Well, we are home!!!!!! What a blast we had!!!!! First let me tell you a little about “Space A” traveling. It is designed specifically for the military and their dependants, active and retired… Basically any active duty or retiree can hitch a ride on flights transferring cargo or active military from duty station to duty station. The kind of plane varies. Overall, we traveled on one passenger plane and then two cargo planes. All were different from what one would expect that only has traveled commercially (like me), but the cargo planes had much more room, allowing you to stretch out on rows and sleep, which was nice on our 10 hour flight home. I think we all slept 7 of those 10 hours comfortably. I was nervous about the planes at first just because they are so different from what I know. But I tell you what, you get a lot more freedom on these cargo type planes. Room to move around and stretch. One some of the planes, there is enough room to throw a football! And the best of all, the flights are FREE! Now, imagine being on stand by with a regular commercial airline because that is realistically what we were, stand by. There are various categories to space a traveling. 1-6 I believe. 1 being the active duty ON ORDERS. 2 being emergency leave. 3 being active duty on leave (that’s us), not sure about 4-5 and 6 being retiree. Now the thing with these flights is they can pop up at any time and just as easily be canceled at any time, so watching the website and calling the passenger terminal is a MUST. You can’t get exact details (time, type of plane, seats available) until 24 hours to travel, so you kind of have to be ready to go at a moments notice. All in all, this worked out great for us. All the planes we wanted to get on we were able to. Our plane ride home was at 3:00AM Hawaii time and we didn’t know of such flight until 10:00PM the night before, so within 4 hours, we had to get a few hours of sleep and pack up and get to the air terminal, but who cares. FREE!!!!!!!!! We had a wonderful time. We were gone for 13 days. We started out flying into San Diego and spent a few days there.. Then we casually drove up North, stopping a lot along the way and seeing friends we haven’t seen in ages… Every place we went, we had friends there to visit. It was great. We flew into Hawaii on Thursday evening and stayed thru Tuesday, well really Wednesday early morning (3AM)… It was BEAUTIFUL THERE! I didn’t take my big camera, so most of my photos were taken with my Iphone… We went snorkeling at Hanauma Bay and we purchased an underwater camera. I am taking the film in to be developed today but not encouraged that we will get good photos! The fish, the coral, the water, everything. BEAUTIFUL.
Here are a few highlights.. I took over 250 pictures so I will spare you.. Let’s start with California. Actually, I will split this up into two posts. It will be easier. So, California first.
Sunrise the first morning in San Diego
Lucas playing close to the water. It was pretty cool that morning, but it was beautiful as the sun was rising behind us and you could see the beautiful mountains in the background (pictured in the first photo)
San Diego Zoo. Wow. That zoo was amazing. All the animals were active. I have never seen polar bears before and these guys were especially active and playful.
Lion and Lioness. All my times to my local zoo, and I have never seen lions do anything but sleep. These guys were active. The Lion was actually fishing in the pond below him.
Just had to sneak this one in. This is me and my husband on the bus at the zoo.
La Jolla Beach, CA! Seals! There were in the water, on the rock, everywhere… I wanted to show you this far away shot so you could see the background. Look how pretty!
We climbed down on some rocks to get a better peak!
Close up of the seals – La Jolla Beach
Hilly roads of San Francisco. In Florida, everything is flat! This almost looked like a roller coaster ride to me…
HA. I had to share this crazy pic of me. It matches the people. Crazy!! Hollywood Blvd…
A pic with the whole family
View from Monterey, CA – on our way to San Francisco
San Francisco, CA – Alcatraz in the background
SEALS – Pier 39, Fishermans Wharf – San Francisco
Golden Gate Bridge
Tunnel after going over the Golden Gate Bridge
Sunset as we drive to passenger terminal to hop on our flight to Hawaii
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eMfG0P_wAVM&hl=en&fs=1]
video clip of the seals
Stay tuned for part two, which was my favorite part of the trip – HAWAII!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
For a sneak peek of all my pictures including Hawaii, click here to view my mobile me gallery!
Wow so cool that you can travel for FREE! Thank you for explaining it! :> Loved your photos! Looks like you had so much fun! So nice to catch up with friends! What a great trip!
So I scrolled down and posted on the WRONG entry!! The comment I just made on the “Aloha from Hawaii” entry was totally meant to go with this entry! =) Glad you are home!
Your pictures are amazing! I expect to see some scrappy pages soon 😉 HAVE FUN!