With less than 2 months to go before we head off on our trip, there is still plenty to do. Cambpell and Kelly have both finished school, but are already into other activities. Campbell is working full time and playing baseball on two teams. Needless to say, he does not have a lot of extra time for minor little details like packing. Kelly has a few days off before starting her grade 9 geography course at summer school. That will keep her tied up until the end of July. In between driving kids to work and school, going to work ourselves, and hanging out at the ball park, Dean and I are trying very hard to get the house into some kind of rentable state . We had great plans to complete a lot of construction loose ends at the house, but as always, time seems to be slipping by fast. At some point we will just have to decide that we are as close to complete as we are going to get and start advertising to see if we can find renters for 5-6 months. If we can't, we will have to come up with Plan B. No idea what that may be!
Our travel plans are progressing well. We have purchased a number of plane tickets, made lots of accommodation reservations, and have done some research on what we want to see and do. The internet never ceases to amaze me. It is wonderful to be able to research our options, see photographs of what we're getting into (although I realize reality may not always resemble the photos on the internet!) and pay for things on the other side of the world, all while sitting at a computer. Times have sure changed since my brother Geoff and I traveled the world in 1982. In making our reservation for a climb up Mount Kilimanjaro, I discovered the person we are working with built a house about 5 kilometres from us back in 1979. We'll have lots to talk about when we arrive in Tanzania. Other key events that have been finalized include Dean and my 20th wedding anniversary at the Taroko Gorge in Taiwan, Campbell's 15th birthday in Luang Prabang, Laos and Kelly's 14th birthday in an apartment in Dahab, Egypt. We will be staying in a treehouse in a private game reserve in South Africa for Christmas. Kelly thinks it is very fitting for Christmas, as we won't have a tree, so we may as well stay in a tree. New Year's Eve will be in Buenos Aires. And our flight home will be on January 30th from Quito, Ecuador. Some things in between have been planned, while others are still up in the air. As we get closer to departure date, we will have more news.
