Sunday, 6 September, 2015

A busy week of geocaching and socializing - pretty nice life, eh? :-)

Dad and I are really enjoying getting into geocaching.  This week, we went back to some ones we had visited previously - we have been trying to pick up as many geocoins/travel bugs from HB as we can to take back to Canada.  Dad checked out online which ones were supposed to be here in the Bay, but some of them were listed as being placed here up to two years ago.  We figured that those ones had probably been picked up by someone, but they had not recorded it being done.  Sure enough, when we revisited the ones we had been to previously, they weren't there.  Dad was then able to let the owners of the travel bugs know that they had gone missing.  We now have four bugs to place in Canada - we hope to take the grandkids geocaching when we are in Canada so that they can help us place these travel bugs in caches there.

 geocache found in small tube under a rock in between those two big rocks

 geocache found in small medicine bottle in the hole in the tree

 geocache found underneath this footpath on top of the wood plank it is on

 geocache found in this stump of a tree (it was covered with branches)

 geocache found underneath this pagoda

 geocache found in the middle of this woody area - it was in an ammo box covered with a green tarp and covered over with branches

 woody area - I was a little anxious about going into this one as the snakes are just starting to come out of hibernating - fortunately we didn't meet any creatures

pelicans we saw on our walk along the pier (doing another geocache)

 the pier we had to walk along - we had to count the number of tables used for cleaning fish and the number of benches on the pier - we then used these numbers to calculate where the geocache was near the pier

 seagull on the pier

 seagull in flight (I thought that this was a great photo that Dad took)

 ibis near the pier (they are called 'bin birds' cuz they scavenge from garbage bins - they are always at the schools so that they can eat the leftover crumbs from when the kids eat their lunches outside)    

we found another geocache underneath this bench

We had the missionaries over for dinner on Tuesday night - Elder Kishi from Japan and Elder De Young from Utah.  It's always nice to have them over for dinner and to get to know them.  Elder Kishi is quite shy - probably due somewhat to his English not being very strong.

Elder Kishi and Elder De Young

On Wednesday, I visited with the grade two teachers at Kawungan at morning tea time.  I had told Terri (one of the teachers) that I was coming and she had bought some muffins from the tuck shop for us to enjoy.  She is such a sweet person and we both enjoyed working with each other when I did the contract teaching in grade two a few years ago.  I had a lovely visit with her and the other grade two teachers.  One of the other teachers there, Sandy, told me how nice it was to see me and how I always am so happy - that was nice to hear.  Bronwyn was there helping out and we had planned on going out for lunch, so I stayed to help out in Terri's classroom.  I took a small reading group - it was nice being able to step right back into things. :-)

Once Bronwyn was done, she and I went out for lunch to a little cafe in town.  It was good to catch up with her and to find out what she has been doing since we last saw each other.  She and her husband are heading off to Europe soon for a 6 week trip around various countries over there starting in Paris.

On Friday, I got together with my friend, Maureen (from church).  We both enjoy going to movies and so I checked out what was on and chose one called 'Last Cab to Darwin' - an Aussie film based on a true story.  It started off slowly, but then became more interesting - I would rate it a 7/10.  Since the movie was at noon, Maureen and I decided to have morning tea and afternoon tea and no lunch.  We went back to Bayaroma where I went with my friend, Thea, last week.

 Maureen and me at Bayaroma for morning tea (I had a hot chocolate and a scone with jam and cream)

The very yummy Hawaiian Hula fruit juice I had for afternoon tea (orange, apple and pineapple juices) - I also had half a slice of apple and walnut bread with maple butter (I brought the other half home for Dad)

Dad and I spent Saturday organizing things for Dad leaving on Monday.  He will be flying on Qantas from HB to Brisbane and then on to L.A. on Air New Zealand.  He will spend the night there and then head to Vancouver on Tuesday morning.  He is going to spend three days with Grandma Martin there.  He will get to see Erika and meet Erika's husband, Terrence while he is there as they are going to be living with Grandma for the school year.  I will meet Dad in Vancouver on Friday and we will fly to Toronto together.  We are looking forward to seeing everyone again! :-)