Aegean Sea

We got back yesterday from our cruise to Greece and Turkey. It was my first experience on a cruise and I loved it! We started in Athens, Greece After Athens we went to:

Istanbul, Turkey
the island of Mykonos
the island of Patmos
(where John wrote the book of Revelation in a cave after he was exiled there)

Ephesus, Turkey
(As in the Epistle to the Ephesians in the Bible)
The ruins at Ephesus we the best we have ever been to - truly amazing!
This amphitheater seats over 22,000 people! The acoustics are also amazing - no amplification equipment available in 500 BC.
the island of Rhodes
we were on this beach all day

this is the color of the water in the harbor! This is the straight out of the camera shot - I haven't altered it at all!


the island of Cretewe swam in water like this (again - unaltered photo taken from the sidewalk)


and the island of Santorini
It was an amazing trip! We already want to go back.

The Perfect Anniversary Present - Wimbledon!

Note: This post has lots of tennis details that may bore some people.

Scooter and I are both tennis players. We both played in high school and still really enjoy playing together. Our third anniversary was while my parents were here and they gave us tickets to Wimbledon as an anniversary present. Centre court! It was such a fun day - one of our best here in England. When you have tickets to centre court your seat is yours for the entire day. You can also use your ticket to roam around and watch the matches on the other courts. There were three matches played on centre court that day, so we got to see all of them plus some on the other courts as well.

This is the tube stop where you get off to walk to Wimbledon. Look how decked out it is!

It was beautiful weather and it was packed! Here is a view from centre court.

Centre court before the matches started.

There was a lot of testing of the grass before the matches started. These guys were testing how high the ball was bouncing for a while. Other people were checking that the lines were perfectly straight and wide, etc.

The venue is so beautiful and classy. The theme of purple, green, and white is very prevalent. There are tons of beautiful restaurants and places to sit and eat.

This men's doubles team is the best in the world. They are also twins, by the way. Mike and Bob Bryan. It was disconcerting to watch them play. They not only look alike but they play similarly and are crazy in sync. One is left handed and one is right handed.

The first match on centre court was Federer (who is favored to win - if he does he will take the all-time record for most Grand Slam wins from Pete Sampras) vs. Soderling. It was a great match but was really a "serving contest" (Federer's words, not mine) with not many rallies. The final score and gracious winner. He really did seem like such a nice guy. Excellent sportsmanship.


The second match was a ladies match - the number 1 seed playing the number 17 seed. We watched for a while but there were tons of other great matches going on on the outside courts.

In case you ever wanted to see the referees chair in more detail. The Evian fridge is filled with water for the players. The Robinsons bottles above that are filled with squash, which is the English equivalent of powdered drink mix. It is just the flavor concentrate but in liquid form. They also make it by the glass, not by the pitcher like we do in the states. You pour a little squash into your glass and then fill it the rest of the way with water. You can also check out the ball boys and girls new outfits. Aren't they nice? They even all got brand new matching shoes.

Handsome boy...


This is the results board with the score of every game for that particular day. There are 19 courts, so it is nice to have the scores summarized in one place for people to check periodically.


The men's singles draw. You can't tell in the picture because it is so small, but next to each player it also shows the flag of their country. I looked for every American flag because they each felt like a friendly little wave.


This is Ferrero. We were on our way to his court to watch him play and it sprinkled for a about one minute so they stopped all play to check the courts water levels, springiness, etc. While we were waiting for play to resume we looked up and there he was. Once play started again we watched him play for a while.



Scooter spotted Layton Hewitt go into a building when they stopped play and he was so excited - he has been watching him play for years. Bless his heart, Scooter didn't move from that spot for probably half an hour until Hewitt was brought back out to resume his match. He was thrilled to be so close to someone he admired so much.


More beautiful landscaping. See the balcony? They have nice spots to eat all over the venue like this. (We of course were too cheap to eat there - we ate snacks from my handbag all day.)


We were so glad that we didn't have to get one of these because if you have one it means you probably spent 6-24 hours in the queue.


The centre court stadium is the huge building behind me and to the left.


I was loving every minute of this. Need I say more?


Venus and Serena playing doubles. It was incredible to watch them. They absolutely smoked their opponents without even trying that hard. Those girls are gifted.


They were so consistent about encouraging each other between points and also talked to each other and made a plan more than anyone else we had seen that day. Apparently communication is key - they wouldn't be the legends they are if it wasn't working for them.


