More about our last US trip

...that has found its way to my scrapbook pages. It's cool to see all these pictures again, they bring back so many memories of good times!
These pages are about New York City mostly.

Times Square was so much smaller than what we expected!! You see it in the movies, you see it in the news, you see it on New Year's Eve... it was a must-see for us! Just a little advice, don't go to the MacD's there, we've never ever seen one that was this dirty and unsafe. I couldn't believe my eyes and even Jan refused to use the bathroom there. We went around the corner, there's a little Irish pub, and boy, that was a nice place!

The "fashion district" was high on my list of places to shop at, so I did. It was incredibly hard to choose though! My eyes nearly popped out when I saw the vast choice they had!! Beads, buttons, fabrics, oh and did I mention beads???

But take the subway just a few blocks west and it looks like you are in a different city altogether. Lots of green, less high tall buildings, just a feeling of more open air and umm, a somewhat relaxing feeling. Of course I visited The Ink Pad, the one and only rubber stamp store in Manhattan!! This was where I was meeting up with another online friend and it was soooo much fun to see each other in real life! We had a good chat, and she drove us around in NYC to see some highlights. Or maybe she wanted to let us feel what New York traffic was like... Mission accomplished I'd say!! LOL! :-))

I just like taking pictures, and bridges somehow have a special draw to me and my camera. :-))

 

That was it for today, folks!! I hope you enjoyed it!! 

Yes, I am in the US again at this moment, and when I'm all over and done with the jetlag I hope to find the time and energy to blog about the new adventures!! :-)) 

Hugs,

Wezz 

The USA trip

The blast from the past. Remember our trip to the USA from way back in 2006?? I've never really finished the story of that trip, did I? Well, at least I'm back at scrapping more of it! This year I wanted to get back into scrapping and since I got a LOT of scrapping done during the Pro Scrapbook League organized by Club Scrap in 2008, I decided to sign up again this year! Yay!! I'm slowly finding my way back to the scrapworld. LOL
Here are two layouts I did about the graduation of a friend's daughter in Washington, D.C. It was so special for us to be invited to that ceremony as we don't have that here in Belgium.

 

  

There is no way I can explain how special this was to be able to be there for the graduation together with her family. I just wish the speakers were not so boring as they were.... ahem... we all agreed on that!! LOL

It was great to see a sign language translator working her way throughout the whole ceremony too. We had never seen that before either! The whole experience was just very impressive and we'll never forget it. We loved being part of that special day. :-))

Hugs,

Wezz

Be The Best!

That's it. Just be the best. Okay, maybe not THE best, but just be the very best YOU can be. That's all anyone can ask, right? If you strive to be the best you can be, it will make you feel good and fulfilled. You should be proud. You have the potential. Live up to it. Reach for the stars!! The sky is the limit. Okay, I'm sure you get it by now.
Here's a card to celebrate that!
Stamps are from StampFrancisco and Stampin' Up.

And speaking of StampFrancisco, we are lining out our new travel plans!! Yay!! :-)))
We'll land in San Francisco on February 17th!! Jan is working on a road book already. heheh. I'll start collecting addresses of the "must-shop" places.... oh err, I mean, the "must-see" places... ahum... and I sure hope there will be some "must-meet" people along the way!! :-))
Now I wanna know who will be the first to react to this and how many of you will leave me a comment.... LOL!!

Hugs,
Wezz

Get your kicks...

