June 28, 2009 – Bill's Blog

Ocean is shown above enjoying the beach at Hagerman Lake. It is a favorite beach of ours because there is a large, flat, grassy area and hardly anyone goes to the public beach. When we went on Thursday, there was no one there except for us. The weather has been nice so far, with hot temperatures during the day and cool temps at night. Ocean lived up to her name and was the last to leave the water. She shows no fear for water, going up to her neck and then jumping up and falling on her “dupa” and then giggling.

Owen and Ollie are having a nice time with their cousins, Beau and Tony, the sons of my brother Jim. They are not fighting all the time like they were last summer. Beside swimming at Hagerman Lake, Friday we also went to Chicaguoan Lake to swim at the beach at the Bonetti’s cottage. There are so many lakes in our county. We could visit a different one almost every day of our holiday. And that is a nice thing about Iron County, there is hardly any people here so anywhere you go, there is plenty of space and no crowds.

Besides swimming, Nadia has been running daily. I drop her off 6 miles from our home and she runs here. I got out to run twice with Owen on the bike on the Apple Blossom Bike Trail.

On a sad note, we buried my mother in the Stambaugh Cemetery on Friday. Father Clisch, from our home parish of St. Cecilia’s Catholic Church in Caspian gave a short service. Cemetary and funeral home officials were very kind to wait for me to return from Belgrade. The ceremony was attended by a small group of close friends and family. It was touching to see Ollie put a blue flower from the McDonald’s garden on the casket. Blue represents our school colors of West Iron County Public Schools. We will be ordering a tombstone later and are thinking of putting “Coach” on the stone. My mother was a big sportsperson. Afterwards, we had a BBQ in the backyard. Andy is shown below on the grill. It was good to catch up with my aunts Darlene and Ione, and cousin Debbie, as well as friends Mac and Julie. It was a nice way to say goodbye to my mother. She will be missed.

The kids are shown above sleeping at the gate of our United Airlines flight in Chicago’s O’Hare Airport. The flight was eventually cancelled and we had to take another flight the next day. We tried to get on a later flight, but they only had 3 empty seats and we needed four. The kids as well as I were exhausted by this time as we had left Belgrade early in the morning European time. With a short stopover in the Lufthansa hub city of Frankfort, we made good time over the Atlantic.

Ollie & Ocean Hitch a Ride on My Carry-On

My father lives in a small town in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula and it is a remote area not well serviced by airlines. The nearest larger airport with regular flights is Green Bay, Wisconsin. We landed in Chicago around 1:00 PM and as you can see, our 5:00 PM flight was cancelled. United Airlines was nice in providing us with a good hotel and a free breakfast for the night. I think they felt sorry for us, especially the dramatic scene at the gate with three children sleeping in front of the desk. They also put us on an American Airlines flight the next morning.

Now that I have flown Lufthansa quite a bit living in Europe, it is a pretty good airline. The only problem with them is the lack of leg room. When a person leans his/her chair back, there is almost no room for the passenger behind.

We eventually made it the next day, although the cancellation caused a bit of inconvenience for my father and brother. My hometown is a 3 hour drive from Green Bay.