Last flight................

Big ruts in the beach from the rain storm

 What a nice picture hey?

Token picture

Best Poutine in a long time!

Well we've made it to Vancouver, about to get on the final flight, but not the final leg of our trip.  This has been a lot of travelling!  I don't think I've ever gone this long without cooking a meal, not that I miss it all that terribly, but I think it'll be okay.  One more quick hour to Prince George where Chelsey and Jon and family will be there to meet us.

On our way home

Waiting in the Toronto Airport.  Here are some final pictures of our departure.

Good morning y'all

Getting ready to do the second leg of our flight, flying to Vancouver.  We've got a couple of hours of a lay over.  Can't wait to see the little darlings and give them great big hugs.  Snow has fallen lightly on the ground here.  Guess it's just a little refresher of what we'll find at home.  We are excited to get back home again.

In Toronto

We safely made it to Toronto.  A wonderful holiday, but now the long trek home.  The flight was uneventful except for some minor irritations.  This flight seemed to carry more than it's fair share of obnoxious and rude people.  It was quite a shock feeling that cold winter wind.  It will be nice to get back into the swing of things.  Until next time. 

Rain, Pouring Rain followed by Torrential Downpour

Today was just about a complete write off as far as doing anything fun was concerned.  The rain was unrelentless today.  The pools here are full to overflowing.  The beach suffered a great deal of damage.  Hopefully we'll have time to take some pictures of it in the morning.  We did take a movie of the water running down the sidewalks like a creek.  Several of the houses in the area are suffering from flooding simply because they are not used to this amount of rain and therefore not prepared for it.  The city streets flood in minutes.  Hopefully you can see it on these pictures.  Until morning, we bid you a goodnight!

Snorkeling

On the Catamaran

 This is a Quarantine house used for when the slaves wer new arrivals to Curacao.  They were kept here for two months before being sold.

 This water was 12 meters deep  UNBELIEVABLE!

Wonderful day today, on a catamaran and snorkling tour.  The water was so so clear.  Unbelievable!  What a treasure! 

Dec 03 2010

This is one of the fish Dad caught.  For some reason, it would hurt the skin to touch it, therefore the towel.

This is the boat dad was very excited about going on.  He actually went on the one beside it.  Not so exciting, but he paid $40.00 as opposed to $1200.00 and still caught some fish, although not the tuna he was slightly promised.  Even the computer would not accept the picture he took of the other one.

 Clear clear water.  You could see the bottom and it was about 40 feet.

 Oh vat is dat beauty!

 Dat ook!

Playing a very competetive game of bocce ball!

 The second sunset we've been able to see.

This is seconds before the sun disappeared behind the clouds.  We had to take a "time out" in the bocce ball game.

Just some more pictures for you, the night time view

December 2 2010

Dad is off fishing this morning.  Hope he has a great time.  The weather looks really good so, hope he catches something. (a fish that is).  Here is a post that is against my better judgement but it's good for a laugh.  ( I hope)  Here are a couple of pictures but they deserve some explanation.  I complain of "armpit boobs"  When I lay down, they disappear into my armpits, but with some encouragement, I posed for "non armpit boobs.   After \i did this I then see you don't get the explanation til later, Oh well, sucks to be me!

December 1 2010

This cute little bird couple joined us for breakfast this morning!

The water is unbelievably clear!

We had a reservation for 1:00 to ride the hobbie cat but the boys decided to have lunch!  Then it rained, so now we're waiting for 2:30!  Hope the weather cooperates.

 The cruise ship in the background is in the port of Wilemstad.  We're very close to the city.

 This a trapeze at the hotel.  There are shows everyday weather permitting.

The first of December and we're spending it at the beach!  And it's warm!

A sunny day!

After days and days of rain yesterday was absolutely beautiful!  We wandered around and explored a lot.  We came here for rest and relaxation and that's just what it's been!  There is not a whole lot to do here, but we've had a blast just hanging out at the hotel and participating in the games here.  It seems as though there is at least one cruise ship every day!  The competition for people to get you into the stores is incredible.  We went on a mission the other day to find dad a watch.  We were solicited into this one store, they had the theory of divide and conquer.  Little did they know these are the Dekens they were dealing with.  The gentleman took dad to see the watches and the woman took me to see the rings. I said well actually I'm not interested in any rings, I'm happy with the ones I have, but within seconds, there was a ring on my finger and seconds later another.  I'm not really interested in rings I repeated and walked over to your dad who WAS interested in the watches.  They were very nice.  Guess watches.  He was trying several on.  I (thought) I whispered, Leroy I can't handle the high pressure, to which the gentleman replied " Oh no pressure ma'am.  Yeah right.  But the price did drop DRAMATICALLY!  Your dad said, well just let us go outside and talk about it.  Of course they thought oh yeah right, they're gone!  But your dad returned, because it was a great price.  As I'm writing this, I sure hope I'm not repeating myself.
Dad and I participated in a game last night, hoping to win something but alas it was not to be AGAIN!!  The girl was quite difficult to understand.  All I knew about the question is that she wanted a number, and it was about Michael Jackson.  (I thought it was hit songs or  records)  I kept saying numbers , she'd saw higher or lower, only to find out the question was "How many NOSEJOBS did Michael Jackson have?"  Well guys, I now know it is EIGHT!
I hope you are all proud of me I haven't checked my crops in a long time either!  Restraint, restraint, restraint.  If dad goes to play poker though, it will be Frontiering as usual.
We went on an adventure to find a holed-em table yesterday.  It was a success but the tables don't sit until the evening.  I'm trying to talk your dad into it.  I really would like this trip paid for, and it would be a lot of fun for him.  I'm sure he would have no problem lightening some pockets. 
Well as per usual, this is probably way too long, but if you're still reading, have a great day, keep smiling, and remember the mother ship's famous words, Even though I'm not watching, God is!!!"  Love to you all, can't wait to at least hear your voices soon!

