Belgium

Brugge Belgium offered lots of shopping in a clean, touristy city with beautiful old buildings. Really beautiful and really touristy. But clean and with good bus service. One of the highlights was discovering high-speed wirelss access in the campground. We only needed to open the computer and we were online.
This quickly brought us back into touch with home via Skype calls (with lots of echo), movie and tv downloads, podcasts and streaming radio shows. We watched John Stewart’s Daily Show, Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Strong Bad, and Pirate’s of the Caribbean. We listened to some of our favorite Public Radio shows.
Before leaving Amsterdam we bought a second phone. Now we could come and go as we pleased and still find each other. No more waiting outside of a store instead of wandering towards something interesting. And the bike now meant we could go to the store or into town easily. Life is getting good.
Except for Jubie. We received news that she has a serious liver and pancreas illness. Laura, Frank and Mary Ellen are doing all they can and we’re all hopeful but very concerned. We lost Scully, Jules’s turtle to a coyote a few weeks ago so this is especially painful.
The pictures show Ben and Jules’s new sweater complete with 3 foot long cap and tassel. Ben is playing in a tornado of leaves (Not trying to get home I hope) and in front of a nice planting of marigolds.