Sydney, Australia, Here I Come!

Most of you know that I will be making a pilgrimage to Sydney, Australia. What's a pilgrimage? It is a journey to a sacred place. Hmm, didn't know that Sydney was a sacred place, did you? Well, from July 15 - July 20th we, the Roman Catholic Church, are going to make it a pretty special, if not a holy place to be! They are estimating 200,000 pilgrims to descend upon Sydney to learn and grow closer to Christ and His Church. Amazing! I will be 1 of the 200,000 people attending. The mugshots of the yellow hoodies below are just a few friends I will be pilgrimaging (is that a word?) with. Check out this link to see what we will be doing. http://www.wyd2008.org/ On the last day I get to celebrate Holy Mass with our Holy Father, Pope Benedict XVI. It just can't get better than that! Please keep me in prayer while I travel half way around the globe. I will be updating this blog from Australia, so visit often! God Bless you all.

The Beginning Again...

The picture above are the pilgrims (my friends) that I will be attending World Youth Day. We are getting very close to departure time. Please keep us all in your prayers for a safe and fruitful pilgrimage.
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The Beginning

The three stooges in their new sweatshirts. Do you think we will be seen in Sydney? Meghann on the left, Karen on the right and me in the middle. My travel mates in Sydney Australia. Pray for us to have a safe trip! God Bless.

All in the Family

We are finally home from a quick family vacation. When I say "family" I mean the entire Xavier clan. Just before we left for Mexico, we decided to do a short family vacation. Due to busy summer outings and going ons, we couldn't synchronize a Xavier road trip as in past years. We settled for a few days together at on old familiar place, Lake Camanche. Concurrently, Kerry is being pampered in Mexico, so you won't see any photos of her and Mike (my darling husband) had to work. Luckily we weren't too far from home, so he was able to join us for dinner and a little fishing. Water seemed to be the center of our attention again. With Anthony's boat and a borrowed jet ski, we were ready for lots of fun in the sun.



Here are Bailey and Nicole enjoying the good life; being pulled through the cool water with the wind blowing through their hair on a hot summer day.

Here are Bailey and Nicole barrel rolling off that tube into the cool, refreshing water. I guess Uncle Anthony thought they were getting a little hot under the sun.

I was fun to have Uncle Joe visit during the day. He doesn't often get to enjoy our vacations. He proved his talents on the water with a slalom ski and a wakeboard.





What I find amazing is how fast the kids catch on to new sports. Nicole, Charles and Bailey all got up and going on the wakeboard. With more time on the water, these kids will be jumping wakes and really showing up their adult counterparts!




Charles was very excited to be wakeboarding. He tried last year and just couldn't get up. I could sense a feeling of accomplishment coming from him when he finally did it. The smile lasted a long time!

Nicole just celebrated her 13th b-day and got to take her brand new wakeboard out for a ride. She was the one who showed us how it was done.

Bailey is our natural athlete. I wish sports came to me as easily as it does for her! Show her how to do it and it's done. She was the first to cross both wakes and make it back over them.





The adults on the other hand, experienced sinus cleanings, near concussions, sore muscles and weak hands before they were able to conquer the wakeboard. Uncle Anthony demonstrates this the best on a slalom water ski:

He's working hard to get up, uh oh, he's a little off kilter...

he's going down... he's gone.

Okay, in all fairness, Uncle Anthony did quite well on the wakeboard, even when Uncle Joe was going 40 mph.

I must say, wakeboarding is an exciting sport! When you finally get up and out of the water, there is a feeling of being a kid again. I will confess, I have tried at least once each summer for the past 3 summers and was unable to accomplish the goal of gliding above the water. My very patient family and skilled boat captain watched me try to drink the entire lake in the many attempts at wakeboarding. I kept trying until I just couldn't hold on any more. Laying in bed the next morning, I realized what I was doing wrong. I got back out that morning and I actually got up, for a second. Well, I was now bound and determined! After many (atleast 10) more tries, I finally got up and stayed up for a while. Like I said, I wish sports came as easy to me as it does others! I really have to work to do it. We are all looking forward to more wakeboarding! (I will post a pic when Papa gives me one.)

It's amazing what a few toys and water can do to a person! The kids weren't the only ones having all the fun.

Even Papa got in on the action. He was just as relentless on the jet ski as the uncles were! I was told that even Papa went faster than I did. Needless to say, I wasn't the popular jet ski driver but Grand Ma trusted me. (I'll post that pic when Papa gets it to me)

Just when you find a quiet place to enjoy the sun and rest...

The restless natives attack!

Our days were filled with sun, water and sand.

The cousins played for hours on end and spent quality time together...























And nobody complained when it came time to sleep.

Lake Camanche brought back many memories for me and I'm sure for my parents and brothers. Now our kids can have memories of the lake too.

