so we weren't too worried. We phoned the airline from our apartment lobby (we were already all checked out and moved out..) only to find after about 20 minutes on the phone that our flight was in fact still on, but that it had left already.....and that the next flight would not leave until the following morning. Turns out that Andy got an email a few months back saying that our flight time had been changed...but when he printed the itineraries right before we left, he printed the old one, not the new one...

So we were stuck in Sydney for another night....The lady at our apartment would not give us a deal even though we already stayed five nights, and therefore, Andy and I started walking around Sydney in search of a hotel to stay at. Take a moment to imagine that scene....No, I did not cry....but yes, I may have mentioned the phrase..."I want to go home." We ended up finding a hotel a few blocks from the apartment and gave Sydney some more of our money at dinner that night.

As soon as we landed in New Zealand we got a rent-a-car and started the drive towards Queenstown. I drove first....and had a few near panic attacks on the roundabouts near Christchurch....driving on the right hand side of the car, and the left side of the road, definitely threw me off for a bit....oh yeah, and one more minor issue.....yes, Andy, I will admit it to everyone.....

Apparently I drove with the parking brake on for an hour.....

It's okay though, because our car was a POS to start with.

Alright, I need to go to bed, we are getting up early to finish our drive. Just wanted to update everyone....we've learned that the people here in NZ are the friendliest ever...thank goodness for this cabin tonight!!


LOVE FROM THE MIDDLE OF NOWHERE :)

J&A

Random Pictures/Stories

I finally sent a few of the pictures from my iPhone to the netbook so that I could share them with y'all (as Kendra would say) :) can't wait to see you dear!!! Anyhow, earlier in the blog....day 1 of this adventure, I said that Andy owed me about our whole Visa dilemma....well we ended up evening the score rather quickly. As we were on the bus to the Outback, I handed him the camera to take a picture and the "no memory card" message popped up. I left it in the netbook at the hostel after loading the pictures the night before. HOWEVER, the pictures that follow are all from that day, and my iPhone camera instead...and I think, they are actually better quality than our camera, but I guess I'll let you be the judge of that. (For the record, Andy stayed very calm after realizing we couldn't use the camera in the Outback.)

Here I am standing in the middle of the highway that stretches through the Outback. The road honestly is endless. I was more worried about being run over by a camel, kangaroo, or random biker (pedal bike, not motorcycle) than a car at this point. (Yes, Andy woke me up at one point on our bus ride because out of everything that we passed in the MIDDLE OF NOWHERE, we passed a guy on his bike...talk about dedication...or craziness...)

Sidenote: Our bus drivers/tour guides for the day were two of the biggest knuckleheads ever. It's a surprise we didn't end up stranded on the side of the road in the middle of the Outback being chased by wild Dingos...

As we were watching the sun set over Ayer's Rock, our tour bus (from the 1970's....no joke) which was parked, but running, starting accelerating very quickly, and loudly....our bus drivers, Dumb and Dumber as I will now affectionately refer to them as, ran faster than I ever thought their legs would take them to the front of the bus and jumped in the driver's seat trying to "solve the problem". Talk about killing the peaceful ambiance...well let's be real, the Contiki Tour bus full of drunk 18-22 yearolds also managed to do that for us. Pretty sure most of them didn't even know (or care) what they were looking at as the sun went down. There were a few cheers and champange glasses in the air from their crowd though as our bus nearly exploded.

Andy just hanging out at one of the rocks in the Outback....this picture was taken before the near bus explosion, when our biggest worry was that we weren't able to understand what one of the tour guides was saying because of his accent.....oh how the priorities changed as the day went on! :)

Speaking of priorities, health code does not seem to be one of the priorities in The Outback. On our drive home, we stopped at a rest area where there were public restrooms, a gas station, and a restaurant/bar. As I was sleepily walking from the bus to the toilets, I absolutely freaked out when I noticed there were little mice running EVERYWHERE in the parking lot and bathroom. But I really had to pee, and god knows the 1970's bus toilet was non-existent....so I trekked through Mouseville as quickly as possible....and then decided to take refuge in the restaurant for the rest of our break. Little did I know.....


Yep, you've got it......mice running everywhere in there too!!!!! In the States, the place would have been shut down due to violations starting at the front door. I booked it out of the restaurant, sprinted across the parking lot and found safety in the bus....ha, go figure!! (By the way, the mice didn't seem to bother any of the customers eating food in the restaurant....)





You can see Ayer's Rock in the distance, this was on our drive out there, when we were still in the mindset that we would be "conquering the rock" later in the day. When we arrived at the Rock, the climbing was closed due to "high winds at the summit". I'm pretty sure that had our tour guides not stopped us, Andy would have made the climb too and risked the $5,000 fine. (I'm glad Dumb & Dumber were there, otherwise it would have been up to me to stop him....) So anyway, back to this picture, the red sand everywhere made it feel like we were on Mars. Literally, the middle of nowhere...Mars.

