Washington DC

Hi All! We arrived in DC on Sunday and stayed the first two nights at Gigi's house - thanks, Gigi! We moved in to our brownstone apartment, just NE of the capital building on Tuesday. It's really nice and has 2 bedrooms and exposed brick and a spiral staircase. So, again, if anyone makes their way to the DC area, just let me know and the stay is on us! We started working yesterday and have put in 2 full days so far. It's been great! However, it's super hot here so it's hard to do anything outside.
So, we are allowed to share who we are collecting this data for; however I cannot post it on the blog. So, if you'd like to know, either give me a call or shoot me an e-mail or comment and I'll fill you in. It's really exciting. Also, our company has just promoted two of the bug drivers, so we are hiring immediately. If you're interested in driving around the country with all expenses paid, just let me know and I'll forward you the information. Unfortunately, I don't have any pics to post from DC as we haven't been out exploring much because we've been working. I'd love to hear from anyone/everyone, so let me know what you've been up to. Much love! Oh, and happy one-day-early Birthday, Devon!!!

The Magical World of Disney

Hello again! First, I would like to congratulate Brian Oestrike and Justin Hewitt on their summit of Mt. Everest. I'd also like to congratulate Katie Oestrike and Rachel Rankin on being a wonderful support team at Advanced Base Camp in support of the summit. We're all so proud of the amazing feat they have accomplished for a wonderful cause, LUNGevity (www.lungevity.org). If you'd like to learn more about them and their adventure, visit their blog at www.climbforcancer.blogspot.com. Congratulations again!
I'm currently in St. George, SC aka The Grits Capital of the World. We've stopped over here on our way to DC. We're leaving shortly to go to the Grits Headquarters, which I'm sure I'll post pictures of in the near future!
So, Disney was good, but I'm glad to be gone. We stayed at a Disney Resort called Pop Culture - it has 2800 rooms and giant plastic statues of different icons from the 1950's - 1990's. We stayed in the 1970's and it was pretty cool - by cool, I mean weird!
Anyways, we collected on two different days of the Magic Kingdom. We had to wake up at 5am and be in the park by 6:30. We were allowed to collect from 7am - 7:45am each day. We collected Main Street, FantasyLand, and ToonTown the first day and then TomorrowLand, FrontierLand, and Liberty Street the second day. On the first day, we were given free hopper passes so we hit up Animal Kingdom during the day and then had dinner and fireworks at Epcot and rode the Tower of Terror and Aerosmith's Rockin Roller Coaster at MGM at night. MGM was open late for Disney Resort Guests, which we so luckily were!
We didn't do anything special the second day because we were super tired. Then on Friday, Team 2 (we're Team 6 by the way) had a friend from Miami, FL visit and we went to Universal Studio's Islands of Adventure. Universal is different from Disney in that there are less Mickey Mouse crocs and less crying children, so that was nice. There are also much bigger rides there. The last bonus is that I got in free. It's a long story, but basically, I kept a hold of a 2-day pass for the past 6 years because I only used it for 1-day thinking I'd one day end up in Orlando, FL again, which I did. I learned on Friday that the pass had to be used within 6 days of the original date it was used, but they were nice and let the 6 years pass instead!
We then left today and are headed to DC. We are renting a really nice Brownstone apartment just Northeast of the Capital Building, so if you want to visit, we have a nice place for you to stay. Alright, well I've posted some photos of me being a Tourist and of the wonderful World of Disney and some of a beautiful sunrise I experienced in Jacksonville. Enjoy and hope everyone is doing just grand in B-Town, C-Falls, etc. Happy Memorial Day (Blossom Time) weekend!

Leaving J-Town

Hey everyone! Hope this finds you all doing well. We're leaving Jacksonville in two days and I'm sad to be leaving the beach, but also excited to go to Disney and then DC. I haven't been to DC since 8th grade, so I'm sure there is a lot more exciting things to do now. So, we went and saw the Jacksonville Symphony Orchestra play with the Glass Camels, a Grateful Dead cover band. It was a good show - a diverse crowd due to the Orchestra and a nice venue. It was about half the size of the Palace Theater in Cleveland.