Driving from Chicago to Galesburg gives you the opportunity to follow a part of the legendary Route 66, which starts at Jackson Boulevard. We found a turn by turn description of the whole Route 66 on the internet. This is awesome because it tells you exactly where to drive in order to follow the Route 66. It even specifies all the different alignments where applicable. Jan printed out both the sections that were applicable to our trip; from Chicago to Bloomington, where we would have to leave the Route 66 to head for Peoria and added the whole she-bang to his famous road book. :-))
So, there we were, ready to hit the Route 66, with some nice belgian rock music in the CD player. This was going to be great fun, if it wasn't for the pouring rain that has followed us all the way from Chicago. :-(((
And the temperatures were like the winters in Belgium!!
Why??? Why us??? I've never seen the Route 66 in the rain in any movie!! It's always blazing hot when we get to see it on the screen!! Oh well...
I guess we must be just about the only people on the globe that have been sailing the Route 66 instead of driving. Get your kicks... yeah, right. I'd put a LOL here, but it wasn't that funny at the time really. Now I guess we'll just have to go back so we can see the Route 66 in sunlight one day, right??? Heheh.
Most of the directions were really accurate, except at one point where we couldn't find the right turn. But we caught the Route 66 back again only a few miles further.
Our little side excursion to find the right route drove us through a neighborhood with really really really big big big houses. Almost like the ones Manda showed us in Dubois! Wonder who can afford them in areas where there is just nothing???
I was sitting next to Jan and reading aloud the directions from the road book to him. At one point it said to look for old telephone poles... as if we know what old telephone poles look like! There wasn't a description or picture of them and they probably won't look like european ones, will they?? So, these old poles, how do we recognize them?? Do they have grey hair, or what? When we finally saw the old telephone poles, we kinda knew what it meant!! :-)
They were all crooked and none of them stood straight. And yes, they looked OLD too. They were very short as well. No wonder the indians could cut the "singing wires of the pale faces" in earlier times. (ggg)
Maybe that is why the new telphone poles are a lot higher now. Haha!!
Because of the terrible weather, the many turns, some really small and narrow streets to be followed, and the inevitable road works at various spots, we didn't progress as fast as we thought we would be. We abandoned the Route 66 a little earlier then foreseen to hit the I-55 to Bloomington, and then another interstate route to Peoria and Galesburg. Where the rain followed us the whole time.
Get some rain on Route 66.... LOLOL

Hugs,
Wezz

Crafts 'n' Rock

We're still very amazed at the amount of road kill we see along our route. And not just the amount but the SIZE of these things!!!! If you'd hit these head on your car would be total loss!! Or at least in Belgium it would be...
In Belgium we'd have the occasional cat or small dog run over, but nothing
like what we see here. Of course, there's a lot more wildlife here
than in the denser populated Belgium. You'd have to go to the Ardennes
to find some more wildlife, not where we live.
And then the signs that say "FOOD - McDonalds"!! They still crack us up!!
You know, people in Belgium just think good things of you guys??? Everybody there believes americans alllll stick to the speed limits, whether that's on the interstates or on the secundary roads. But not so!!!! Another desillusion... Darn!!

After a good drive we arrived in Akron and I called Debi-Ellen and Stephanie (you know, I gotta use that US phone now!!) to meet them at Hollo's Papercraft in Brunswick, Ohio. Stephanie was already there with her little boy when we arrived
and we started exchanging goodies on a bench outside, so Debi-Ellen could see us when she'd arrive. Of course she drove right past us and had to turn back... LOL

Hugs all around, coz we've known each other for years without ever meeting before!
The fun of exchanging goodies is just indescribable. I know some have mentioned this about me, but it really goes for everyone!! People's faces light up when you give them something nice that may be hard to get for them and even more so when you present them with something handmade. That excitement alone makes this trip worthwhile. Sending goodies is just not the same, coz you can't see their face when they open the package.

But then!!! We went inside the Papercraft Store!! Man, I thought I had died and gone to heaven!!! What an amazing array of cardstock, paper, envelopes, precut cards, and more!! Jan thought this was just yet another one of my biiiiig mistakes. I'm pretty sure this will end up in his top 10 of the big mistakes of this trips... LOL
Back to the paperstore now. I got me some 12x12 cardstock for a scrapbook. I needed black background cardstock for that "crazy" picture of the black truck that I took in the rear side car mirror!!
See, I do plan ahead and know what I'm doing... ahemmmm....
Got just a little bit of sheet sized cardstock, patterned, structured, and whatever I KNOW I won't be able to find back home. Stephanie had to leave early, and her boy didn't think the cardstock was all that exciting, even if we did think so.
I also got some stickers, well, actually they were some kind of photo corners, sooo
pretty!!! And won't they come in handy when I finally get down to actually start scrapping?? LOL
Got some patterned vellum too, just the "had to have" kind. Not my fault!!! LOL
Debi-Ellen just exaggerated on my shopping spree! ;-)
Meanwhile, Jan had gone to a bar next door. No way he was gonna come in with
us for looking at paper. Where's the fun in that, huh?? LOL
He was already waiting for us when we came out the store... Seemed to last like enternity to him, or at least that's what he says. Hmmm....
The plan was to have lunch with Debi-Ellen but we were kinda running short of time (though we agree that we did NOT stay too long in that store, regardless what Jan says!! LOL), so we had to say our goodbyes and head for Cleveland where we visited the Rock 'n' Roll Museum. That was fun!! They also had a section where you could see the development of the equipment used over the years. How the first radio started up until the development of the I-Pod!!Very interesting!! Then of course we hit the museum's store. LOL

