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| At lunch, that day, two years ago, one of the chefs on our Antarctica cruise, on Ponant Le’Boreal, was preparing a beef and vegetable stir-fry outdoors. We all partook of the delicious offering but decided to dine indoors. It was a little too cold to eat outside for our liking. For more photos, please click here. |
Last night, we played our final round of buck euchre with Gene and Eugene. As always, it was pretty enjoyable. Tom and I speculated over how fun it would be to find players in our future travels.
However, that’s highly unlikely. That particular card game is popular in the Midwest and is seldom played in other parts of the world. When we return to the US in about two years, we’ll play cards again with his family.
Tom’s sisters and brothers-in-law only spend their winters in Apache Junction, Arizona, and Minnesota’s balance of the year. Most likely, next time we visit Minnesota, it won’t be during the cold winter months, and we’ll see his family and our kids and grandchildren in Minnesota, once again.
This morning, as I sit here preparing today’s post, I’m feeling at ease. Most of our packing is complete, and all I have left to do is restock my 28-day pill case and empty the food in the refrigerator.
We’re bringing all the remaining non-perishables and perishables over to the sisters to see if they can use anything. If not, their friend Margie (another Margie) will bring everything to the local Food Shelf where she volunteers.
We’ve weighed all of our bags except for the supplies bag, which is always questionable in meeting the weight restrictions, in this case, 50 pounds (23 kg) per bag.
Assuming we won’t have easy access to a pharmacy for toiletries, I’ve had to pack enough to last for three months; two months in India and 29-days on the following cruise from Mumbai to London. Once we arrive in the UK, and then Europe, we’ll easily find the products we use.
Last night’s six hours of sleep was filled with crazy dreams and frequent periods of wakefulness. Tom experienced the same. But this morning, upon awakening, I felt fine and ready to tackle the remaining tasks for the day.
Our new friend, Jodi, kindly volunteered to take us to the airport. This is so appreciated, especially since we must leave during rush hour at 5:30 pm. With the traffic, we should arrive by 6:15 pm with our first flight departing at 8:40 PM.
We’ll fly all night for 10 hours, and as mentioned, we’ll spend 8 of the daytime hours at busy Heathrow Airport. We’ll attempt to find a place to plug in our equipment and busy ourselves online.
Here are our combined final expenses for our 82 days in the USA, beginning on November 8, 2019 and ending today:
| Final Expenses USA | US Dollar |
| Vacation Home AZ | $ 3,626.00 |
| Gifts & Misc. | $ 325.00 |
| Airfare | $ 872.00 |
| Rental Car | $ 996.78 |
| Groceries | $ 4,100.32 |
| Dining Out | $ 2,082.00 |
| Supplies & Pharmacy | $ 1,674.05 |
| Total Cost (82 days) | $13,675.83 |
| Average Daily Cost (82 days) | $ 166.78 |
We did not include the cost of new digital equipment and clothing, but we did have the cost of supplies we purchased for the next three months.
Also, we paid no rent while staying with friends Karen and Rich for three weeks in Minnesota, nor did we pay rent during the 11 nights we spent with son Richard in Nevada. Of course, we hosted several dinners out in sincere thanks for their hospitality.
Here in Arizona, we paid the rent as mentioned above from 12/09/2019 to 1/31/2020. The property manager gave us a discount to compensate for our early departure, today on January 29th.
Most likely, we’ll upload a post tomorrow during our 8-hour layover, providing we have access to wifi and a place to plug in our equipment. If not, sit tight. As soon as we get settled in the hotel in a few days, we’ll prepare a new post.
Thanks for all the warm wishes from many of our loyal readers/friends. We so appreciate your kindness and words of encouragement.
We’ll be back at you soon! Take care and be well!
Photos from one year ago today, January 29, 2019:
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| We could only guess why this particular lioness hadn’t been hunting and eating. For more photos, please click here. |