I am so just not a techie person and have tried for three days to send this blog. One more time and if it doesn't go through, I'll find another blog site! We are home as of midnight last evening................happy to be here and have a bed that is the size of our cabin on our sailing ship, with bunk over.
It's interesting how fast one becomes new best friends with 30 people that you knew nothing of, one week ago. The first day I went up on deck dressed to go to the shower and the last day went up in my robe! We had two showers and they were both topside.
The food was amazing and did I mention we had home made bread every day...yum!
We did win the schooner race...............remember we were the only three masted ship in our class and winning was a given!............got a trophy etc.! The race ended in Camden Maine with lots of festivities and a steel drum band.
One slight mishap, no injuries, when one ship thought he could sail between two others in the final leg and hit both of them.......exciting times. Every one finished and of course blamed the other ship.
Weather was good, either hot or cold. We were prepared. Much of it depended on which side of the sail you were on!
Working was not mandatory........you could if you wanted. John raised sails a few times as well as furled sails at the end of the day.
And now to pictures..................of the ghost ship I mentioned. These pictures were worth missing the fireworks the night before. One or two of race day and one or two of lighthouses.
I think all of the light houses are in Maine. The state of Maine claims 3,500 miles of shore line and NOAA claims they only have 228.
Thanks for checking in on us and we'll hope to continue doing this in September when we are on the road once more.

Yea!!.....I'm finally able to get online and blog. I bought really spiffy equipment before we left with hopes of being able to post on a fairly regular basis.........but.........we've been in the middle of nowhere most of the time!!! Seagulls, lobsters, other tall ships and fabulous scenery.
And I promise not to criticize John about his lack of a direction gene, at least not too much, because we were in New Hampshire not Vermont!!!!

We have spent the last four days sailing in Penobscot Bay dropping anchor in various ports. Last night we were in Castine and were fogged in. No fireworks as we wouldn't have been able to see them. Today we are back in Rockland preparing for the The Great American Schooner Race. We are guaranteed winners as there are no other three masted schooners racing........winning our division is a slam dunk.

The name of our sailing vessel is The Victory Chimes and is 100 years old. It is the ship used on the Maine quarter. There are thirty passengers and we carry a crew of 10. All in all it's been a great trip [not finished yet] but the accommodations are really small. About the size of my closet on Old Creek minus a few feet! I've got the top bunk and have yet to be organized with our stuff. Each move is planned in advance. Showers are on deck, enclosed of course. There is nothing like a shower at 7:00 AM when the temp is probably about 50. The food is outstanding to include home made bread at every meal. Lobster being one of the most often served.
Neither John or I have been to Maine and we find it to be exactly as expected. Almost untouched by anyone. I think sailing has been a great way to see this beautiful state.
There is a professional photographer on board who has had mini workshops in the evening. I've learned quite a bit including I want/need a new camera!!

As you can see I got a cat fix yesterday. It was at the home of "Woodboat" magazine and woodboat school. Race pictures tomorrow as well as images from this AM pre shower when the boats all looked like ghost ships in the fog.

Good Morning from Vermont!!
We're on the road again, this time on a schooner cruise off the coast of Maine. We've had a 2 day stop with our soon to be Florida neighbors, the Stivilas. Soon we will leave here for the 3 hour trip to Rockland Maine where will meet up with other friends Sandy and Tom. Boarding is at 6:00PM this evening.

Yesterday took us to the top of Mt Washington VT and the Mt. Washington observatory, which touts itself as "The home of the worlds worst weather". Coldest ever
 -47 and fastest wind speeds of 231MPH. The winds we experienced were around 60 MPH and it was a bit nippy at 40 degrees.

Josey, Ken and John made it to the summit but I wasn't comfortable with my footing so stayed back to take pictures of the fools almost being blown off the rocks! Not for the faint of heart.
The country side is beautiful, very Ohioish, except, of course, the mountains.
There is a small cog railway available but we chose the not wide enough road to the top. This trip must be done in 1st gear and even at that we had to stop because the breaks started to smell and needed to cool

Lobster roll for dinner last evening..............life is good!

