Ancient Temples by TukTuk {Siem Reap, Cambodia}

Siem Reap is only an hour flight from Bangkok, so we couldn't pass up the chance to zip over to Cambodia to visit the famous temples. There are over 1,000, and we only had three days, so we just hired a guide for one day to take us to the most popular three. 

Sok picked us up from Isann Lodge in his TukTuk at 5am in order to watch the sunrise from Angkor Wat. We arrived thru the heavily wooded back gate, bypassing the moat, walking the path in the dark with owls and who-knows-what-else calling. 

We made our way around to the front while learning about this temple. Built in 1100s by King Suryavarman II as a Hindu temple to Vishnu, it later became a Buddhist temple.

Such interesting architecture made for great photo opportunities.

The stories of Hindu epics and mythological stories line the walls, 6ft tall and 600 yards long! These incredibly intricate stories were carved directly into the sandstone walls between 1113 and 1150 during the reign of King Suryavarman II.

View from the top.

Macaques play on the lawn and in the forest edge of Angkor Wat. They were quite entertaining.

This was a very interesting place. One could easily spend an entire day here, but we have two more temples to see!

2025 {Colombia and many new experiences}

2025 began with a mix of pain and opportunity. We rang in the new year watching fireworks from our window in Hanoi, Vietnam and the following day flew to Taiwan.

The day after we arrived home after two months in SE Asia, I was warned my grandma didn't have much time left for this world. Journey and I caught a flight two days later to be with her, where we experienced the intense honor of holding her til her very last breath. The pain of losing her is undescribable, and didn't happen at once, but over a long stretch of years. I have peace now knowing she is fully healed, restored and with our Savior! Our reunion one day will be so sweet! 

I love to celebrate our children's "firsts". (Age 14)

Asher made his first coin by melting metals like aluminum cans in a propane forge and pouring into a graphite mold. He sometimes creates his own alloy blends, and made his first, of many knives. He's begun selling his coins both collected and created on eBay. He joined Civil Air Patrol. He won a fishing tournament. He got braces, the invisible kind. 

Journey learned to play guitar and Tiple, a traditional instrument of the Colombian Andes. While we were staying in Vélez, she borrowed a Tiple for 1 week, took 4 classes and spent 2 nights of practicing with a friend then played 4 songs and sang for 20 people! Since then she has performed for countless people.

Journey has been crocheting for awhile, and this year learned how to knit. We picked up a sewing machine at a church sale and she made her own curtains and a shoulder bag. Journey and I took an embroidery class in Vélez.

Asher and I experienced our first saltwater fishing charter. Two hours and 27 miles into the recently renamed, Gulf of America, we reached 50ft of depth where we ended up with 29 keepers (including our friend, Jason's fish)! Asher alone caught 15 grunts, 4 hogfish, 1 toadfish, 1 red grouper. I caught 8 Grunts. 

Asher flew a plane home from Gville, the pilot handled the takeoff and landing, while Asher did the rest- taxiing, and flying between 500ft to 2000ft altitude. 

Together we found out what it might be like to be a bird when we did parapente (paragliding) over Chicamocha Canyon in Colombia. Afterwards we rode one of the longest cable cars from one edge of the canyon, down the steep slope, across the river at the bottom and back up to the other edge, covering nearly 4 miles in 30 minutes! We explored multiple Colombian caves, one that required us to rappel in, stem over a deep section, and climb our way out. We sat in complete darkness and silence in the belly of it. 

In Vélez we found friends, we wore traditional clothing, played traditional instruments, including a jawbone, danced the Torbellino, and attended the annual weeklong festival of the tiple and guabina. We played Tejo, and I still have the hearing damage that goes with it! Journey went to volleyball practice with new friends.

The best new experience is that Asher decided on his own to be baptized! What a wonderful opportunity for him to make a public profession of his faith and for us to celebrate his salvation and the reassurance of spending eternity with him and our Savior!

As a family we volunteered at an English language school in Colombia. Most students were children, so they loved interacting with our teens. Back home the kids really started getting involved in volunteering at the nonprofit we assist. Journey makes desserts while Asher helps with building things.

We joined our library's Friends group, volunteering with them. We fostered two black Shepherd puppies for a local rescue. Daddy hosted the second Men's Recharge. I attended my first women's retreat with church. We volunteered for our church's fall festival and choir, and for Night to Shine.

Daddy took Asher to the fish and float weekend and Journey to the Daddy daughter dance again. The kids went to teen camp with the youth group.

As a family, we toured Wycliffe, Pioneers, Cru (Jesus Film) and a sugar cane factory.

Thru Perspectives we met a family of missionaries who spent 11 years working with an unreached people group in Papua New Guinea, and another who grew up in the Colombian Amazon in a hut over a lake where the poison darts couldn't reach. 

In Ghana I crossed the 1,800 birds mark. Later I spent 10 days birding near Cali, Colombia with Tami and Cilia. 

We visited our neice's new home and zoo! We held her coatimundis, pet her squirrel monkeys and brought home two lionhead bunny babies. 

We spent 5 days snorkeling and lobstering in the Keys, no keepers though.

Since the kids will be driving soon, Grandpa gifted us his SUV! In December we flew to Ohio to visit and drive it home. The timing was right for the kids to play in snow. We visited Chrissy and Shaun, the Fugates and Kim on the way home. 

We hosted Deann, CP, Amy, Alan and Josie, Dad and Helen, plus Mom stayed with us for 4 months.

