Curacao is nice and Nolo and Monica are wonderful hosts.

Curacao is beautiful island in the tropics. This is where we ate dinner our first night. Living like this could become habit forming in about another six or seven hours.  

Nolo and Monica live across the bay to the right. They are marvelous hosts.

Of course the big deal for me was completing my SCUBA dive course at Ocean Encounters http://oceanencounters.com/en/  @www.oceanencounters.com and beginning underwater diving. Well that has happened. With the help of a great instructor and the attraction of being in a saltwater fish tank with lots of exotic fish, coral and things to see, it was super.

A few times as the instructor and I were on our way down to the bottom, I struggled a bit equalizing pressure with my ears, but on my fourth dive getting to 60 feet depth was fairly easy with only one episode where I had to stop and go up a bit before continuing down. Something about going slow being rewarding is counter to my thought process. However it is beginning to "sink" in.

Just about all the photo documentation we are going to get is here. We swam out past the rock barrier, then along a shelf for a distance with a gently sloping coral reef with tropical fish at depth about 20-30 feet. The shelf dramatically increases the slope of the drop at about 40-50 feet depth to a sharp drop and the variety of sea life and coral change dramatically.

 Final adjustment for goggles and, boy-oh-boy, while diving it seems I clear them almost constantly.

Yeah that first deep dive was a thrill. 

One evening we went for a sunset cruise along the island shore down to Spanish Waters, a large residential golf development in a bay. Nolo packed a full picnic dinner with ample drinks and refreshments. Yes, it was delightful.

and the sunset beautiful too. 

 Patt liked riding in the boat.

Returning to the harbor, the beach entry for dives is to the left between the beach chairs. The dock for Ocean Encounters is just behind the white boats in the back left.

Monica preparing to tie the boat as it enters the slip to the left of the yellow building.

And on more than one occasion I have spent in excess of 90 minutes in this position listening to the breeze in the palms and feeling the sun on me and wondering where the time went when someone spoke my name out of the blue.  Things are getting tough here with Nolo and Monica. You might want to think twice prior to visiting.

through the Canal — THE CANAL

A day or so ago, Patt, Raleigh and I joined a few, well actually a whole bunch, of our friends of similar situation in life. (The observant will notice hair styles and color.) We cruised up the Panama Canal on the Pacific Queen providing multiple opportunities for photography. Here we are following a tug pushing a barge into one of the locks at Miraflores.

Coming the other direction is a Liberian cargo ship in route. It is being lowered in the locks as we are being floated up.
 

The previous locks we have come through as seen from the stern (Eric is that right?) of our vessel.

The Baltic Patriot is pulled past the tourist museum and observation decks at Miraflores as we move forward. Big ships are pulled by little trains called mules, smaller vessels proceed in the locks under their own power but tied together or to tugs as the water rushing in creates a whirlpool effect.

Important side note - this remodeled multi-floored tourist center was the location of a very pleasant party that Patt and I hosted the evening prior to Stephen and Jen's wedding at Gamboa the next day July 9, 2009.

And we are fully underway going north toward the Atlantic and the Pedro Miguel locks.

While watching the ship rise against the wall of the lock, Raleigh enjoyed his lunch time cookie in the mess hall of our cruise ship - we were well fed twice on the trip. I think this lock had something like a 30+ foot change in water level.

As fortune would have it, there was on board another young boy from Argentina with his parents.  The two boys hit it off quite well and enjoyed each other very much. His name according to Raleigh is "Boy" though they talked entirely in Spanish and the child according to his Mom is 3 years old. I hope his birthday is next week as he is going to be big.

The Chesapeake Highway, a Panamanian ship, is a car carrier and its recent stops in order were Shanghai, Jacksonville,  Newark, and Colon. Its current location is in the Pacific, just west of Panama traveling at a rate of 17 knots. The internet is an amazing thing. The tour guide on our ship said typical car carrier cargo ships like this one could carry 5,500 cars. Large carriers that use the new locks can carry 8,800 cars. FYI.

Said ship going through the continental divide and the location known as the Big Dig where the most digging was required. Well duh.

And this ship was so close and impressive I just missed the name in my photos. Not like you haven't seen one of these before, but it was impressive to see come by.

We did not go all the way to Colon. We got off our ship near Gamboa and took a van back to the City.  A long and fun day and enjoyable conversations too with several of our shipmates.

Panama and the times are: well as expected

Not this, not standing still, at least not for long. And please not the outfit. Jen is working on making the grandparents pleased by remembering whose clothing to dress which child in when which grandparent is visiting. Jen is good at that.  

And no, not this either. This pose lasted all of about 36 seconds, about six shots on an iphone and two  of the subjects looking somewhat in the same direction. It was a morning in the park that was fun.

It looked a bit more like this. And the sun was hot - can you say hot. It is the dry season here, and whew, we have weather. An important note and skill our eldest Panamanian grandson has is the ability to do most things using only a hand and a half as one or the other is holding "Bluebear" and a car of some size. This particular car is a hot wheels, but it can be as large as the Bluebear.

Shopping is a big deal. Bluebear of course is with us and making sure only desired objects make it into the cart is part of my responsibility. Pretty good at it too. Not great, but pretty good.

