Spring Break II

We took a nature cruise on our last day in Florida. We went through the mangrove estuary here in Naples. A little ways into the cruise, we saw some dolphins, and we followed them all the way out into the Gulf. The girls were thrilled. We also saw some pelicans and egrets. Here are some photos. It is hard to take pictures of dolphins with a digital camera with low batteries. They don’t surface for long, so I just pointed the camera and sort of pre-focused, then just tried to click when they came up.

Spring Break

The Gordons are in Florida for Spring Break. We drove down from Virginia, and stopped by to see our friend Amy in Fort Stewart on the way. We are visiting Gia's dad in Naples, Florida, which is south of Tampa on the Gulf Coast side. The weather is fantastic. We are staying about a mile from the beach. There is a coconut tree in the front yard. I have some pictures of the Gordons on the beach.

Giana on the beach

Under the umbrella

Gia and Seneca Rose

Daddy and his little lady

DC Trip

The Gordons took a trip to DC on Wednesday. It was a beautiful day, and so we pulled Eowyn out of Kindergarten and took off. We drove to Fredericksburg, then took the Amtrak into Union Station in DC. We got on the subway from there and went to the Mall. Eowyn has been studying presidents in school, and learned about Washington and Lincoln for President's Day last month. She was very excited to see the Washington Monument when we surfaced from the subway station. As you can probably see, it was an absolutely beautiful day. The sky was blue (at first) and the temperature was in the 70s.


We haven't been to DC since 2002 when we went for the Easter Egg roll at the White House. Eowyn was about Seneca's age then. We have a picture of Gia, Michelle, and Margaret in this very tree from that trip. Gia thought it would be cool to have the picture with the three Gordon sisters. Seneca has her usual group picture face, we are pretty sure she doesn't like her sisters. You can see the new World War II monument in the background. It wasn't built the last time we were in DC. It is nice. There is supposed to be a pool of water in the center, but none of the pools on the mall have any water in them, probably because it is still officially winter. The monument reminded us a lot of the monument in the American cemetery in Normandy.

We went to the Lincoln Memorial after visiting the Vietnam Memorial. Eowyn and Giana climbed up the monument with Shawn. Eowyn did it all by herself, but Giana needed some help.

We went to the National Zoo afterwards. It was a disappointment. I prefer the Nürnberg zoo, which we went to many times in Germany. The Pandas were kind of cool, and Seneca referred to everything as a "DOG!" (She pronounces it dogga!, which sounds a lot like her word for daddy.) It started to rain, so we headed back to the subway for our journey home. All in all, a pretty good day.