So much to do... ... and so much time to do it!

October 1st - The Puzzle Begins -

We have arrived in Asheville and are staying at the McElhaney's. Literally. Our motorhome fits perfectly in their driveway which is great since we can visit them whenever we want and the kids can come in and hang out with the birds whenever they want. Today we started a 750 piece puzzle rated for ages 12 and up with lots and lots of shades of blue and purple that didn't seem as close in color until we separated all the pieces in the box and started in on the puzzle. Sarah, Katie and I worked on it for about 3 hours with the sporadic help of Ryan and Frank. We girls took a break once our eyes were so crossed we couldn't see straight, had lunch and headed outside.

The kids loved the birds and their tricks

Katie enjoyed the guitar

	Parrottrek Journal 2008

			Such concentration		Hooray!!! The last two pieces		The completed 750 piece puzzle

	Once outside, with lots of neighbor kids in attendance, Frank, Bradley and Cody did a miniature bird show with all their various tricks. P.S. We finished the puzzle on Sunday the 5th. I know, I know! I lagged on these entries. Sorry but we were having way too much fun with the McElhaney family all week to write! Life is so good!! :-)

October 2nd - Fun With the Birds - Camp McElhaney -

Today began with a few hours of work on the very addicting puzzle followed by an amazing brunch with homemade granola, fresh fruit, yogurt, waffles and eggs. Sheila and Brennen are quite the cooks and have inspired Frank and I to steal their salsa recipe and add it as a staple to breakfast, lunch, snacks and dinner. Salsa is a great thing to have around and we are firm believers that one can never have too much of it. After breakfast Sarah and I were pulled back to the puzzle table by a force much stronger than either of us, along with wonderful background music thanks to Frank and the guitar. Katie was entranced by it. After Sarah and I pulled ourselves away from the now half finished puzzle all 3 kids took their turns taking photos with the birds. Bradley sure loved Kate, especially her cast.

				October 3rd - Biltmore Estates - Asheville, North Carolina - Fall is in the air! The leaves here are beginning to turn the most amazing colors, another thing one never sees while living in the state of California. Since it was such a beautiful day Frank and I decided to pack a lunch and head over to the Biltmore Estate, again after a great breakfast with the Macs. WOW! What an amazing place this estate is. We arrived around 11 and started out touring the house, which was floor after floor of bedrooms, elaborate sitting rooms and more bathrooms than imaginable. The Biltmore Estate was built in the early 1900's so indoor plumbing wasn't quite yet a concept anywhere but here. The Vanderbilt home was also one of the very first homes to have electricity. The house is over 1.2 million square feet and the Vanderbilt's used it to host parties that would last for months on end with their friends staying as long as they wanted. I got a little happier each floor we explored and each set of rooms we walked by, realizing that my house is much easier to clean, heat, cool and furnish and the guest list is a lot smaller. After our exploration of the house, we walked up the hill to an even better view of the house and enjoyed our picnic lunch. Once lunch was done we decided to head to the winery on the property for a tasting. We decided that the Chardonnay, not from the oak barrels, was our favorite and bought a couple bottles.

	As we left the winery we noticed a bike trail. Lucky for us, our bike rack is permanently fixed to the Jeep, so off came the bikes and a new tour of the property began. The path started out nicely paved with the house peaking round every corner and through the trees. Once we got back into the forest a little more the pavement turned to rocky and sandy trails. The views were still pretty, but the challenge of riding a very relaxing beach cruiser became a little difficult. Note to self... pretty flowery tread doesn't work worth a crap when it comes to grabbing the loose soil beneath you. We were troopers and were not going to give up on the ride until the 1.2 miles, as the sign said with "steep elevation", came to an end. They weren't kidding about the steep elevation, since it was about 9% most of the way up. We were both standing up pedaling as hard as we could and laughing at ourselves, which again doesn't help in the uphill pedaling process but makes for a memory not to be soon forgotten. At one point we were both walking our bikes up the hill, which we realized would be a great ride downhill... as long as we made it to the top. We will!!! We will!!! We kept telling ourselves. And we did! And it was well worth the agony. The views of the side of the house were ones that you couldn't see from the regular tour. Yes, you could pay extra to get access to this part of the house, but why pay when you can burn off a few calories and see it for no additional cost. We took a few self portraits, posing with the various statues and then headed back down the mountain. Just as we expected, the ride back to the car took about 5 minutes compared to the half hour ride up and the average speed was about 20 miles an hour. My brakes are toast and I think I got air about three times from flying over the bumps at what felt close to Mach Ones, except for the fact we weren't at sea level.

