Posts from — December 2007

Aloha in Hawaiian means Hello and Goodbye. Aloha, Hawaii. Although, I must say that I really wish it was Aloha, Hawaii!  Oh well. 

So our two week vacation is coming to an end with a MARATHON trip home.  *Sarcasm warning*   Luckily, Lindsay has come down with the annual Christmas/New Year Flu/Cold so the trip home should be really fun!     Oh wait.   Maybe not.    Luckily, because we’re flying the security won’t let her bring the NyQuil on the plane.   Oh fun!   *End sarcasm warning*

Enough of about us leaving.   We’ve had a great time and have probably done as much as humanily possible in the past two weeks.  While at the same time being able to relax.   Although, ‘apparently’ we haven’t done enough sitting on the beach doing ‘nothing’.   

The last week we’ve driven the road to Hana and beyond.  Don’t do it.  Ever.  Seriously.  If a friend says “hey, wanna go to Hana?”  Immediately stop being their friend.    We’ve boogie-boarded (duh), relaxed, tried to find turtles and just enjoyed Maui.  

Well, I’m off now.  Time to start this 23 hour trip home.  Happy New Year all! 

Love Jeff & Lindsay

Since we are staying at such a remote place in the middle of nowhere and it gets pitch dark at 6pm and everything closes sharply at dark and we have internet but no cable tv, we had time to put up some pictures last night!!! http://picasaweb.google.ca/jeff.sill/Hawaii

Enjoy. We’re off to the beach!!

xoxo,

L & J

Hey all,

So, funny enough we’re kind of in the middle of no-where on the Big Island of Hawaii. We’re located 30 miles from Hilo and 96 miles from Kona, however, we have wireless internet. Go figure. Anyway, time for a bit of a longer blog.

Today, we headed to the Dormant Volcanoes Mauna Loa and Kilauea. What an amazing experience… The first thing we did was drive up a road to 6000+ ft. The volcano tops out at around ~13,000 feet so not really that close to the top. The road was kinda neat as it was paved but one lane and SUPER curvy with tons of blind corners for about 10 miles. When we got to the top we were a bit disappointed with the view. We’d like to hike the other 7,000 ft but ‘apparently’ it’s a 3-4 day hike.

The rest of the day we toured around Kilauea and saw Steam Vents (which occur when the rain water seeps through the earth, reaches hot rocks, evaporates, creates steam and comes out the cracks in the earth.  See I even learned something today). We also saw some sulfur something or other… I’d give more details but let’s just say it didn’t smell like roses and we didn’t do much reading. We also drove down this road to the ocean where lava used to flow. Unfortunately no lava is flowing right now but we were able to see all the destruction of the lava. It’s so neat the way the lava just goes and takes out whatever is in it’s way (roads, trees, vegetation, signs, etc…). At one point a road used to be where the lava flows and you can see exactly where the lava just flowed right over the road and kept on going.

Yesterday, we went to the black sand beach of Punalu’u. The beach is apparently visited by turtles quite often but no turtles for us. We’ll check it out tomorrow. Speaking of tomorrow, we’re off to Kona. It’s a bit of a drive at ~ 100 miles but we really want to snorkel, explore, see the coffee plantations and do some xmas shopping. Yes, xmas shopping. The plan is to set a time (30 minutes), price ($30) and quality (no useless sH$t) for our xmas exchange. Kinda like me, simple but fun. That’s our plan for our first Mele Kalikikmaka.

The place we’re staying is called the Crater Rim Cabin and let’s just say the name doesn’t really disappoint. We’re literally on the edge of the national park and volcano fault lines go through the property. They have a fault line crack that is about 15ft deep, let’s just say it’s not ‘kid’ friendly. The place even has a lava tube that you can shimmy your way down to go through the tube. Not sure if we’ll find time to get in the tube as we’ve jam packed our “relaxation.”
OH! and don’t ask us why we’re not ‘more tanned’ or ‘browner’ we’re in the middle of a rain forest, can see snow on the top of the volcano and haven’t been to the beach in two days. Rough I know… but it’s a pretty chilly 15C. We even have the propane fireplace going in the cabin.

Lots of love,

Jeff & Lindsay

ps. Pics are on their way (hopefully tonight).

Aloha everyone!

We’re just in the airport heading to Hilo right now.  Hilo is on the big island so we’ll be seeing some volcanoes, playing disc golf and hanging out at the beach.

