Go see this movie. Now.

The past 5 weeks I have finally had something I went without (and missed) for a long time: leisure time. So, I've been able to resume some of my favorite activities, such as traveling, cooking, exercising, taking pics, reading, and watching movies. Joe and I saw Slumdog Millionaire last weekend, and if you haven't seen it yet, you need to. Tonight. It deserves all of the hype it has received. Also, I have a lot of other movies on my "to watch" list, so if you've seen any that stand out maybe you can throw a suggestion or two our way to help prioritize the list. It goes as follows, currently in no particular order:

-Milk
-The Reader
-Doubt
-Rachel Gets Married
-The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
-Wall-E
-Twilight

Kauai in Review: Hiking the Napali Coastline

If you've never been to Kauai before, here is the island in a nutshell (in comparison to the other Hawaiian islands): small, undeveloped, wet/rainy, cool in temp, luscious, green, adventurous, and most importantly- breathtakingly beautiful. Similar to Oregon, the weather is not its selling point (the rainiest point in the US is located on the island), but the ample rainfall provides for beautiful scenery. It is SO GREEN and luscious vegetation abounds... So if you are looking to bask on the beach every day, this might not be the island for you. However, if you don't mind putting on the hiking boots everytime the rainclouds roll in (which they will, inevitably), you are in for a hiker's dream: good exercise and amazing scenery. Here are some pics from the first hike we went on, along the Napali coastline on the north side of the island.

On a mission to find a waterfall...

Found it!

Jonas, taking in the falls.

I love it when he looks small! (Doesn't this pic look like a scene straight out of "Honey, I shrunk the kids"?)

Doing what he does best... talking about trees.

A break in the trees= a beautiful vista!

Um, Hi!

This views on this hike reminded me of hiking the Cinque Terre in Italy... can you see it?

A glimpse through the trees near the end of the hike.

Look at that water! So beautiful.

3:22am. Insane, I know.

3:22am. This is what time Joe and I returned to our home in Newcastle, WA on Monday morning. We were on a 3 week "vacation", which included (deep breath): a trip to Kauai, driving from Seattle to Roseburg just hours after a sleepless redeye flight (in order to retrieve our beloved retriever Jack, since Joe's parents so kindly watched him while we were in Kauai), then driving back up to Portland for Jessie/Matt's wedding and pre-wedding fun, then back off to Hawai'i for Joe (the Big Island this time, ridiculous I know) and Columbia,Missouri for me (to visit BFF). I returned to Portland this past Saturday evening, and picked up Joe from the airport at 12:30am on Sunday night (technically morning I guess...) Normal, sane people would've stayed the night in Portland and driven back up to Seattle the next day, but we literally don't know where we're living next week (the all-too familiar 6 month lease is up), and are feeling a slight sense of urgency to try and figure that out asap. SO, I apologize for the month-long lack of updates. When one is a nomad, it is hard to maintain a blog. Ironically, I actually have a lot to blog about right now too. Aside from all of the aforementioned activity, my last week of teaching was pretty memorable as well. But we already cancelled our internet, and we probably won't have it for at least a week or too until we find a new place and get settled. So check back for updates in a week or so, and I'll share the last whirlwind of a month in review, and finally catch everybody up with us... Hope everyone is doing well, take care and hope to post again sooner than later!