Trip to Connecticut (Posted April 23, 2013)

We flew up to Connecticut for a visit from April 13th to the 22nd. The weather was a little chilly but not too bad so we took credit for bringing some of it up from Florida since everyone blames us for coming when the weather is bad and tries to pretend that the weather is Connecticut is not always bad! I, of course, know better so am not fooled!

Olivia and Laura were off from school for their "Spring Break". One day they took Linda and me on a hike in the woods near their house. I, of course, was joking about "Da Bear", referring to the bear that was roaming their neighborhood and was in their backyard when we were there a year ago.  Olivia said, "Papa, don't joke about that!". Well, that evening a mother bear with a cub was spotted right in the area we had been! Obviously, Olivia is smarter than me and I am a smart-a**!

Here is a photo of the girls during our hike:

We all took a trip down to New London to tour the submarine museum and the USS Nautilus, the first nuclear powered submarine. Everyone enjoyed it and learned a lot.  Much of the interior of the submarine, such as the berth areas and radar/sonar room were very similar to those on the aircraft carrier, the USS Enterprise, that I had served on so the girls got to see how Papa had lived back then.

Here is a photo of Mark, Amy and the girls taken on the deck of the Nautilus:

We also toured the square-rigger tall ship the USS Eagle, the Coast Guard Academy training ship. Here are a couple of photos.

 

 

All too soon it was time to head back to Florida. But we had a great visit with everyone.

While we were there Amy, Mark and the girls were thinking about getting a dog! About a week after we left they adopted Sadie, a lab/hound mix.  She sounds like a great dog and we are looking forward to meeting her on our next trip up there. But in the meantime, we will all be going to Hawaii at the end of July and everyone is really looking forward to that! GRIN