November 3, 2010

This morning all 3 children did their own blog entry about our day yesterday and some school work.

Bob showed us a piece of high voltage cable this morning. The same kind my father (Foffo) worked with up at Raccoon Mountain. This cable is certified for 161 000 volts. That´s pure copper in the innermost ring. Around it was a layer of oil under pressure.

We had a calm day until we drove over to a climbing club at 3pm. Michele had invited us to climb with her and Shae.

I cannot climb because of my bad wrists, so I was appointed photographer and cord holder.

Everyone had a ball. There were no complaints from Iseline about too many activities. 🙂 The first couple of times she was a bit careful and afraid of the height, but afterwards that was all blown away. The boys also did some great climbing and Hélène enjoyed climbing again for the first time in about 7 years.

We dropped by Northgate Mall which I remember well from my childhood. They had an arcade there in the good old days! A fascinating place for a 9 year old. We didn´t find an arcade, but did find a real American bubble gum dispenser:

In the evening Gwen and Bob took us to a restaurant where we had excellent chicken wings served by a very active and funny waiter who took pictures of us:

I told the boys they were not allowed to watch TV while eating. A hard task when there are 44 TVs in the restaurant, all within view (Viktor counted them) Here are some of them:

In the evening I prepared mousse for tomorrow´s dinner. I haven´t made it in a while and it was good to get into mousse making again. I felt at peace with the universe again.

One of our faithful readers has sent an email to the editors asking for a state of the voyage update. He wants to know what we have learned so far and what we would have done differently if we had known what we now know.

First of all, time has passed very quickly and it´s hard to realize we have been on the road so long already.

One lesson we have learnt is that we have not set aside enough time for the kids to just play and be kids. This is especially true for Iseline. It´s so easy to be tempted to do as much as possible when you are in a location. “We probably will not be here again for a long time, or ever, so we must…” It´s easy to forget that both the kids and we get tired and need some time to just relax. We have changed our schedule here in Chattanooga to calm down a bit. We had originally planned to do a two day trip to the Smokey Mountains, but decided not to. That was the right decision.

It´s always difficult to think about everything in advance, and we got very stressed with everything piling up at the end. Sure, we could have done more, but I think we found a good balance. When we left I was not happy that we had not done all the reservations for New Zealand and Australia. Right now I´m glad. We have learned that we need to lower our ambitions a bit and it is now much easier to change our plans. If anything I wish we had reserved less. All pacific island plans are e.g. fixed and we might have chosen one less stop given what we now know.

Another lesson is that it is difficult to find time for schooling and that we, the adults, need to count in time to prepare. I wish we had done a few test lessons at home before leaving. The internet school the kids are attending is very good. Unfortunately it is only available for a few subjects, since it is meant for Norwegian children attending school abroad.

On the other hand the kids are learning a lot during our voyage. We have e.g. spoken a lot about space and the exploration of it and also about tectonic plate movements and its consequences (volcanos, earthquakes). Adrian has both as major parts of his science curriculum and it´s more or less covered now by all the kids.

In terms of luggage we have been very positively surprised. We have managed to travel very lightly and have include all essentials. We are traveling with less than we would have packed for a weeks vacation in Spain. We have to wash clothes relatively often, but on the other hand the volume is then limited.

Blogging has taken more time than I had anticipated. I had the ambition to blog every day when we left and have managed to more or less do so, but it has been hard at times. Inspiration does not always come immediately. Blogging consumes most of my time in the evening after the kids have gone to bed.

I blog for all of you out there, but I also do it so we can have a good travel diary when we are back home. This is a once in a lifetime trip and I want us to have a good record of it. I will probably thank myself when I´m at some institution for the elderly and can look at those old web pages on my mind reader.

We are also very happy that we have rented apartments or are staying with people we know in most locations. There are so many advantages of having an apartment over staying in a hotel. You have much more space. You have the option to cook or go out and eat. The prices are also low compared to a hotel.

Another thing that has been good is doing direct flights or putting in margins for airport transfers. We do not take tickets where there is less than 2 hours transfer time at an airport. Losing luggage would be a nightmare and we know from experience that the chance of that goes up very much when you get under 2 hours between planes. No luggage lost so far, knock on wood.

So, all in all, we are very happy. We have been extremely lucky, bordering on the improbable, with the weather That has got to change at some point. Our biggest climatic risk is  going to the Amazon during rainy season. We have read that most of the time you get good periods without rain. Time will tell.

See you around, folks!

Eirik

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