We're back again in civilization once again!!!! Yellowstone has no internet service as well as no TV [no Fox news for John ...ha!]. Phone service was questionable. Anyway...we are now in Jackson Hole WY and have the most incredible last few days.Every day has gotten better and Bigger!! I now understand the meaning of"Big Sky Country". Cody Wy offered the Buffalo Bill Historical Center. A must see if you are in this part of the country I'm embarassed to say that my knowledge of the west hadn't gone too far beyond "Hopalong Cassidy". The museums we've visited have filled in a lot of the gaps.All of them have been family friendly.We crossed the Continental Divide twice. Forgot to mention that John has had problems with the altitude and is looking forward big time to getting back to sea level.And then the buffalo...........lots and lots of them. We have also savored buffalo burgers, buffalo stew, and I'm sure there was buffalo in the eggs yesterday.We stayed at the Yellowstone Inn and arrived just in time to see Old Faithful do her thing. We saw many other geysers and hot springs. I hadn't given this much thought either and have taken for granted, these postcard images. This whole area is a volcano crater and is over due to erupt................in fact we're 40000 years overdue. It was strange to stand in one spot, turn around and no matter where you look, there is stream coming from the ground. A little Martian Chronical-ish............!!!We visited Mamouth Hot Springs and again this was beautiful. Somehow boiling water coming out of the ground doesn't quite compute. Here we saw a lot of elk and in one case they were on the porch of a residence. Gave new meaning to "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner".Today ........the Tetons and all I can say is WOW......these are mountains!! This type of beauty is difficult to describe, I wish I had the vocabulary.Today, a raft trip on the Snake River The rapids were about class .5! not too difficult......pretty slow and I mean really slow but very fun and gave us a different view of Grand Teton.Jackson Hole is way too expensive but again beautiful. There is no such thing as a 10.00 t-shirt. I know this as I've done my share of cash therapy on this trip!Tonight we attended a a chuck wagon bar-b-q with entertainment. The cowboys [singers] were very good and even impressed Mr. The only real musician is Dave Brubeck DiPinto. In fact he bought a CD. Tomorrow morning we will wake up to 31 degrees. Might have to wear socks. This will be our last day and will arrive in Salt Lake City around 4:00

'Twas a long day today as we were in three states........South Dakota, Wyoming, and now Billings Montana. We saw Devils Towers from 50 miles away....can't get there from here. It was the first national monument.

We saw miles and miles of snow fences which interestingly enough are being torn down and replaced by composite material. The people that are replacing these fences are doing this at no cost as the old wood from the fences is more valuable for cabinets etc.

The most impressive part of today was Little Big Horn. The Ranger that spoke to us should be nominated for an oscar...................I could see the Indians coming over the hill!! That whole story is so wrong on so many levels. I'm glad we were able to see it.

Animal pics include a two headed calf [every museum needs one] and antelope as in where the deer and the antelope play.

This whole area is a paleontologists dream. But.....the only dinosaurs I've seen are on our tour bus.

Tomorrow, Yellowstone

TTFN Judy and John

Finally arrived last night around 8:30, after what seemed like a bizillion hours in the air. You can't get here from there...........there being Sarasota.

Our accommodations are great and WOW......Rapid City is really a neat place!

I had a chance to walk around this afternoon and of course discovered a bead store that sells mostly Indian stuff for their native ceremonial costumes. Did a small amount of cash therapy but not for a costume!!

On all of the street corners in Rapid City there are sculptures of the presidents.

Crazy Horse is an unfinished sculpture of Crazy Horse an Indian Chief. It's huge and all of the presidents in the Mt Rushmore sculpture will fit into the head of this one. One of the attached pictures show the final result.

Mt. Rushmore is all that we've thought it would be and more. It's a beautiful tribute to this country and amazing because of how it was done.

Not too sure where we are headed tomorrow except that we will be in three states. If this blog works I'll add to it again. Give me a heads up! thanx

TTFN........................Judy and John

New ideas and will try this for our up and coming vacation.

As I post, I will send an e-mail suggesting you check our blogspot.

This image was from a zip line experience in Costa Rica. This trip won't be quite that exciting as we will be visiting some our national parks................on a tour bus.......works for me!!!!

We can be found at www.wherearejudyandjohn.com.blogspot.com

we'll be in touch next week

Judy