On the Road Again

Here is half the caravan. We've arrived at Lake Camanche. When I was a kid, our family owned a home here for a few years. My brothers and I spent a lot of time here as kids. It use to take us a few hours to get here. We live much closer now, a mere 50 minutes. Here we are, about 30 years later with our kids. Looking forward to fun and sun in the next 4 days.
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A great big THANK YOU

Thank you Mikol, Cindy, Koby, Noah and Madison (the dog) for sharing your time and energy with us. Thank you especially for being such wonderful friends. We love you all! God Bless.

More highlights from Mexico

Our resident Chef Mike (which happens to be my darling husband,) made some magic with our hero's catch. The locals know how to debone a fish while keeping it in one very large fillet. Chef Mike stuffed the fillet with fresh veggies, wrapped it in bannana leaves and foil and then slow grilled the masterpiece. MMM...MMM...good.





Along with all the resting and eating, we had lots to do. Charles became very friendly with the activities director, Elena, at Coral Baja. Whenever there was an activity, Charles was bound to be a part of it. He played beach volleyball and water polo (he was the team captain.) He also participated in a water balloon fight and a donut eating contest. Charles is the one with the black strip across his shoulders below the ball.

Surprisingly enough, Savanna didn't grow a tail and swim away with the mermaids considering she spent most of her time in the water.




We visited La Playita, where you could swim in schools of fish. Charles boogie boarded there and said he was surrounded by fish. the idea of fish swimming around her, made Savanna a little nervous so she enjoyed the play structure that was positioned on the beach instead. It doesn't get any better than that for a kid!


We spent one morning at Chileno Bay. The snorkeling was breathtaking. I didn't get too far, my mask was leaking and a jellyfish was scooped out of the water right beside me (I could have floated right into it.) But what I saw was just beautiful. God really outdid himself when he created sea animals. They are so amazing, graceful and so delightful, darting here and there. Charles and Mike had a better experience than I did. Charles was amazed and really enjoyed it. Savanna was even coaxed into a little bit of snorkeling. Mikol and Cindy graciously helped her.


What I love about traveling is visiting the local Catholic churches. We were fortunate to attend Holy mass 2 times while we were visiting. St Joseph's church was just wonderful. We attended the bilingual mass and the music was so invigorating! I loved looking around and seeing all the locals, there was standing room only. Both times I left mass with a great sense of joy. Mikol and Cindy are blessed with that church. Mikol has more info on the church on his blog. There is a link in the sidebar to the right if you are interested.



Mike found a shifter car outfitter and had to take a spin. Charles got in on the action too.



The next day we all piled into Big Green and headed north up the Sea of Cortez. HWY 1 in Mexico isn't quite the same as in CA. For one thing, it is narrow, really narrow. I rode in the back seat on the driver side. I got an extreme close up of a semi as it passed us going the other direction. I don't think there was more than 18" between us and him. Another challenge for the driver is to try to keep on the road. There isn't much room on either side of the road for error. The real scary part is the road is elevated from the desert floor. If you veer to close to the edge, you fall off, not a few inches, but down and embankment. I was glad to know that Mikol was driving, I would have had white knuckles all the way there and they would have had to pry my hands from the steering wheel upon arrival.

This drive took us to an amazing fishing village, Los Barrilles. Again, we stayed in a beautiful resort overlooking the beach. The photo at the very top of this page where the kids are sitting under a palm tree was in Los Barrilles. We stayed at Las Palmas de Cortez, a fishing resort. The Sea of Cortez was so much calmer and warmer here than at Coral Baja. Unfortunately, swimming was not an option unless you had a grand desire to be stung by jellyfish. The water was teeming with little bubble like creatures that had blue tentacles dangling from them. They were in the water and washed up on the shore. The next day, they were gone from the water but there were still a few on the beach. Cindy and I played in the waves a little, but the kids found the only shade on the beach, under the palm tree, and played there.

The last night was spent at Mikol and Cindy's house. And then off to the airport. The ride home was hassle free, oh, except for customs. Mikol was pretty sure Mike could bring Cuban cigars home. The honest folks that we are, divulged the possession of cigars. Well, the immigration officer did ask, we could not tell a lie. Well, he marked our customs paper with a giant "C". That giant "C" stood for, you guessed it, CIGAR. Everyone ahead of us was flagged through until they got to us. "Please step aside, we will be with you shortly" was all I heard. UGHHH! Okay, so they confiscated Mike's cigars. Well, they handcuffed us all and took us into a hot, dark room with a double sided mirror. I guess they wanted to see what we would do. Well, no doubt, we were a bit scared, especially the kids. They decided that the kids and I were innocent and let us go, but Mike was detained. We were told to sit in these 3 red chairs in the hallway. As we waited, we heard a lot of yelling and arguing in the room. Well, I guess that's a little exaggerated, okay, okay, I was only joking. They did take the cigars, but we were quickly sent on our way after a short lecture (actually the guy kinda mumbled some stuff.) So, here I am in my home sweet home getting ready for our next adventure. We're off tomorrow for a few days at the lake with my whole family! We couldn't fit in a big road trip like in the past, so we threw together a quick 4 day lake stay. I'll tell you all about it when we get back.