Jan was not gonna leave Cleveland without having gone to the Hard Rock Café of course so that's where we went for dinner. Happy me from meeting Debi-Ellen and Stephanie and going to the paper store, happy Jan from visiting the Rock Museum and eating at the Hard Rock Café (and of course buying another t-shirt. See, I'm not the only one with shopping on my mind!!! haha!!). Perfect day for everyone!! :-))

We hit the road again, and around 9:15pm we stopped at Fremont, Ohio, to find some place to sleep. Most places do seem to have wireless internet, so that's nice coz I like to check some e-mails before going to bed. :-)
Addicted?? Who, me???? Naah....

Hugs to all,
Wezz

Hit the road Jack... err, Jan...

When we left Jennifer's place we drove through the nice scenery of Connecticut, stopping once in a while to take some pictures. Not as often as I wanted though (and this goes for the whole trip), as I can't expect Jan to stop every time I see a good photo opportunity. Kodak moments just happen way too often. LOL
I should have taken a picture of a sign that said "Adopt a Highway Program" while driving through Connecticut. But hopefully I'll get a chance to do that in another state where they have this program too. It's definitely something we don't see in Belgium!! Maybe this has got something to do with the condition of the roads here.
It's just such a smooth drive, nothing like in Belgium. There's got to be a reason for the good condition of the roads here!! In Belgium I could never type on the laptop while on the road, here that's no problem at all. I could never do any crafty stuff of any kind in the car in belgium, here that's no problem at all.
As we were continuing our trip along the Interstate 80 we really enjoyed the views. We can't believe how GREEN this country is!!! Someone had said this might be a boring piece on our road trip but nothing could be further from the thruth. Jan just loves to drive and is now really getting used to driving an automatic. I jokingly
said that once we get home after three weeks he'll need lessons again to learn how to use the manual gear box again of our own car. LOL
We both enjoy looking outside as the world passes us by. The sun is out and everything just looks so much nicer then!! I can imagine this could be a boring part when the weather is not playing nice though. But lucky for us it is!!
Even the ton of roadworks we pass along just about every route we take don't bother us as the traffic is still moving nicely. I took a wonderful picture (okay some may think this is just weird) of a truck that was behind us in the next lane. I took the picture from the truck using the rear side mirror of the car. It was black and all shiny in the sunshine. Very american. :-)
We had booked a room in a bed&breakfast type of place in DuBois, Pennsylvania.
I actually got the address from Manda, one of my many cyberfriends, and I can't thank her enough for pointing us in the direction of that place. If you ever want to go on a short break or little getaway, this is definitely THE place to go to!! Wonderful people run the Narrows Creek Inn, the rooms are absolutely gorgeous, the garden is amazing, and the breakfast... well, what can I say. It was of course home cooked and absolutely de-li-cious!!! Owner Linda brought it to our room even.
And it's only about a mile away from the Interstate 80 too, very easy to find!!!
Check it out here: http://www.narrowscreek.com/

