Our Japan chapter is coming to a close...

We are wrapping up our time here in Japan. We have moved on base, the movers took away all of our things and we are down to one car. So far, everything has gone fairly smooth. Even with a quick turn due to getting orders late in the game, we haven't really run into any major snags. We will continue to knock on wood until we are on the plane headed back to the states on 04Aug. As we wrap up our tour, we have been saying good bye to all our friends and classmates, graduating from Hosen and turning in the keys to our home and cars. Here are a few pix of what we have been up to:

I flew my last flight last week. I flew with Pat O'Neill. He took me flying for the first time when I arrived in Japan, and he and his family will also be headed to Naples. We did nothing but sightseeing. We did a lap around Mt Fuji, then flew down the beach over towards Yokohama. We flew over the giant Buddah at Kamakura as well. 

And then we headed towards down town Tokyo. We did a similar route on my first flight.... crazy to think 2.5 years is in the books. 

We did a lap around the Tokyo Tower.

And a lap around the Tokyo Sky Tree. 

The day before we set up arrangements to land at the US Embassy in downtown Tokyo. They rarely approve such a request so we got lucky they said yes. ]

Pretty neat to be flying beneath all the sky scrapers.

On Deck US soil in downtown Tokyo. 

After the Embassy we did a lap around the Tokyo bay....

Flew over Tokyo Disney land and Disney Sea... Just a great way to close out my flying career. More than likely it is the last time ill ever fly in a naval aircraft. Sad... but it was fun! 

Movers came on 25July. Started at 9am and drove off with all our stuff at 4pm. 

See you in Italy! 

We also had to say goodbye to all our Hosen Yochein friends. They had a special little ceremony for each girl and presented them with their certificates. Here is E and her Sensei saying goodbye. I have to admit, it was very sad to close this chapter. Even though at times it was stressful, it is an experience like no other for the girls. Hopefully they will remember. I feel like just as their Japanese was taking off, we had to leave. All the teachers were so sad and demanded multiple hugs from each girl. We walked out with all their supplies and all the crafts they made. 

LC receiving her certificate from the Principal. 

E and one of her classmates receiving their certificates. 

Family photo with the pricipan Encho Senseii and the girls' senseis. 

E's Sensei. 

E's sensei last year. She also came to say goodbye. I think E was one of her favorites. 

This is Miyu Sensei -- LC's sensei from last year. 

 Our flight is on 04Aug and we will be off to the USA for a few months before we head to Italy. We are looking forward to seeing family and friends along the way. Japan - thank you so so much for the 2.5 years! We will truly miss you. Your genuine and respectful culture will be something we will remember forever.  Thank you for accepting us and for letting us call this place home. We thoroughly enjoyed our time and the infinite experiences... ones that we will never forget. 

Busy + Mt Fuji

We've been super busy these past few weeks. Girls have been busy wrapping up the school year, Shannon has been busy with getting the house in order for the move and I've been busy at work with a major inspection. Our time here is coming to an end and we are trying to make the most out of the time we have left. The girls had open school on Father's day weekend so I was able to go watch what they to on a daily basis. We've also been hitting the pool and watched LC and E progress with their swimming. A few months back E wouldn't even want to be let go in the pool -- now she wants to go to the deep end by herself. LC has learned how to ride her bike with no training wheels which was a great transition. And we decided to climb Mt Fuji.

We took the girls to Camp Zama for another one of their friendship festivals and ran into all the Senseis from Hosen. 

This is station 5 at Mt Fuji. The last major stop before you head up. Here is where we bought are walking stick that eventually filled up with brands as we hiked up. 

We lucked out with a good day. The two days leading up to it, it had rained which would have made for a miserable climb. 

The path for the most part was a dirt/rock/gravel composition. The temps were perfect. A little muggy but cool. 

This is at station 6..... all smiles, for now. 

We made it up to station 7.5 This is where we overnighted it. We started hiking around 3pm and hiked for 4 hours or so to get here. We rented a futon for the night, ate dinner and laid down. Wasn't really able to rest because it was loud and worse than sleeping on a ship. 

This is inside the hut. It was actually brand new and nice. We slept in the holes where there were 6 beds laid out to accommodate Shannon, our friends and myself. 

We got to see a really nice sunset from station 7.5. We watched the weather clear out and knew the next days weather was going to be perfect for the climb to the top. 

