Our Hellenic Adventure - Part 4

We arrived Mykonos Sunday at about 6:30pm. This is the off season here, but there are still lots of tourists. Monday we explored the city. There are about 12, 000 residents and maybe twice that number of visitors. This island thrives on the tourist. There is little to no industry as this primarily a desert island. The streets are narrow with just enough room for two small cars to pass. In a large part the streets are for pedestrians only. Here the streets may accommodate a Vespa with people having to step aside to let them pass. Tuesday we boarded a boat with about 200 people to visit the Island of Delos. Delos is located about 15 miles to the southwest of Mykonos city from the old port. A note to the Sandpeeps about only going back to the 11th century, the Acropolis was built about 465BC and Delos was first inhabited about 2500BC.

 

At one time Delos was the largest city in the world with in excess of 30, 000 residents. This island is the birth place of Apollo and Artemis. Mykonos buildings are white with maybe a little color for doors and windows.

The photos below show a picture taken from the

 New Port and the theater in Delos.

Here is a photo of the narrow streets.  

John & Mary

 

Remembering

Stan gave us a very moving Memorial Day ceremony....his last at Sandpipers.  He and Margo will be moving shortly to Las Vegas to be near family.

 

 

He read little vignettes, stories about the delivering of the worst news to a wife, mother, father. 

Military deaths from WW1 until present day.

 

He told his stories with a trembling in his voice that pulled us all into the tearful scenes.

 

Stan, we are going to miss your gallantry, and your passionate patriotism.

Memorial Day Reminder

On Monday at 10:30 am we will have our Memorial Day Service over at the Court of Honor.
(Indoor if it rains) 

 

We hope that you will join us as this will be

the last program Stan 30 will be doing for us.

 

 Thank you again to the guys (Charlie, Barry, Bill and I am sure there are a couple more) who fixed the flag poles so we could get this area cleaned up.

 

We will serve a pot luck lunch starting at 11:30 in Flip Flopz.

We will have a breaded porkchop or a BBQ chicken leg quarter and are asking you to please bring a side dish to pass.

 

 We hope you can please join us for this event.

Our Hellenic Adventure - Part 3

We departed Athens 9:00pm on May 20th, bound for the isle of Chios. This was our first overnight ship. We sailed the passenger ferry ARIANDE. This ferry transported about 300 plus a large number of tractor trailers, a small number of autos and about 10 motorcycles. Our sleeping quarters comprised of a set of bunk beds one small desk and chair. This area was comparable to a postage stamp. The bathroom was about one quarter the size of a postage stamp.

 

We arrive Chios 5am the following morning. Chios is not a large island. It was ruled at one time or another by the turks, the Ottoman Empire and invaders from Genoa, when Genoa was a City State. They all left a very large imprint on this island. 

We visited  three small towns whose origins go back to the 12th century. The city of Chios is the only town built directly on the coast. The towns visited and all others we did not, were built 10 to 20 km inland. This was done to protect themselves from roaming pirates. The towns look very much like they did 900 years ago. Castles surrounded by high walls, narrow street and houses linked together by passageways from one roof top to the next. This allowed inhabitants to avoid capture. Houses were built of stone. The ground floor housed animals and the kitchen. The first floor was the living quarters and the roof was for entertaining. We met a woman who uses the ground floor as a boutique and lives in the small one room on the first floor in a house that was built 900 years ago. Running water and electricity have been added to allow her modern living.

 

 

Chios is the only place in this world where the mestic tree grows. The soil and climate conditions are just perfect. The mestic tree is rather short and somewhat gnarly like a mesquite tree in Texas. In the early summer the owners of the mestic farms will slash the bark of the tree about 1/8 inch deep. During the summer the tree will weep sap which will drop on to the well prepared ground around the tree. This sap by fall will have crystallized into pea sized cream colored nodules. These are then sold to merchants who use the mestic for everything from candy, coffee, soap, oil and a liqueur. This is the major cash crop for Chios.

 

 

We also got to visit a black pebble beach. These pebbles range in size from a chicken egg to a soft ball. This beach is a result of volcanic action eons ago. Of course, being in Chios, the north end is a nude area.

We shall leave Chios Sunday morning for a 2 hour ferry ride to Mykonos. Mykonos will be time to relax and refresh. 

 

John and Mary

Message from The Mighty Bus!

Hi Sue, I saw this quote at White Sands when Sandpipers were going through the latest flood. Thought of all of you and how it applies. Hope all is well there now.

 

Best to all from

The Mighty Bus. www.mightybus.wordpress.com

 

Wendy Crosby

 

 

Water Aerobics

Water aerobics is being held on

Thursdays at 11 AM and Sundays at 8 AM.

 

Come join the mermaid brigade!!