	Biltmore's majestic greenhouse...		... filled with amazing flowers		One of the many grape arbors		A busy bumble bee

Next Stop... The Biltmore Gardens -

Once the bikes were back on the Jeep we headed to see all the beautiful flowers grown here at Biltmore. The greenhouse was amazing and the orchids and roses were some of the prettiest I have ever seen. There were lots of bumble bees and one of them even stood still long enough to pose for a photo. They have mazes of flowers and bushes and grape arbors over each walkway. This is an amazing place and if you're ever looking for a fun vacation, Asheville is a must!

October 4th - A Bike Ride Through Fletcher Park -

Since today was another beautiful day, the group decided to pack up all the bikes and head to a nearby park. Fletcher Park is enormous and very fun. We rode the bikes a ways back into it, over some very pretty streams, by lots of ball fields and birthday parties, to find a quiet shady corner to rest for a bit, kick around the ball and enjoy the day. After a bit we all switched bikes and took a lap around the corn fields. Frank and Cody took Ryan's bike, I rode Frank's and Sheila rode mine while Brennen, Katie and Ryan stayed in the shade and kicked the ball around. Frank felt a little awkward on the mini bike, but luckily the trail was short.

October 7th - We Bought a MacBook - A Whole New World -

Over the last few months, the program that I use to create my web page, has begun to have lots and lots and lots of annoying side effects. I realize now that these side effects have come from various upgrades that the software has had. Apparently the people who work for the company have no idea how to fix what is broken and, as a result, my web page looks like a moron might have created it. One glitch, that the newest and last upgrade I promise to ever do, no matter what they say, takes one line of text and repeats it and repeats it over and over and deletes everything else I have written. Not only on new pages I have created, but past pages that I hardly ever look at. Of course I searched out each and every page and spent hours re-writing them, only to find the same thing happened again... two weeks later. So, I do apologize if a section or two or twenty on a certain page makes no sense. We are working very hard to fix this issue. After many testy conversations with the inept people that answer the phones, I started looking at other software to replace the current pile-o-crap and all the people that come with it. After many many hours of research and friends input, it seemed that the software I was looking for was no where to be found unless I wanted to spend hundreds and hundreds of dollars... ... and then! We started to look into MacBooks. We went to the Apple store and asked them every question about everything we could possibly think of and have been having issues with. It seemed that our prayers had been answered. After I spent about an hour fiddling around with one of the display computers, I found that the iWeb software was very close to what I have been searching for. So... ... we are now the proud owners of a bouncing baby MacBook, okay so bouncing it might be bad, but you know what I mean. I have begun the tedious task of transferring all our adventures over and might I add... ... WOW! We have done a lot of stuff over the past 4 years, since the inception of Parrottrek. Some thing I even forgot about. So as lengthy as this task may be and as long as it might take, it's been a lot of fun re-reading and re-wording all of our various adventures and pictures. Bear with us, as it might be awhile to complete and hopefully the webpage won't get too funky in the process.

October 8th - Who Needs Sleep? -

I love love LOVE the MacBook. I can't say enough about it. It is the smartest computer we have ever owned and I keep asking myself and my new computer "Where have you been all my life?" It hasn't crashed once. When we bought our last PC, which I have nick-named Pile-o-Crap, it crashed about 10 times in the first week. It is now about 2am and I am forcing myself to go to bed because it's way too late and I can no longer see straight. I have made great progress on transferring the web page and am very excited seeing it take shape. iWeb is so intuitive and is able to do everything I wanted the old software to do. Good thing I will have lots of time on the drive to Florida to continue the process. I can't wait till Sunday night and we head home to beautiful TGO!