This is looking down from 7.5 as people made their way up.

Great sunset. 

So we all ate, and went down to rest around 9pm. It was up at 1215 to time it right to get up the mountain to see the 430am sunrise. None of us really were really able to sleep but we were able to get some rest.

We donned our headlamps and started climbing at 1230. The traffic towards the top got really bad. And it was cold.... really cold. I kind of stopped taking pix at this point because i would have to take off my gloves and my hands would freese

At last, the same came up at 430. We were about 5-10 min from the top when the sun peaked out. 

We only took this one pic at the top because it was frigid and Shannon didn't feel too well. We we stayed long enough to get a stamp and down we went. 

Just spectacular views from the top of the mountain -- you could see Yokohama and Tokyo. 

 The path down was brutal. It pounded the legs and it was nothing but volcanic gravel and dirt. And nothing but switchbacks.... for 5 hours.

Looking up the Mtn as we came down. You can see all the people coming down as well.

And that was all the pix I took. Overall, it was a once and a lifetime opportunity and it was a nice check in the box to get before we leave Japan. We have looked at Mt Fuji (12,400 ft) for over two years now and glad we were able to get to climb Japan's highest peak. It was no joke though.... in fact it was brutal. We were properly prepared, it just was long and a  lot to do in a few hours. 

Bali, Indonesia

We packed up the kids and headed to Bali for a little vacay. It was all of our first time in the southern hemisphere and it didn't disappoint.

7 hours on this bad boy down to Bali. 

The girls did great! They played, colored and watched a few shows. 

They only did well because they were separated! 

One of the first things we did was hit the Safari park that was close to our villa. We purchased the elephant package which included a safari through the grounds while riding an elephant. 

We even got to keep those sweet hats! 

The place we stayed at had a nice pool and was very family friendly. There was 4 villas on the ground that was right next to a beach. We spent A LOT of time at the pool. It cooled us down and the girls loved swimming.  

This was the beach area right outside our place. The river was used as a bathing area so we saw a lot of people washing their clothes and bodies. 

We hit up a really cool water park. 

And afterwards we went and had dinner while watching the sun set.

My three little ladies. 

This was we awoke to on the first morning from the villa.

LC was self sufficient in the pool with her floaty and by the end of the first day, E was good to go by herself.  

Breakfast time.

The villas had 5 dogs who the girls fell in love with. Honestly, that is all they wanted to do -- hang out with the pups and go to the pool.  This is E with Tintin. 

E with Andrea. 

Here was the place we stayed in. We are every meal out on the patio. The weather was pretty darn hot. 90-95 every day with a 100+ heat index. The girls didn't really care for the heat. 

For the most part, we had the pool to ourselves all day. Andrea followed the girls everywhere and event went swimming with us. 

Our room had a jacuzzi on the back patio as well. 

Safari Park with the Garudas. 

Feeding the elephants, Valentine and Boppy, Carrots. 

This was after the elephant show. 

We went out on a day excursion where we hit the hindu temple...

A waterfall.

We cooled off with a fresh coconut drink....

And finally made it down to the waterfall. It was actually pretty miserable down there. There were rocks everywhere and it was very loud. E refused to get down so we waded out into the water for a bit before we gave up. They werent really into any excursions we went on... they just wanted to go to the pool and cool off. 

We went to a plantation as well where we saw cocoa trees (coffee). 

And probably the neatest things were these Luwaks. These civet have unique digestive tracks. They feed the ripe coffee cherry to these guys and when they poop them out, they collect the bean, wash it up, roast it and make coffee out of if. Google it -- its pretty cool and quite yummy. They are nocturnal, so they all were sleeping during the day. 

At the end of the plantation we got to sample the coffee, a bunch to teas and chocolate -- all from the plantation plants. the girls killed the tea too.... and the chocolate. 

More pool time. 

And lots of beach time. Andrea the pup followed us out everyday and played with the girls in the surf.

The meals they prepared for us was very Balinesean and delicious. We ordered a whole fish that LC destroyed. We bought her one on the final night and she ate the whole thing.

Overall, it was a great trip. Very relaxing and beautiful. And like all good vacations.... we felt like we needed to take a vacation after getting back from our vacation. So to do that... we went to Disney Sea and Disney Land in Tokyo the same weekend!