When I homeschooled Spence in 8th grade, my parents invited him to go on a trip to British Columbia with them. It ended up being a great trip and he loved having the opportunity to go somewhere that he likely would not have been able to go if he had been in school that year. We liked the idea of it, so when Cami got to 8th grade two years later, Glen took her on a trip to Denver.
Now we had two official 8th grade traditions--homeschooling and a special trip.
We had a few years after Cami before Emma's 8th grade year rolled around, so there was plenty of time to concoct something big and exciting for her trip. My sister, Heather, is an attorney who loves to travel, so we put her on the task of trip planning. She got excited about Emma potentially accompanying her on one of her trips and thus began Emma's exciting 8th grade trip plans!
Emma and Heather discussed at length different options for their trip, but in the end the super cheap plane tickets to TURKEY made that their winning destination. And less than two full weeks after returning from New Zealand, Emma hopped on an 11-hour flight to Istanbul!
They just returned from their trip after enjoying an exciting 10-days there and although there won't be quite as much commentary as there normally is here on the blog, since I wasn't there, but here are some pictures from their amazing journey.
Since we were a little nervous about the two of them traveling in Turkey by themselves, we convinced our brother Tim to go along and be the intimidating male presence!
Istanbul
ISTANBUL
The first stop on their journey was Istanbul where they saw amazing sites like the stunning Blue Mosque...
Blue Mosque
Blue Mosque
Blue Mosque
Here's the famous Ayasofya...
Ayasofya
And yet another shot of the Blue Mosque!
Blue Mosque, Istanbul
The spice market for a chef like Emma was a colorful and exciting place to visit….
Spice Market, Istanbul
Getting a treat wasn't as easy as she expected...
Ephesus
Next they took an domestic flight (which are super, super cheap) to Izmir so they could visit Ephesus…
Ephesus
Ephesus is an ancient city that over the centuries has been ruled over by the Greek, Persian, Roman, Byzantine, and Ottoman empires. The temple to the goddess Artemis, four times larger than the Parthenon, is considered one of the "seven wonders of the ancient world."
The ruins were spectacular, the carvings intricate, and they were amazed at the artisanship of the ancient people who had built this great city.
AFter Ephesus, they drove to Priene, which was also a cool ancient city full of ruins…
Priene
but Priene is a little more off the beaten path and didn't get the Mediterranean cruise tour group traffic that Ephesus did...
Priene
They loved how much less crowded it was there and enjoyed exploring the beautiful ruins.
Priene
Next they drove to Pamukkale where they saw the stunning, world famous travertine hot spring terraces...
The terraces are naturally created by the calcium deposits in the hot springs and can only found a few places in the entire world.
Travertine Terraces, Pamukkale
Mammoth Hot Springs in Yellowstone is an American example of it, but these terraces in Turkey are absolutely one-of-a-kind in the world because of their pure white color.
At the top of the travertine terraces is an ancient city called Hierapolis. In Hierapolis they swam in Cleopatra's Pool...
Cleopatra's Pool, Pamukkale, Turkey
According to legend, Cleopatra's Pool was crafted by Marc Anthony and then presented to Cleopatra as a gift. However sometime in the 7th century an earthquake toppled nearby columns into it, creating a unique blend of what are considered "healing waters" of the natural hot springs and ancient ruins all melded into a really cool one-of-a-kind place to swim all year round!
Cleopatra's Pool, Pamukkale, Turkey
Next they drove to Aphrodisias to see some more cool ruins...
Aphrodisias
Aphrodisias
Then they ended up on the shores of the Aegean Sea in Bodrum. Bodrum is a beautiful seaside town with narrow steep roads that made driving a harrowing experience.
Bodrum Castle
They didn't get to spend a whole lot of time in Bodrum before taking off to their next destination, but they all raved about the beauty of the area and the clear blue waters of the Aegean Sea!
Aegean Sea on the Bodrum Peninsula
Next they flew to Cappadocia where they stayed in a hotel cave. Because of the naturally soft rock (called tuff) that formed from ancient volcanic eruptions, people have been crafting their homes out of rock for thousands of years.
Cappadocia Region (Goreme Open Air Museum)
At sunrise they took a little hot air balloon ride….
Hot air balloon over Cappadocia
…you know….just for the purpose of seeing the most gorgeous views in the universe!
They were a tad cold after their little jaunt in the stratosphere (or maybe it was the troposphere)….
After hot air balloon ride, Cappadocia Region
After that they stayed a little more down to earth and went for a little camel ride...
Cappadocia Region (Goreme Open Air Museum)
and visited some other beautiful places in the area….
Valley of the Pigeons?? (Cappadocia Region)
…by horse drawn carriage!
