Tag Archives: Emma

Happy Campers

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Well, it’s been a considerable time since any of us have written posts. I may as well do the first for August 2013.

Since returning to the US, we have seen no fewer than seven family members, a dozen deer (including five new fawns), and a black bear. The black bear was up in the mountains, and it ran across the road right in front of our car shortly after we found several bear bones on the side of the road. Last week, my parents saw a bobcat and have photographic evidence.

Right now, my cousin and aunt from Texas are visiting. Yesterday we made two types of cupcakes for a grand total of 22: nine apple-almond with cinnamon ganache and thirteen (surprisingly bland) dark chocolate with peppermint frosting and dark chocolate-mint M&Ms. I’ve also made lemon-blueberry cupcakes, chocolate-orange, and chocolate-zucchini (with a to-die-for cinnamon buttercream), and a few days ago we made lavender cupcakes with a whipped cream frosting.

Ethan and I spent last week at camp and had a very good time. It only rained once and then for only ten minutes on Friday morning. Ethan managed to get a very bad sunburn while wakeboarding, but for all my playing basketball in the sun I came away tan as ever. The only bad thing about camp was that, the day after we left, One Direction’s new single came out and the third in line for the throne was born in the UK. Those Brits. Couldn’t wait for us to get back.

We haven’t gotten poison oak yet, which is rather surprising considering our rather cross-country hike three days ago and the little rainy excursion we went on yesterday.

But I’m okay with that.

Poison oak isn’t necessary.

Ciao!

Bye-Bye Beach

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Today was our last beach day. I have mixed feelings about this. (Well, not really.)

I’m not a beach person. The sunscreen I have to wear is sticky, the water is too cold to swim, the sand is to… well… sandy, it’s too windy to keep an umbrella up and a towel down, and it’s hot as anything.

So it was with some relief that I pulled on my striped dress and purple flip-flops, grabbed my green bag, and headed back to the car. Today being our last beach day also means that we’re nearing the end of our time in Crete, Greece, and abroad.

 

Ethan and I swam in the pool after eating slices of chocolate cake with our parents, since today was Fathers’ Day. For supper we went to Zisi. It’s a really good thing we’re leaving soon so we don’t have to return there because the food is mediocre, the tzatziki is probably the worst I’ve ever had (although all the other places have had really good tzatziki), and the service is atrocious. Our waitron knocked over our bottle of water when he could have easily stopped it, and he served raki even after Dad refused.

Ciao!

Barricaded Because of Beyond

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Everyone, write this date (May 5, 2013) down: for the first time in over two-and-a-half months, I wore something besides pants and a shirt in public. It was one of my Dijonian dresses, and it was very exciting. For me, at least.

We walked across Pont de las Minimes and into town, where there was supposed to be a farmers’ market. Mom declined to buy anything, so we kept going to a shop where we bought a newspaper. Although news of the flood (the water’s gone down about five feet already) was splashed across the first four pages, Semur-en-Auxois didn’t make any of the pictures—or the article, for that matter.

Oh, well.

After chilling in the house for a while and getting diesel for the car, we walked down the river to a barricade because the road beyond it was in a state of disrepair.

“So much for our walk,” Mom said.

Back at the house, Mom prepared a supper of pizza, salad, and zucchini. None of it had enough vinegar.

Ciao!

Thundering Thursday

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KGALAGADI TRANSFRONTIER NATL. PARK, South Africa—After the thunder and rain had passed and Mom had crept over to my bed in the middle of the night to look at the waterhole, Dad’s phone alarm went off at 5 am.

We were on the road with all our stuff by 6:37 am after having had breakfast, showers, and packed luggage. We saw the female lion walking up over a hill, but the male lion (this was the mating pair) was nowhere to be seen.

After passing familiar landmarks such as the giraffe carcass, dead eland, and steep turnoff up to a lookout, we finally arrived on new territory. Three kilometers later, we turned onto the Dune Road (South) and drove between the Auob and Nossob Rivers. We saw many secretarybirds and rocks that looked like animals, plus ostriches and a gemsbok, but not much else until we hit the Nossob River valley.

We turned north, away from Twee Rivieren, and drove for 12K before U-turning south. We passed a snake eagle drinking from a natural puddle (!!!) and our first interesting animal of the day: (well, animals) a small pride of lions sitting in the shade. We kept going and found another cat 20 kilometers down the road: a leopard.

It was lying in the fork of a tree. Dad thought it had a kill nearby (he still thinks that, in fact), but we looked and looked and couldn’t find one. We also saw a pretty red slender mongoose there and at a tree later, where a man pointed out the lions sitting in a bush.

We didn’t see these mysterious lions until our evening drive, when we once again saw the leopard. We also saw an eagle trying to catch a Cape cobra for dinner. However, it took too long and the gate was going to close soon. So the other three satisfied themselves by looking at the leopard again, which had changed trees and gave a nice silhouette.

Ciao.