We're just sorry that we didn't get to meet Linda's husband Henry. We were told that he's quite a character!!
After we settled in and I had shopped at their wonderful store (okay I'm running out of more different words to describe this place!!) for some gifts for the family back home, we met up with Manda, a british lady living in Dubois. She took us out for a meal at the local Ruby Tuesdays, we talked and talked like we had known each other for years and years!! Then she took us for a ride and showed us where the rich people live in that area ("Treasure something" - sorry, can't remember the full name of the place). Man, such nice houses!!!!! But not so nice prices.... LOL
Wow, and the deer just walk out on the street and in the front lawns. They're not afraid of people walking by or cars passing on the roads. They just wanted their dinner I guess, they ate all the flowers from the rich folk's gardens. I tried taking a few pictures but by then it was already too dark for that. Of course I had some belgian chocolates for Manda and a british stamping magazine. I don't know if you guys can get these over here or not (I haven't seen them yet), but I hope she likes it anyway. It even comes with a small stamp too!!
After we said our goodbyes we took a long relaxing bath and had a really good night's sleep. First time really since I got here. Guess the first three nights the jetlag and excitement still got the best of me. LOL
Btw, the sleeping is getting better and better with each day now. :-)
In the morning before we left I took loads of pictures of the garden, I already had taken some picture of the room we stayed in, and the amazing shop too!! Heheh, yep, photography happens to be another hobby of mine. (ggg)
I'm sure gonna try to keep in touch with everyone I meet on this trip!! They're just the nicest people!! Or is that just coz they're stampers?? I'm really such a lucky gal to be able to meet them!! :-))

Many hugs,
Wezz

Our first US weekend

Hi all,

well we got settled in, with alllll of our bags, and it was a lot. Jennifer can testify to that. I'm not exactly known as a "light" traveler. LOL
Besides, one of my suitcases looked like I had robbed the chocolate store and the local craft store. No, it didn't look like a stamp store. We don't have dedicated stamp stores over there.... But I did bring loads of belgian chocolate, dutch and UK craft magazines and local craft stuff to swap or as gifts for the people I'd get to meet along the way.
We freshened up, I found out that they have a polish type of shower, you know, where the C stands for Hot and the H stands for Cold... LOL... and then it was time for dinner. The fish Jennifer had prepared was just slightly overseasoned, guess that was a polish thing too, but if husband Bruce hadn't made a comment, we would never have known it wasn't supposed to be like that!! Who are we to know what life is like in an american household?? On this trip we were specifically looking for totally submerging in the american life style if possible, and if that's what they are used to, well, we'll go along with that!! So we didn't even blink and ate that fish. But I think Bruce gave her a restraining order for any further cooking that weekend since he did the cooking for the next two days. LOLOLOL
Bruce's cooking was very good, btw. More on that later. First things first.
While sitting at the dinner table we talked the night away so to speak. There were no awkward silences at all. We were all very interested in each other's life styles and compared how things worked in both countries. It was like we'd known each other for years. Which is true for Jennifer and me, but through e-mail only and that's still something entirely different than spending hours on end together in real life!!
Trust me, the real life experience is waaayyyy better than e-mailing each other!!!
Jan and Bruce got on well too, so that's a bonus for when Jennifer and I started swapping goodies and talking stamps. Heheh.

Am I going to much into detail?? I'm just trying to remember as much details as possible from this trip, and I'll probably read these stories for years to come! Hope it's not too boring for you guys though!!

Anyway, we had been up for quite some time and finally went to bed. Usually I am soooo not a morning person and I even warned the family about that, just in case, but of course I was wide awake by 6am. I blame it on the jetlag. LOL
Though maybe the excitement of going on this trip and the prospect of meeting so many of my online friends might have played a slight role in that too of course... hmmm....
But Bruce was already up too, and we just chatted and chatted and chatted over a cup of coffee... It's amazing that almost perfect strangers would find so much to talk about!!! And it wasn't even about stamping or crafting either!! LOLOLOL