Oahu, the island we are just leaving, was terrific.   We had a great time and in true Sill style cram-packed as much as humanly possible in the last 3 days.   Climbed Diamond Head (dormant volcano), surfed (Lindsay did really well and got up on her own!), boogie-boarded (bought one to ’save’ money from Jeff being out for too long) and toured around the island.  Yesterday we spent the day in a rental vehicle (convertible) driving around the island.  So many things to see and do but not enough time as usual.  Next time (yes, we’re already talking about next time) we’ll do portions of the island at a time.

Many more stories to tell and pictures to see.  However, we have to go catch our flight.  Hope everyone is cold and missing us. 

Oh and to our faithful blog readers, sorry for the lack of posts but our computer isn’t waterproof.

Mele Kalikimaka,

Jeff & Linds

Today we decided to do what normal OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder) people do. Have a garage hack session. Why? Because it’s the winter and it’s too cold to hack outside so why not use the garage to hack?

So we invited some friends over for some Omelette’s, Coffee and hack. What a great way to start a Sunday. And by “start” I mean hack for 2-3 hours. From the hack session we learned a couple of new moves.
The Shack - The hack off of the shin. This is Lindsay’s patented move

The Ski Jump – The hack that you kick in front of you and then land as if you’re landing a ski jump in the Olympics. Terri is the inventor but patent is pending.

I think we’ll try to make this some sort of annual event. Why Not? I might even need a name for it?!? Next year though, we’ve learned that actually mopping the garage floor is a good idea. The grease and residue water tends to make the floor a bit slippery.

Hacky Holidays Everyone (Lindsay came up with that …. just too terrible not to use)

While getting our pedicure the other day, Jeff and I got a parking ticket. It’s my first parking ticket EVER…I survived 27 years without ever getting one and BAM, there goes my perfect record. I guess only 12 count as I’ve only been driving for that long, and I had to mention the small details as a lot of smart asses read my blog.

Anyhoo, being the good samaritans that we are, we plugged the meter for 1hr 20min, airing on the side of caution for our 45 min. pedicure. The metermaid must have been circling like a hawk, because 10 mins after our time expired we got a $30 ticket. So lame!!!  Now our “free pedicure” has cost us $50 ($20 tip plus $30 ticket).

The only good thing to come out of this is a brilliant idea. When you get a ticket you have the option to pay $30 in 21 days, $40 in 31 days, and it goes up from there. A penalty payment program. Well, I might just adopt this. Playing ultimate can be the worst for collecting money from teammates. League fees, tournament fees, group dinners, etc. When the demographics state the average ultimate player make $60,000, it sure is hard to get money out of some people. So, next time I collect league fees I might send out an email. Pay me by next week and it’s $20, in two weeks and it’s $30. The city of Calgary can do it, and they have a heck of a lot more money then I do, so why can’t I?

Jeff and I are just killing time until Hawaii and trying to make the best of this cold winter. We had a bit of a chinook this weekend, and it was only -5, so we went snowboarding on Sunday. Jeff’s brother was generous enough to give us a weekend ski package next weekend as a wedding gift, so we wanted to polish up on our skills on a crappy hill (C.O.P.) before going to a real mountain (Sunshine or Louise) next weekend.

The following story is not for the weak, incase you have not heard or read it already on Heather’s blog.

Upon arriving at the hill and dusting off the equipment from last year (and finally getting my snowboarding boot back from the Hogan’s) we bundled up in said gear. Once I got all my stuff on, I realized one my boots didn’t fit quite the same as last year and some of the material on the inside was digging into my right toe. They were used, cheap boots, and I figured they were just falling apart. So I stood up, moved my foot around and said “let’s go”. Then I decided it felt pretty uncomfortable walking and I should investigate further even though it meant taking my boot off and re-lacing it (which is a huge pain!!!). I took off my boot, reached inside, expecting to feel some frayed boot material and instead found a DEAD FREAKING MOUSE!!!!

I shit you not. I couldn’t believe it either. I let out a blood-curling scream, threw the mouse and had the attention of everyone in the whole building. I was traumatized for the rest of the day and have learned a valuable lesson: have your husband check you boots before snowboarding every season!

Once I calmed down, we hit the slopes (some harder than others). I love snowboarding with Jeff and Heather. Jeff bombs down the hill quickly, and somewhat in control. Heather makes her way down very carefully, with great technique and slowly. I have periods of fast and slow, control and uncontrolled. We make a good team. We are also very friendly, giving each other hugs as we get off the chair lift every time.