I just had to ask - what was this girl thinking? The frilly tutu part wasn't sewn down, and it kept flapping when she bounced at all. It was annoying even to watch - I can't imagine how annoying it must have been to wear.

The third match on centre court was the most highly anticipated of the day. Andy Murray, the British's highest hope for a champion, was playing. All day people were queuing to try and get tickets. People even offered to trade tickets with us. We are so glad we didn't because it was an amazing match! This was the first match ever that was played with the roof closed. It lasted three minutes shy if four hours. It went to deuce more times than I could even count. The crowd was SO into the match as well, which was really fun. It was surprising how loud it was when the crowd would gasp simultaneously.
The rallies were long and so fun to watch. There is a reason why these guys are pros - they never miss! All of their groundstrokes are deep, perfectly placed, and precisely angled. Everything they do is well planned and flawlessly executed. It was a thing of beauty.


Andy broke his strings during one of the points - you could hear it. But he played out the entire point using only underspin and even won it! Here he is unwrapping a new racquet. He probably went through a few during his match.


The classic tennis celebration - a fist pump.


This was a tense moment, folks. It was match point. The stadium was absolutely electric.


And then the stadium exploded - it was finally over after four hours of intense play. I'm sure he was partially so thrilled because he was exhausted. It was also almost eleven o'clock at night. Good thing he had a free day the following day.


The handshake. We were so impressed with his opponent Wawrinka. Andy was ranked third and Wawrinka only 19th, but he really gave Andy a run for his money.


He threw his wrist bands into the audience. He also stayed and signed autographs for a long time afterwards.

The closed roof and court cleanup.


What a day!

Dubrovnik

We went to Croatia with my parents and stayed for a couple days in Dubrovnik. It was an amazing city with huge walls that you can walk all the way around and look down on the city below. Here are some photos.


Isn't it a beautiful city?

The water around the city was so blue.

The city walls are very impressive.

From the city walls

This sight makes Scooter a happy, happy man.

This sight is good for my heart. It fills it with peace.


Aren't my parents a handsome couple? (Individually as well though, I must say...)

The ultimate traveller/tourist. Audio guide and video camera at once!


The city walls fall straight into the sea one three sides.


Can you imagine how long it took to build those walls?

This is the main thoroughfare of Dubrovnik.

We ate gelato - lots and lots of gelato. Croatia is just across the Adriatic Sea from Italy and, lucky for us, this delicious stuff made it across!

Do you know what makes me happy?

These folks!

My parents just left this morning from a ten day visit. It was too wonderful for words to have them here. They are always so enthusiastic about everything, so it was really fun to show them around Oxford. Even things that have begun to seem regular and mundane to us were so exciting from their perspective. I'm afraid that the trip wasn't entirely as relaxing for my overworked dad as I had hoped, but he sure did see a lot. We went to Stonehenge, met Scooter as he came out of his last exam (which he did very well on - thanks for your prayers), went punting, ate dinner in hall, had a private tour of Christ Church college with afternoon tea at High Table, went to the village of Doxey, took a four day trip to Croatia, went to Wimbledon, went to show in London, had a picnic in the Buckingham Palace park, saw a lot of Oxford, ate in a historic pub, and bought plenty of Oxford paraphernalia. The best part of our trip was just being together talking and laughing. I miss them already even though I will see them again in a few weeks when we move back home. Thanks so much for coming mom and dad!