what dad does when mom shopping

you guys want pictures the only time i get the camrea is when mom goes into a store  and look at what see yes chels and keri and curt look what i found        now think        dad

Another Day Out on the Town

Today we went on an adventure to try find Dad a Hold=em Table.  An adventure it was, two busses and an aweful long walk, but we did indeed find one, only to find out the tables sit at 8:00 p.m.  We were there at 12:00 noon.  Oh well  another day.  At least he knows where they are!

This was a most beautiful bird.  The song it sang was just as beautiful.  It was a little bigger than a robin.  For those who enjoy birds ( no beaking or pun intended.)  Hope you can find out for us what it is.

This was a nativity scene on the other side from Willemstad.

Maybe in another picture you can see the climbing wall, this is the scene from our balcony, one of the entertainers climbed to the top and is saluting us!

Until later!

Otrabande (one of the spellings must be correct!

The view from our room

Parking Wars Curacao style

 Some of the Entertainment Crew. They are amazing!

Seems to be at least two cruise ships everyday!  Thousands of extra people in the town.  The place thrives on tourism.

Part two

The story of the nicely painted buildings goes as follows.  At one time all of the buildings were white.  The govenor complained to the townspeople that he got a headache from all the white buildings when the sun shone on them.   His residence is the yellow building in a past post, with the tablets on them.  He then ordered that all the buildings be painted various colors.  Later it was found to be true that the Govenor himself owned the paint factory.  So although he made a bundle, the townsfolk were not too happy with him.  Cute story hey?

Wilemstad from Otreband I don't know what's up but again having trouble posting pics.  What I wouldn't do for a computer savy offspring to help me here.  Will try again later!

An Afternoon in Otrabande

Had a nice and sunny day today, visited a museum and walked the streets on the other side of Wilemstad.  Pictures won't load, will try again later.  Had a fair bit of sun today and cleaned up on the pool side games!  Found some more local shops.  It's amazing that when you just walk a few short blocks in, in the city, the prices drop dramatically.  Got some good deals, and some souvenirs at payable prices.  Should only be one more day of rain, and the sun should hit!  Can't wait for that.  We did have a snorkelling excursion planned for tomorrow, but it is cancelled because of weather.   Oh well, can't win them all.  When it does rain, it is short lived and the temperature is quite warm. 

Partly cloudy with a chance of showers..............

Being here reminds me a lot of the BVLD weather report, in the summer, "partly sunny with a chance of showers," in the winter "partly sunny with a chance of flurries."  Therefore all is covered in once sentence.  Got up this morning thinking it would be a beautiful day, but within minutes, there was the downpour.  Oh well, you can't buy weather.  For us it's only a minor inconvenience.  For the folk here, it's a real problem.  By Wednesday it's to be beautiful, fo we'll just hope for it then.
 Dad tried to be a bit of a rebel last night.  We've been seeing these "fish" swimming towards the light at the dock.  His "plan" was to steal a big net used for cleaning the pool when no one was watching and scoop up a couple of them.  At the last second he was busted so so much for that.  We'll try again another time.  They look like eel.  A man at the beach had a "fish book".  Kind of reminded of someone in our family and their "bird book".  By the way, the birds here are so cute.  Would be wonderful for a bird watcher.  I'll sign off for now and post more later.  Breakfast time!  Love to you all!

Sunday November ???

Have had a great day so far.  One thing I've always wanted to do is go to a southern Baptist Church.  We had second best today!  We went to a little local church here today.  Everything was in English.  Everyone that walked warmly welcomed us.  Someone made sure we got a bulletin, another made sure we knew which hymnbook to use.  A lady came and asked us if we would sign the guestbook.  Well it didn't take long and I saw the guestbook make it's way to the reverend.  Sure enough, " a special and warm welcome to our visitors Leroy and Patricia Dekens for Canada, let's give them a warm round of applause, then a five minute speech on how we were welcome and then another round of applause".  It was so nice and heartwarming. After church someone offered us a ride back to our hotel, I really couldn't believe it!  We would do well to learn from them.  It was really nice.
After church we came back to the hotel to have some more croquettes and frikadellen.  What a way to round off the morning.  I forgot to say that the church service was two hours long, but that really didn't matter, Chelsey and Jonathan had got us a little warmed up to that fact! 
Well it is another overcast day today.  It has never rained this much here ever.  There are a lot of people with flooded homes and problems because of the rain.  So we really shouldn't complain.  But through the rain, it is still warm.  We are not wearing our winter get up, so we're not complaining.  We'll check in later through the day, if there's time of course!  If not, love you all.

Rain drops keep falling on our heads

Had a very low key day because the rain kept falling.  Regardless it was very relaxing.  We played some games, and went in the ocean.  It was quite nice actually.  Tomorrow we really hope to make it to the church down the road.  Should be fun.  Anyway, hope you enjoy the pictures.  The one is really funny, there is a sign and plaque that says something like, this plaque is to commemorate that on such and such a day, absolutely nothing happened!  Enjoy!

Wilemstad

This is where we DID have lunch!  Dad, croquetten, me Frikandelen!