Heading up the chairlift after lunch, I got to the top and tried to secure my second foot in, and realized I was missing the second half of my binding. It had completely ripped off. So, I did the “falling leaf” all the way down (heel edge scraping down the hill creating ice for all of those behind me -everyone loves it!). I talked to the liftees and they hadn’t seen my buckle and I figured I lost it on the chair lift, so I hiked up the mountain under the chair lift while Jeff and Heather did another run. Oddly, I was able make it up almost as fast as them! I don’t recommend hiking up ski hills however as people like to ask you for your phone number (when they are half your age and you might be old enough to be their mother, but you can’t tell because everyone has ski gear on) and they also like to ask you where your snowboard is or went. Hiking down is also WAY less fun than going down on a snowboard. This story is getting way to long so I’ll wrap it up by saying once I hiked all the way up and down, and had given up, I found the buckle on my way into the lodge! Ten feet from the buckle I also found the screw and plastic attachment piece. I’m back in business!

Our weekend also included getting a pedicure (wedding gift from Scott- we’ll post pictures of our pretty feet later), my Cybera staff Christmas party (Ukrainian food menu-yum!) and a gathering at Mary Ann and Robert’s house (see Heather’s blog: www.hezohez.blogspot.com).

So I thought I’d write a little post about the highlights of my trip. It seems like a lot of people like to ask “So, what was your favorite part?” … which is really a very good question to ask (especially if you’re the first couple of people to ask) because the person is usually really excited to tell you the BEST part. Anyway, here’s a top 10 list, ala David Letterman.

10. All the really REALLY old buildings.

It’s so neat to see all these crazy brick / stone buildings that are all over Europe. In Western Canada an old building is something built 1900’s (ish) and usually made out of wood … an old building in Europe is 1600’s…

9. Pigs Knuckle / Raclette (it’s a tie)

Pigs Knuckle was great because it was a ton of food and neat atmosphere.

Raclette was great because it’s a food that the Swiss treat as something that ALL who come to Switzerland must have.

8. My First blog post from Europe

Enough said.

7. Trying about 30-40 new beers

If you’re in Europe for 18 days and you have two different beers a day then you can try 36 different beers. Yum. (check out all the types in the background).

6. Pizza Oven

Pizza is the best. Homemade Pizza in a Pizza oven is better then normal Pizza. I’m not sure where that puts it on the ‘Pizza is the best’ scale of things.

5. Round-a-bouts

I’m guessing Lindsay is tired of hearing me say we need a round-a-bout here or here or here. Or man I never had to wait this long in Europe.

4. Bread Vending Machine!

This would have been higher up on the list had I been able to sample a bread. But they were sold out. Awesome!

3. Edinburgh Castle

My first real Castle that I’ve ever seen. So cool.

2. Golden Roof Languages

The golden roof is such a great landmark in Innsbruck. All the languages in Europe and especially Switzerland is so neat. Switzerland has 4 official languages (French, Italian, German and Romanish and quite a few people speak at least two languages and sometimes (usually) English too. We’re so ignorant in Canada to other languages mainly because we only need 1 language. The thing that really strikes me is also that most of the ‘tension’ in Canada is because of differences in Languages. Where as we went out for dinner in Zurich (pictured below) and three to four different languages were all spoken at the table at one time.

1. The Matterhorn / Gornergraut / Zermatt

Zermatt: is a really cool little village that was established as a trade route between the Italians and Germans. Over the years the city was established and began to flourish as a tourist ski destination. A cool part of the city is the lack of automobiles to reduce pollution.

Gornergraut: You take a train up the side of a mountain and get a great view of the Matterhorn from up there. We brought a pack lunch to eat at the side of the mountain. It was also kinda neat to be a little dizzy from the elevation changes.

Matterhorn: What a cool mountain!

The title of this post was inspired by the commercial from a few years back. I think it was a Subway commercial that was really annoying but stated “back off, get off your own sandwich”. I’m starting to feel the same way about my blog. People are offering me advice about what to write on my blog, and although most of it is really good, I think everyone should have their own blog.

So, here are instructions on getting your own:

Go to https://www.blogger.com/start and follow the instructions. This is where I become a bit of a hypocrite as I’ve never actually started my own blog, but my next bit of advice would be to marry someone with a blog and you can share one.

Most people tell me their life isn’t exciting enough for a blog. That’s a pile of horse manure. As if my life is exciting, and I still have a blog. It’s a great way to express your thoughts, strong opinions, make fun of the odd person, let your friends and family know what you’re up to, or just vent.

You may be an incredible writer and not even know it!