Happy Thanksgiving to our American family and friends! The weather is cooling off here too, but still glorious. This week I thought I’d share some of the pictures I’ve taken recently on the deck here. Jack says  Dan and I are “getting old” because we enjoy watching the birds.

After Thanksgiving in Sedona, we will be heading to Tucson to visit with the wonderful Linda Price and our Tucson friends. It will be a trip down memory lane for Jack, who attended kindergarten in Tucson. (Joe still swears he’s never been there – he was two – but for some reason he does remember Linda’s house. It’s that memorable!)

Next week, it’s the long trip back to a winter visit in Ontario.

As our time in Sedona winds down, we are getting very excited about planning the major travel adventure to come! January 1 we leave Canada for 6 months, the first four of which will be spent on the Semester at Sea program. While we are in the various countries, we have quite a lot of travel time as a family. In most countries we are participating in Semester at Sea field programs, and they sound fantastic. Although all trips sound great (tobogganing down the Great Wall of China!), I am especially looking forward to some unusual trips we are doing in Burma, Namibia, and Morocco.

Rather than the crazy hectic pace of a trip from south India (where the ship docks) up to northern India to see the Taj Mahal and Agra, we have decided to stay in the Kerala area of India. With the kind guidance of my Indian friends (thanks Niraj, Kersi, Srini and Ratti!), we arranged some fantastic independent travel in the south of India.

After the voyage is over, we are spending two months in Europe. After a few days in England, we will fly down to Athens, and ferry over to the islands of Naxos and Santorini before flying to Rome. After a few days in Rome we will start a gradual train trip through Europe. If any of you have favorite spots, especially less-well known ones, send them my way!