For a three week car trip I wanted to get me a nice large sleeping pillow so I could rest/sleep during the longer parts of the driving, or whenever I'd get real tired. We also needed a cooler box if we wanted the chocolate to survive this trip at least until we'd reach the place where Jan's niece is staying. We have some belgian chocolates for her and her guest family of course. So on Saturday morning Jennifer took us out shopping (another big mistake according to Jan!) for the pillow and the cooler box. I was totally blown away by the cost of some things here!! I had just bought me a large bottle of contacts fluid for this trip and lo and behold, they had the exact same brand and bottle size here!! For less than one third of the price in Belgium. Duh. Of course I'd never leave on a trip without this and I didn't buy one here coz I just got one back home. But I might get one before we head back home though!! Oh, and remind me again why we spent over 50 euros on a battery recharger back home?? Oh yeah, because we needed one to recharge the batteries for the digital camera and the MP3 player, and coz we didn't know we could get that recharger here at Walmart for 7 dollars!!!!!! More duh!!!
There are some plans on getting started on a scrapbook, but I needed something to put the pages and cardstock in so I could get it home without it all getting wrinkly. So Jennifer took us to an AC Moore's. Third big mistake according to Jan. I really felt like a kid in a candy store and was again really amazed at the prices!
The 12" Fiskars cutter was on sale for $9.99; this little baby costs about 35 euros in Belgium. I have one, but was still tempted. I was good though, coz I saw that the stamps were 40% off, so I wanted to spend my money on those!!! LOLOLOL
Also saw a three pack of 3M double sided tape for the price of just one back home.
The price differences are truly mind boggling. Jennifer asked us if we would like to go to a flea market on Sunday morning. Would I LIKE to go??? What a question!! OF COURSE, I'd LOVE to go to one!!! And we invited them for lunch afterwards, as a way of thank you for taking us in for three days. Of course since we didn't know anything there we relied on her to pick a nice place. Suddenly she got all excited and started jumping up and down with twinkles in her eyes saying she knew the perfect spot. A restaurant with a stamp store inside!!! It doesn't get any better than that, does it?? Jan just rolled his eyes... LOL
Bruce's roasted chicken for dinner was like we were out in a restaurant, soooo good!!! And coz Jennifer and me were still busy exchanging more stuff and explaining it to each other, he was on his own for the veggies too that evening. Hahaha!!
The next morning I was up again very early, around 7am this time. Still waaayyy early for me, but hey, it's getting better!! :-)
We went to the flea market with Jennifer and Bruce, and browsed around. It was held at the grounds of a drive-in movie theater, and I hoped I would get to see one. Well at least I got to see it during the day, with the big screen up and the speakers in the parking lot next to the cars. At the flea market I found a leather baseball glove and a baseball as a real american souvenir. Also found the bat, but Jan insisted on "no!".... hmm.....
Jennifer and I found some interesting old books from the forties with nice ads. Some local old business directory book or so from Waterbury. Then we stumbled across some very old handwritten letters from the thirties. When I took my nap in the afternoon they all spent some time reading them, even Jan. Never thought he'd be interested in anything like that, as they turned out to be love letters from a gal named Fran to a certain guy Raymond. Fun to read and what a nice handwriting!!! At one point I was browsing through some stuff at one of the booths when I suddenly saw Jen waving with a stamp in her hand!! Wow!! I almost tripped over in my haste to get to her! Actually husband Bruce had found them, and there were several large boxes to rummage through! I got a few and asked the lady if she would make a deal on those. She took them out of my hands, held them lovingly and kept fondling them while saying to me "oh I so hate to let them go"... Duh, you're selling them!! If you don't want to let go of them, don't put them up for sale, and if you are selling them for whatever reason at a flea market, you gotta be prepared to make some kind of deal on them. Didn't get much off the price, but I still got the stamps... Hahaha!!
I know that one of the stamps I got there would cost around 22euros in Belgium, so I actually never had bought one of that company before. Sad, isn't it??? LOL

Then to top it all off Jennifer showed us the place where we would have lunch, a local restaurant that also has a stamp store inside! There's no words to describe how I felt going in there. It's so different from anything I've every seen before! I was completely overwhelmed! Jan and Bruce got bored and went outside, chatting while they were waiting on Jennifer and me to finish up the shopping. (ggg)
That evening we got a treat: Bruce's famous ribs!! Man, they were sooo good!! I should have asked him to make us some for take away lunch the next day when we would leave. Jennifer and I kept busy swapping treasures with each other until after dinner and FINALLY, we got down to stamping. It's funny how you think you have all the time in the world, after all we were gonna be there the whole weekend, but then time seems to start running away from you and suddenly you realize there's so much more you wanted to have done or said!!

