The Austin's Family Cruise /Panama Canal

This is our Princess Cruise Ship. There were about 2000 people on this ship with 850 staff workers. It is a huge ship. There was a casino, movie theatre, 2 resturants, bars, a buffett, 2 pools, hot tubs galore, gym, spa, just to name a few. We sure had a great time relaxing and being with our family.

The Panama Canal. This is an amazing experience. This picture was taken from our balcony and you can see another ship behind us. This ship is 87 feet above sea level and before it can move forward the water ahead of him has to rise to 87 feet also. There are six total locks, 3 on the Pacific side and 3 on the Atlantic side. It is gravity driven no pumps. There is a canal captain steering us along with little trains pulling against us to keep from hitting the sides of the lock. It is very interesting and amazing experience. This took most of the day to go through.

Huatituko, Mexico. Our first Port. Dan, Emily, Darin and I went into town and looked around. We were there for only 4 hours. It is a beautiful place. We will hopefully come back someday. I love Mexico.

Emily and I went and did wine tasting on our Princess Cruise Ship. It was set up in our Dining area were we ate our dinners. We were able to taste samples of Chardonnay from Kendall-Jackson, Pinot Noir from La Crema, Cabernet Sauvignon from Wolf Blass (Australia)Sauvignon Blac from Errazuriz and Sauvignon Blac from Nobilo. From this we recieved a shooter glass to take home. It was fun.

In Costa Rica Diane, Doug, Darin and I went on a Countryside tour and Coffee plantation tour. It was very fun.

As you can see I volunteered to taste their coffee. I am smelling the coffee aroma by continuously sturring my spoon. HMMMM!!!

Only if you had smellavision. ;>) With your spoon you would then slurp your coffee instead of sipping it. You get more flavor from the coffee that way.

They used a coffee press instead of a coffee maker. BIG difference. I got a complementary hat.

Sunset from Aruba.

Aruba is only 19 miles long 6 miles wide. Beautiful white sandy beaches and blue water. The whole island looks like a desert with cactus galore.

We were able to rent a van and tour the island ourselves. We went to a beach and swam for a while and then drove around the rest of the island exploring.

Opening Day Success!!!

Opening Day Success!!!

Darin can't believe hunting season is over.

I am looking forward to good eats.

Quatro has Arrived!!

Yes, SHE has arrived all by herself. Her Momma is the one behind her and did a fine job of delivering. Whew! We are so so Glad!!!

She was born on 9/28 sometime between 5:00pm -6:30pm because I discovered her at 6:50pm.

She is tiny compared to Tres who was born 5 days earlier.

Well, sadly but thankfully this concludes our newborns of 2007. We will be expecting our first Uno 08 in March 2008. It has been a successful year of all our new arrivals. Hopefully next year we will have the same success.

Baby Girl Tres

She is one day old in this picture. She is doing really well. She and her Momma join the others in the pasture.

Its a GIRL! Baby Cow

This is Tres and she was born this morning. Momma' s water broke just after 7:00am and she arrived at 9:20 am. She had to have help from Darin and Pete. She is doing just fine. She is just a beauty.

I will post more pictures of her up close.

St. Joe 1st. Annual Smackdown Babyback Ribs Competitors

Tony has offically opened the 1st annual Smackdown Cookoff.

Holmes is preparing his Smoken Smackdown Babyback Ribs.....

As Darin is preparing his Winning (later announced) Smackdown Babyback Ribs.

Silver Creek Plunge

This is Silver Creek on your way up to Silver Creek Plunge, Idaho.
Beautiful drive.

Here is our campsite at Silver Creek Plunge. We were right next to the road. It was about the only place available when we arrived late friday night. We scouted for better camp spot the next day but no such luck. It is a beautiful drive up there however, we will not return to this area to camp again. There were way too many people and dirt bikes going up and down the road all day long and there weren't many places to go in order to get away from all the campers . The hot spring was a nice set up but again too many people and not that warm. It was not to our expectations. We heard coyotes at night and saw some Elk foot prints around our campsite. If you want to ride on your dirt bike all day long this is the place to be but if your looking for peace and quite we don't recommend camping here.