2014 In the Rear View Mirror

I can’t believe that I retired over 2 years ago. When this August 1st came along, I didn’t even realize that it was my retirement anniversary until I remembered it a week or so later. As I did last year, I wanted to share a review of 2014.

Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, or Happy whatever-holiday-tradition-you-follow!

Early 2014

We brought in the New Year in Fort Collins with our boys (Cameron and Ryan). We got to learn more about Fort Collins and spent some quality time with the boys. Cameron and I skied Breckenridge and had a great time.

Horsetooth Reservoir

Cameron skiing

In February, we returned to Florida with much warmer weather than we had experienced in Colorado. We took some day trips a couple hours away to visit Port St. Joe, Apalachicola, and Cape San Blas. I spent my time fishing and golfing on warm days.

Cape San Blas

Sunset on Scenic 30A

Spring 2014

For Spring Break, we returned to Fort Collins.  Now that it was warming up a bit, we were able to hike and cycle the numerous scenic trails.

Cycling the Poudre Trail

Hiking Fort Collins

We also got out and explored the Fort Collins breweries. While visiting the local brew houses, we met some new friends (Doug and Julie) — they are also into craft breweries.

Pateros Creek Brewery

Tour of Funkwerks

Summer 2014

Our youngest son, Ryan, decided that he wanted to take the summer off and transfer from Colorado State University to the University of Florida. Since he was taking the summer off, we decided to travel to Europe for the summer. Our oldest son, Cameron, was working during the summer, so he stayed in Ft. Collins. This was the first time we had traveled with Ryan since we retired, it was a great way to spend the summer.

Paris, France

We spent 2 weeks in Paris, renting a small apartment just down the street from the Arch de Triomphe. We explored all that the city had to offer, visiting all of the major attractions and taking excursions to the French country side, visiting wineries and chateaus.

Chateau De Chenonceau

Chateau

Eiffel Tower

Spain

After leaving Paris, we flew to Barcelona, Spain.  We stayed in Spain for about a month and was able to visit Montserrat and Costa Brava.

Costa Brava

Montserrat

Park Guell in Barcelona Spain

Barcelona Beach

Our Spain trip was scheduled around the Running of the Bulls in Pamplona, where we had front row seats from a balcony overlooking the festival. It was incredibly fun.

Ryan all dressed up

Running of the Bulls

We capped off our visit to Spain by visiting Valencia, Madrid, Laguardia, and Bilbao.

Valencia Spain

Flamenco Dancing in Madrid

Laguardia Spain

Incredible castle view – Laguardia Spain

Italy

After leaving Spain, we headed to Italy. We started our travels in northern Italy, visiting Milan and Lake Como.

Duomo in Milan

Lake Como

Lake Como

From here, we headed to the Italian Riviera which was probably our favorite area of Italy.

Vernazza

Monterosso

Italian Riviera – Monterosso

After leaving the Italian Riviera, we headed south to Rome, Tuscany, Pompeii and Capri. The blue grotto in Capri was stunning.

Rome

Tuscany

Pompeii

Capri

Blue Grotto

Portugal

Our final stop in Europe was in Portugal. We did not stay here very long but in hindsight, we should have stayed a few more days to take it all in.

Lisbon Portugal

Lisbon Portugal

Fall 2014

After Europe, we spent about a month in Fort Collins then headed back to Florida. Ryan came back with us so that he could take a Physics class as he awaited his acceptance to the University of Florida.

Ryan and I decided to challenge ourselves to cycle 50 miles on the bicycle (I did the challenge in 2013 but he wanted to try it as well). He and I trained hard and completed a 45 mile and 50 mile ride a week apart. We finished the 50 miles in just 3 hours, 45 minutes quicker than when I did it by myself in 2013.

With the great weather we’ve had in Florida since our return, we’ve been boating, swimming, fishing, and spending lots of time outside. It has been fun having Ryan with us for a few months. He starts at the University of Florida in January so we will miss him.

Huge Jelly Fish

Gliders on the beach

End of 2014

We are spending December in Florida. Cameron and Ryan will be here for Christmas so we will get to spend some great family time together.