Exam Day

We have been so busy preparing for our last whirlwind month here. My parents are coming for a visit, and then Scooter's mom is coming out for graduation. We have a couple of last trips thrown in the mix. Tomorrow Scooter starts his exams. He has three written and one oral exam. He takes his first two written exams, and Friday he takes his last written exam. Each written exam is three hours and consists of a few essay questions. His teacher estimated that they should write 70 pages over the course of the whole exam, so that should be 46 and 2/3 pages just tomorrow folks! I bought him some new pens to ensure that he wouldn't run out of ink. I'm sure he is going to need a major hand massage tomorrow night! We are really looking forward to these exams being over. He has been studying pretty much constantly for the past month or so. Yesterday he went at the library at 6:30am and didn't come home until 10:30pm. It will be nice to have him back. My last day of work is tomorrow as well. All in all it is going to be a very exciting day. I've been thinking a lot about how much I am going to miss Oxford and our life here. It has been such an amazing and surreal year. I'm going to miss riding the bus and people-watching my fellow passengers everyday. I'm going to miss our tiny flat - no matter where I am in it I am never more than a few steps from Scooter. I'm going to miss being able to sleep with our window open (even in the middle of the summer it cools down enough). I'm going to miss all of the street performers on Cornmarket Street. I'm going to miss the fields of yellow rapeseed I ride past on the way to the grocery store. I'm going to miss waking up at 5am thinking that it is noon because the sunlight is so bright coming through the window. I'm going to miss our local library's huge collection of travel guides. I'm going to miss the incredibly old buildings. I'm going to miss the chalk pictures that a homeless girl draws on the sidewalk every night. Anyway, enough of the reminiscing. We packed for a couple hours today. It is amazing how quickly we were able to pack. In under two hours we were able to pack about 70% of our stuff. It is such a contrast from our last move from Provo to Saint George - it took weeks to pack that time. Anyway, I need to run off and clean my house before my parents get here!

If you remember, Scooter could use your prayers - he has a lot to remember over the next couple of days.

Ascension Day

We are getting so behind on our blogging - sorry! A few weeks ago we celebrated Ascension Day with Scooter's college - Lincoln College. Ascension Day is a day where our college celebrates these strange traditions that originated so long ago that no one is entirely sure how they started. The first thing you do on Ascension Day is participate in "Beating the Bounds." This is where you walk with sticks along the medieval borders of our college parish. These borders now cut through all kinds of interesting places: through stores, through other colleges, down alleys full of dumpsters, etc. There are stones all along the way marking the boundaries. At each stone the priest marks it with some chalk, a prayer is said, and we all "beat" the boundary stone with our sticks. We looked really strange walking along with our long sticks in this long procession following huge religious banners and various priests. Our procession went through fire exits, the stockroom of a shoe store, through the lingerie section of a department store, another college's pub, and a restaurant, among other places. People kept stopping us to ask what was going on. All of the stores were expecting us and some places even had treats waiting for us.

After we "beat the bounds" we go back to our college and celebrate the rest of our traditions. Read what Wikipedia says about Ascension Day at Lincoln College and the rest will make more sense:

"As is common with Oxford colleges, the College has a longstanding rivalry with neighbour Brasenose College (which was also founded by a later Bishop of Lincoln). The two colleges share a tradition revived annually on Ascension Day. The story goes that, centuries ago, as a mob chased students at the University through the town, the Lincoln porter allowed in the Lincoln students but refused entry to the Brasenose member, leaving him to the mercy of the mob. An alternative is that a Lincoln man bested a Brasenose man in a duel. Either episode resulted in the Brasenose student's death, and ever since, on Ascension Day, Lincoln College has invited in members of Brasenose College every year through the one door connecting the two colleges, for free beer as penance."

For many years the Lincoln students (because they were upset about having to part with some of their precious beer every year) started "poisoning" the beer with ivy. It really doesn't poison it but it does make it taste really gross. So they opened the secret passage and let the students from our rival college though and we all ("we" meaning everyone except for Scooter and I) drank some of this bad tasting beer.

Many years ago the college started contributing to orphanages every year. Somehow over the years they started making some kids come to college to receive the donation, then someone got the bright idea to start giving the donation by throwing it at the kids from the college tower. Then in order to teach the kids to not be greedy they started super-heating the coins (which they have only just recently stopped doing for safety reasons). Kids are still bused in to have coins thrown at them from the tower. All of the kids love it. They scramble all over picking up as many as they can gather.


We also went to see the preliminary races of the Summer VIIIs. It was the first proper race that we have attended. We stood on the top of the Lincoln boathouse and cheered for our college. The boats try to overtake and bump each other. It was a lot more exciting than we had expected. We really love Oxford.

Broad Street

This is one of my favorite areas of Oxford

Not only is this because of the bright shop-fronts, but because this is the street of delicious baguettes. English people really know how to make good sandwiches. I think that, in general, they are more creative with what fillings they use. Mortons, the shop on the left, tries to get rid of all of their sandwiches before they close by selling them for only one pound fifty for the last fifteen minutes they are open. Sometimes we plan our days around getting there at 4:45pm in case they have any mozzarella and sun-dried tomato baguettes left. Another shop in the photo, Cafe Creme, has delicious feta cheese sandwiches to die for!