Well, anyway, our first weekend in the US was a complete success and I wouldn't have minded staying longer if we hadn't had all these other plans!!
Thank you so much Jennifer and family, it was a great time together!! :-))

Hugs to all,
Wezz

Close encounter of the US kind

Hi all,

bet you are all getting really anxious to read about the rest of the trip!! Well, let me tell you, it has been a hectic few days!! And would you believe it, we're already 7 (seven!!!! that's a whole week!!) days into our holiday???? Wow, this is just going waaaayyy too fast!! Instead of 3 weeks I wish we could be here for 3 months!! LOL!!

When we got our car (yes, the suzuki...) we went straight ahead to tackle the NYC Friday afternoon traffic. Ya know, when they all head up north to "upstate NY"... Just the direction we were heading of course. But Jan had really done his homework and printed out a whole road book with maps and everything, and wrote down all the numbers/names of streets and highways and expressways we needed. Traffic was heavy, but not worse than rush hour in Brussels. Once we had New York behind us we were quickly on our way to head to Connecticut. The first stop we made along the way was to get us a cell phone so we would be able to call everyone we were gonna meet and maybe for hotel reservations along the way and stuff like that. My cell phone actually works in the US, but for some strange stupid reason I couldn't get the card alone. Noooo, of course not, I needed to buy a phone too, even though the card works in my phone. Duh!! Isn't that stupid?? The shop owner of the Radio Shack tried it in my phone. And he and his co-workers kept checking out my european phone. "oh, look, they did this another way than we're used to".... Well, to us at least it was funny, since we both work for telephone operators. LOL
We went to the Starbucks next door. I had heard so much about these already that I REALLY couldn't pass up the chance to go to one and so soon too!! LOL
But then, I made a mistake, probably the first of many. Since we had almost nothing in the car to drink, I ordered two large coffees. Oh man!! I shouldn't have done that!! I should have remembered that US portions are a LOT bigger than european ones!! This was at least the size of two regular cups for us, so we had to take them with us in the car coz they were just too big to drink right away. Lucky they do have good cups that really keep it warm for a long long time! While we were there I had to try out the cell phone and called Jennifer, the first one we were gonna meet on our trip. Hey, I had to try the phone right then and there, what if something didn't work? I'd have to be able to take it back to the store I bought it to get it sorted! But no worries, it worked perfectly, talked to Jennifer, tried calling Christi and we arrived at Jennifer's house that evening. The dog came running out to greet us. She showed us the room that would be our home for the next 3 nights and had dinner just about ready to serve. We met her wonderful husband Bruce and son Zach (sp?) plus dog Petey and a few cats. They all made us feel right at home!! :-))
Driving up there we really enjoyed the landscape and were totally amazed at the amount of roadkill alongside the interstate roads. We just about cracked up when we saw a sign that said "FOOD - McDONALDS"... We looked at each other and laughed "since when is McDonalds a synonym for food????? LOLOLOL
And funny enough, we passed that same sign at almost every exit on our way. (ggg)

More later guys!! Hopefully soon!

Hugs,
Wezz

And the cat came back...

Okay, so the cat had to wear a collar she didn't like. We just didn't realize how bad she didn't like that.... We had brought her home on Monday evening from the vet, and she was wearing her new collar. On Wednesday I needed to go out for an hour or two and had checked the cat before leaving. You already KNOW where this is going, right????? Riiiighhhht..... when I came home she was proudly awaiting me with a look on her face "look what I got off!! Isn't that great?!" oooohhhhhh noooo, she had managed to get rid of the collar and got the stitches out again too!!! aaaarrrghhh!!
Back to the vet with her!!! She figured she needed to take drastic measures with a cat like that, and gave her a white netted stocking with holes to put her legs and tail through. Now that's a fashionable cat!!! White net stocking on black fur, and white legs!! I know it wasn't funny for the cat, but boy, that sure was a sight to see!!! Right before taking her to the cat hotel on Thursday we had her checked up on again by the vet on Wednesday evening, and thank goodness, she could take off that stocking. Happy cat, if it weren't for the collar that she still had to wear....
On Thursday evening we dropped off both our cats at the cat hotel they have been going to for the past 9 years and finished our packing for our big trip to the US.
The vet will check up on the cat at the cat hotel (it's actually the vet they always work with so that's no problem) and will hopefully remove the stitches on Monday (that's today!! I hope it went alright!).

