Alabama

This post should actually be named Mobile because that was the only part of AL that we actually saw. AND this was the only picture we took the entire time. Like I said before, the times you are having the most fun are when you snap the least amount of pictures. Here we are after listening to some local and live music. We ate fried pickles and enjoyed some bluegrass/country/folk?

We were only planning to stay two nights in Mobile but our hosts talked us into staying three. Let me tell you about Megan & Sergio.... they are the prime example of what couchsurfing is all about. Like us, they prefer that travelers stay with them at least 2 nights. For Jake and I, one night with a host feels like we're just using them as a cheap hotel. When you stay 2 or more nights with someone, you have time to see the city and you have a chance to get to know your host and build a friendship. Megan was over-the-top NICE and Sergio was just plain HILARIOUS. His and Jake's humor is very alike so we all got along real well. They have created a close knit CS community and they love to introduce their surfers to other local Mobile CS hosts. They all hang out with each other and a lot of their time is spent building a network of like-minded travelers. Jake and I weren't real fond of old Mobile. It seems like it'll be a cool place to live maybe 50 years from now, but we really enjoyed our time with our new found friends there. If we lived in Mobile, these guys would be our regular hang out buddies. If you're interested in checking out couchsurfing, I wouldn't recommend having your first stay with Megan and Sergio because they'll set the bar way too high for any future couch experience you might have. The people you meet can really make or break a new city for you, and these guys made Mobile shine a little brighter than how most people probably see it. No doubt about it, these guys have a couch at our place anywhere, anytime.

Oh wait! I found one more picture from Mobile.... Jake fixed our car window. He fixes everything. Last week he changed the CV Axle on our Subaru once again. He's UH-mazing.

I'm tired of blogging. It's too time consuming. However, today is special.

Shout out to my mom Brandy Busy Bee. Bzzzz bzzz bzzz bzzz. Buzzz bzzzz bzzz.

Happy happiest happerton birthdaymous wishes to yous!

Love you, love you, love your bum.

Suwanee River & Gainesville

Jake and I always joke about our CouchSurfing Hosts being the typical scary movie "axe murderers" when, in reality, there's no way an axe murderer could ever get away with a killing through the couchsurfing website. The way everything is organized and documented makes it completely safe. However, our trip to Fanning Springs started out a little shaky. After driving through the woods for half an hour looking for our next couch, we wearily pulled into an unmarked driveway where we saw an old man, thick glasses, scruffy beard and torn sweatshirt chopping wood with an old, rusty axe in his front yard. Jake rolled down the car window to ask if we were in the right place and before he could say anything the old man gave us a huge, toothless grin and said, "Ya Jake, pull right in. This is the place!"

Jake and I exchanged a quick, questioning glance and then laughed. Our host ended up being one of the nicest human beings I've ever met. As soon as we stepped out of our car he directed us towards two old, rickety bikes and walked us through the back of his property to a "Rails to Trails" bike path. He told us to travel a couple miles down and we'd run into the Suwanee River. He also told us that he hoped we hadn't ruined our appetite for poultry over the holidays because he was fixin to roast us a hen for dinner. And so we rode. The trail was lovely and the river was beautiful. The bridge too was architecturally picturesque. Jake snapped an awful double-chin-yawning picture of me but the iron work in the background looks so pretty that I had to post it.

Then we took a trip over to the city of Gainesville where I spent years 6 and 7 of my life. I knocked on the front door and introduced myself as someone who had lived in this house 22 years ago. We were immediately welcomed in and they let us take pictures inside and out. This backyard is where I spent many summer days playing in the creek and trees with my brothers and sisters. The creek is pretty much dried up now, but I remember it going over my head after we had a big storm. The water was rushing a lot faster than I could tell and the river swept me a little bit farther than what I was comfortable with. It was one of those 6 year old moments where I thought I was going to die. There's also a tree that I'm pointing to.... there used to be a saucer swing hanging from it which is one of the funnest things a kid could have out in the woods.... I was really excited to be here again.