Cappadocia Region
Ihlara Valley (Cappadocia Region)
The last thing they did in Cappadocia was visit the underground city, Derinkuyu, which, in a City of Ember-ish sort of way, was carved in the aforementioned soft rock to be a place of refuge for the people in Cappadocia during times of war and danger.
Underground City (Derinkuyu, Cappadocia Region)
Emma had a fantastic time on her 8th grade trip and will never look at the world through the same eyes again! It was years of education all rolled into a week-and-a-half.
Cappadocia
The only problem with the trip was that it sets a pretty high bar for Adam who is already mulling over ideas for his 8th grade trip in a couple of years. His top choice right now? Antarctica!
We woke up on the last day of our trip with mixed emotions--
on the one hand excited to have one last day to explore,
on the other hand disappointment at having to leave so many New Zealand sites unexplored,
and on the third hand I've only ever daydreamed about having, a serious longing to be back home in our own beds!
The ship and hobbit hotels had the cool factor and all that going for it, but by this point we were all ready to head home.
Our first stop after checking out of the hotel was the world famous Waitomo Glow Worm Cave which was only a very short drive from the hotel. They don't allow any photography there, so this picture of a boat exiting the cave is the only photographic evidence I've got of our trip there. (Glen is in the third row on the left side on that boat).
I've borrowed the following picture from another source to give you a glimpse of how beautiful it really is. So what makes this cave so cool (as well as many caves in New Zealand) is that deep within the caves, a very ugly insect that so happens to also glow in the dark, makes its home on the ceiling of the caves. Their bioluminescence is a very striking and beautiful contrast to the blackness of the cave and people come from all over the world to see this amazing sight.
AFter that awe-inspiring experience we got on the road and started heading back toward the airport, but this time instead of going straight there, we went through the city of Hamilton so we could see the temple!
It was a lovely, warm day with blue skies and we were happy to visit a place that, although we'd never been there before, still somehow seemed so familiar to us.
We explored the visitors' center...
and in a major small world moment, met the parents of my friend Catherine, who are senior missionaries serving there at the temple.
It was fun making the connection with Elder and Sister Monson (no relation to the more well-known Thomas S. Monson) and we enjoyed having someone there to talk to and who knew the coolest photo shots at the temple!
Spence was engaged in conversation at this point and missed this photo op.
Elder and Sister Monson's last piece of advice before continuing our journey to the airport was to stop in the tiny town of Pokeno for some tasty (and cheap) ice cream.
On the way there though we kept seeing signs for Pokeno Bacon and were not too disappointed that there was a Pokeno Bacon store right next door to the ice cream shop(s). We went to see if they had anything pre-cooked that we could buy and scored the jackpot when they gave us a whole plate of cooked sausages that they had cooked up for giving out as customer samples and were about to throw away because they were closing for the day. We bought some dipping sauce they sold and made those sausages and ice cream our super nourishing last meal in New Zealand!
After that bit of indulgence we got back on the road and before long we arrived back in Auckland where we could see that Cyclone Pam had definitely affected that area a lot more than the area where we had been when it hit.
We found this one last spot for a family picture (minus the photographer). We thought the foggy view of Auckland in the background was pretty cool and hoped to find some passer-by who might be willing to take a picture with all of us in it, but alas there was not a soul in sight and we had a plane to catch!
After that, we drove back to the Auckland airport, returned our rental car, and settled in for the long haul way home (13-hours to LA, and another 5-hours or so back home). We arrived back to Virginia in the wee hours of the morning and had a limo waiting there at the airport to bring us home. We enjoyed the last little taste of luxury and arrived back home with only a couple of hours before diving back into the middle of a busy week of "normal life".
It was the trip of a lifetime and we are still in awe that it actually happened. Thank you to Make-a-Wish for making Spence's wish come true! It's almost unbelievable to us that they paid for all of our transportation, housing, food, and activities while we were there….just to give hope to one sick teen. It meant the world to Spencer and to us….THANK YOU!!!!
By Monday we were pretty worn out and as a result it turned out to be the most low-key of all of our days in New Zealand. Even the drive from our little hobbit hotel to our first activity of the day--the Hairy Feet Tour--ended up being oddly silent. After six days of excitement, I think our adrenaline stores were finally starting to run low and it was all we could do to keep from snipping at each other all day long.
Sagging energy levels and edginess aside, we, with as much excitement as we could muster, arrived at the Hairy Feet Tour all bedecked in rain gear to be prepared for the potential deluges of rain that Cyclone Pam might have brought. Luckily it only sprinkled and we (mostly) enjoyed a lovely three-hour tour of one of the sites where the Hobbit was filmed. Like Hobbiton this picturesque locale (also a sheep farm) was discovered by location scouts via helicopter. Sir Peter Jackson (the director of the Hobbit movies) had come there and declared it just right for some of the filming, a fact which made the tour guide/owner very proud.
