One more post before the end of the year!

Hey Everybody -

I've been dismal at blogging this year, but here's hoping 2018 is a better year all the way around.

Anyway, we have not been on too many recent adventures, but we're having a nice, lazy New Year's weekend at home, and I figured I would report in.

Let's see - going back earlier in the month, we met up with Chad and Lisha for Sunday brunch at Parts of Paris and then walked down to the pier. We saw some manatees and a dolphin but I can't find any good pics to share of that, so here's us. It's hot.

Despite the summery temps, Glenn did a spectacular job setting up our outside Xmas lights and is the envy of the neighborhood.

And we got a live tree which we decorated, and temps even dipped down to the point of justifying a fire.

Sadly, we had to take the tree down early - a couple nights ago, as it was infested with baby praying mantises. I wish I was kidding. I don't mind a baby praying mantis, but I don't particularly want hundreds of them in my living room.

Anyway, before Christmas we went to my company's holiday party, which I have no pics of, but it was fine. Actually, our web designer, Eugene, illustrated our Roger West Christmas card this year, so here is that. (I'm the first person in the second row in case you couldn't tell.)

 We also went to a party at a friend's house who is also friends with Chad and Lisha.

Aren't we adorable? We had another fun night at their place recently (again no pics) and Glenn and Chad have been meeting up to play disc golf a few times.

Did I mention that Glenn has been off for weeks? He's turning into a hobo. He did, however, take an 18-mile bike ride the other day and saw a bunch of dolphins.

Meanwhile, while Glenn has more days off than he knows what to do with, I work for Mr. Scrooge, who only gave us Christmas day off and didn't even let us leave early the Friday before. Here's my car in the parking lot - I'm guessing other people got to leave early.

Anyway, we tried to recapture some Christmas spirit by going to A Victorian Christmas Stroll at Tampa's Henry Plant museum. The museum used to be the Tampa Hotel and is famous for its metal spires. It's a nice building but the stroll cost $15 a piece and we were in and out of there in about 10 minutes, so not really worth the cost of admission.

Still, however, are a few pics.

We also managed to get a walk in on Bayshore later, where Deuce agreed to pose by a sign (I was hiding in the back).

Last night, on my way home from work, I was treated to a beautiful sunset over the Courtney Campbell Causeway. I was not able to get a good pic, but one of my fellow commuters did and posted this online, so I'm stealing it.

Here's to a happy and healthy 2018!

Start Spreading the News...

Hey Guys -

Earlier this week, we had a whirlwind trip to NYC (planned by my amazing husband for my birthday!).

We flew in on Monday evening, checked in to the cute Blakely boutique hotel in Midtown Manhattan, and then walked to dinner at Maestro's Steakhouse (thanks Mom and Dad for funding the meal!). The food was amazing, and because our wine was delayed in getting to the table, they gave us a free shrimp cocktail that came in a glass and silver bowl packed in dry ice so it was smoking dramatically when they brought it to us.

Tuesday, we spent the morning exploring Central Park. It's really a beautiful oasis in the middle of the city.

The weather, as you can see, was beautiful, which was nice because there was a Tropical Storm sitting over Tampa - it rained every day we were gone.

Giant bubbles!

We walked around the lake, the Loeb Boat House, and then on to the reservoir. They were filming something here so made us go back the way we came.

After a long walk, we decided to have an early lunch at the iconic Tavern on the Green. This New York landmark opened in 1934, briefly closed in 2009, and then was completely restored and reopened.

I literally had the best lunch of my life here. They had a three-course special for NYC Restaurant Week. I got a refreshing watermelon salad, roasted salmon with lime butter sauce, and for dessert, strawberry cheesecake with a GLUTEN FREE lemon cookie crust. Wooo! (Don't judge...it was my birthday celebration!)

We took it easy for the rest of the afternoon, and then headed out to dinner on Broadway at a place we had been to before - Nizza, which has great gluten free Italian food. Then we headed to Hamilton at the Richard Rodgers Theater.

Guys, all I can say is the show totally lived up to the hype. Hands down the best show I've ever seen. It was smart, it was funny, it was emotional. I laughed and cried. The music was amazing. The fact that a lot of it was sort of done as a rap - spoken rhyme - actually made it easier to understand. The choreography was stunning. The whole thing was just WOW.

While the guy who played Hamilton was great, Glenn and I agreed that the guy who played Aaron Burr kinda stole the show.

Dad, Glenn was so glad that he read the book on Alexander Hamilton that you recommended. He truly had a crazy life story - it was hard to believe it was true, and they really covered most of it in the show.