This is my old front door. Ta-Da! The current owners put up some lovely floral wall paper that the wife is really proud of.... And even though these were my old stomping grounds, Jake found something very familiar-- a lover of music. The husband had a nice collection of instruments that Jake got excited about. I think Jake was secretly hoping that the man would decide he was too old to have so many instruments he doesn't play and just give some to Jake. I think Jake is always hoping something like that! I love his facial expressions when he gets around old instruments. When it comes to searching for guitars, Jake is never too impressed with anything from this decade. The older the better. 

I recognized a big rock in the same spot in my front yard, only it's actually a fairly small rock (to the right of me in front of the house.) And I remember the big tree across the street wrapped in honeysuckle vines, but I don't remember my neighbors driveway being so tame. That thing, I swear, used to be at a 70 degree angle! I remember going down it on my bike one time and I must have hit 50 mph because it was so steep! It couldn't be my memory, the neighbors must have flattened out their driveway and sunk their entire house.  :)  Speaking of bikes, NW 36th Drive is where I learned to ride a bike. It was the classic story. The training wheels came off and my dad held onto the back of my seat. I asked him not to let go and after we had reached the end of the road I looked back to see if my dad was ready to turn around. HE WASN'T THERE. My dad was all the way down the street still standing in front of our house! I was furious. But I was riding a bike.

My best friend growing up here was about 5 years older than me. Now that I think about it, I'm not sure why she hung out with me; it was probably because we were neighbors. Five years is a big difference when we're talking about being seven years old compared to being twelve. I found out her parents still lived next door and I'm not sure if they thought I was crazy for coming over to say hi or if they thought it was awesome. I made them take a picture with me. Haha. It turns out my old best friend still lives in town there and she was visiting her parents only an hour earlier with all of her kids. Crazy. 

And then there's a picture of Jake playing a miniature steel drum because of course.... we found a music store in Gainesville to stop in and check out for "just a minute." If something this simple makes him happy, then I'm happy to do it. And now I want a steel drum.

Clearwater, FL

After my parents left Florida we kept traveling up the coast. We stayed a couple of nights at Clearwater Beach where we enjoyed a stroll on the boardwalk. The city had a huge screen set up with a movie playing on the beach, lots of local artists and vendors, and pretty good entertainment. This fire breather led us on for half an hour and kept telling us we needed to stay and watch his entire show to see the BIG ending. "BIG ending people. You'll want to see the BIG ending. You won't believe what's going to happen for my BIG ending. I have an amazing BIG ending." We waited and waited and he didn't do anything very amazing but after twenty minutes of watching him we decided we had invested too much time to just walk away without seeing the BIG ending. I had my camera ready.... and all he did was blow some fire. A talent, I'll admit, but if I were him I wouldn't brag about the BIG ending to my show. People clapped but it was rather anticlimactic.

The next day we took a walk through beautiful Dunedin Park (pronounced done-eye-dinn.) There were a bunch of fruit trees with what we thought were tangerines growing on them. The branches were just dripping with more fruit than they could handle so we thought it wouldn't hurt to take a few. We discovered this the hard way, but later we were told that if tangerines freeze too many times they turn bitter. And I mean bitter. It was worse than biting into a lemon.

Then we ventured over to Tarpon Springs. It's a cute coastal Greek village that's been populated with Greek-Americans for over 100 years. I didn't feel comfortable taking too many pictures of people here because it seemed disrespectful, like I would be exploiting their everyday lives for my own pleasure of a few blog pictures. We witnessed a lot of old Greek men sitting on park benches, smoking, reading newspapers, wearing authentic greek fishermen hats and shooting the breeze in greek. It was great. I have never seen so many greek people in one place and it made me happy to know they have a community in Florida where they can feel at home with one another. We visited the local baker who was pulling fresh bread out of the oven. There were 12 paper bags on the floor each filled with five or six steaming baguettes. We wanted to buy some but the baker told us they were meant for the local restaurants. So we bought some spinach bread and a cannoli. After we left we saw the baker close shop and load the bags of bread into the back of her mini van. She drove down the street and delivered the fresh bread to a few different businesses. Awesome.

