Hawaii part 2

Good morning.
We got on the ship Saturday afternoon, and sailed that evening.

Here's a pic of the Honolulu skyline as we prepared to leave.
And yes, Craig is wearing a windbreaker. He is always cold!

Our stateroom with our balcony.....

And the towel animal they put on your bed every day they do the room.

A pic of the pool deck.

And this is the last of the ship pics. Apparently I didn't take any more of the ship. But if you're interested, there are a ton of pics online. Just google Norwegian's Pride of America if you're interested.
And here's a pic from the main lobby area with the great seal on the floor.....

And here's a pic of the route we took around the islands....

We did 4 ports, and two overnights.  The most extensive Hawaiian cruise of any cruise line.
I'll go into details in a later post.

Hawaii

Good evening.
I suppose I should post a little on the Hawaii vacation we took.
 I'm just getting lazier and lazier with posting.
But anyway..........
We took a 11 day vaca to Hawaii, and spent 4 days in Waikiki, and 7 days on a cruise around the islands.  Here's a few pics......

Waiting at the airport.....

At our favorite beach bar in Hawaii, we found  2 years ago on our last visit.

A mural on a building in Waikiki.

This is called a walking tree.

And back at our favorite beach bar with Diamond Head behind me.

Weather of course was beautiful. Mid 80's every day. Stayed at the Ramada Plaza on the west end of Waikiki beach. About 4 blocks from the ocean. No Ocean view from our room, but a lot cheaper that way. Plus, we figured we'd have enough ocean view from our balcony room on the ship.   :-)
We arrived on Wednesday January 15th. Spent 3 nights here before getting on our ship on Saturday the 18th.
I'll post some more pics and commentary maybe tomorrow. Now, I'm tired and going to bed. Been sleeping 8-9 hours the last couple of days instead of my usual 6-7.  Still recovering from the trip I think.

Ides of january

Good evening.
Time sure fly's whether or not you're having fun!
Anyway, been busy with our upcoming Hawaii cruise, and I just booked our flight back to Michigan for this summer. I had to do it before the cruise, as Craig may never want to fly again after our long flight to Hawaii.   :-)
Here's a puzzle I did recently......

And a couple of pretty pics I took of our Sheep Mountains on one of my early morning walks....

I sure do love it here in this community!
And another puzzle.....

Been helping a few neighbors with things. Got to be nice, as I will be in their position sooner than I probably think! Been a cold winter here with temps slightly below normal. High today only 59.
But it could be much worst! At least we have no hurricanes, tornado's, floods, fires, cloudy, dreary days,  or humidity. All in all, a nice place to live.   :-)
And, as our nighttime temps start to slowly rise, I think all my plants made it!  We'll see in a couple of weeks.
That's all for now!

My first post....of the new year!

Good afternoon.  And Happy New Year!
It was a busy holiday season.
Barbie, a neighbor got back on the Monday before New Years. We were going to pick her up at the airport, but she said she'd take Uber if I could pick up a package she was expecting to be delivered. So I kept an eye out for Fed-ex and UPS.  I also went over a few times during the day to check, in case I missed anything. Well, there was a tag on the door. USPS tried to deliver a package, and would try again the next day. So it was from the post office! Anyway, I didn't get it and knew she'd be upset. It was Harry's (her deceased husband) ashes. When she arrived, I told her and she seemed to think no big deal. We went out to dinner and talked a while.
The next day, I found out it didn't arrive again, and she went down to the post office to get it. She didn't want 'Harry' sitting there over the Holiday.
We've been walking in the morning together, and she seems to like talking to me about stuff. It's got to be hard after being married 15 years. But she's still fairly young at just 55, so I think she'll be fine in the long run.
Here's a couple of the latest puzzles I've done......

 We had a few neighbors over for New Years Eve, and since none of us stay up very late, (we're all early risers) we watched the London fireworks. They must have gone on for nearly 15 minutes! The party broke up around 9pm. Yes, we're a bunch of old farts!    :-)
 I got all the Christmas decorations and outside lights down and put away. I also trimmed the backyard Lantana's back, and trimmed up the front tree as it was partially  blocking the view on one of the cameras on our garage.
Here's the pie I made today.......

Another Apple/Cranberry Pie with a Pecan Crumb topping.
Apples were .88 a lb at Smiths.
Took Craig to a new Restaurant for his Birthday. A neighbor gave us a gift card to the Yard House at the Red Rock Casino over in Summerlin on the west side of the valley.  We had the Coconut Shrimp as an appetizer, and a pizza for the main course. The shrimp were the largest I've ever seen! And sooo good! The Pizza was good, but nothing special. The restaurant had a nice atmosphere. Then, we did a little gambling over at the Rampart Casino down the street from Red Rock. And as usual, One loses, and fortunately, one wins. Of course, it was Craig on his birthday that lost. He lost $80, but I won $97! So that helped pay for the dinner, since we had a $50 gift card, and the meal was $73 with tip. Won't eat there again! Unless we get another gift card!
And of course, that's why we don't gamble very often. They didn't build these big fancy Casino's by giving money away!
Craig is making a Turkey Rice Casserole for dinner with some of our leftover Thanksgiving Turkey.
 We've been doing afternoon walks lately, Trying to get some of the holiday weight off before we go on our cruise later this month. I plan on eating a lot! Want to make sure we get our money's worth!
That's enough for now!