Thanks,
Barb

Karen Notes

I guess I am just going to stop making plans and just live in the moment.... nah, too old to change my ways.   The water pumping was moving right along when on Friday the clouds opened up on us again with somewhere between 1 - 2 inches of rain.  We don't accept defeat and just kept on pumping.  Thank you to Bill 434, Bill 212, Jim 413, Mike 221, Charlie 46, Barry 47 and those who have helped pump that I missed.  The 20 and 30 road is pretty much cleared so get your sump pumps going over to the field to help with your water and smell.  We hope to have the 600 and 400 row roads cleared by Tuesday night so that those of you can get the sumps going as well. 

We will have to turn off the water again on Monday, May 18 at 10:30 for about an hour or so. Please plan accordingly.

 

   The palm tree guys are supposed to be here on Monday and Tuesday. We are hoping that Max's Tree service will have the chipper fixed and back out Wednesday and Thursday to finish.    Please do not ask them directly to trim something for you, but instead please contact the office.

Someone put some white aluminum pieces at the office front door.  If you can let me know where you found them, maybe we could get them back to where they belong.  I also want to thank those of you who have cleaned up and help look out for your neighbors.  We hope to start the west fence repairs as soon as the ground dries up.  Then we can get the concrete sites poured and then start on the road repairs. 

We will have staff here all week to get cleaned up again for the Memorial Day weekend.

 

  I talked to Charlie and we will have a little Pub Nite over in Flip Flopz on Saturday.  We were thinking like a Super Happy Hour starting at 4 pm.  Please bring over something to snack on, please no crock pots, but we will have plates and silverware available.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 We hope that WVB will be going Saturday and Sunday, perhaps a pentenque game too.  The pool table, wii and card room is cleaned up and cool, ready for your enjoyment. 

 

  On Monday at 10:30 am we will have our Memorial Day Service over at the Court of Honor. We hope that you will join us as this will be the last program Stan 30 will be doing for us.  

 

 Thank you again to the guys (Charlie, Barry, Bill and I am sure there are a couple more) who fixed the flag poles so we could get this area cleaned up.  We will serve a pot luck lunch starting at 11:30  in Flip Flopz.  We will have a breaded porkchop or a BBQ chicken leg quarter and are asking you to please bring a side dish to pass.  We hope you can please join us for this event.

I just want to say that we have a great group of people here that just get in and get things done when we have mother nature problems.  THANK YOU for all that you do to help make Sandpipers Resort a wonderful place to enjoy life.

Hugs,
Karen

 

 

 

 

 

 

John and Mary's Hellenic Adventure -Part 2

We took a bus tour to Piraeus. This is the port city for Athens. I am very familar with Piraeus. Although this is our first trip here, in my previous life I acted as an agent in North American ports for many cargo ships that had the Piraeus name painted on their stern.

We traveled by bus where we were able to sit on the upper deck.

We had lunch in a local restaurant overlooking the marina. Lunch included Greek salad. The feta was not the crumbly kind we usually get at home. This feta was a slab about half an inch thick. 

 

Tomorrow we hope to arrange transport to the Greek islands. We are not sure which ones, so check with the blog in a day or two for an update. 

Saturday we toured the new Acropolis Museum. This building contains some 20,000 artifacts in 14,000 square meters of floor space. It gave us a much better understanding of the reasons for this construction and the changes over the last 2500 years. One of the more modern displays was a rendering of the Acropolis in legos. All the many who were fans of this toy will recognize this display and the time taken to put it together.

 

 

Time to Build the Ark!

Yes, it has rained again.

Yesterday afternoon another inch and a half got our flood right back to where it was Tuesday.

 

We do have water now though, so flushing and showers are a go.

  I think we are still supposed to boil if we want to drink it. 

Gotta check on that.

 

Fence is still down and won't be fixed until the ground water goes down.  Weather forecast for the next week looks mostly dry, hot and windy so we are hoping....

 

Jim is waiting for parts to fix our weather station.  Wind measurement doesn't work and the rain totals may be off.

 

There are some interesting water birds wading in the field from time to time.  Different that the one's from the April flood.

Not Egrets. Maybe Plovers.

 

Pray for dry land.

John and Mary's Hellenic Adventure

 

Summer time and we are about to embark on an adventure of a lifetime. May be not a lifetime but at least fifty years.

 

Mary and John left Houston at 1500 hours Tuesday May 12th.

Not on a spyder this time but on a KLM 747.

 

 Our first stop was Amsterdam. We had arrived one hour earlier than schedule due to a strong tail wind. After two and half hour layover we boarded a 737 and departed for that ancient city of Athens.

We arrived Athens at 1230 hours May 13th. After by passing customs we hailed a taxi enroute to an apartment near the center of this ancient city. We had elected to book an apartment instead of a hotel. Booked through AirBnB at about half the cost of a three star hotel.

Our apartment is about 50 square meters, comprises a sitting room, kitchen and bedroom. Small but larger than a hotel room.

Today was spent visiting the Acropolis

and taking a bus tour of the city.

Regards

John and Mary

So, What Do I Know?

Jay has 3 or 4 pumps chugging away at least 12 hours a day (and I am SOOOO thankful when they turn off 'cause they are right outside my door, even tho I know they should run 24/7...still, blessed quiet when they are off).

