ANOTHER ADVENTURE BEGINS!

Bright and early this morning son Isaac - my chauffeur - and I headed to PDX, our home airport, made even cooler than usual this time around by a large, gorgeous fabric sculpture exhibit of an ethereal under water world.

I mentally waved bye to mountains Adams and Hood and my home in between

 and enjoyed wonderful home-grown snacks thanks to my beloved gardeners, Mike and Carlos.

Playing cloud games was fun

until the captain announced that thunderstorm activity was delaying our landing in Houston. This was bad news since late developing schedule changes (grrr) had shriveled my 2+ hour layover to 50 minutes already.

I imagine I was quite a spectacle charging ("hell bent on election" as my Grandma Mudrow would have said) from Terminal C to Terminal E with 2 backpacks and little hope that the 15 minute layover allowed by the thunderstorms would be sufficient. IT WAS!! Here you see the 1st group gathering (from left to right) Laurilyn (another miracle runner from the Portland flight), me, Theresa, and Beth.

I don't normally check a bag but my usual carry-on and personal item didn't offer enough space with donations and gifts for the Beca Project kids. Gratefully the checked bag made the quick layover successfully, too, and the way through immigration and customs was what it was. We met up with 2 more group members as we exited the airport - Julie and Kim.

Hurray for the friendly shuttle guy with my name on a sign! In an hour we made our way through the outskirts of Guatemala City

and to our 1st stop, Casa Cristina in Antigua: left to right shuttle guy (sorry I didn't catch his name), Beth, Laurilyn, Julie, Kim, and Theresa.

I touched base with group members Stu (my nephew :-) plus Molly, Zechariah, and Janet before settling into my room. Goodnight!