March 31, 2009

If these pages are sparce it's not because I've been asleep for months, on the contrary, I've been traveling and having a hard time trying to catch up.

Since January when I finished up a nice Christmas vacation in Sierra Vista, Arizona with my daughter's family, I focused on preparations for my first "Operation Smile" medical trip to Managua, Nicaragua. As an operating room nurse, I have been looking forward to going to developing countries and doing what I could to change people's lives for the better. In February I was honored to be able to go with this volunteer organization and be apart of fixing the cleft lips and cleft palates of 91 children. It was a very challenging experience, but very rewarding. I plan to go on another of these missions in July - again to Nicaragua...this time operating in the USNS Comfort, and US Navy Hospital Ship that will be anchored off shore on the Pacific side.

At the moment I'm preparing for a trip with "Overseas Adventure Travel" to Thailand, Vietnam and Burma. I've secured the required visas, and will get my malaria pills soon.

In addition I'm trying to fit in some genealogy moments, and also get out to the gym and to pursue my outdoor fun tracking down "GeoCaches" at this end of Hawaii. See photo where I'm finding the "SubMariner's" geocache and photo of Lucille finding geocache "Tunnel Vision" in the lava ledges.

I'll post some photos below of the Operation Smile experience: