Mother Racer

This trip to Africa (Tanger-city) was a last minute decision (last night over dinner) and we were so happy to have agreed to go!!! It was not in our budget but we figured, it would be a long long time or maybe never again that we would be out here again. So for 67 euro round trip, we took a ferry to Africa…

It was absolutely amazing!!! Probably one of my favorite places to visit here on our trip (entertainment wise). We didn’t have too much time but we were able to fit in camel riding. I never thought I would be doing this! … 😉

We were shocked to see my mom get on one! We drove/walked around the city, which was absolutely beautiful…

The people here were so nice and it was very interesting learning about their culture (their religion, the different types of clothing & it’s meaning, & their way of life). Very friendly!

We walked past the school there… Things are the same wherever you go to. 😉

The food was amazing and so cheap!!! Our guide was excellent… I just wish we had more time here. I did lose 35 euros here (about $50 American money)! 😦 But what do you do… Borrow money from everyone else to pay the tour guide. 🙂

On the Ferry back to Spain… I had a blast. My mom, sisters and I played games, laughed, talk about everything…

… Very eventful! 😉 They did wake up towards the end of the ride… I guess in the car ride home I fell asleep and my sisters took a good picture of me. Payback! Well we made it back to Keri’s house… It is now packing time. Bitter sweet!!! I miss Corom and the girls so much but this has been so much fun visiting 4 countries-2 continents! We packed while Steve made dinner… There is so much stuff that we needed to pack… We then played games & had s’mores. Fun times!!!

Keri received a text from our tour guide… He retraced the places we went to until he found my money! Sooo nice. So nice of the guy that picked it up to be honest about it. There is no way for me to get it back so I told my sister to put it towards her next trip when she uses this guy again. That was a nice surprise!

Friday: I slept in this morning (until 7:30) and then went out for a 37:56.56 minute run. I was planning on getting 5 miles in… Another beautiful morning!

Today we went to the oldest European city, Cadiz, Spain. It was beautiful and we had a blast…

Some things we laughed so hard… One is my little sister just peeing anywhere and everywhere!!! Another is all the people posing everywhere, cats everywhere with random people feeding all the strays…

We headed down to the beach just a block away from Keri’s house. We found so many shells!!! It was nice to walk around in the sand with no shoes on…

We did movie night with the kids…

… And then it was bed time!!!

Saturday: All week long it has been so hard for me to get out and go running but once I get going it ends up being very pleasant. Today was more of a struggle. I do have to admit that the 2:20.35 minute run went by faster than I thought it would. It was still a struggle to be somewhere where I had to stay somewhat close to my sisters house for fear of getting lost. So the “20” miles (which I hope I ran 20 miles in that time) that I ran was all near my sister’s house. It was a beautiful morning, though!

I was so happy to see this place!!! Yes it is my sister’s house…

Soon after getting back we all left for my nephew’s soccer game and then to my nieces horse lessons…

Parking is crazy here! Try to get out of this one… Corom would love it! Good thing Steve was driving… He did say this was very common and that is what bumpers are made for…

We did walk around the city of Rota… Another beautiful city in Spain!

Steve was able to get us on the U.S. Military Base. We drove around for most of it but I loved it!!! It really was a neat experience to see where he works and to see a lot of the different auxiliaries. Our military is simply amazing!!! There were some things we couldn’t take pictures of.

We then headed to Arcos de la Frontera. Soo pretty!!! Loved this little city!

We ran into a young gentlemen there with owls and hawks that we were able hold…

On our way home, Steve backed into a pole and Keri got our car load lost… We took quit the 45 minute detour. 🙂 We even got off the off ramp and began to get on an on ramp… She pulled a grandpa and put it in reverse back down the on ramp… It’s all good, though… We made it home! 🙂

Trina, Steve & the kids realized they didn’t have a way in to the house. They sat outside waiting for us (missy, Keri, my mom and I) to get home. After about 40 minutes of waiting, Steve realized the house keys were in his car the whole time… Stinks to be them! 😉 The kids ate s’mores and after they were done, us adults went out to dinner (at 9:30 p.m…. So late here!). The bottom picture was an appetizer we had. 🙂

A fun, busy day! Lots of laughing and goofing off!

It was a great morning for a run along the boardwalk! A head wind coming back but it was worth it. So beautiful here in Spain! I feel so fortunate to be able to enjoy the early morning scenery before our “day” starts.

