Boulder to London

I should have done a full posting on each of these locations as Melisse and I had a great time traveling across the US and visiting with friends and family before we left.  Unfortunately, I haven’t kept up on things so here is the abridged version of the past month…

Melisse’s last day of work was the 5^th of June and we left on the 6^th for Texas.  We started the journey in San Antonio where we spent the weekend with her dad and her brother.  We used our Marriott points to get a hotel downtown and were given a beautiful room with a balcony overlooking San Antonio’s famous Riverwalk.  While we were there we were treated to breakfast tacos, local music, her dad’s BBQ and plenty of hot weather.  It was great to be able to spend time with everyone including her Dad, Susan, Masha, G.R., and G.R.’s girlfriend Samantha.  After a few days in San Antonio we moved on to Seguin.  Seguin is a quaint little town about 45 minutes outside of San Antonio where her Grandma lives.  We spent several days in Seguin and we really started to ease into vacation mode.  Each day included several hours by the pool, at least one nap, a walk down to the lake and many hours visiting with Grandma and Don.  We were also very excited to see Melisse’s Uncle David who had just returned from Mexico and made it over for dinner one evening.   After several days, we had to move on so we headed north to Austin to see Melisse’s older sister, Wendy, as well as her Mom, Scott, younger sister, Celeste, and Celeste’s boyfriend Ben.  Once again, there was plenty of eating, drinking, sitting by the pool and catching up.  We were treated to a very nice surprise when Ben took us out on his boat for the day on Lake Travis.  It was a great day to swim, cruise around on the boat and enjoy the Texas sunshine.   After a solid 10 days in Texas, it was time to get back on the plane to Colorado to move out of the apartment. 

Lucky for us, my brother volunteered to come down to help us pack the apartment and drive the U-haul up to Montana.  The process started on Tuesday morning when we picked up the truck and packed the first load of items that were to be given away locally.  We loaded up the dining room and kitchen for brother H.J. and took the guest bed over to Maggie.  While this was an important first step, we soon realized that there was still a lot to do.  Maggie and HJ showed up at the house that evening to help pack, provide nourishment and keep the process going.  Since we had packed most of the house by this point, we ended up staying the night with Maggie.  Thanks Maggie!!!  We spent until Wednesday afternoon packing, loading, cleaning and disposing of everything else that was left in the apartment.  By 4:00 on Wednesday, we had the truck loaded and were ready to hit the road.  We stopped off at Choice City Deli in Ft. Collins for dinner and started the drive to Montana.  We drove through the night and arrived in Helena, MT around 5AM the next day.  The trip went well except for the two hail storms and the inevitable tension that can arise when three exhausted people share the cab of a u-haul for 15 hours in the middle of the night.  We all slept well the next day and unpacked the truck over the next two days.

Once the truck was unpacked, MT was great.  We got to see Nate and Darbi and their three beautiful children Libby, Isabelle and Brit.  We also spent time with Hugh, Chris and much of Joslyn’s extended family from Helena.  I was very impressed with Helena and everything that is going on there.   The neighborhood that Jim and Joslyn live in is incredible and the downtown area is developing quickly.  I’ve lived in some pretty great places, but Helena seems to be as nice as any of them.   With only a few days to spend in Helena, we got back in the car and headed west to Washington to spend a few days with my family at Newman Lake.  The weather was a little cooler than I like for the lake, but it was nice to see everyone including my Mom, Dad, Jenny, Luke, Angie, John and Grandma before leaving for London.  As with our previous destinations, we ate, drank, slept in, and enjoyed catching up with friends and family. 

Finally, on June 28^th, we got on the plane headed to London.  We stopped in Chicago before flying through the night and landing at Heathrow around 8AM local time.  We worked through the maze at immigration and were both allowed to enter the country.  We actually had to get two baggage carts to carry all of the bags we brought over and made our way over to the taxi line.  The taxi took us to the apartment that had been rented for us which turned out to be a beautiful fourth floor corner unit with floor to ceiling windows on two sides and a large balcony looking towards the city.  We slept most of the day, but woke up in time for the Euro Cup finals to watch Spain beat Germany.  Since we had slept most of the day we had trouble sleeping through the night.  At one point I woke up and was delighted to see that it was almost 7:00.  Melisse said…”How can it be 7:00?  It is still dark out?”  As I looked at my watch again, I realized that I had it upside down and it was really 1:30 in the morning.  We didn’t sleep to well the first night, but hopefully tomorrow night will be better.  We did get over to the KPMG office and also to the Art Academy where Melisse will be studying.  Tomorrow we start looking for a place to live permanently.  Oh yeah…speaking of places to live permanently, my house in Ft. Collins sold and closed last Friday!!!