La Festival Nacional de la Guabina y el Tiple

The biggest week in Vélez takes place in early August when the Feria de la Guabina y el Tiple comes to town and it seems the population triples almost overnight. The festivities kicked off on Tuesday morning at 5am with bottle rockets and alborada, a very loud band that marches the streets for an hour! When we asked why so early, they said it's for the drunk people, which was confusing for us, but made sense later. It seemed each day had a different kind of desfile (parade). The three big ones featured horses on Friday, chicha on Saturday and flowers on Sunday. The children pictured here are wearing the traditional traje of Vélez.

Friday's highlight was 33 Parranda Veleña, a parade featuring hundreds horses and riders. They assembled at the edge of town at 1pm, and the first ones reached the square at 5. We watched for a couple hours and they still weren't finished when we left for dinner. It was like no parade I've seen before. It was very slow. They would stop for long periods of time, sometimes to chat with spectators, riding forward and backwards along the route, some with a beer in one hand, reins in the other. It looked a lot like bumper cars on horses. Sometimes the horses would bang into others and often end up bunched up in a tight group. By the end the riders had been at it for a good 8 hours. 

The horses were doing a special maneuver, a very fast footed trot, while moving forward slowly and somewhat sideways. It looked pretty intense.They were obviously trained well. No separation between horses and spectators, made for some risky situations, and the next day I met a man who was injured by a horse during the parade. It's avoidable by keeping your distance, but it's also more fun to be right in front!

For Saturday's parade, EVERYONE was wearing a sombrero and traje, traditional clothing for this area, so it was hard to distinguish between the parade and spectators. Each parade group, unified with a colored ribbon on their hat, came through distributing chicha, a traditional fermented drink made with corn, but alternatives include pineapple, rice, and other fruits. They sometimes had multiple 5 gallon jugs on wagons! They also handed out baked corn kernels and chicharron, fried pig skin. This is just the beginning section, a sea of hats. This continues past me at least the same distance, then turns down another street leading to the square. Just a ton of people! Below is our friend, Nora, getting a chicha refill.

Our friends, Alejandro and Claudia, came prepared with their own homemade chicha to share and calabazas, little cups worn as a necklace to conveniently drink what is shared. They also brought piquete, a traditional food basket containing cooked potatoes, yucca, chorizo, wrapped in banana leaves to keep warm. 

The very vibrant Desfile de Los Flores (flower parade) on Sunday was my favorite. Check out this teeny tiny, traje-wearing dog! 

Many of the floats and decorations were bird related, which i really enjoyed.

Bands played traditional instruments including a jawbone (far left) and dancers performed while balancing bowls of chicha on their heads.

Vélez is known for their bocadillos (guava candies), so I thought this float was super clever.

After the floats, the horses again joined the parade, decorated with flowers. This time riders were wearing trajes and the women had their dresses turned around so the hand stitched panel was displayed over the end of the horse.

Journey hopped on when she spotted her favorite horse again at the end of the parade. 

At night the streets filled with food and game vendors. Pictured below is lechona, a deboned pig which has been slow roasted and stuffed with rice, pork and peas.

The stage in the town square hosted entertainment throughout the day, competitions and displays in song, including Guabinas, dance, and coplas, and at night big name performers played all through the night until 5am! Now you see why the Alborada starts at 5am, to lead the drunk people away from the square (and hopefully home)! It's truly a nonstop event over the weekend! Saturday night featured a ton of fireworks around 11pm, which Journey and I watched from our apartment, two blocks from the square.

We really enjoyed our first feria experience in Vélez, but it was also nice when Vélez returned to the quiet, little, tranquilo town it normally is. This is absolutely an amazing feria to experience! 

A Look Back at Our Years of Fulltime RVing and Worldschooling {A collection of our 'Year in Review' posts}

 Some of my favorite posts to read are the annual reviews. I decided to make it easy and put all of them here for quick reference. While living in the RV for the first five years, I wrote a recap of the previous year on our nomadiversary in April, but I later switched to calendar year. Click on the year to read.

2014: Began Fulltime RVing. 22 States, 33 state & national parks 

2015: 12 states, Hawaii, Japan, 22 national parks, Began birding, work-camping at a National Wildlife Refuge 

2016: Drive to Alaska for the summer. camp hosting. 6 new states and 3 provinces of Canada (Yukon, British Columbia, Alberta). 13 national parks 

2017: East Coast plus New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island, Downsized from 37ft to 16ft RV! 13 new states, 37 national park sites, first birding festival. Birding the Everglades.

2018: 2 new states, Established a home base, Road trip to Vegas, hosted exchange students, training trip to Kenya with ITEC, Uganda to visit friends, Birding Colombia 

2019: Five months in Ecuador, visit with Waodani in the Amazon Jungle, Birding Ecuador. Colombia, Trip to Ohio, Tennessee 

2020: The good, bad and ugly year. The Keys

2021: Florida Keys. Charleston, South Carolina. Ohio

2022: Four month RV roadtrip out West. Our 50th state together! North Dakota. Minnesota

2023: Three months in South America: Peru, Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Paraguay and Uruguay. Tunisia. 

2024: Southeast Asia: A month in Thailand and a month exploring Cambodia, Vietnam and Taiwan.  Turning Teenagers and flying airplanes.

2025: Two months living in a small town in the Colombian Andes (Vélez). Paragliding, caving, discovering new hobbies: playing the Tiple (a traditional Colombian instrument with 12 strings), and smelting coins.