In the Fall, we purchased a piece of land pretty close to the beach in Inlet Beach (about a mile from where we live today). We are planning to build a home on the lot, hopefully beginning in the Spring or early Summer.

We haven’t planned our next travel adventure yet, but we will definitely take a trip somewhere in 2015. Maybe Greece, Malta, Ireland, Norway, Sweden, or Finland? Not sure, but they all sound great!

Slideshow of our Spain Trip

Summer is coming to an end so I wanted to pass along some of the pictures we took while in Spain this Summer.  Simply click the slideshows below and ready your dancing shoes — you will experience an electric slide of pictures.

Barcelona

We hung out in Barcelona for a little over a week, visiting Montserrat and Coasta Brava during our trip. Barcelona has lots to offer, from Gaudi-inspired architecture to incredible coastal views just north in Coasta Brava. Enjoy the slideshow.

Valencia

We boarded a train and in just over 2 hours we arrived in Valencia, directly south of Barcelona. As soon as we arrived, it felt like we were on a beach vacation. The vibe was more laid back, the prices were lower and seafood restaurants dominated the seaside boardwalk. We only stayed here a couple of days but I could see spending lots more time in Valencia.

Madrid

We visited Madrid for just 2 days but it happened to land on our youngest son’s (Ryan) birthday. To celebrate his birthday, we scheduled a Flamenco dance show and it turned out to be one of our favorite events of our trip.

Lagrono and La Rioja

We had heard that La Rioja was the Tuscany of Spain and it was true. It had rolling hills and was dotted with award winning wineries. The wineries here are small and mostly family owned. It was the first time we have ever tasted wine right out of the wine vat — and it was a treat.

Bilbao and the Guggenheim Museum

On our way to Pamplona to see the Running of the Bulls, we had an extra 2 days to kill so we dropped by Bilbao to see the Guggenheim Museum. It was the most contemporary museum we visited on our European trip with an incredible exhibit that was an audio experience like no other. It was filmed in an old mansion and had 8 wall-sized screens showing a different musician playing their part of a song that came together as a harmonic experience that involved all the senses.

Running with the Bulls in Pomplona

Our entire trip to Spain centered around the week in Pomplona where the Running of the Bulls takes place. Most of us are familiar with this Spanish tradition so it was a real treat to witness it first-hand. It reminded us of New Orleans during Mardi Gras — a festive atmosphere with people partying all hours of the day and night.

2013 in the Rear View Mirror

2013 – A year of travels and self discovery

The end of the year always brings reflection, a habit I developed when running our business. For us, 2013 was the first full year of retirement, traveling and self discovery. With our year-end travels, we were not able to send out Christmas cards this year, so hopefully this will suffice in lieu of cards for friends that follow our blog. Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, or Happy whatever-holiday-tradition-you-follow!

Early 2013

After spending last Christmas 2012 with our boys (Cameron and Ryan), we started out 2013 by moving Cameron from Maine to Colorado. After a semester at the University of Maine, Cameron missed Colorado and wanted to spend his college years at CSU in Fort Collins, Colorado. That suited us, as Ryan was already enrolled there.

Ryan, Cameron and I flew to Maine, cleared out his dorm and made the 3 day trek from Maine to Colorado. We were packed into his Ford Mustang like sardines, sharing the backseat with half of his belongings.  Not the most comfortable ride across country, but we spent a lot of quality time talking, joking and just having fun. We rotated driving duties, so we only had to drive about 2 hours at a time — a cool way to travel. Lynn met us in Colorado and we moved Cameron into his new apartment and he enrolled in college.

After returning to Florida, I spent my time fishing and golfing on warm dry days. Fishing in the bay was great, a friend (Tom Helderlie) and I caught lots of red fish. We had plenty of cold days that brought on the first bout of boredom since I retired so I decided to start working on a new software project, discussed in my March 2013 blog.

Spring 2013

In February, Lynn and I talked about traveling again. We had an epiphany — what if we rented our condo to fund more travel. Getting the condo ready for the rental season was a bit of a chore, but by early March, it was fully rented for Spring break. So we hit the road again by visiting our boys in Colorado, then on to California. In California, we spent several days in Napa Valley, learning more about wines than ever before.