No, it's not a deer.....and no, Andy is not cutting off its air supply. This little guy is the Kangaroo that LOVED us because Andy kept shoving food in its mouth! (Okay, I'll admit it, I did too.) Once again, this is one of our "Get in here little kangaroo, Jen is going to reach out her arm and snap a picture of the three of us" pictures. LOVE IT!!!

The only thing missing from this shot, would be the skateboard underneath Andy's feet. Thank you iPhone. (Another reason for Andy to get his own iPhone....the ability to snap amazing photos, like this one. Or, I suppose, I could take the credit for the amazing shot...afterall, I did take it! Feel free to compare it to the next picture, that Andy took. You can be the judge.)

Now granted....I wasn't posed as perfectly midair as Andy....I think he secretly does some skateboarding in his spare time.

Little did I know when I was jumping off this bench....that when this day was all said and over with, I would return to our hostel (where we had a private room, but shared a bathroom and kitchen with one other room) and would be introduced to the coolest roommate ever! (Note: 8th Grade Teacher Sarcasm in full swing!!) Now, I'm not sure what this man looked like.....I couldn't tell you his name....his age, or even what country he was from....the only thing that I know about him, is that he LOVES to hock loogies (spelling....I just had to look that up on Urban Dictionary.... I've never typed that phrase, nor did I ever think I would have to....) The minute we walked in the door, it started and I swear, the sound vibrated through the wall into our room. It sounded like he was hacking up a lung, only grosser. Anyhow, once he fell asleep, it stopped (and I was truly missing the Germans from the night before....their noise was much more tolerable.....think young twenties/honeymooners.) but our friend woke up at 4:30am, probably for a hiking tour.....He must have set his alarm an hour early so that he could spend 60 precious minutes hocking loogies, because that is precisely what he did. When I got up that morning and found a dead cockroach the size of a Reese's PB Cup near my bag, I barely flinched, because I survived the Loogie Hocker, and I knew, that if I survived that....I could pretty much get through anything! Seriously....that guy needs to see a doctor.

And finally, here we are hiking around the rocks. (Really? How do I smoothly transition from Loogie Hocker, to this??) We may have spent more time on the bus than we did exploring the Outback, but the drastic scenery is unlike anything we will ever see again....camels, kangaroos, bikers, near bus explosions, mice everywhere, Mars....what a wonderful day in The Outback. :)

Fond Memories (and Love) from the Outback---

Jen & Andy

Sydney Part II :)

When we wake up tomorrow morning, our legs will probably be sore....thanks to the 1,390 steps that we climbed to get to the top of the Sydney Harbor Bridge! :) By far, the highlight of the trip so far, and I have to admit, it will be hard to top. Our tour guide took pictures of us at the top, but we won't be able to share them with you all until we get back home. The views from the top of the bridge were spectacular! If you visit Sydney, the Bridge Climb is a must do!!

After our bridge climb, we wandered through the Botanical Gardens...here's an artsy shot of the Government Building. (That's for you sister!!)

As we lined up this shot, a woman asked me if I would like her to take our picture, I finally gave an honest answer and replied, "No thanks, we're actually really good at this." I was laughing and hopefully didn't come off too rudely, but I think by her reaction, it was fine. :) Oprea House, Harbor Bridge, Skyline, and sun setting. Perfection.

One of the most beautiful views of the Sydney skyline in our opinion, taken in the Royal Botanical Gardens.

I was stopped twice today and asked for directions to certain places. (I am proud to say that I was able to provide those directions both times!) While I'd like to think that I seem like a local, I know that my tennis shoes (I'm hating wearing them.....but had to today because of the Bridge Climb) and Minnesota "jumper" are a clear statement that I am not. However, one of the people that asked me for directions was an Australian.....so maybe I seem like a Sydneysider to them.....

Tomorrow we are off to a tour of the Oprea House and then to the Blue Mountains. We are in Sydney until Wednesday and are keeping our fingers crossed that everything works out as we head to New Zealand. The volcanic ash cloud is now affecting flights in that direction. We've already dealt with delayed flights because of it, so we are hoping that doesn't happen again.

Still loving Sydney...time for some rest. Climbing the Harbor Bridge can really drain your energy....no complaints here though!!

Love from Sydney :)

Jen & Andy

Sydney :)

Yay for Sydney!!! After spending time in the Outback, it felt AMAZING to get back to civilization. Apparently there is a HUGE rivalry between Melbourne and Sydney that goes back in history, I have to state for the record, that I am TEAM SYDNEY. And trust me...our accomodations have not been the thing that has won me over...more on that later :)

People in Australia are so damn nice, but unfortunately it has in turn ruined our "one armed take a picture of ourselves shots". Each time we go to "line it up" someone runs up to us and offers to take the picture for us. Which means that we end up with a picture like this one above, with us and the Sydney Opera shooting out of our heads.


