Here are our photos from our visit to the chapel of St Francis in Assisi(St Francesco) located in the Tuscany region of Italy, south of Florence. The chapel for St Francis sits up on a hill, one for the monks and another higher up in the mountains for the nuns. You walk up through the town which was surround by a large stone wall and heavy gates for protection. The St Francis chapel was built after he died and is actually one chapel on top of the other, built into the side of the hill. We entered through the door in the bottom chapel and St Francis is buried there under the altar. No photos in the church. The ceilings are painted dark blue with stars, and the life of St Francis is painted along the walls of the upper chapel. The large stained glass window is built facing the setting sun which was not the usual for churches of the day. They usually build the church facing the rising sun to celebrate light and a new day. This one was celebrating the setting sun and life after death. INcluded are some photos from around the town. As you can see from the steps and roads, there is a lot of hiking and walking straight up and down on top of the hill! The shots from the top of the hill down into the valley are beautiful. The area is surrounded by the town in the valley(peasants) and olive tree orchards. And as I mentioned, The Franciscan cross looks like the letter T. Included is a shot of our tour guide and the local monk who took us through the chapel. Also a courtyard inside the chapel. And my favorite wine, cheese and sausage shop where I bought Tom some wild boar salami.  

We're Having A Heat Wave! A Tropical Heat Wave! Wow. Temps in the 100s here in Baltimore and humidity on top of that. It is actually hard to breathe outside sometimes, especially when there is no breeze. It seems to be coming to an end though with a couple of tstorms. We mostly spend our time indoors.It makes it hard to take Cookie for a walk. I usually wait until around 10pm.

Scott spent his mornings though outside on the greens at his Golf Camp this past week. He then spent his afternoons at Pets N Vets class at the local community college. SCott has taken the Pets class several times and never tires of it. You never know what type of animals will show up. This year they had a goat, a chicken, lizards, turtles, rabbits, cats, police dogs and lots of dogs as pets. Of course Scott took Cookie one afternoon, and our turtle another afternoon. We discovered our turtle is a yellow eared or yellow bellied turtle and not a red eared as we thought. Scott needed to take the turtle to class towards his Boy Scout merit badge "Pet CAre" that I have him working on. (Along with his summer reading and other badge work).

Thank goodness for Allison. She has been driving him all over for his classes. It has certainly been a great help. She is also staying busy on the weekends at work, and finally she and Tom were able to get all her model birds put up at the Nature Center over the week. She has already heard great compliments from guests and the staff on having the birds available on the trail. Now she is trying to schedule a class for the staff and hopefully one for the kids before she goes off to school in August.

Speaking of school, she received her college housing assignment and roommate. She sent off an email to Melania (seems she is Ukranian), but it also seems she is off visiting in the Ukraine. Allison is anxious to chat with her. She did scope her out on Facebook. We went off this weekend and spent Allison's graduation gift cards at Target, buying all her dorm room linens, as well as buying school supplies with her Staples gift cards.  We also got our fall semester bill-it was nice to see they credited Allison with her scholarship money. And she also received her orientation week schedule. What a week! Lots of activities planned all over campus. Allison is reading a book assigned to all the freshman, The Meaning of Matthew about a guy that was killed in Texas several years ago who was gay. The mom wrote the book and she is their guest speaker over the opening weekend. We have to drop Allison off at 7:30 in the morning on a Thursday, and then they have programs scheduled for students and family members all day until they send us off with an ice cream social. Salisbury is a very family oriented school and schedules programs during the year to get the kids and their parents and siblings together. Not to mention lots of activities organized for the kids to get involved in their community, as well as with each other(and of course to succeed in their classes).

We also had the Girl Scouts over on Friday night as we plan for our upcoming trip to Michigan. We will be leaving next Sunday and stopping overnight at Cedar Point. We also plan on driving up to my parent's house in Charlevoix to spend time on the water as well as taking a day trip to Mackinac Island. The girls are very excited! I also plan on taking Tom and Scott along for the trip. Scott can't wait for Cedar Point too!

