Will the fire eat our wedding?

Click image for full size picture

In a word: no. The Cold Creek fire is currently North of Trout Lake and burning to the North and Northeast. In the image above, you can see the perimeter of the fire in yellow. Mt. Adams is in the upper middle, and the approximate location of the wedding site is the red circle.

If there is anything to update, I'll pass it along.

Sunday Flight

The route

Sunday, Eric and I headed to the coast in a cramped C-150. It was nice to get out of the heat of Portland, fly along the coast, and even land a two new airports for me.


Standard-issue cockpit shot

A few pictures at the end of this set.

Where's Your Mom?

Mine is in Georgia. No, not the one with "Hot-lanta". This one. Cool.

UPDATE (July 11, 9:38pm PDT): Just got this e-mail from my mom:

Hello you two [it was sent to my dad and me]. Everything is going great. Having a terrific time. Seeing lots of countryside and meeting lots of people. Our hotel in Istanbul was right next to the Blue Mosque. Today we tour Kutaisi. Tomorrow we move eastward. Tell everyone hello and tell Sophia Happy Birthday.

UPDATE 2 (July 16, 3:39am PDT): She's still alive! (minor edits made)

Hello you two. It is so hard to find internet access here. We are in the capital city of Tbilisi. Still having a great time. Have taken almost 400 pictures. A beautiful country. Divided almost like western and eastern montana. I miss everyone but am certainly enjoying the trip.

Love you all. Mom (At one stop we were 15 miles from the Russian border.) Take care.

Velodrome Action

The Alpenrose Velodrome

Mark has been asking to ride on the Velodrome, which is only about a mile from our new house, for a year. He found that they had a Wednesday beginner class. After watching and photographing the "Six Day Challenge" there two weekends ago, we decided to do it.

It was pretty cool. That first turn was nervous, but then it got fun. I certainly have a lot of respect for track racers now. I will be tuning in come the Olympics!

Kevin has a write-up here.

Meg took a ton of photos here.

The 4th

Meg meets the grandparents

For the Fourth of July this year, we headed down to Ashland. Meg has met my aunt and uncle, but not my grandparents. They were all scheduled to be in town, so this was a perfect time go down in introduce my fiance. We drove down on Thursday night. We hit the small-town parade on the morning of the fourth, checked out the park, then hit the pool back at Uncle Steve's place. I didn't think we would be out that long, but I was wrong. Hello sunburn. That night we had a nice dinner over at Grandma and Grandpa's.

Saturday was an easy day as well. We had breakfast with step-cousin Joey (soon heading off to George Washington), and then a tour of town. Friday night was a family diner with everyone including Scott and Coleen who came down from Central Point. The night ended with some Boccie. I didn't win...

Sunday morning was time to get airborne. Uncle Steve took me up in his Piper Warrior. We flew up to Grants Pass, and he put me in the left seat. I was able to get it back to Ashland and then get my three landings to make me current again. All that, and not a scratch on the plane (or a heart attack in Uncle Steve).

Good times! Check out the pictures Meg got here. I'll post a few I took soon. Until then, here we are playing with a chicken:



UPDATE: My photos are now up here.