This is the nice shopping area on George St. It has some VERY high end stores in an already very expensive city. I could do some MAJOR damage here...unfortunately for me (and the stores) and fortunately for our bank account, we were just passing through on a walking tour....The walking tour was three hours long and free, a young guy lead us all around Sydney telling us some of the history and little known facts of the area. I still want to head back to this shopping area.....you know, just to take another look around!

Ahhhh Napoleon on Kent, our lovely abode!! (Hence the comment from above...) In all seriousness though, this place is awesome. We've rented a fully serviced studio apartment. We have a living room area, kitchen, dining room table, bathroom, and obviously a bed. It's larger than any of the studio apartments that we rented out at Steven Scott (and probably nicer too!). It's really nice to have some space and not feel crammed into a hotel room. We're making some of our own meals too, because at this point on vacation, we get sick of eating out all the time. Not to mention that food here is crazy expensive. We bought icecream bars last night on our way home from dinner and it was nearly $10. (we're not talking Blizzards here, standard icecream bars!)

Here's the Harbor Bridge at dusk....today we will conquer the bridge and climb along the top of it!!! Wooohoo! We may have not been able to climb Ayer's Rock, but we will dominate this thing! (Oprah did it too on her Australian Adventure Show.)

I was so excited to finally bust out the capri pants and sandals. The temperature here is topping out at 67ish degrees during the day, and I'll take it. It's the warmest weather we've seen. But hey, if this is "winter", no one should be complaining. I've shown quite a few people our pictures on my iPhone from our snowy winter this year...their reactions are quite funny "How do you drive??" "Do they shut the city down??" Ha--I didn't even get a snowday this year people!!!


Alright, time to grab lunch and go off to conquer the Bridge!!!!

Love from Sydney mates ;)

J&A

Melbourne & The Outback

I apologize for the lack of updates, while my iPhone was streaming internet just fine in Melbourne, the netbook, my only source for updating the blog, was not. Funny that the best internet connection we've found so far is here....in the middle of the Outback. So the pictures from this update are going to be a little bit out of order. We spent our first few days of this vacay in Melbourne and are currently sitting in Alice Springs.....pretty much in the middle of the Australian Outback. Tomorrow we will spend the day taking a trip to Ayer's Rock.

We're staying at a place called Toddy's in Alice Springs. It is a haven for backpackers....our driver from the airport was one crazy Aussie. He let us stop to take a picture on our way into town (okay, let's be honest....the "letting us stop for a picture" was probably just an excuse for a cigarette break for him....but hey, he got us to the "resort" safely, and provided much entertainment along the way. At one point Andy looked at me and asked, "Who is he talking to?"

I'm not going to lie, kangaroos were the number one reason I wanted to visit Australia....we had a ton of fun feeding and hugging these guys....Andy and I took some awesome pics of the two of us and one of our kangaroo buddies, but that was with my iPhone....those pics will have to be unveiled later!

I'm not sure if this picture was taken before or after this lil guy got mad at Andrew. He was a little fiesty to say the least...but I can't say I blame him, Andrew was in the way of his prescious food....

Ahhhh yes, back to the one-arm, line up the shot, and take a picture of ourselves mode....gotta love it. Thank you Mom, I have the perfect length arms for these shots. Note: bags under my eyes....this picture was taken on day 2 of our trip, still feeling very tired! Thank goodness Melbourne is known for their coffee, caffinate me up baby!!

This alleyway is painted monthly with new murals by local artists.

Here's a nice shot looking down the river in Melbourne. Don't be decieved by the sunglasses, the weather has been actually pretty chilly.

Things I learned in Melbourne (pronounced "Melbin"):

1. The Australians do not provide you with help when crossing the road like they do in London (ie. Look RIGHT or Look LEFT painted on the road) Our friend Beth gave me the best advice "look both ways, five times, before crosssing". I think I've finally got it figured out...

2. Beeyah = Beer

3. Australians are very friendly and will buy you a "Beeyah" within ten minutes of meeting you. (Friendly Aussie sitting next to us at the rugby game)

4. Most people in Melbourne have dark hair, contrary to my stereotypical view on Australians. Being blonde here and walking through a rugby game is one way to easily attract attention. Lesson: do not have your husband leave you unattended for too long during such events.


Alright, time to sleep...we are catching our bus to Ayer's Rock at 6am. Hope you are all enjoying the gorgeous summer weather in the midwest.....it is winter here in Australia and that actually means it's pretty cold, especially at night!

Love from the Outback!! Please say we don't see any snakes tomorrow......

J&A

G'Day Mates!