So anyway, folks, that's it. The next morning we had a sickening and terrifying cab ride back to the shittiest airport on earth (LaGuardia) and headed home. I should mention that I got on the plane, fell asleep for an hour, and woke up to discover that we were still on the tarmac and hadn't taken off yet.

Booooo.

We're home now, and it is a beautiful sunny day in Tampa Bay. (Scorching hot with 1000% humidity, but who's complaining?) We're spending a relaxing day at home.

By the way - I did write a blog post for work about our Montana trip. It's probably repetitive for you guys, but if you'd like to see it, here you go:
https://www.rogerwest.com/strategy/take-a-hike/

Also, just for fun, here's a pic of Deucie hard at work at daycare:

At least for me, that should be it for traveling for a while, but we'll try to find more blog-worthy things to do around here. Love you guys!

Glacier Part 2: The Adventures Continue

Hi Everyone - Let's jump right back in.

When you last left us, we were communing with the mountain goats at Logan's Pass.

The next day, we found that we had earned the title they give to amateur hikers here - Tenderfeet. Everything hurt. We are not used to walking up mountains.

So after spending the morning at the cabin, we drove down to the Two Medicine portion of the park, to take the easiest hikes we could find. First we went to Running Eagle Falls which was about .8 miles off the road and a flat walk - first through the woods and then along a beautiful clear stream with multi-colored rocks.

Then we went to Two Medicine Lake (which is in Blackfeet territory) and took a trail to Aster Falls.

The next day, we also took it relatively easy and headed to Rocky Point Trail which starts at Fish Creek and offers some great views of Lake MacDonald.

Later, we drove to Apgar Village, a cute little camping town, for ice cream. We nosed through some shops and then walked on a bike trail.

We were the only ones on the trail and were met by a doe and her two fawns playing in the woods. We also had a couple young bucks come out and say hi.

Thursday, July 20th was a big day for us, as we took the nearly 3-hour drive to Many Glacier in the Northeast of the park. (We took the long way around instead of Going-to-the-Sun, because, nope, nope, nope.)

It's a good thing too, because we had two separate black bear sightings on the way. One just crossed the road in front of us. I tried to quickly retrieve my camera from the case, lean out the window and snap a pic.

Here is the breath-taking result.

The other was on a hillside clearing as we rounded a bend - we got a better view of him, but as soon as we stopped the car, he took off running.

There were also weirdly a lot of free range cattle everywhere.

Many Glacier was beautiful and wild, with the famous Many Glacier Lodge sitting on the edge of Swiftcurrent Lake. We walked the trail around the lake.

The Swiftcurrent area is supposed to have a ton of wildlife including grizzlies, big horned sheep and moose, but we didn't see anything other than more deer. We were told of a moose sighting, but apparently just missed him.

Anyway, we took a trail to yet another waterfall - Red Rock, which was another nice trail, with lots of wildflowers.

So Friday was our last day in the park, and we decided to go out with a bang.

First we took an early morning drive to see wildlife, but were unsuccessful. It was pretty seeing the sun come up over the mountains though.

Then we decided to brave the trail to Avalanche Lake. It starts out off the Trail of the Cedars and goes up. I was concerned about my knees and stamina, but we figured we'd take it slow. The whole hike took us about 2  1/2 hours but it was worth it, and probably the most beautiful trail we saw.

Early on in the hike, there was a gorgeous waterfall, and then a shady Cypress forest with giant rocks (from the avalanche) and tons of moss and ferns.

At the end of the hike, we came out in a magical valley with a turquoise lake surrounded by giant mountains. Three spectacular waterfalls dropped from the snow-capped peaks. We just sat there for a while and took it all in. It was the grand finale to our adventures in the park.

But WAIT! That's not the end.

Saturday we headed back towards Kalispell where we got a hotel for the night before flying back to Tampa on Sunday.  We decided to take a detour and drive to the Moiese Valley to the National Bison Range. It is a large national park where buffalo and other animals are safe to graze. We drove on a 19-mile one-way dirt road through the park, with the superzoom in hand, looking for wildlife.

As we were driving, I yelled at Glenn to stop the car, because I just happened to spot some horns.

Hello Mr. Pronghorn Antelope!

Then, Glenn gets all the credit for spotting a bull elk. (There were actually two of them.)

Later, saw this little female pronghorn too.

On our way back to Kalispell, we drove around Flathead Lake, which was another beautiful lake.

So - that's pretty much all the highlights from the trip. Hope you enjoyed seeing them!

Tomorrow, we are heading out again on a very different trip. Glenn is taking me to NYC to see Hamilton (the musical) for my birthday. Very exciting!

Love you all and hope you are well.