Red wines fermenting

Then we were off to Sequoia National Park, the home of some the biggest redwoods in the  world. I was literally in awe of the size of these trees.

Huge redwoods

Sequoia National Park

Lynn and I had seen lots of Ansel Adams photography but had never visited one his most photographed subjects — Yosemite National Park. We took the chance to take some of our photos that could never rival his.

Yosemite National Park

Yosemite National Park

Before we left for California, a friend (Craig Bromley) mentioned that we had to visit Big Sur and the Sonoma coast. We tasted wine in Sonoma, visited Big Sur, the Hearst Castle, and spent a few days in San Francisco — what a cool town.

Point Reyes National Park

Iconic Golden Gate Bridge

We ended our trip by taking in a Criss Angel show in Las Vegas.  That was my first trip Las Vegas, so we also took that time to visit the Hoover Dam.

Hoover Dam

Las Vegas

After traveling for a little over a month, we returned to Florida. April and May in Florida is very nice. Warm days, cool waters, and almost no crowds. On nice days, I fished and golfed as much as I could.

Right outside our door in Florida

On cool or rainy days, I continued to work on my new software project (aMemoryJog). I wanted to have a solid business plan and software prototype before summer and I was able to accomplish that.

Summer 2013

By the start of Summer, our condo was fully rented for the season so we jetted off on our next adventure. We decided to spend some time with our boys in Colorado, then visit the Grand Tetons and Yellowstone National Park. We saw more mountains, wildlife, lakes, streams, geysers, hot springs and mudpots than you can imagine (I almost said “than you can shake a stick at” but I visualized Lynn rolling her eyes as she read it).

Hot Springs

Old Barn on Morman Row

Jenny Lake

We then made our way to Oregon — starting in central Oregon and stopping to see Crater Lake — simply spectacular. Then we headed to the coast (Cannon Beach) — we had spent a weekend here when our boys were really young, but this time we spent a week really exploring this area.

Crater Lake, Oregon

Haystack Rock  – Cannon Beach

Oregon Coast

Our journey then took us to Washington.  We started in Seabrook, Washington, a town fashioned after the movie “The Truman Show”. It is an idyllic town, reminding me of Seaside, Florida.

Seabrook, Washington

Seabrook, Washington

Lynn and I briefly lived in Seattle Washington when our kids were young but never spent a full summer there. Most of you know that Seattle is miserable during the winter, autumn and spring — it rains constantly. The summer, however, is another story. So we visited the Olympic National Park then headed for Seattle for a couple of weeks. It was spectacular. We discovered a new found appreciation for Seattle’s beauty.

Ruby Beach

Kestner Homestead Trail

Kestner Homestead Trail

Space Needle

Seattle

Mount Rainier

We then journeyed to Victoria, British Columbia, Canada.  There we explored the city and saw Butchart Gardens — probably the most beautiful gardens we had seen. Victoria is a cool town with lots of history. We learned more about Canada than we ever did in school.

Butchart Gardens

Victoria, British Columbia, Canada

Leaving Victoria, we headed for a 3 week trip to Vancouver, British Columbia and Whistler. Vancouver is a really cool town, probably one of the coolest towns I’ve ever visited. It is trendy, has lots of great restaurants, is a waterfront community, and has tons of biking and hiking trails. The city looks similar to Hong Kong, with high rise apartments and condos on each block. Stanley Park is an incredible park — reminds me of Central Park in New York.

Vancouver BC Canada

Whistler BC Canada

It was also here that I started experimenting with meditation. It really helps calm the mind, I highly recommend it if you have not tried it. I also accomplished a challenging hike called “The Grind“.  It is a 2,800 foot mountain climb that is nicknamed “Nature’s StairMaster“.  I summited in just over 1.5 hours and found a new confidence by completing it.  After finishing this hike, I pledged to train for a 50-mile bike ride upon our return to Florida.

Warning: Not for Wimps!

The final leg of our Summer trip took us to Alaska. We spent 2 weeks cruising Alaska and visiting Mount McKinley. We visited Ketchikan, Juneau, Skagway, Glacier Bay, and then onto a land tour in Denali National Park. During this time, we visited breweries, took a helicopter ride up to mountain glacier, rode a dog sled across a glacier, and visited the iconic Glacier Bay — watching glaciers as they crashed into the sea.

