Magnolia Odessa

Thank you to our veterans! <br><br><br><br>We are camping for free with full hookups, behind the Chamber of Commerce building. Bill was able to connect to wi-fi with his antenna. This is a great free camping place. We walked down to the City Lake and around it, about a mile, that is a good ...

... girls, their legs perfect, long, graceful, in heels or flats, flip-flops, and each wearing the tiniest of shorts or skirt or dress, tanned to perfection. I heard that Russian women were beautiful, but this quickly took my attention from the streets and spent the rest of the afternoon staring at women instead.<br>We found out that there were trains leaving to Simferopol, in the Crimea, or Moscow, so we stood at some cross-roads, which we decided to postpone ...

... think how good you will feel about traveling when you use RezHub.com. This company is donating 20% of their revenue from all travel booked at the Green Travel Hub to a green organization. Not only can you have fun on your vacation, but you feel good about making a difference knowing 20% went to help out a green organization. Another cool feature that ...

... Anyway, the next day was our last day in Odessa. I think that we were all sad to go. It really started to feel like home and the people were so laid back and easy to get along with (most of the time). We had asked which was the best beach and we were told to go to Arcadia. So we chose to go. This beach was definitely a lot better than the other one. There were waterslides and water activities to do like parasailing. The weather ...

... i suppose...and also got to see Victor Wooden and Mike Stern from the USA! They both put on fabulous shows. Another highlight of the festival was the Balkan Express band which plays traditional eastern European songs but all jazzzzed up. They ROCKED! Ok must move on here this story is getting loooong. Well at this festival there was a self titled "american camp" which consisted of a few americans who were peace corps volunteers and I hung out with them a ...

... my tail light bulb, which I did. Then it was off to the hotel. Then there was a night ride to the Permian BAsin Memorial, so, of course, I went. It was a little bit disappointing, because the lights were not working. However, they had an impromptu discussion, and seemed to really help some vets a lot. And a lot of FNG (new to the run) riders really seemed to get a lot out of it. Then back to the hotel - short night tonight for sure!

We awoke to a flat rear tire, we slowly drove to Carlsbad to get it fixed. It turned out to be a cracked valve stem only $10 to fix. Then off to Carlsbad Caverns to walk down into the cave enter ace. I remember visiting the Caverns when I was 9 &amp; 16. This time we walked ...

I dislike smokers. I have a theory that were smokers not an issue, bus trips could be shortened by 20%. But instead, it seems a requirement that at least every two hours the bus stop so the driver and passengers can have a cigarette. I suppose I should be thankful smoking isn't permitted on the bus itself, but having just spent 12 hours on a bus, I'm inclined to be bitter. For being just slightly smaller than Texas, the Ukraine sure takes a long time to get around. Simferopol is a ...

As you can see on the map we arrived in Odessa already some time ago. So, to be honest with you, it is not really the first day of our journey, but the first day of the report you read. Until the day before yesterday it was awefully hot here and because we are here directly at the Black Sea it is extremely humide during summer time. Since yesterday however temperature dropped and now we ...

We took it easy today and caught our breath around the pool. Tonight we went to a Baseball game (the Midland Rockhounds - assisted by Rocky their mascot - beat the Wichita Wranglers) - it was great to see a game live and to soak up the atmosphere. We followed up this with a trip (in Jane's convertible) to a drive in movie where we saw Underdog. great movie - pity about the mosquitos !!!