I did run for 1:11.09. I wanted 8 miles so I know I for sure got that in. I did finish off with 4 strides up and down my sister’s street. After getting ready we headed into San Lucar, a little shopping area. We ate, shopped, went through the fish market (it was a little stinky) :/…

… Went through a store that my kids would absolutely go crazy in…

… Yes a big candy store (good thing I was full)… I didn’t buy as much as I would have! We went to both of my nephew’s soccer practice…(my sister, missy, got stuck on the railing and couldn’t get off of it- pretty funny)!

… then went to a cafe to get churros and hot chocolate. Soo good. I swear I have eaten so much this vacation!!!

Once again, we went out on the town to do more “shopping”. I do not like shopping!!! But my mom and sisters do so I just went along. I have to admit that This trip I have had fun shopping because I am looking for things for my girls and corom… Other than that, good luck trying to get me to try things on! As we were heading home we ran into some LDS missionaries. We stopped to talk with them for a little while. They were fun to talk with…

We got home around 9:45 p.m. and ate dinner. That is the European way… Breakfast before school, a huge lunch at 2 p.m. and a light dinner around 9 or 10. My problem is, I don’t eat light dinners. We just finished and I am way full and super tired. I did receive an email from Corom… It is snowing in Utah. I’m so sad about that! I’m not ready for the cold!

Thanks Corom for sending this picture! Love you guys and miss you guys!

Tuesday: I was tired this morning when my alarm went off (at 6 a.m.)… The time change is so hard! I went up to the wonderful treadmill again because of how dark it was outside. I did run for 80 minutes on the treadmill and then another 16 minutes outside along the beach. Ignore the miles on the treadmill (for yesterday and today). I wish I could run 16.2 in 80 minutes… Obviously I didn’t go off mileage… Running outside felt great!

At the hotel room, we packed up, then drove to the beach (more for picture purposes).

We headed out for breakfast (more pastries :)) and then to the airport. Missy had to get her suitcase wrapped for who knows what reason. 🙂 Her luggage was ripped in the corner… Trina had the pat down in the airport. We could not stop laughing (I had to hide taking a picture because I guess you are not aloud to take pictures of the security). I found out after the pic. 🙂

We had a fun time in Italy… A whole whopping 6 hours in the airport! 🙂 But we really did have fun. We laughed a lot over nothing!

Our 2 flights were amazing… The one from Greece to Italy we all had our own seats…

There was a little incident where a young man was acting a little weird walking through the security (he cut in line in front of us; just seemed nervous, antsy… Etc. I didn’t think anything of it but I noticed it. As we were lining up to board the plane, he once again cut in line and happened to cut right in front of us again. We (my sisters and mom) were laughing and joking about it… Once the guy got to the lady they checked his boarding pass and ID and told him to step aside… 2 of the airport police were there and took over. It could have been a random search or it could have been something more serious… None of us saw the guy get on the plane. who knows… Our flight from Italy to Spain was very entertaining! Trina, my mom and I all were able to sit in aisle seats right next to each other. All the people we say with were very interesting. For some reason, we could not stop laughing at every movement our “seat mates” would make. Trina had a guy that sneezed at least 30-40 times on that flight. I had a mom and daughter next to me fighting over the same guy and the 3 girls behind us didn’t like us to well (maybe it was because Trina took a picture of them)… And they were being a little frisky with each other back there (if you know what I mean). Anyway… The flight was a little entertaining!

We went out to get our rental car and before we made it out of the parking lot, the check oil light came on, the car was not driving very smooth and we found out that our head lights didn’t work. So we had to trade the car out for another. We drove to our hotel here in Spain (after we got lost for a good 30 minutes)… Beautiful hotel!

We stayed up late talking and I went to bed around 1 a.m. and the others stayed up a lot later!!!

Wednesday: I woke up a little later then I wanted but I was so tired. It was good though because I wanted to wait until it was light out to go for my run. I only had an hour to run so I had to shorten my workout. I ran a 10 minute warmup and then began a speed. 20 x 1 minute fast, 1 minute recovery with a 10 minute cool down. (100:08 total time.) It was a beautiful run… Amazing!!!

I ran past a lighthouse and along the shoreline. Loved this run. It was a peaceful morning and I had a lot of time to think. Once we were ready we headed off to Gibraltar, Spain. We crossed the border into the UK but before that we stopped off at Mcdonalds (I know… Right)!

We paid for a tour in the UK… A very sketchy road but our tour guide was really good!

Our 1st stop we went to a lookout and as we were standing in the UK, we were able to see Spain and Africa.