Glacier Bay

Alaska Landscapes

Fall 2013

Returning from over 3 months of Summer travel, we made our way back to Florida.  This was mid-August and the weather was hot and humid.  There were still crowds during some weeks and some weeks were quiet.  It was a great time to catch up with our Florida friends, share dinners and play golf.

Rosemary Beach, Florida

At the same time, I decided to begin working on my next challenge — training for a half century bike ride (50 miles).   After 6 weeks of training, I accomplished my goal and lost 1o pounds during the process. I also became passionate about bike riding and am still riding each week.

Training for a Half Century

October and November were more mild with some really beautiful days. We spent weekends watching Bama kick butt in the SEC (until Auburn humbled us) and with the usual ups and downs of watching Dallas Cowboys football. Our boys came to Florida for Fall break and we spent Thanksgiving with the Miller family. My brother and his wife graciously had the entire family over for an incredible meal. Thanks Chris and Danielle!

Also during this time, I committed myself to finishing the first phase of my new software project and before we left for our next set of travels, I had accomplished that goal and blogged about it in early December.

End of 2013

We are spending December and January in Colorado with our boys. In fact, we rented a place in Fort Collins so that we can spend more time there in 2014. It is surprising how much we missed Colorado since we moved almost 2 years ago. Upon returning, we’ve been eating in our favorite restaurants, biking the Fort Collins trails and learning our way around the city. We plan to get some ski days in during January.

Our journey to Colorado started rough. We decided to leave a day early because there was a huge snow storm coming to Arkansas and Oklahoma.  On our first day, our car broke down in Birmingham, so we spent 2 days waiting for parts and getting it fixed. On the third day we made our way to Arkansas where it started sleeting. The next day was spent trudging through the snow storm, slowly making our way through Arkansas, Oklahoma and Kansas. White knuckle driving for a day, but we made it through the storm the next day and it was smooth sailing after that.

As I sit writing this blog, it is December 22.  The snow is falling outside, it is cold, and the boys, Lynn and I will be having dinner together tonight followed by playing board games.  What a wonderful life.

Central Oregon: Mountains, Cool Towns, and Wine

Cruising Around Oregon

Cruising around Central Oregon for over a week has been a blast.  It offers a bit of everything. Cool towns, awesome landscapes, the most beautiful lake in the universe, incredible sand dunes, and a respectable wine country.

For a slide show of this trip, click here: http://www.webetripping.com/Gallery_USA_OR_CentralOregon.asp.

Bend, Oregon

We started our week in Bend, Oregon.  Bend is a hip town where bicycles are as common as cars, people are friendly, and the landscape is rich.  On Sunday, the Old Mill area had live bands playing and lots of people kayaking on the river and enjoying the day.

Bend Oregon

Bend Oregon

This area has a volcanic history.  There are lots of buttes caused by ancient volcanic eruptions.  We zipped up to the top of Lava Butte, just one of their buttes created by lava.  From here, we had a spectacular view of the surrounding area.

Have you ever experienced a Lava Tube? We first learned about them on our trip to Ecuador. Lava tubes are formed when lava travels beneath the surface of the ground, expelled by a volcano during an eruption.  As the hot lava leaves, it creates an underground tunnel, similar to a cave.  Below is an example of a lava tube we saw in Bend. It is actually a mile long. There were no lights inside, so we took our flashlights and stumbled our way through.

Bend Oregon

Crater Lake

Upon leaving Bend, we journeyed to Crater Lake — the most beautiful lake in the universe.  When I sat on the edge of the cliff that surrounds the lake, it almost felt like a spiritual experience.  I felt one with nature and the serenity of the lake.  It is hard to explain unless you experience it for yourself.  As you can see below, I took tons of pictures, but all fell short of doing it justice.

Crater Lake, Oregon

Crater Lake, Oregon

Crater Lake, Oregon

Crater Lake, Oregon

Crater Lake, Oregon

Crater Lake, Oregon

Crater Lake, Oregon

Crater Lake, Oregon

We wanted to take a boat to Wizard Island, the small island inside the lake. However, it is still not considered Summer so there was too much snow to get down to the launch point.

