<p>We saw S graduate & then caught Amtrak from LA to Seattle, saw several national parks, caught dozens of delicious crabs, visited with family & friends, & made a lot of precious memories. Best of all, I got to be in the car while S drove swtichbacks in the mountains & along the coast, as well as through heavy LA traffic, including navigating their freeways. He’s a much better driver than I knew!
We had a great time & spent a lot of wonderful time together; S, D, hubby & I. Not sure when we’ll all be together again, as S wants to go off & see friends who are all over the place before he begins his job, but we shall see.
Starion</p>
<p>HImom,</p>
<p>Glad you had such a great trip. I thought you were going to go to Europe, or are you another family that decided against it?</p>
<p>We WERE going to Europe until the volcano started its show in earnest. We all have respiratory problems in my family & our docs ordered us NOT to be around volcanic emissions, so we had to plan this trip instead. We had a blast and it was a great alternative.</p>
<p>Hubby had a co-worker who was stuck for an extra week in Switzerland. A friend’s D was having a tough time breathing through her asthma in London. </p>
<p>We avoid volcanic emissions that we have from our own Hawaii volcano as much as possible, so it seemed really like a bad idea to fly thousands of miles to be nearer volcanic emissions with the possibility of being grounded! Maybe if we didn’t all have respiratory conditions, it would have been a different story, but oh well! No regrets!</p>
<p>My sister is planning a trip to Europe next month–will see how things evolve for them.</p>
<p>I hope you found a good place to eat in Pasadena!</p>
<p>It sounds great!! I treasure every trip we can convince our kids to go on with us, now that they have so many other things to occupy their free time. I’m so glad you got to do this, and congrats on getting your first through USC!</p>
<p>Yea, we went to the family favorite–the Shanghai dumpling place in Arcadia that now has two locations. We also went to Presidential Thai for another meal. Both were very good and we enjoyed ourselves. We were glad that family in SF were able to drive down to share the happy weekend!</p>