A lot of the locals are fishers, shrimpers and sponge divers. We learned all about the art of sponge diving and how it's safe to the plant and to the ocean to cut the sponges free for our own use. As long as the sponges aren't pulled out by their roots they will continue to grow back as big as you let them. Before seeing all of this I had never even taken the time to think about where sponges come from.

P.S. How sexy is my husband?!

Later, in the little Grecian Plaza we listened to a Jamaican guy playing some pretty good Reggae music. Random. Then we sat on the back of our car and made sandwiches for lunch like we do every other day. That's how we can afford this trip of a lifetime! We saw a bunch of crazy birds flying around and thought it was worthy of a picture. And after that we fell in love all over again with another picture to prove it! I feel lucky everyday that we have this vacation time to relax and create memories together.

New Years 2011

And the fun with los padres continued. We spent New Years Eve being awesome. Riding bikes, playing dominos, lounging, and Jake played us some music. He made up a song about bzzz bzzz Brandy bee. I wish we had a recording because it was hilarious. Jake makes a really good buzzing sound, you should ask to hear it sometime. He'll appreciate that I announced that on the blog.... Anyway, my parents are pretty much professional vacationers. When they get the chance to party, they make every minute worthwhile.

In case you couldn't tell, my mom and I are the birds. Jake and I are the disgustingly cute ones. Not too much was going on for the New Years countdown at Englewood Beach so we took an amazing trip to 7-11 for some slurpees. After all, this night would never happen again! I asked the cashier if she would take our picture and she acted like it was something she did for customers everyday.

Then somebody got the brilliant idea to buy a lottery ticket because it would feel great to start off the new year with some kiz-ash in our wallets. The thing is, we're not old pros at playing the lotto so it took us ten minutes to figure it out. Look at how confused everyone is-- reading the directions aloud in a convenient store. I was laughing so hard. Then right after we stepped outside my mom began to worry. She was worried that we would win and that Heavenly Father and the rest of Florida would know we had gambled away a dollar. More laughing. It was the BEST! And of course there were fireworks.

2010 was a good year. After losing our jobs, Jake and I had a lot of time to figure out what we really, truly want from life. I want a place to call home, with a huge garden and enough space for our family to enjoy the outdoors. I want to be healthy. Mind, body and soul. Jake wants to make music and art and figure out a way to share it with the world. He also wants to see if he can turn people watching into a career somehow. We both want to continue traveling and seeing what this gigantic world has to offer. In the past 4 months we have met some of the most interesting and inspiring people and we hope it's the beginning and not the end of our adventure.

Deep Sea Fishing

While we were hanging out with my parents in Florida, we fulfilled my moms life long dream of going deep sea fishing. Actually, she has gone before when she was a little girl and she caught an enormous fish, so I think she was hoping for another "big fish" story. We chartered a fishing boat with a group of people and went out to sea with a couple of crazy sea men. We traveled away from the shore about 15 miles and it was COLD out in the middle of the ocean.

Deckhand Stan and Barracuda Brandy were right at home on a boat. However, the only person to catch a fish 5 fish that day was Jake. He lured in a blowfish, three pig fish (which actually make snorting noises when they're out of water), and a flounder. I guess pig fish aren't very good to eat, same with blowfish so those were tossed back.

It was dark by the time we got back but we waited an extra 15 minutes and watched these dirty old seamen swab the deck from head to toe before they took one step off of their vessel. For one dollar Captain Jack would clean and fillet your catch. I'm glad we waited for an old pro to do it because that flounder was so skinny that there wouldn't have been any meat left on it if the Shumways/Bouchers tried to pretend like we knew what we were doing. Ten minutes later we were home and Jake was in the kitchen cooking up a storm (one of his areas of expertise.) That flounder was DELICIOUS. We all enjoyed the freshest fish of our lives.