 

 

Water is receding...slowly. Roads are reappearing.

 

 

Waves of toads.

 

 

Hummocks of grass clippings and mud.

 

Wear water shoes when getting mail, or doing a trash run.

 

Shore birds are back.

 

 

Several houses did have water inside, many more had/have water underneath their units.

 

 

Newspapers are being delivered to the office and piled up on the porch...go get one if you subscribe.

 

 

Most everything that was toppled is now upright.

 

 

Fence is still a mess.

 

 

We have water but are cautioned to boil it.

 

 

 

We leave the park at the least excuse...shopping, Dr. appt's, whatever...just leave.

 

 

 

If we get another heavy rain...well, I just can't even imagine. 

 Jay & Karen have got to be beside themselves!

Water, water, everywhere.....

1. Believe it or not these pictures are NOT from the April flood...they are from the May flood! 

Skip's disaster...

 The Memorial Garden...bent poles, shredded flags, downed poles...in fact every flag pole on the property is damaged or down.

Fences down, which took out our water lines.

 Basketball court is decimated, gazebo broken, lighted palm trees on the ground.

 Annie & Bill, you may have water...fence is down by you too. We are expecting goats at any moment.

 Front gate....

 Bill & Laura, you've lost some ...what is that called?  Sheeting?  Above your window.

 It's deeper that last time...up to our car, which has never

happened before.

We may have had as much as 80 mph wind gusts...duh, 'ya think?

 

 

 

A Letter from the Trail!

Dear Sue,

 

On Saturday, May 2, Catherine and our daughter, Jennifer, competed in the John T. Cooke Memorial Ultimate Trail-ride Competition Rodeo in Holman, TX. 

 

There were fifty contestants making up ten teams of five. It was a very large collection of riders and horses from all over Texas. 

While our team, "The Pistol Annies", competed quite well they did not win the competition.  They rode for over eight hours in rigorous and complicated events. The horses and riders were completely exhausted by the end of the day.

 

Catherine says that her horse, Touchstone, out-performed all the other horses on her team.

I have attached some pictures from the event.  The "Pistol Annies" shows Catherine on the left side of the picture and our daughter, Jenn, in the center.

Bob

 

Keep Them In Your Prayers! Clint & Barb...

 

Suez, Here is my current status. It is fine for publication on your Blog or where ever else you think it fits. I or Barbara will try and keep you guys updated as best we can. I am doing better, but probably temporarily.      To be blunt: I am in the St Lukes Cardiac Intensive Care Unit. Been here going on a month. Almost total isolation to prevent infection when I get a heart for transplant. I am essentially here until a heart becomes available or I die.   Only Barb can visit. I am listed on the heart transplant list as a I-A patient and will get the first or second one of the first heart’s that fits. I am loosing weight and trying to reduce my weight as quickly and as much as I can. As I’ve mentioned before, I am an attractive heart transplant candidate because everything works. I have no organ issues, bone issues etc. The heart is the only issue and that is rare I’m told. I have no coronary blockages or other problems with the plumbing. So, they will keep me here until they get a heart for me, however long that takes I’m told. Of course, things change in medicine and the plan has changed quite regularly of late. However, this is what we got now and what we believe will happen. Recovery is about 6 to 8 weeks in the hospital following surgery, another month to 2 months living close by with daily visits to the clinic and then home with weekly clinic visits.      If all goes well, I’ll move to monthly clinic visits and so on. The anti rejection drugs are pretty tough and require a lot of monitoring to get them right and keep them right. For now, keeping me here keeps me on the I-A status and puts me at the first to be considered status. Hearts are transplanted on the basis of the recipient being best able to utilize the new heart and have nothing to do with the order of when one signs up or anything else. It is purely on who can do all the things, solve the problems and get the most benefit from the very limited number of available hearts. So, I am in the best situation I can be in and have the best chance I’ll ever have to get a suitable heart. So, Barb and I have decided to do all we can to take advantage of this God Given opportunity I’ve been given. We deal with things day to day and keep a positive attitude at all costs. Barb has hired some help to take care of John at our Angel Lake Ranch near Columbus TX as she is out of resources by herself. She’ll have 2 people that will help John and more coming on as the need arises later in the process.      Will be quite a while before we get back to SP or anywhere else, but if this goes well, then it should happen later this year. We’ll see. First thing is to have a heart available that works for me. That is it from the Hospital and is most all we know. This is tough duty, but I have plenty I can do and plenty they are doing to me. Things can get busy here and painfully slow and boring. Barb can visit a lot of the days, but she needs to take care of John on Sunday and from time to time tend to other things. She has hired people to handle outside work and can get mechanical stuff done pretty completely. It isn’t forever, but will be a good bit of 2015. You folks take care of yourselves and we’re looking forward to breaking bread with you as soon as the Lord gives us the opportunity. Clint & Barbara

Radio News

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