Tom should be used to traveling by now. He had just gotten home from LA, and then was off to Salt Lake City all last week. He is busy repacking for a trip to Chicago this coming week. Too bad he lost his pager when we went off to the mountains last week! It is harder to keep in touch with him!

I have been busy at my new job. We finally put together our entire team, but may need to add a few extra therapists as we get busier. It is just nice to have a steady income again!

We arrived back home in the US early Saturday morning! We had an amazing Girl SCout trip of Europe and saw absolutely everything! We were quite happy to be back home again though as we were missing toilet paper, decaf coffee with cream, tortilla chips and salsa and hamburgers! (In that order!)

The first part of our trip took us on a United Flight last Weds night from the DC Dulles airport to London Heathrow airport. Tom convinced me it would be better if we drove ourselves. We had a quicker flight with a strong tailwind-just about 5 1/2 hours. I would have preferred to sleep all night, especially since I wasn't feeling too well. But between dinner service and drinks and snacks, the very nice flight attendants kept us busy and awake. And the economy seats are so much smaller than they used to be! Hard to get a comfortable spot for sleeping. Although I did manage to get a very fluffy pillow! Overall it was still a great flight and we arrived in London around 9am, 5 hours later time difference than Baltimore and made it through a very long, hot customs line.

I guess we were the last one's to arrive. The rest of our Girl Scout Group was already there. Our group consisted of 50 girls and women from all over the country-South Carolina, Seattle Washington, California, and Nebraska. Ages ranged from a 10 yo girl to a Grandma. Most of the girls were around 15-16 yrs old. We all boarded our bus and headed to our hotel in Beckton, south of London. We checked into our rooms and grabbed some sandwiches at a local equivalent of Walmart. We then boarded the local train and headed into London where we switched to the tube to head downtown for a walking tour. Our first train ride was interesting as it ran above ground, operated by robotics-no driver! We got a great view of Olympic village and East London University, a local stadium for concerts as well as the marshes that run into Thames river. Our walking tour took us by Big Ben, Picadilly Circus, the National Gallery, London Tower and the Tower Bridge. We stopped for dinner near the London tower at an Asian restaurant and did some souvenir shopping. Then headed back to the hotel on the trains.

We were pretty exhausted. Unfortunately, Allison and I were stuck with the group's misfit mom and daughter as roommates. Very nice people from Nebraska, but constantly losing everything(including a close call with the passports). The daughter had anxiety attacks and spent more time in our room than her room. I could have paid more and roomed just with Allison, but she was hoping to spend time with the scouts and meet new people. She did meet a few girls that she enjoyed hanging out with but they never had the opportunity to share a room. And my roommate snored horribly. Although I was so tired it almost didn't matter.

