Family Camping

So my dad wanted to do a camping trip, that was not necessarily a family trip, but of course the entire family was invited. Whoever wanted to come could come but no one was forced to go. Not that anyone in our family would be forced to go on a family trip, our family loves outings. However, it did turn into a farewell for Chris and Alicia before they go up to North Dakota. We stayed in Spruces and everyone that could be there was there (missed you Andrea). Friday night was the only night that everyone was there. We had hobo dinners and roasted marshmallows. I love camping!

 

Here are some of my favorite pictures. Everyone says me and Jake need more pictures and I agree. This is only like our third pictures. Although our engagement pictures are going to be taken in about a week or so.

The little girls are so freaking cute! Seriously I love all my nieces!

 

Here are many of the other pictures of the family while we were roasting marshmallows

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Towel Jungle

One of my favorite things about travelling is maid service. I leave for work and when I come back everything is nice and neat my bed is made and everything is restocked. Being in Manila for so long the staff really got to know me. One of the people who cleaned my room was really nice one day and left me towel bunny and a note saying hi. So I responded saying thanks for cleaning my room and that I really enjoyed the animal and he left me another animal, this time a gorilla. Although the following night I left but I wonder if I’d stayed if they would have made me more animals.

Corregidor Island Part II

I’m so bad at keeping my blog up to date so I have to play catch up and the problem is that I don’t have enough time to catch up. Anyway here is the second part to Michaelene, Dad and I’s trip to Corregidor Island.

After we went to the Malinta tunnel we went had lunch at the hotel on the island. It was Filipino food which was good, but I don’t have any pictures of us eating.

 

Next we went and saw some of the big guns on the island. Dad really enjoyed looking at these and of course we had to get pictures of our big guns next to the big gun. Haha, but those are on Michaelene’s or Dad’s camera so here are my pictures with the big guns.

 

Next we saw the old barracks on the island. There were actually a lot of barracks, the mile long barracks, top side barracks, middle side barracks. All of which actually look the same, like ruins. Still pretty cool to see. I’m sure during the glory days these were some pretty nice buildings. The mile long barracks had an indoor swimming pool and you could tell the architecture was beautiful. Although I should mention the mile long barracks are only 1/3 mile long, but the soldiers had to run the length of the barracks and while running they seemed forever long and that’s how it got it’s nickname.

Next we saw the U.S. memorial and the eternal flame, but by this time I was exhausted and since I had seen all this before I let Michaelene and Dad go on while I waited on the tour bus. After which we went to the light house on the island. It’s not a big light house, but it’s fun to walk up and look around.

   

Finally we’d seen it all so we went back to the beach and found out that the Ferry wasn’t going to be there for another 2 hours. Me and Michaelene hung out at this really nice little “shack” that had a dance floor, place to get drinks and nice chairs to sit in. They had Karaoke going on and yes me and Michaelene went up there and sang. Dad said we had a lot nerve to get up and sing in front of people hahaha it was funny. Dad went on an additional tour of the Malinta tunnel. It took people through the side tunnels.

Corregidor Island

So I love Manila and enjoy going there every time. Tropical air and trees, plus the people are nice and the food isn’t terrible. However, one of my recent trips there I was able to have my sister and my dad come for a few days and it was fun. I must admit it was a little hard because I still had to work so our schedules clashed a little, but it worked. I pretty much was only able to spend two days with them. Saturday and Sunday, but they were really fun.

Saturday morning (right after work for me) we had planned to go to Corregidor Island. It’s an old Military base right at the mouth of Manila bay that had some American History during WWII. Michaelene and Dad met me at my office and then we went over to the bay to catch our ferry. We were a little bit early so we had breakfast in this little square right by the bay. It was fun and an interesting place because there were all these  people there doing aerobics. I didn’t get any pictures of the aerobics, but there are a few pictures of us at breakfast and around the area.

We then took the Ferry to Corregidor Island which I slept the entire way to the Island. Once on the island we got on our little tour “buses” they were small and were fashioned after trolley’s. The tour guide said that during the time when the island was big they had a trolley system on the island. Our first stop was the Japanese Memorial.

Next we went to the Malinta Tunnel which is one of the more interesting sights of the island. It was used as a bunker way back when the island was active. There are all sorts of tunnels that go through hill and the main tunnel is a light and sound show. It pretty much tells the history of the island during WWII where each little tunnel off the main one has statues and scenery depicting scene. Then over the sound system would be a dramatic reading of the story and the entire tunnel would be dark except the tunnel that the story was talking about.

I have been writing this post for awhile so I’m just going to post it and put a part II up later.