Vittoria's Gymnastics Meet

Here is the video from Vittoria's first gymnastics tournament. (The youtube links are higher resolution).
Floor

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vez-eyUfUPc&feature=youtu.be

Vault

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oo7ULYDXcJk&feature=youtu.be

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t-MVfEZua8s&feature=youtu.be

Bars

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7U0nJWfgel4&feature=youtu.be

Beam

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DMKnn5EW3tA&feature=youtu.be

Just in case you were worried that she has started to take herself too seriously.

Conversations with Vittoria

They're playing old songs. Like from Katie's childhood. 

Say Ya To Da UP, Eh

Katie and I went to the UP for some camping.  Mary decided not to go because she was scared of bugs (probably a good choice).  V was not given a choice so she could do team gymnastics (again, probably a good choice).
Here we are, about to cross the bridge.

We're looking at you, trolls (those who live under the bridge).

Here's where we stayed the first night.  Notice the lack of fear.

We went on the Pictured Rocks boat tour.  Got some nice pictures.

There were some pretty mayflies on the boat.

Hey look, that's the second oldest lighthouse in Michigan (it's on Grand Island).

We talked to the people at the visitor's center.  We asked them about the bugs on Grand Island.  They advised that we get a head net.

We took a ferry to the island.

Our campground was a 4 mile hike from the end of the ferry ride.  Here it is.

There are bears on the island.

Guess if the head net helped entirely (unretouched (you can see some of the 70 mosquitoes that bit her; she wasn't really laughing in the first picture, she was thinking that I am something that rhymes with bassbowl).

The bugs weren't bad on the beach.

There was a really pretty sunset.

 We got arty.

Katie thought this was hilarious.

Sailing

Takes me away to where I've always heard it could be. We anchored at a different place each night.

This is how we spent a lot of time. Reading and relaxing. Or doing puzzles.

That's our boat from the dinghy.

We went to this little island where  this couple who lives in a tent throws parties every Saturday. We went on Sunday. On Sunday they are all cleaned out of beer. Only had Coke Light. It was an odd place, to be honest. But they had a swing and I took the photo from a great hammock.

These are mangroves. That was cool. Do you see those clouds that look gray and not nice?

It started raining on our tour. We got cold.

This is a picture of the hotel I was telling you about. It was right about here my swimsuit top fell off! Luckily I caught it before it fell. Lydia had to come help me out. I was just standing there and it came unfastened!

Them Birders...They're Different.

And by different I mean totally COOL!

Langkawi has several different species of eagles. The island is famous for Brahminy Kites and they have a sculpture of them on the island.

There is also the great White-bellied sea eagle.

They hunted on the water, so that was fun to watch. They'd circle, circle, circle and then swoop down and try to catch fish. This time he lost.

I was also lucky enough to see the Oriental Pied Hornbill. I lost it when I spotted this guy in the trees. We were visiting a resort (stopping by and using outdoor showers :) ) and I saw him. Needless to say, I went bananas.

The next day I got a better shot. I think we were walking to the falls.

Birds. Boat. Heaven.

Baby Elephant Bath

Look at this cool butterfly I saw while at the National Elephant Conservation Centre at Kuala Gandah.

We took a van to the elephant sanctuary and fed elephants sugar cane. Then we watched a video about how they move elephants that are destroying farmers' crops to other parts of the jungle. It is interesting because they use tame elephants and put them with wild elephants. The tame elephants reassure the wild ones and help show them what to do.

Then we got to give the babies a bath.

(That's not really the elephant splashing. The men do that so that it's more exciting and you get wet.)

That night we had dinner at the hotel and went to the top of the Petronas Towers.

Tomorrow we'll be on a boat!