Our 2nd stop was to the St. Michael’s caves. In WW2 the soldiers would hide/fight in these caves.

Our 3rd stop was with the monkeys!!! It was so fun. A monkey surprised me and jumped on my head…

We were all able to hold the monkeys… (My girls… I will have to bring you here so you can hold the monkeys!!!)

One of the monkeys took off with my mom’s hat. It was so funny trying to get the hat back… Which we did get it eventually.

Our last stop was to another cave…

This cave was also used during WW2 for the soldiers to hide/fight in. It was really neat to walk through…

The view was amazing but a little scary driving up the “Rock”…

Once we finished the tour (thanks dad for recommending the tour), we ate fish and walked around for a little while before heading back to Spain (the Bobby-police officer, let us take a picture of him).

As we were in one of the shops in the UK, we ran into a couple of ladies that helped us at the airport in France. My older sister (Trina) had a screw up with her plane ticket going to Greece. These 2 ladies let my sister go before them (our flight was leaving very soon)… They also had everyone else let her cut through. Very nice ladies…

Very random that we were to run into them!!! We eventually left and headed to my sister’s house in Chipiona, Spain. It was so good to see her kids and husband!!! So dang cute (her kids and you too Steve. :)). It was fun hanging out and Steve made a delicious pumpkin soup for us!

Sunday: What an emotional day!! Before we left Spartan, we went to the main square to look at a statue that my grandpa (my mom’s adoptive dad from Utah) sculpted. It was neat to see something my grandpa did here in Greece.

We then went to the village of where my mom grew up (Geraki) before she was adopted into the U.S. at the age of 11. So many relatives (distance and close). Many tears and many hugs & kisses!

We stayed at my mom’s cousin’s house and they walked us around town. We went to my mom’s house…

It was so neat to see where my mom lived and to hear some of the stories of her childhood. We found out that she had to sleep outside on the “deck” with her other siblings because inside was too small. We saw where my mom went to school…

After all the visiting and walking around Geraki, we headed back to Athens.

“This is from the babysitters… We ate cereal and cleaned and watched a movie and read stories and store lunch and made cupcakes (Kailey brought) for the neighbors and the girls taped LoTS of their Halloween candy on papers to give away! They did a good job helping clean, and we were thrilled to get up at 5:45am! Haha The girls painted for a while and we only had a few timeouts! We kept the cat out most of the time…their grandma came about 2 and we are all leaving now! Have fun in Greece! (We played frozen matching game lots too and also my 3rd wet the bed so we cleaned her mattress and washed her sheets and all).”

Monday: I woke up at 6 a.m. to go out for a 10 mile run. It was still so dark. I decided to run on the wonderful treadmill here in Greece… I really am a chicken when it comes to running by myself in a place I don’t know. So I ran 60 minutes on the treadmill (which it shows that I ran 13.3 miles in that time:) )… Then I went outside for 11 minutes as a cool down. It was actually a pretty good run. Total time was 1:11.11… And I have no clue how far I went…

We took the metro into the middle of the city to go see some ruins, to shop and of course… To eat!

We went to the Acropolis to see the ruins… Very beautiful and so much fun. It was also fun watching all the marathoners hiking up the trail… They looked sore. It was fun talking with many of them and hearing how they did! I found out today that the Athens marathon was yesterday. It was bitter/sweet finding out that I was here in Greece and I missed running the marathon. 1st it was on a Sunday and 2nd, my race is in 4 weeks. As we were standing in line waiting to buy tickets for the acropolis a few older gentlemen from Holland asked us why we didn’t run the race… We told them we didn’t know about it, we were in a different city and that it was on a Sunday (and I have never ran on a Sunday)… One asked jokingly, “Are you Mormon?”… I laughed and said why yes we are. 🙂 Anyway… We had fun sightseeing!

We walked up and down the streets with many food vendors, shops neighborhoods (with lots of graffiti & squatter houses).

We are traveling back on the metro… I’m tired and I’m ready to come home. I miss my kids and Corom. I was able to talk with them earlier and it was great. My sisters (well 2) have been making fun of me for blogging on my way back but I don’t care… My kids and Corom like reading this! 😉 I’ve only been able to talk with them once since I’ve been in Greece because of the difficulty of cell phone issues. But as we were sitting on the metro, We realized we missed our stop… 3 stops after. Well it was more walking for us! 🙂
Pictures I forgot to post… Our great grandpa and grandma & our great great grandparents… Many other relatives…