Not yet Summer in Crater Lake

Oregon Caves National Monument

We trekked on to Oregon Caves National Monument and had a great tour of the cave.  It was discovered in the early 1900’s by a hunter whose dog chased a bear into the cave.  Following after his dog, he discovered the cave and brought national attention to it until it was later dubbed a National Monument.

Oregon Caves

Oregon Caves

Riding the Oregon Dunes

One of the funnest things we’ve done so far is to take a dune buggy ride on the massive Oregon Dunes.  The dunes span over 40 miles of the Oregon coast.   For a nominal fee, you can get a hands-on tour of the dunes by dune buggy.  These things go fast.  They accelerate to 50 or 60 miles an hour in a few seconds.  The driver would go straight up a high dune and turn in on a dime and zoom back down the hill.  Exhilarating and just great fun.  Lynn loved it too.   At the end of the ride, you had sand in places you never knew you could get sand in.  Enough said :).

On the Dune Buggy

So much fun!

Running down the dunes

Dune and lake views

Massive dunes

Oregon Wine Country

Willamette Valley Oregon is home to some of the best Pinot Noir wines in the country.  We took a day and toured several wineries just outside of Salem, Oregon.  The Pinot’s were the star but we also stumbled onto some pretty good Riesling.  The cost of the tastings were reasonable – only $5.  Compare that to Napa Valley whose price is normally $20 per tasting.

On our way to the wineries, we stopped by and saw the University of Oregon (go Ducks!) and Oregon State (how ’bout them Beavers!).

Cubanismo – Cuban winemaker

RedHawk – great Pinot Noir

St. Innocence – a larger winery

St. Innocence – a larger winery

Oregon Wineries

The Left Coast Winery

The Left Coast Winery

Oregon Wineries

Oregon Wineries

Portland Oregon

Our final stop before heading to the Oregon coast was Portland.  It is a bit more of an industrial city than I expected.  It is a town of hipsters and free thinkers.  If you have not heard of hipsters, they are a group of younger adults that like alternative music, prefer organic vegetarian or vegan food, and have a fashion sense that is not considered mainstream (normally wear plaid shirts, retro glasses and hats).   Portland is haven for hipsters.  There is a TV show called Portlandia that spoofs hipsters.  I find them cool and groovy :).

We happened to be in Portland when a parade was going on, so we got to see a little of it.  They also had a naked bike ride that took place on the last night we were there.   Imagine the saddle sores you could get doing that (sorry for that visual).  Not my thing, but to each his own :).

Portland, Oregon

Portland, Oregon

Portland, Oregon

Powell’s Books is supposed to be the biggest bookstore in the country. Who knew?

Portland, Oregon

Driving the Sonoma Coast

The Sonoma Coast is north of San Francisco, about a 4 hour slow ride along scenic highway 1.   We began our trip at Bodega Bay — this is where Alfred Hitchcock shot the iconic film “The Birds“.  There is not much evidence that the movie was shot here but you can recognize the area.  As you can see below, the coast is beautiful.

The Sonoma Coast

As we drove the twisting roads along the coast, it reminded me of Maui, Hawaii.  If you have ever driven the road to Hana and kept driving past Hana to the other side of the island, it looks a lot like this.  You will see cows sunbathing and enjoying the day.

Cows on the coast

Cows on the coast

After about 4 hours, we made our way to Point Arena to see the famous Arena Lighthouse.  As you can see, the views are incredible.

Point Arena

Point Arena

Point Arena – Ski Jacket and Flip Flops!

Point Arena

Point Arena

Point Arena

As we made our way towards the Sonoma wine country, we saw a lot of really cool farms.

Cool farms

Cool farms

After an hour on a long and winding road, we made it to the Navarro winery.  This is a cool winery that has some great white and red wines.  When we got there, we were famished, so we bought some wine and cheese and had a little picnic.

Navarro Winery

Navarro Winery

Picnic at Navarro Winery

Navarro Winery

Our final stop for the day was Yorkville Cellars, a winery that uses sheep to groom their grass and fertilize the grapes.  I don’t think I’ve ever seen sheep in a vineyard before but hey, if it works…

Sheep providing fertilizer

Yorkville Cellars