Happy Father's Day

For Fathers day, the 4 families got together for dinner. This is a picture of all the kids (Mikey dodged the camera). Bryan is late and missed the picture.
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Surprise!

Our dear friend Fr David celebrated mass in Stockton. We get to see him once a year when he is visiting from Yecora, Mexico. We showed up at for Holy Mass and made a surprise attack. We were so happy to see him and he was surprised and delighted that we came to visit. Our visit was short, but it is always a blessing to see Fr David.

Testing with pictures

Here is a pic of the kids at home.
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Testing on my Blog

Hey all, just trying to figure out how to do this with my blackberry so I can update easily while on the road.
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Our Summer Kick-off Vacation

To start out our summer we took a family vacation to
San Jose, Mexico, BCS (Baja California Sud).

Our good friends the Maitlands were our wonderful hosts.

Cindy and Mikol with Carolyn and Mike

They drove us from here to there and everywhere in Big Green. Have you ever parked with Cindy in Big Green? That is an experience all in itself. Life in Mexico is slow and easy going. Time is not of essence and the day rolls by without the second hand, minute hand or even the hour hand being noticed.

We ate when we were hungry...

...and slept when we were tired (afternoon siesta after much sun and water.)

With daily siestas, night time was fun time too (Savanna got an unscheduled performance to sing on stage with the lady that was scheduled to perform).

Time took a backseat and we enjoyed paradise like surroundings, scrumptious food and excellent company. Couldn't ask for a better beginning...

...well, actually, we could. You see, the flight to San Jose was much to be desired. Have you ever been in an airport evacuation? We got to experience one in San Diego. The funny part was we weren't scheduled to land in San Diego! Yeah, San Diego was not part of the flight plan. Our boarding passes said San Jose/Cabo San Lucas yet, we found ourselves in San Diego (it's kinda hard to tell the pilot that you don't want to land in San Diego and to fly straight to San Jose, since he is behind a secured door.) When we arrived in San Diego (our mystery stop), we disembarked, took all our carry on luggage and proceeded to wait for them to call us back which was estimated to be a mere 10 minutes. Well, 10 minutes turned into +1.5 hours. The entire airport was evacuated. K-9 units were called in and news reporters were wandering around. It is an eerie site to see an airport come to a stand still. Nobody coming or going and everyone standing in large crowds in the parking area and in breezeways between the parking and terminal. We found ourselves standing in a line with 200+ people ahead of us and even more behind us. All waiting for security to allow us back in. Apparently, someone slipped through security without being secured. How that happened, I couldn't guess. Security is so tight these days. Oh it gets better! You see, we left Sac at 4 am with limited snacks. It was now 2 pm and we hadn't had a decent meal. Talk about famished. Well as soon as we got pass security we headed to the much needed food stop at, oh our favorite, Mc Donald's (JK about the favorite, it is actually abhorred in our family -1.) Well, you got it, everyone else had the same idea. The food was ordered paid for and then wait, wait, wait. Well, the plane was ready to go--uh oh--no food! After little discussion to our situation with the airline personel, we are told to board and are whisked down the plank onto our airplane with crying, hungry kids. Due to a kind hearted older gentleman, we were paged on the airplane and Mike was allowed to go pick up our food. Praise God! Here is the clencher. Mikol our dear friend waiting in San Jose to pick us up, calls the airline to find out when our new arrival time is and he is told, "the plane is currently in the air and is about half way there". Hmmm, here we are choking down McDonalds on the ground in San Diego yet US Airways says we are almost to San Jose. Miscommunication at it's best! Okay, we arrive in San Jose and Mike and I have absolutely no idea where we are staying or going once we left the airport. Mikol had made all our reservations (and kept it all a secret. JK) I now realize the guy in immigration was very kind to us. He let us through even though we couldn't answer a single question to save our lives. He smiled and let us through. We cleared customs with a green light, literally. There is a big signaling light (like in an intercession when we are driving) and a button (just like the button to cross the street at a light). You press the button and it either lights up the green light or the red light. Our light was green which meant we could go through without inspection. So, off we go. As the automatic doors open, we see a friendly face in Mikol. Again, Praise God!

We are now on our way to a relaxing and fun vacation.

We stayed at Coral Baja for 8 restful days. A beautiful resort right on the beach. We swam, swam and swam some more.

We were either in the pool...

or in the Sea of Cortez.





In addition to swimming, we got in some shopping and the guys did some fishing. Mike and Mikol did some shore fishing at dawn. Not much fish in these waters.



The sole catch was by our hero Charles while deep sea fishing. He provided dinner for the two families. Without this lucky catch, we would have gone hungry.


Stay tuned there is more to come...