	Is that for us??		Bradley helps stabilize the bowl		Next step - a cup of water		Make sure they're the same size

October 9th - Richmond Virginia - Baking Bird Bread -

With our most recent order of bird food, the wonderful company of Harrison's Bird Food, sent us a free sample of bird bread. Once we got home we brought out all three birds to help us make it. Cody was excited as soon as saw the muffin pan and jumped right in to help. 20 minutes later, at 350 degrees, the millet and flax bird bread was done. Everyone chowed on it as soon as it was cool enough to enjoy and have voted to try other flavors and add it to all our future orders.

October 13th - The Great Outdoors - Titusville, Florida -

We have arrived at our wonderful, tranquil, amazing resort. We have been looking forward to these 11 glorious days for a few weeks now and apologize in advance if the chronicles of Parrottrek are neglected in the meantime. After all, we did have to work last week, don't we deserve a few days off? I will do my darnedest to pull myself away from the wonderful 10 mile bike rides each morning, lounge time at the pools and the beautiful sandy sunny beaches and update you, but please stay tuned in case I lag a day or two or 11! We still love all of our faithful readers and appreciate you greatly... ... Stay Tuned!!!

	The victorious car of round 1		Aaacckk! Who stole the car?		Oh, that's right, we get to race again!		A happy group of guys head to round 2

October 15th - STOP THE PRESSES! -

With all the excitement of our up and coming drive, arrival and fun times planned in Florida, we completely forgot to tell you all about our wonderful weekend in Richmond... well in the racing part of life that is. No offense to Virginians, but I have never been yelled at by so many random people for things that weren't anywhere near my fault anywhere in the country so I was more than ready to leave the state behind, but that's another story. Our Monster Men not only qualified for this race we actually won a round and had a decent speed while doing so. We came mighty close to winning the second round of races but due to a dropped cylinder we lost at the top end of the track. BoooHoooHooo!

An Update -

The research of the new software is still in effect. iWeb seems to be an okay option, but it doesn't have all the bells and whistles of my imagination. I have 'The New Parrottrek' image so clearly in my mind and am not quite ready to settle for the same old look it currently has and iWeb would pretty much do that. The MacBook is awesome and has lived up to everything we have expected. The software, that we are 99% sure of using, is made with Macs in mind. I am currently taking a few on-line classes learning all the ins and outs of this amazing new software and am enjoying every bit of it. I am learning A TON and might just turn out to be a web designer geek after all. A dream I have always had is to learn to write in HTML code... ... I know, I need to branch out a bit, but since a couple of my other dreams, goals and aspirations have come true I figure this one has a pretty good chance as well. Okay, so shoot me for being an optimist.

October 16th - A Morning Walk -

As the sun rises and the park awakens, I realize there is no better time to walk the nature trail. The good thing about our travels is that when we hit the Eastern time zone waking up early is pretty darn easy. What more could a girl ask for other than a bit of exercise and a lot of great animals to observe. Since the clocks won't change for another week or so, the sun comes up a little later each day, which makes for great scenery around 7:30 or so. All the wild birds are hunting for fish early in the morning on the banks of the lake and the deer, who are brave enough not to bolt into the bushes when people walk by unless they are eating someone flowers from their yard and feel a little guilty, nibble the grass clippings that the mower has left behind from the previous day's yard work.

			October 16th - Breakfast in Paradise - After my morning walk, and everyone woke up, Frank and I loaded up the bikes with the birds and a handful of their food and headed out for a bike ride around the resort. The perimeter road is almost 4 miles and with all the streets in between we can go about 10 miles and not have to pass many things twice. And since the roads are all fairly flat Cody gets a lot of flying in. As we watch many animals in the fields and bushes and lakes, we try and explain to Cody just how good he has it. How many other birds get fed breakfast as they ride around The Great Outdoors on the handle bars of a bike, only having to flap their wings when they want to and not because they have to hunt for their own food. Halfway through our bike ride, we stopped of at the Café and had breakfast on the back patio with both birds. Cody was still hungry after he had his bird breakfast and helped himself to half of mine. What a pig!

