Off to Europe!

Well, under 24 hours until Katie and I take off for Europe. We fly through Toronto and then into Frankfurt. We land at 7:00am Christmas morning. Our plan is to spend Christmas and the following day with Katie's sister Kelly and visit a Christmas market in the North of France. Then the fun begins.
On the 27th we all fly from Brussels to Barcelona. After three days we head to Rome to ring in the New Year. After Rome we wrap up with 3 days on London and then take the train back to Brussels and eventually to Kelly's.
We are so excited and as you know, I will be taking a ton of pictures to share with everyone.
Merry Christmas everyone and I will touch base with you after we return on the 8th.

Take care.

Annual Holiday Blog

Here goes, the annual holiday blog. This has now become my tradition to let all of you know what is going on in my life. This year I thought I would summarize my year in a poem, enjoy.

Twas the night before Christmas and all through my head
Danced images and memories of the year that was at end
The time flying by and the days moving fast
Made me stop and think about the year that has past
I think back to a year filled with challenges and victories
From work, to school, to swimming… oh the stories
I finished my MBA, yes, that’s two masters to date
With hopes of that corner office with a view one day
The swim season was amazing, full of fast times and wins
We dethroned some champs and made our mark felt with our swims
My sixth year in the books, oh how the times flies
My passion keeps growing, that I cannot deny
The work front has changed, a new role I will tackle
I am scared, nervous, and excited about the new obstacle
My life is amazing, the people, my family and friends
I cannot deny that I am blessed beyond end
Thank you for your enrichment and joy you add to my life
Many wishes for a Merry Christmas and a happy New Year’s Night

Thanks for the wonderful cards, pictures and updates from all. This Christmas is an exciting one. Katie and I will be joining her sister in Germany for a 15 day trek around Europe. I will miss my family, but was blessed to see the CA crew over Thanksgiving and then my mom, dad, Steve, Gretchen and Myles last week.

We are off next Friday. Wishing you all a wonderful season. Check back for updates from the trip.

Love you all.

Beth

San Diego- See Em, I told you I'd do it!

Over the Labor Day weekend, Katie and I travelled to San Diego to see Emily and Katie's family. It was great time as I had never been to San Diego before. We spent time at the beach, shopping and even had lunch with my old friend Shannon and her husband Marc. We went to the zoo with Emily and her sister, took the trolley around town with Katie's mom, and just relaxed at the pool .

We spent a day with Katie's mom at Old Town and La Joya. Some cool stuff, a haunted house, and bought some good old style candy, and ate some good breakfast every day! Below are some pics from the trip, it was a great one.

Where in the world???

I know, I know, where the hell have I been? Good question. You want the long version or the short version? Short version, I've been all over. Work, Swimming, a little vacation and more work. I spent 10 days in CA and AZ filming some new videos. I also go to attend a NASCAR race which was quite the experience. I also got to spend some time in CA over Thanksgiving with the little guys. I will have some pics of them soon. Then there was swimming. To say we had an amazing finish is an understatement. We swam our tails off at the state meet after qualifying someone in every event. After Friday night we had swimmers in 8 of 12 events. The coolest part was that our lowest seed going into the night was 4th. And we came out of the night not lower than 4th in any of those events. For the first time ever I had two state champions. Our 200 and 400 free relays won and our 400 free relay swam the second fastest time in state history. To say we were proud would be an understatement. We ended 4th as a team which is one spot lower than I wanted, but it was a 3 way battle for 2nd - 4th. We swam very well.
Work has been work. I took a new job within Polaris but have not started yet as I am wrapping up the last projects from my old role.
What's next?? After a couple more weeks of work, I will be off for my European vacation!! Katie, her sister and I will be off for a couple weeks of tooling around Europe. We will land in Frankfurt on Christmas morning and then start a 10 day trip to Barcelona, Rome and London. I am so excited for the trip!
I will do some more detailed blogs about the last few months, but wanted to give everyone a quick update of my life. Although I think I talk to almost everyone that reads this, but updating every once in a while is fun.
And of course, look for the new installment of the holiday blog coming soon......

True Team State

Last night was the True Team State Meet. Stillwater had won all 6 meets since its inception in 2004. They did not win a seventh. We were down by 32 going into the last relay and had trailed the entire meet. The closest we got was 12 points at one point. Right before the last heat we got the diving scores and with those added in we had taken a 9 point lead. We knew our relays were better than theirs and when all was said and done, 2,339 to 2,310. Our girls swam so fast, and raced so well. We were so proud, and a little shocked that we actually did it.

Not only did we dethrone Stillwater , but we scored the most points ever by a winning team in the 7 year history of the meet.

Wow is all I can say.

Did I tell you about the elephants?

I can't believe I never did a post about the elephants! After we went to check out the bridge between Zambia and Zimbabwe, we got one of the best parts of our trip. On the taxi ride there, we passed a herd of elephants hanging out on the side of the road. Our taxi driver said that if they were there on the way back, we could stop. Well we drove past the spot and did not see them, but luckily out my side of the car I spotted them back in some trees just off the road.

We were amazed at the size of these animals as they started to cross the road right in front of us.

The one bull elephants towered over the others and scared us so we were sure to keep our distance. These animals may be big, but they can move very quickly.

This is how close we got. It was close enough for me. African elephants are different from Asian elephants I that they have large tusks. We heard some stories of these animals attacking tourists who get to close, but also attacking other elephants who challenge their leadership in a herd. We were just fine this far away.

This was the bull elephant camped in the woods. What a cool thing to see, these amazing animals in their natural environment.

Myles' First Birthday Party

On September 8th, Myles Robert turned one year old! It has been a fast year for me, maybe not his parents. He is doing great. Crawling all over the place, loves to swim, A LOT! He will hold your hands and walk around. He is a smiley, happy guy.

Myles was very excited to see the candle lit on his cake, so much that he put out the flame with his hand instead of blowing it out. No harm done.

Myles loved all of the presents he got and I am sure has taken over the living room with his new toys.

Happy birthday Myles. And many, many more to come!

Love, Aunt Beth

Victoria Falls

Finally, the reason I went to Zambia in the first place, Victoria Falls. This place has been called on of the Seven Natural Wonders of the World, and I have to agree. The anticipation of seeing it and being able to go stand at the top of the falls was the pinnacle of my trip I could not wait for. I was not disappointed by the experience, and everyone in our group was in awe of the beauty of the falls.


We were able to stand at the very edge of the falls and look down. The amazing thing about the falls is that in two months, the area in the picture above will be bone dry. We were there in perfect time. The falls were not at their fullest, but it was still an amazing place to stand.

The other side of Livingstone Island was the other mile of the falls. We could not even see all of the falls due to the large spray put off by the massive waterfall.

We had to wear rain coats to avoid getting soaked by the spray and had to be barefoot due to the slippery rocks and mud. It was quite a trek around the island. Following the tour of the island and the falls we got to enjoy some tea and afternoon snacks. Another great adventure in Zambia.

The Lion Encounter

Our second full day in Zambia we hopped on another bus first thing in the morning to do the Lion Encounter. This program is helping to rebuild the African Lion population, that has been depleted by 75-80% over the last 30 years due to humans and poaching. This programs slowly releases lions into larger habitats and eventually will have cubs born from these lions we saw that will be released into the wild. Any lions that have had human interaction will not be released into the wild, but their offspring will be. It is a young program with great potential and I was glad to help them out by doing this great experience.

We got to take and hour walk in the bush with Besa and Bimba, two 8 month old sisters. And we got to get close with them. We pet them and watched them play in their habitat. It was pretty neat to be a part of.

I was the first one to get to pet the lions. They taught us before how to approach them, how to respond if they "looked" at us the wrong way, or how to react if they came towards us aggressively.

We were walking in the wild where earlier that morning rhinos and elephants were spotted right where we were walking.

An amazing experience that I will remember forever. What amazing animals.

Our Extreme Morning

We started our Zambia adventure by doing a half day abseil package. That meant we got picked up in a crazy open sided truck at our hotel, drove about 15 minutes and then met the guys who would have our lives in their hands for the next few hours.


We did an activity called the Flying Fox. We got harnessed up and then they told us to run until we hit the green line and then we had to dive!

I have to say it was pretty cool. We got to do it twice so we could get the feel for it the first time then really get a good run the second time. We flew high over the gorge. It was pretty cool. From there we went to rappel into the gorge. I had never rappelled before so the 30 second tutorial was great. They had us lean off the safe side of the platform in our harness and rope, he said sit back, now push off and release rope. Well I did a little but if I released any more I'd be on my behind on the dirt so I chose to just learn on the fly.

This was the scariest time for me. Leaning back over a 150 foot + drop scared me a lot. But I didn't look down and kept pushing off the wall until I hit rock bottom :)

All smiles at the bottom. After this we hiked over to do the Gorge Swing. But that will be a post on its own. I got some video of one of our group doing it and some great snapshots of me taking the plunge.

Thanks for checking in.... more to come from Zambia.

