Welcome to the Azores

First off...the Azores are amazing. Truly amazing. Just intriguingly beautiful, calm islands. We had a blast everyday we were there and would love to do it all over again.

From London we flew to Portugal (we didn't fly through Spain, as several people had feared) and had essentially another 8 hour layover. We landed at 10:00 pm, got to our hotel at 11:00, we were asleep by midnight and up at 4:00 am to catch our 6:30 am flight to Sao Miguel, the largest Island in the chain.

Here we are changing airplanes. We sat in the plane from about 6:30 to 9:30 while they tried to fix a problem. They served us breakfast and drinks. We finally switched planes and sat in this one for about an hour before we eventually took off, 4 hours after we were supposed to leave.

We liked the word "whilst"

We got in around noon and after taking a taxi to our Bed and Breakfast, we slept for almost five hours. It was so nice. After that we decided to walk into town. Here's Jackie crusing down the sidewalk.

We passed "Big Black Man Street" along the way

We ate at the restaurant at the end of the docks
We had a great candlelit dinner on the dock and asked for the check. The teenage busboy brought Jackie this book and told her she could read it while we waited. He stepped a couple of feet to the side but continued to watch Jackie's puzzled face. The book he gave us appeared to be a 1st grade elementary school book.
Jackie opened the book and sure enough the check was inside. He totally got us. We then went back to our place and slept for about 11 hours. We woke up when the rental car lady arrived and was ready to drop our car off.
We hopped in the car and started to cruise the Island
First stop: 90 to 95 degree ocean water. This little area was amazing. The water nearest to the camera is actually pretty hot. The thermal water is coming up from below somewhere. The area where everyone is swimming around is a little bit cooler and tolerable because it has the colder sea water flowing into it. It was fun when little, cooling swells rolled into the swimming area.
I'm lovin' it!
More beautiful hillsides

Be careful!

We followed signs on the highway that pointed toward "Natural Pools"

I'm lovin' it...again!
I'm better at synchronized diving
A little more cautious getting in
It was fun swimming around

Lagoa das Sete Cidades. One lake is green and one lake is blue (hard to tell in this weather)
Just a beautiful crater. Unbelievable
Cuidado! (Be careful!)
That raps up our first night and then our first full day on the Azores. Only like 300 more pictures to choose from.

London: 8 Hours Well Spent

With the 8 hour layover in London, Jackie and I decided to make the most of it. We bought a one day pass on the London Underground and headed for downtown. We were both hungry so we stopped at a little cafeteria in one of the parks behind Buckingham Palace.

The old Kings road

Keep your car within the lines

After a quick bite to eat, we walked over to the Palace to look at the guards like everybody else. They were setting up for the kick-off 2012 summer olympic games right in front of the palace right to the side of the palace so that was neat to see that.

I just had to take it

We then walked through a park toward Big Ben and Westminster Abbey, taking pictures along the way.

Tired Doggay

Jackie was taking a picture of me in front of Big Ben when a man volunteered to take one of us both and told Jackie to get in the picture. We were excited but soon disappointed when we realized he didn't try to get Big Ben in the picture. He asked me if it was OK and I chickened out and told him it was OK, not wanting to hurt his feelings I guess.
We still had a few more hours to kill but after we made it here we decided to head back to the airport. Jackie had a bad cold and walking around wasn't helping. It was a good thing we got back a little early to the airport because we first went to Terminal 3 and after trying to get through security, they told us our plane was in Terminal 5. That meant we had to find our way back to the metro, wait 8 minutes for another train to come and take us to Terminal 5. We we got there we were sure we were in the right spot because it was essentially the British Airway terminal, and that's what we were flying. After trying to get through security there, they told us we had to go to Terminal 2 because that is where our flight was taking off. I asked her if she was positive and she said she was. We went back to the metro, waited for another train, and eventually found our gate in Terminal 2. FYI, if you are flying to either Portugal or Spain on British Airways from London, it is at Terminal 2, all other locations are at Terminal 5.

I Can Show You the World...

Other title option was: "Nine Planes and Four Countries Later

Jackie and I just got back from our (second) Honeymoon. We had a blast and feel really lucky to have had such a great experience. Between London, Portugal, the Azores, and France we have around 600 pictures so we going to try and get a good travelogue up in the next few days. I thought I would start with an overall introduction here and then put a few more pictures and stories in subsequent posts.

We flew out of Salt Lake airport at 1:00 on the August 19th (Happy Birthday Mom) and landed in Dallas a few hours later. We sat around the airport and then flew to London from there. We had 8 hours until our next flight so we decided to make the most of it.
We walked around a park, ate some lunch, checked out Buckingham Palace, Big Ben, and then Westminster Abbey. We didn't sleep much on the red eye from Dallas so we felt pretty exhausted walking around all over London.

We made it back to the airport and got on a plane to Lisbon. Thanks to my Dad, he got us a room at the Marriott there and we made it there around 11:00 pm on August 20th. It felt nice to take a shower and then sleep on a bed. Unfortunately, we didn't sleep much because we had another flight to catch at 6:30 am. I don't know what I was thinking on that one, should have booked the afternoon flight in Heinz sight. We got about 4 hours of sleep until we had to leave. We got to the airport and boarded to plane only to sit there for about 3 hours, switch planes and sit for about another hour until we finally left around 11:00 am. After a two hour flight, we had finally made it to the Azores. We left our house in Provo at 10:00 am on the 19th and finally got to our destination at noon on the 21st. We got to our hotel and took one of those awesome 5 hour afternoon naps. We then spent the next 5 days wandering around the Island.

Partly cloudy with mostly sun everyday. Highs of 78 and lows around 60. Just beautiful

After the Azores we flew back to Lisbon to go spend some time in the city of Coimbra, where Jackie served almost half of her mission. Coimbra is home of one of the oldest Universities in the world, permanently residing in Coimbra since the mid 1500's.


We then drove back to Lisbon and hung out around there for a night. The statue "Cristo Rei" is in the background as well as the imitation Golden Gate Bridge.



From Lisbon we flew to Madrid, 3 hour layover, and then on to Paris. We had 20 hours to kill so we got a hotel room and spent almost all of our time running the streets, trying to take in everything that we could. It was awesome.

Videos from the Steiner Stampede

Christine and Kelly prove they still have it




This is a video of the championship round of the big pants race. I didn't realize how violent I was being with Thomas until I saw this video. Sorry Thomas