There were no props here as there were in Hobbiton, only the gorgeous backdrop that can be seen through some of the scenes of the movie. The tour guide/owner had a booklet with pictures from scenes of the movie, so that we could be reminded of which scenes they were, and imagine ourselves standing right where some famous actor had stood before us.
He took us walking on trails that he'd built himself
…and pointed out distinctive rocks, tree limbs, and the limestone cliff faces that could be seen through the movies.
The rock Thorin is sitting on in the picture below is one of the rocks also in the picture above...
Then the guide had us stand underneath the distinctive rock shown in this clip….
and reenact it for posterity to see.
He also happily used my camera to snap family shots of us in several different locations!
We so rarely get pictures of us all together, do not be surprised if one of the photos in this post ends up being in our Christmas card this year!
Hopefully the smile fakers aren't as obvious to anyone else...
Luckily there was nothing fake about this view though….WOW!
After we stopped ogling over the view, we found food ASAP, which helped the mood of the fam at least slightly. Then we went to the Kiwi House in Otorohanga where we saw a real live kiwi. But pictures weren't allowed, so this is all we have!
I can't remember what else we did that day (and have no pictures to remind me), but suffice it to say that there was some good old-fashioned comfort food involved (pizza) as well as some time for everyone to chill.
I usually have a gazillion different things to blog about and I can barely keep up with all my ideas for the blog, however I think I've developed A.D.D. when it comes to New Zealand. I so rarely try to slog my way through so many blogposts on the same general subject, that it's been hard for me to get excited to recount yet another day of our trip and I can only imagine how intensely boring it is for you, dear readers. It's only the realization that I am already starting to forget some of the details that's keeping me on task tonight and I hope you'll forgive me as I make my way continuing to blog about the last few days of our trip!
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Sunday morning dawned bright and clear, making it hard to fathom that a cyclone was quickly bearing down on New Zealand. Cyclone Pam had already decimated the island nation of Vanuatu and we were a tad nervous about what it might do to our plans for the remainder for our trip. We knew it would be weakened by the time it potentially arrived and that the infrastructure of New Zealand was much more modern than that of Vanuatu, but still we worried about being in an unfamiliar area with potential power outages and roads flooding, etc.
In the end, the cyclone turned out to be nothing to worry about, but at this stage we felt like we were racing against the clock. We were still close to the east coast and wanted to be at our final destination, which happened to be much further west, before any of the storm hit. We went to church in Rotorua and left right after sacrament meeting to be on our way.
We arrived to our next "hotel" and had to laugh when we arrived to a little visitor grazing on the roof.
The inside was anything but fancy, but it was adequate for our needs, and the kids were quite taken with the cuteness of the hobbit-ness of it all and the friendly donkey on the roof.
The second night we were there, we ended up split into two different rooms….a hobbit room and a ship room (shown on the right below). It was actually an old ship transplanted into the country and made into this fun and quirky hotel! All in all, we were happy enough with our stay and it was nice to be so close to everything else we wanted to do on our trip.
That Sunday afternoon after getting checked in, we took a drive and hiked to Marokopa Falls. It wasn't a long hike from the road, but the kids amped up the difficulty by going off the trail and scampering over rocks and through mud to get to the base of the waterfall.
It was the biggest of all the waterfalls we saw in New Zealand...
and provided a perfect backdrop for lots of pictures!
I love my silly kids!
After that we went on one more hike on the Ruakuri Bush Track. This was a fun and funky hike that could have only taken about 1/2 hour, but there were so many cool natural features along the way, that we kept stopping to explore and/or take pictures.
There were boardwalks along cliffs, bridges...
small caves, rocks to scramble over...
tropical vegetation that made us feel like we were in the jungle….
and even a good spot to rest the camera and use the timer to capture a picture of the whole family.
It turned out to be a great Sabbath Day, taking the sacrament, moving our bodies, and enjoying this little corner of God's beautiful earth!
Welcome to our family blog where you can find the latest on our family and read all about Spencer's battle with Acute Myeloid Leukemia (subtype M5). He was diagnosed in January 2012 and has been in remission about 13 years now. Every day he is in remission is a gift to us.
In amongst the leukemia updates you'll find a random conglomeration of humorous, boring, goofy, and inspiring tales (with photos of course) from the adventure of our life with five kids. An adventure that we're taking ...a day at a time.
Posts About Our Son's Experience with Cancer (AML)