We had made arrangements for an airport service to pick us up at home at 7:30am. So I put away my last minute things and poured myself a nice cup of coffee. The doorbell rang. Airport service?? It was only 6:50am?? Yep, airport service, we needed to leave as soon as possible coz there was a big fire at Brussels airport and who knows how busy it was gonna be. The road to the airport had been blocked for a few hours coz the building on fire was too close to the road and it was a maintenance place for airplanes. There were 4 planes in the building and because of the kerosine there was danger of explosion. By the time we got there the road was open again, the fires were out but the building had collapsed. Phew!!! Lucky our flight wasn't scheduled any sooner!!
Since 9/11 airport security has gotten a lot tighter, and especially for flights to the US. I don't mind, better be safe than sorry. They just do what needs to be done.
So when we went to check in we already got a bunch of security questions to answer.
One of them being what the address is of your first night's stay. Man, I can't believe how many times I had to give that address!! On the plane we got several forms to fill out, and don't make any mistakes coz you gotta start over!! Of course, I scratched out something, and that was no good, so "here's a new form to fill out, please". Thank you. I'll do that. LOL
At least the plane wasn't full, so I had some extra space to lay down for a nap. I could pick a better spot to watch the movie if I wanted that. Except where the US marshal was with his prisoner. Chains on his feet, and handcuffed. Creepy guy, btw.
When we arrived at JFK ariport in NYC we had to give the address again, have our picture taken and fingerprints too. Electronically, not the old fashioned way with ink. No, this was a tiny scanner, just big enough for your fingertips. Impressive.
We were all waiting in line to get this done, and out comes the US marshal, his prisoner and the marshal's deputy (?). They bypass the whole line, get yelled at by the guy at the counter to stay behind the yellow line and wait their turn. HUH?? That's a prisoner!! Surely you don't want a guy like that hanging around at a big airport any longer than strictly necessary??? And wouldn't they have known that he was coming? The crew was informed, so why wasn't there someone waiting to escort him off the airport?? I thought security was so important? That struck me as odd, to say the least.
By the time we got through customs and claimed our bags I wanted something to drink, a soda, or some water. But no such luck, not in that part of that large airport. Not even a vending machine. So we took the airtrain (never thought something like that would exist!! An airtrain!! How funny!) that took us to the other side of the airport where the rental car companies were located. We were all excited coz we had booked an "all american car", a Chevrolet Blazer (or equal), to travel in true US style. And we got the "or equal", and they gave us a Suzuki. Duh!!! Our dream of driving in US style shattered!! It's still a nice car though and it won't spoil our holiday one bit. It may even have added to the fun, coz now when we see a Blazer, we point at it and go "that's our car!!" and laugh.... LOLOL
The staff at the rental company was so kind to let me buy some water from their vending machine in the back for the employees, coz there was no other way to get something to drink. And off we were!!! Our 3 week trip in a car had started!!
Wooohooo!!
It's getting late now, and I'll have to catch up with the past few days and our experiences some other time. Hope you all enjoy reading it though!

Hugs,
Wezz

Starting a blog?

Okay, so now I've created my own blog. Wow. This is daunting, a totally new experience for me!! But I'm sure I'll learn the ropes pretty quickly and hope I can keep up with journaling. I type faster than I write, so I know I won't do it the old fashioned way, except for making a few notes that will be worked in my blog somehow. Hopefully. I don't know how long I can make this happen, but for sure I will share our experiences as a couple of Euros on a road trip through the States. The good, the bad and the ugly.
See ya!