Just a little help at the kitchen sink. The dogs are hopeful I will drop more food as I snack in the background and am entertained by the calm and orderly sink play in the foreground.

As is true for all our grandchildren, Raleigh seriously needs more legos and little cars. It is a sad and tragic situation that he suffers under. Patt and I must talk with Jim and Fa about addressing this situation as soon as possible.

Oh, I forgot to mention, some afternoons we have difficult, truly difficult, times when the situation just seems to overwhelm us and the two of us have to find time to ourselves to unwind. I know it is tough but I try. You can't blame me for not trying.

Patt even got a date night out of this, actually a double date as Stephen and Jen joined us for an evening in Casco Viejo, which by-the-wayh as really changed since S&J moved here in 2007. When we first started coming down here, I was nervous the first time I rode my bike to this square to see who was honored by the statute (I forgot) - now there is a very high end fancy restaurant on the roof of the white building behind it and no broken pavement.

little between times blog and tomorrow we travel again

Well, we have been home several months, was warm, got cool, then cold and now getting warm again. We had deer as frequent visitors in our back yard upon our return to Raleigh in August. Note two back in the leafy area. This winter we have not seen them. Must be wintering along the greenway.

We did branch out on restaurant dining, finding a very country older establishment on the way to the elementary school our church has adopted to support through providing "reading buddies" of whom Patt is one. This rather rustic and rough place features Civil War photos and flags (that would be General Lee above the distinguished men in the corner booth).  I had the vegetable plate.

With Mark and Marie we enjoyed football season. The Deacons are getting good. And we even had one game that was c-o-l-d. We were styling too. Especially Mark and me.

Patt and I have joined the Raleigh Sister Cities program and among the cities we are sisters with is Compiegne, France, location of the signing of the Armistice that ended World War I. We visited the armistice railcar/museum/park in spring 2016. This was the ceremony at sunrise on Armistice Day 11/11/16 at the NC State Bellower which was built to honor veterans of Raleigh and NCSU who fought in WWI and later II.

Hosting was part of our routine this past fall. Charlotte, Ray and Diane's daughter, Charlotte,  kept me busy; Nolo and Monica; Susan, Graham and Ryan; and Eddie, Betty and Arthur all visited and, of course, Kate lived with us keeping me sorta accountable as the "worst uncle ever".

Here reading to Ryan, once again illustrating the age group with whom I most readily identify.

Christmas party with Kelly and Beth's children's "friends" and a game of "Settlers of Catan" was fun as was the good times associated with the traditions associated with the day.

Winter has seen us in Winston-Salem to see the Deacons on the hardwood and looking good - well better and fun to watch. Check out the score board in the back ground.  Deacons up by double digits in the second half; going on to beat Miami by 17 points!

The Deacon wearing 0 is Randolf Childress's son Brandon, my all time favorite Deacon player and hopefully a new favorite.

and as behoves a new year, and women's marches, and such, Patt has gotten active -  as she says "Grandma is ——"

As Promised … More from Panama

While Stephen and Jen were gone, as mentioned our (and their) friends, Heidi and Edgardo and Raleigh's best friend Eliot spent a few days with us. One afternoon we went to a Smithsonian Institute Research Park at the end of the Causeway that goes out into the Pacific at the end of the canal.  It was built with spoil from the construction of the canal. There are numerous exhibits of saline and jungle wildlife at the site and we got a good tour as Heidi and Edgardo certainly are knowledgeable about this stuff.  

And for once one of the telescopes actually worked and we were fortunate that a large cargo ship just emerged from the canal that we were able to observe especially close up.

Raleigh and kitten playing in castle/fort made from washing machine cardboard box.

These next two photos show a bit of the different personalities of the two boys. Raleigh is a bit more quiet and inquisitive and Clinton is a bit more loud and wide open and rambunctious.

I think I mentioned that I liked Clinton's smile, well here is one of them.

Patt has good ideas. Here is one of them. As we are not going to be in Panama for Christmas this year, she decided to take our Christmas gifts early and even wanted to take a Christmas tree to complete the festivities. Raleigh unfortunately no longer calls it a "Crissman tree" (oh-well, I am no longer called Grannanny either).

Raleigh laughed quietly and almost continuously in a most happy way the entire time Patt and he were straightening out the limbs and as I was putting on the lights. When it came time to put on decorations, serious work began. This is serious stuff now. Certain places for certain decorations.

Patt found somewhere (AC Moore?) a bunch of small little decorations and such a good time we had putting them on. Towards the end of the pile, Raleigh slowed down considerably like he did not want it to end.

And this is where meal taking was taken ever since the tree went up. Note the cars from Cars around the tree. I found the set at Target if you need a good gift idea for someone.

Two boys who are slow on the waking up side of the morning.

Clinton found a random piece of wire sticking out of the ground in the playground. Note how the light catches the few hairs on his head. He continues a long line of bald headed Crissman babies. We seem to possess hair only a few short years.

Raleigh likes it when I bring him home from school. We stop for interesting sights.

Clinton found the kitten once again and is bring him to Grandmama.

Clinton likes to share the kitten too, and kitten even puts up with that.

got yogurt and fruit?