October 17th - Fun in the Sun - Titusville Florida -

Needless to say we are thoroughly enjoying our time here at home in beautiful sunny Florida. Our days have been filled with bike rides and pool time along with a few get togethers with friends and a little beach time as well. Yesterday our neighbors had a block party which was fun and allowed us to get back in touch with quite a few neighbors that we haven't seen since March and meet a few new ones. After the block party we went to the movie theatre here at the resort and watched Made of Honor. It was a sweet and sappy chick flick, but you can't beat a free movie so it was well worth it. The only downside of our time here is that we have yet to see Charlie, the alligator that lives in the lake behind our house, or any other alligators for that matter. He usually greets us within the first days or so of our arrival, so we are a little worried that he may have moved on, or been moved out. There is a policy that if they get to be over 6 feet they are relocated into the swamplands just South of us and since he was a little over 5 feet last time we saw him that is definitely a possibility. Boo hoo! We have, however, seen lots of other wildlife including a sweet little spotted fawn that hangs out with her momma and another doe each evening down the street from us. Since all the people here are fairly passive, the deer have no fear of us which makes it nice since when the deer see people they don't run and hide.

October 19th - Party at Margaritaville -

To celebrate my birthday today we headed down to Orlando to meet up with Rick, LaVerne, Maureen and John, friends that we haven't seen since our last visit to Florida back in March. Since we knew we would be gone all day, and somehow Cody felt it as well since he started to get extra cute as we started packing up for the day, we took him and Abbey for a lap around the park to exert some energy and make us feel a little less guilty for leaving them behind all day. On our bike ride we stopped for a bit in order for Cody to talk to a deer that was having breakfast in the weeds behind the golf course. Once we arrived in Orlando we spent a couple hours at Rick and LaVerne's with appetizers and then headed to Universal Walk to one of most favorite restaurants around the country, Margaritaville. Of course the main perk of attending the restaurant is that Frank can get a new fun parrot t-shirt, but the food is great as well as the ambiance which includes an erupting volcano and singing and dancing pirates who make balloon animals and hats and costumes for the patrons. After dinner we walked around Universal Walk, which is almost an amusement park in itself, to see the Halloween decorations and did a bit of Christmas shopping.

	October 22nd - Taking in the Views - These last few days have been great. Even though our routine might be seen as boring to some, we have enjoyed an early morning bike ride every day followed by brunch on the patio with the birds and a few miscellaneous animals such as the Windsong Way twin cranes, they are getting so big, a cute baby lizard that liked to hang out on Frank's hat and Charlie, yes we finally found Charlie, our friendly neighborhood alligator. After brunch we either sit by the lake and read for a few hours, or head to the pool and read there where we always have fun visiting with other neighbors and friends.



The sandhill crane twins are growing up
		Abbey gets ready for Halloween

	A turtle sunning himself		Such a wise face		Armadillos - cute? or ugly?		A very tiny lizard hangs out with Frank

	Rick and LaVerne joined us today, since they were both off of work, for a nice relaxing bar-b-que and a leisurely day. They live and work about an hour from us and they were in much need of a change of pace and scenery so they brought their bikes as well and joined us on our search of nature this afternoon. I still can't get over how many animals are around us in the trees and lakes and woods. As our time here comes to an end, we are a bit sad to have to say goodbye to The Great Outdoors, but on that same note we are excited to know that we will soon be in Vegas with friends that we haven't seen in months and then in California for a little over two months where we again gets lots of time to spend with family and friends. It's crazy to think we only have two weeks left of work with the racing circuit, of course those two weeks are spread over the next four weeks, which makes it nice and gives us a lot of time to get across the country.

The highways in Alabama go over miles of ocean	A bull in the clouds	The sun sets as we enter Baton Rouge
	A bull in the clouds	The sun sets as we enter Baton Rouge

October 24th - Beginning Our Final Cross-Country Drive of the Year -

Considering it was pouring rain this morning, leaving The Great Outdoors wasn't as hard as we thought. Cody was very upset since he couldn't go for a final bike ride and even more upset that he actually had to stay in his cage for a good portion of the day due to the fact that all he wanted to do once out of his cage is play with Frank on the steering wheel. Not a safe place to play. We made it all the way to Baton Rouge, Louisiana 760 from home. It was sad to think that we couldn't go to the pool this afternoon, but at the same time it was nice to be back on the road to see all the views. The drive over the 10 through Alabama is such a weird felling since all you see on all four sides of the motorhome, with opposing traffic was about 1/2 mile away. Even the clouds were fun to look at.

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