Great Tesla uber to LAX, where we Enjoyed the Star Alliance lounge.  Front door to lounge in about an hour!  Lovely business class seats on the upper deck of 847-8 on Luftansa  to Frankfurt! 

Out the door!  Bags aren’t even expanded!  … so we did pack efficiently!

Our scripture for packing

‭‭Galatians 6:5 KJV‬‬
[5] For every man shall bear his own burden.

We are a few days away from our next departure!  It was supposed to be Thursday!  But….The joys of travel!  Luftansa ground crews decided to strike March 7 and 8!  Exactly the dates we were traveling.   Our travel agent,  who helped us book our flights, was able to jump on the computer and grab the last 2 business class seats on the same flight on  March 9 !  One of the perks of using an agent for flights!  We had booked 4 extra nights in Oslo before our cruise.   We are down to 2 extra nights,  1 day of sightseeing,  but still arriving on Bergen on time!  I always book at least 2 extra nights!  Some little bird told me to come 4 days early this time! And I’m SO  Glad I did!  thank you,  Jesus! For seeing us thru this travel drama!   I think He was that little bird!

On the bright side, we saved 2 nights hotel bill in Oslo!

We fly to Bergen from our shortened stay in Oslo. To begin cruising the Norway fjords from Bergen up to Alta,  in search of the Northern lights!  At the next to last port of the cruise,  Amsterdam,  we are hopping off to fly to Lisbon to meet our cousins,  my cousin  Kathy and Emmett’s cousin Bert,  who are joining us for a 3 week road trip in Portugal and Northern Spain’s Galacia and Basque regions.  We will take a short detour up to Bordeaux, then back to Spain to visit Zaragoza,  Valencia ( for Bert’s interest)   ending in Barcelona to see the progress on the Sagrada Familia! 

In researching our return home,  Emmett found a repositioning cruise for less than the price of flights home!   So Kathy is joining us and we will cruise 2 weeks on the Atlantic,  visiting Malaga, the Grand  Canaria island, and Bermuda.  We booked a 5 day stay in Florida near Orlando after landing in Port Canaveral, where we can visit another cousin,  Jeff and his wife Tammy in New Smyrna Beach.   I hope we can connect with a couple cruise friends,  Kathy and Karen,  while we are in Orlando!  

We aren’t done yet!  Grandson Walker is graduating the next week,  so we will fly directly to Nebraska to celebrate with him, hopefully get to see grandson Tucker compete in the state track finals.  Then we fly to Austin for a few days for a Crawfish boil with Emmett’s daughter Rebecca and celebrate granddaughter-in -law, Kaila’s birthday! Whew!  Makes me tired must writing about it all! 

Stay tuned for progress on the trip! 

Today we had a great drive up to Kilauea Lighthouse and Hanalei Bay. It was a gorgeous sunny day

Taro fields of Hanalei

Big waves and kite surfing!

Near Lihue we visited an ancient fish pond

We went to a great Luau tonight,  which told the story of the Hawaiian people!  Great dancers and a good dinner.   Luau Kalamaku at the Kilohana Plantation, the old sugar cane plantation on Kauai.

We had a relaxing day, pool, Puka dogs for lunch, whale watch in the afternoon! Life is good…. oh, and Chinese for dinner.

The beautiful Waimea canyon, the grand canyon of the Pacific!   We went all the way to the end to see the overlook of Kalalau Valley on Napili coast!

Kalakau overlook onto the Napili coast. We couldn’t get a ticket for a Cruise of the Napali coast so this is our only look into those stunning valleys. Picnic along the way!

We are in our new temporary home on Kauai, the point at Poipu. We even saw a whale spout off our shore from our lanai

It was a great day to watch the waves….. but a bit rough for most surfers. In fact, we didn’t see any!

Overlooking the beaches of the Northshore is an ancient Heiau, or sacred site, just a few minutes drive off the highway. We’ve visited a few others over the years but this one seems less well known, and we had not heard of it before! Puu O Mahuka Heiau

We visited Kualoa Ranch in Kaneohe for the Jurassic adventure tour of the ranch, the movie sights for many movies including Jurassic World and Jurassic Park.

Besides the fun movie parks, the views were spectacular of Koolauloa Valley as well as the stunning coastline, the Kaneohe mountains and the Bay.