Well, we made it safely to Australia........Flashback to approximately 40 hours ago....(I think...honestly, I'm so tired right now, that it may have actually been a week ago....) Andy and I attempted to check-in at the kiosk at the United Airlines area in MSP, and of course we were having problems. A United employee spent about 10 minutes searching for our tickets before she finally found them and informed us that we did not have the necessary visa to visit Australia.....

I (yes, that's me, Jen) stayed completely calm, as Andrew went into a pure panic mode, asking for my iPhone, and immediately looking up Australian Visa requirements, yet another reason to add to the list of reasons why Andy should have his OWN iPhone. Anyhow, yes, you do need a Visa to visit Australia. Boom, ten minutes into our trip and the credit card was getting charged for last minute E-Visas. Note: Andy owes me one calm reaction in the future to a mistake as big as forgetting to get a visa for our Australian adventure...

The next twenty some hours were spent like this:

• 
  
  Minneapolis to San Fran (3.5 hours on plane)....layover


• 
  
  San Fran to Auckland, NZ (14ish hours on plane)...slight layover


• 
  
  Auckland to Melbourne, Australia (3.5 hours on plane)

I wish I had crazy stories about our many hours on the planes, but it actually went really well.... A few highlights:

• 
  
  There was a Khloe & Lamar lookalike (seriously, at first in MSP, I thought it was them!) following us all the way from MSP to Auckland.


• 
  
  We both slept at least six hours straight, Ambien free on the long flight (yay!)


• 
  
  There was an amazing selection of movies, TV shows, music, and games on the individual seat TV's...thank you New Zealand Air---the best airline we've ever traveled on, by far!

As soon as we got into Melbourne, we met up with Beth (a fellow Neenah/UofM Alum) and her fiance for breakfast and a tour and then went to a Rugby match. I'll update with pics and some stories about that later...

To be honest, the only reason I'm blogging right now is that Andy says we need to try and push through and make it until 8pm Melbourne time before going to sleep today. (It's been a LONG day!!) Our eating schedule and sleeping schedule is clearly, way off. I told him a little while ago that I was hungry, and he said, "We've already eaten so much today..." I thought back and kindly reminded him that the only meal we actually have had since arriving in Melbourne, was breakfast.. (Unless the beers we had at the rugby match count as a meal...never know, things are different in the southern hemisphere!)....clearly being up for so long is messing with his head and apparently, stomach too!

(Side note: As I type this, Andy is asleep next to me...)

Alright, time for some sleep....finally! More updates, with pictures, to come!

Love from Melbourne--

Jen (and Andy too! Zzzzz)

Winter Getaway: Cancun

Hola from Cancun!!

We are definitely in full vacation mode now! We've had a couple days of wonderful sunshine which has helped us to dose up on some much needed Vitamin D3 and temporarily forget about the piles of snow in our driveway back home. Our resort is located at the end of the hotel strip at the northern most tip of Cancun. This peninsula behind me is the end of the point and this is the beach area we've spent some time relaxing.

On our first day here, it was overcast and only about 65 degrees. That didn't stop us from laying out....NOTE: empty chairs all around! We did run into one other brave group on the beach....who also happened to be from Minnesota! Go figure. :-)

Our hotel room balcony overlooks this dolphin pool. Each morning we watch as groups of people swim with the dolphins and the dolphins put on shows. It's fun to watch, but we both decided that we do not want to swim in this small pool where the dolphins spend all of their time....need I say more??

Even though we haven't practiced the art of self-portraits since last June...we've still got the skills mastered.

Andy has discovered (once again) that his body does not like the sun. After four hours on the beach, he decided to take advantage of a little shade...and an Appleton & Diet.

Europeans love their speedos (and sombreros)....no matter their age or size.

I will give you two guesses as to why Andy insisted on taking a beautiful photo of me...

Note: I have a twin....wearing half of the same suit.

My favorite morning routine here....reading on our balcony with an amazing frozen vanilla latte from Coco Cafe....dare I say that it tastes better than Caribou??!! It may just simply be that it tastes better because I'm drinking it in 75 degree weather with the sun shining down...on a balcony of a resort, where I don't have to go to work, and my biggest worry of the day is finding a beach chair that doesn't have the "cave-in" affect from too many people laying on it.....but even so, it tastes better than Caribou! AMAZING :-)

A highlight of the trip: Last night they set up a huge projector screen on the beach near the pool and broadcasted the Packer game. We lounged in beach chairs watching the Packers dominate Atlanta with fellow Packer fans from all over! GoPackGo!


Tomorrow we are going on an all-day excursion to an adventure park. We will spend the day zip lining, rafting & swimming through caves, and driving four wheelers through the jungle. Not too shabby for a long weekend in January. For those of you back home, we will soak up some Vitamin D for you too (but make sure you still take your supplement!!).

~Love from Cancun~
Jen & Andy