We did a little planning for DC on Saturday and then we played tourists for a day. We drove down to St. Augustine, which is the oldest city in America. We went to the Fountain of Youth and paid $7 to learn how Ponce de Leon navigated his way to the Americas, which he named Florida back then. It was great. We shared this learning experience with the usual Florida mix of senior citizens and babies with babies. We then had a craving for Mojito's so we headed over to the shopping/dining area and ate at the Columbia - it was delicious. If anyone heads that way, make sure you get the 1905 salad - they make it for you at your table. We then headed out last night to a bar - Eddie Bahama's on Jacksonville Beach. Most of today was spent at the beach and reading in the hammocks at our condo. And I've just finished making chicken parmesean for dinner, so I'm going to get to eating that.

Finished Collecting in Jax

Showin some Navy Love (for my Lynnie) at the beach.

Our shadows

Best teacher's ever - Jacqui & Maureen

A blowfish ashore

Emily in front of the Dino's

so, we've finished collecting the city of Jacksonville. we sent everything in today. we don't have to be in Disney until next Wednesday, so we have the rest of the week to kind of just hang out and plan for DC. we found a cool place near Chinatown in DC and hopefully will be staying there from May 27-June 30. so, if anyone wants to come for a visit, let me know!

i'm not sure if anyone's heard, but there have been some pretty bad wildfires in southern GA and the smoke has been blowing through northern Florida. there hasn't been too much smoke here - most of it centralizes over a city west of here called Lake City. however, you can notice a haze pick up around dusk. let's just hope it rains up there soon.
not much other news to report. tonight we're going to a sports bar to watch the Cavs play the Nets for (hopefully) the last time! then to a local bar in JaxBeach called Fly's Tie to see some Reggae music. I hope everyone is doing well and feel free to call or e-mail if you ever have the chance!

Jacksonville

So, we collected for the first official time today in Jacksonville. Collecting is what we use to refer to as mapping and recording cities. We only got to collect for about an hour because it started raining. So, we have about another hour of work for the day and then we're done. Tomorrow is supposed to be sunny, so hopefully we'll be able to finish up Jacksonville before moving to Disney World. We'll always finish collecting the city we're currently in and then overnight the data to Portland so they can make sure they have everything they need before we move on to the next city.
Yesterday, we went to the beach for a bit and then planned out what we were going to collect today. The beaches here are nice and we were able to take a long walk to the pier, which is closer to where we will be living for the next week. We get to move in to our place tomorrow. We checked it out yesterday on our walk and it looks nice.
I hope everyone is doing well and Happy Mother's Day to all the mothers out there - the list of mothers is growing quickly!!! Love you all! p.s. - there aren't any Jacksonville pics yet, but look below for some more pics from the drive here!

Austin, TX

We have made it to Austin, TX. We haven't seen much of it yet, but are here! We're about to go out on 6th St., which is apparently where some bars and restaurants are. After that, we're headed to New Orleans for a night and then to Jacksonville. We'll be staying at this beach cottage we found on www.vrbo.com (thanks, Sandy!!!). It looks very nice and is about 100 feet from the beach - it even comes with beach cruisers. In Jacksonville, we'll meet up with Team 2, who has been on the road for about 9 months now. They'll be teaching us the ropes before we head down to Disney World. We've also posted some pictures from our drive so far.

Lake Shasta

Mt. Shasta
Sara has met her match (large dino from Pee Wee's Big Adventure!)

We'll be posting more pics soon, it's just kind of difficult from the road.

Headed to Jacksonville

Our crazy adventure has begun. We left Portland, OR Saturday afternoon and headed through beautiful southern Oregon/northern California. We stopped and took a look at Lake Shasta, which is beautiful. We stopped our first night in Redding, CA which we learned is pretty much the turning point from lush evergreen forests and snow capped mountains to desolate hills and shrubs. We left early and drove to Michelle's sister's house in Lemoore, CA to see her mom, sister Lindsey, and Lindsey's babies - Candyce and Paul. We enjoyed a home-cooked meal, quality family time, and a free washer and dryer! We're now headed to Tucson - about a 9 hour drive from Lemoore. Hopefully we can make it there tonight so we can get an early start to Balmorhea State Park - check it out at http://www.tpwd.state.tx.us/spdest/findadest/parks/balmorhea/. Hopefully we'll get some pictures up here soon!

Candyce & Paul (cutest niece and nephew ever!!!)
Out the Bug window in New Mexico