The next morning after breakfast(which was mostly cereal, yogurt, juice and coffee(no cream), we took a bus tour of London. We drove over the Tower bridge and around the Tower of London. Next visit we will have to go in. Many of the places we visited, even cathedrals, charge an entrance fee so it can be quite an expensive trip. The Tower of London was used as a castle, fortress and prison where they currently keep the crown jewels. It hosted lots of executions  with lots of royal prisoners in the past. They also have their own ravens living on the grounds and it is said the kingdom will always stand as long as the ravens remain. We drove around Westminster Abbey and Westminster, Big Ben, #10 Downing Street, Harrods Dept store, The London Eye, with a quick walking tour around St Pauls(cathedral where Charles and Diane were married). We traveled through the neighborhoods where Shakespeare, Chaucer and Dickens lived. An American businessman rebuilt an exact replica of Shakespeare's Globe theater, including the open roof. Theater goers stand on balconies around the stage and have the opportunity to participate in the shows, just as they did during Shakespeare's day. We drove around the fictitious neighborhood of Sherlock Holmes, and the shady dark side of London including Fleet Street and the infamous barber Sweeney Todd and Jack the Ripper. There was certainly quite a dark side to London including heads on stakes as you entered the city and being buried up to your head in the marshes as the tide came in. The bloated bodies were known as Wappers(not the same as the ones at Burger King but gives you a whole new perspective). I learned that Wharf stands for Wharehouse At the River Front. And that the Romans settled London since it was conveniently located on a major river, but it was just too cold so they left. We also saw lots of spots where they filmed the Sherlock Holmes movie and tv series, and of course Harry Potter. Including the Millenium foot path bridge that was closed for several years due to poor construction. This is the bridge where the dementors attacked the pedestrians. We also saw the old train station used in the movies. And we saw quite a bit of the new, very modern London including the Mayor's Office kindly referred to as Darth Vadars helmet. We then stopped by Buckingham Palace to watch the changing of the guards. Afterwards half of our group headed out by bus for a tour of Windsor Castle near Heathrow airport. The rest stayed behind for free time and a ride on the London Eye. Allison and I had decided to tour Windsor castle, home of the Queen Mother who was actually in the castle during our tour. Sadly we did not catch a glimpse of her or her dogs.  After lunch we did see Queen Mary's elaborate dollhouse, the castle tour and St George's cathedral-patron saint of England. Allison and I had the chance to have our photo close up with a royal guard and their bearskin hats! There was a bit of a mix up with transportation back into London, so we arrived to dinner late. Fish and chips in a local tavern. We had hoped to see a play-Phantom of the Opera, however the tickets were sold out that Friday night. Looks like we would have been late anyway. Just have to catch it in Baltimore next year.

On Saturday morning we headed to Hampstead, north of London for a visit at the Girl Scout World Headquarters-Pax Lodge. Lord Powell began the Boy Scout movement in England and his wife, Olave began the Girl Guides. Juliette Lowe met Lord Powell while traveling to England and began the Girl Scouts in the US. Pax Lodge or Peace Lodge was built in 1989 and was named after a vacation home of the Powells and built in honor of Olave Powell. It is a youth hostel with bedrooms and kitchenettes, meeting rooms and a patio/garden. We were met by several Girl SCout volunteer staff members from all over the world. We had a flag ceremony and sang The World Song(which Allison and I know from choir!), a pinning ceremony, tea ceremony, a tour of the building, lots of videos on the history of the building and the girl scout movement around the world and free time to buy souvenirs and swap patches.  If Allison was ever interested, she could apply for a free internship at the Pax Lodge and run programs for the visiting Girl Scouts for about 2 months during the summer. What a great opportunity to visit London! We had the whole place to ourselves that morning, and then headed out to a train station for the two hour ride to Paris.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Tom and Scott spent their first weekend alone doing yardwork. Lots of bushes to trim and Scott rebuilt our stone wall around the birch trees. They also had a boys day and SCott had a friend over for a bike ride. At night, his Dad came over and Tom set up a movie outside in the backyard on our projector. Scott planned on spending the upcoming week in computer classes at Kids on Campus summer camp learning how to make 3D video games and applications.

Here is a taste of our London tour photos-Big Ben, London Eye, Picadilly Circus,  Tower of London and Tower Bridge, St Paul's Cathedral, Westminster Abbey, Westminster and Big Ben, Buckingham Palace and Changing of the Guards, Windsor Castle, Pax Lodge and Girl Scout Pinning ceremony and tea ceremony along with our GS Tour Group. Waiting in the train station for our trip to Paris. I will send out info on our trip to Paris in my next blog(don't want to overload anyone!). Let me know if I got something wrong or missed something Dave and Sandra(the Bozyk family lived in London for a few years and I am sure they are expert tour guides!).
 Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Tom and Scott spent their first weekend alone doing yardwork. Lots of bushes to trim and Scott rebuilt our stone wall around the birch trees. They also had a boys day and SCott had a friend over for a bike ride. At night, his Dad came over and Tom set up a movie outside in the backyard on our projector. Scott planned on spending the upcoming week in computer classes at Kids on Campus summer camp learning how to make 3D video games and applications.