Sunset Cruise

Our first night in Zambia we opted to relax for the afternoon, have a drink and lunch on the patio and then hop on the hotel's boat for a sunset river cruise. It was a small but rowdy crowd on the boat. Our group of 6 grabbed the tables up front for an amazing view of the river, it's animals and the sunset.

Here are the Zambia 6 as we called ourselves..... not really, but it was a fun group to travel with.

We saw some crocodiles along the river, a monkey, some birds, but our favorite animal of the night was the hippo. These animals we learned are very dangerous and fast. They kill thousands of people every year in Africa and are not to be messed with. We saw about ten this night, including a mom and baby climbing out of the water after sundown. It was a truly cool thing to witness. The animals can stay under for 5 minutes at a time so it was hit and miss keeping track of them.

One of the best things of the cruise was free drinks! and a three course snack. This place did it right. We enjoyed the guide, Webster, who told us all about the river, the history and the animals. It was a great initiation to Zambia for our group.

Here is our great ride. We met some really cool people from the US and England. It was a wonderful first night. It let us relax, see some nature, and learn some culture and history about our host country.

We grabbed some dinner after the cruise and rested up for our extreme morning that was to come, but that is another blog.

Welcome to Zambia

After a short flight from Johannesburg we arrived in Livingstone, Zambia. We waited for 15 minutes in line to pay $50 for our visa. Our bags were waiting for us and so was our shuttle driver. He informed us we had about a 25 minute drive to the hotel. We were pumped to be here and ready for some time off of work.

While at the airport I thought it would be a good idea to get some local currency, although we were not aware o the conversion rate versus the dollar. I went to the ATM and saw that my options were 10,000, 20,000, 50,000 or 100,000 +. Knowing it was a tourist town I was timid to get 100,000 so I opted for 20,000. One one of the guys I was with had an iPhone and he pulled up the currency converter. After a minute of waiting and some nerves about how much money I might have just taken out of my account, he informed me that I had just taken out $4.12. The lucky thing was that Zambia accepted US dollars, Euros, South African Rand, and more. It was a very easy country to get around in, sight see and shop. English is the native language and there is little corruption and crime. We felt safe the entire time we were there.

We arrived at our hotel and were greeter with a hand washing and a refreshing beverage while we got checked in.

We got checked in and took in some views of the hotel and the surrounding area. It was a beautiful lodge type hotel, with great rooms, great decks and great views. Oh, an some of the best drinks and food I have ever found at a hotel. All in all it was a great find for our hotel. It was located in the heart of a national park so we were advised to not go outside the fence around the hotel after 6pm. Elephant, hippos and more were known to be found in the area around the hotel. It was such a neat experience to know that these animals were all around us and we were truly in their world. Here's some pics of our hotel.



Well that's it for tonight. I have at least 5 or 6 more blogs to do from my trip to Zambia. I am excited to share the rest of my journey with you. Check back soon!

Sun City Resort, South Africa

The hotel we stayed at in South Africa was amazing. It was close to being Las Vegas in the middle of South Africa. It had multiple hotels, casinos, meeting rooms, and of course a wave pool and water slides. It was a great place with amazing animals (monkeys and baboons lived on site) and beautiful golf courses and activities near by. Here are some pictures of the hotel, and some fun we got to have the last day before we left for Zambia.

The monkeys and baboons were all over the property. The baboons scour the terraces and decks of the hotels and break in through windows or open sliding doors. They eat the food in the mini fridges and then move on to the next room. A few people returned to their rooms to find a baboon in there. Luckily I was not one of them. Good stories to tell after, not so much during the encounters though. No harm done, just some peanut M&M's missing.

Some Great Features of the Hotel. Site of our opening social hour.

We did play a little at the end....

The golf course and the property.

Next stop..... ZAMBIA!

South Africa and Beyond

I am sitting in the airport on my way to Amsterdam and then home. It has been a tremendous trip and I have so much to share with all of you. I only took about 800 pictures so I won the bet of over/under 2,000.

The meeting in Sun City, South Africa was amazing. The best part was an early morning game drive we went on in Pilanesburg National Park. We got to see a bull elephant up close, lots of rhinos and their offspring, warthogs, a couple hippos, wildebeests, zebras, and a lot more. It was a cold morning, but a great way to start my true Africa experience.

Here are some pics from drive.

And to tease you, this is just the beginning of the wonderful world of Africa and it's many treasures I encountered once I arrived in Zambia... but that is another post.... or ten!!

All I can say is that I WILL be coming back to Africa again, and I invite any of you to join me. It is an amazing land of beauty, animals, people and places. I look forward to the next adventure. For now, look forward to more blogs about all of our activities once we got to Zambia.