Summer in Idaho & Reno

 Turtle in downtown Reno at Virginia Lake. 

 One of my favorite walks with my parents because the birds there are amazing!

 Grebe at Virginia Lake.

 My parents at Virginia Lake on an unusually cloud filled day.  Below is our Incze family get together following my Grandfather's funeral service at my aunt Etelka and uncle Bela's house.  So nice for all of us be together, even on such a profoundly sad occasion.

 My parents have been taking Grandma for tons of fun outings.  She came over for the day and we walked her around the marsh near my family's house.  Tons of desert flowers were in bloom.

 Dave and I stayed at a home with Airbnb in Boise on a hill near the North End where we were looking for homes to buy.  This was the incredible view! This is the Boise foothills, a protected area filled with trails where people hike and mountain bike, and in the distance is the ski area, Bogus Basin.  The purplish/bluish color is a large amount of corn flowers in bloom, which we got to see hiking down through these trails for dinner.

 We went on a couple awesome, longer hikes in McCall.  This one was to Box Lake.

 Dave and Todd hiking back from Box Lake.  After which we went paddle boarding.

 This is Davis Beach, where we'll be getting married this fall!

 Davis Beach park from one of the docks.  In the distance is Dave, Emily and Todd.  We went to have a picnic dinner and to check out our wedding site together.  They are so lovely and helpful!  Below is a dock at Davis Beach at sunset.

 Dave on our property with all of our baby pine, fir and larch trees.

 This is on our property in Donnelly too; me to give scale to how tall the trees are.

 The lovely lake view from the Sushi restaurant in McCall.  Almost everywhere we ate had a similar, stunning view of the lake.

 I love this!  It's a gorgeous swing at Davis Beach with the most touching engraved plaque.

 The main beach on Lake Payette in McCall.

 The main beach again; just steps from where our new condo will be, yay!

 This is some more of Davis Beach.  It's narrow but quite long.  And great because only the locals know about it and visit it.  Steps from Ponderosa State Park and surrounded by the prettiest old trees.  Below is the engraving from the swing where we're getting married.  How sweet!

This is part of our condo building with the view of Payette lake.  Isn't it so beautiful in the summer with all the hanging flower pots?  A busy 3 weeks with Dave this time, with a visit to Reno then up to Boise and McCall to shop for a place to live.  We actually submitted 3 offers in that short time and luckily ended up having this wonderful place work out.  We're going to be living steps from where we lived back in February 2009, when we last lived somewhere.  Back in a peaceful small lake town where our friends live.  And just a 2 hour drive from more friends and Boise, which we have really come to love as well.  We also did a lot of wedding planning/finalizing.  I can't wait until September 12th, it's going to be heaps of fun!!!

I'm flying to Norway in a day and am excited to see my brother and sister and go on a 4 day hike until Dave arrives.  Dave and I will go on a bit of a loop backpacking tour to see some fjords and tall mountains in the center of Norway.  We'll meet up with my brother's family at a cabin in the end to relax before Dave and I both fly back to work for the month of August. 

Thank you for looking at our pictures, love you, and see you soon!

Antarctic Fishing-LMG1504

Amazing windy but sunny day in the Neumayer Straits near Palmer Station

Our lovely ship in the Neumayer headed toward Palmer, back from Fishing

These mountains never get old

 Glacier & bird

This area is where most of the cruise ships go that visit Antarctica, leaving from Ushuaia.  Below is Commersons dolphins racing the ship back in the Straits of Magellan

Sunset on our last day of the cruise, before arriving in Chile

The fun and action of getting our pots on deck (this one is full of icefish!).  I'm in yellow running the pot hauler and Jack, my coworker is in the red guiding the line through the pot hauler.

Rigging for pot fishing.  We only got to pot fish twice but it is exciting, the whole affair.  Here is us rigging for it.  It takes 3-4 hours to do 16 traps, and if you have all the knots and coils perfect then you will have a good chance of recovering them when coming back 24 hours later to see if they have fish in them.

The deck ready to deploy pots.  We actually trawled most of this month long cruise, 24 hours a day (12 hour shifts).  That's dragging a net behind the ship on the bottom of the ocean and then bringing the net on deck to see what fish are in it.  I neglected to get pictures of that.

Jack & I deploying pots.  And below is me recovering our CTD machine.  That's a cool project too...we send this machine down to 16,400 feet below sea level to take water samples for the Scripps Institute of Oceanography and NOAA, and any other Science groups or Universities.  The machine on the bottom of it, in the meantime, gives location, temperature, depth and salinity information.  We sampled Shackleton's Fracture on this trip, which before this had never been sampled.

An icy day on deck.

More gorgeous mountains and glaciers in the Neumayer.

Incredible day.

This was a treat, the scientists and all of Palmer Station threw me a Bachelorette Party after they found out I'm getting married in September.  This was the start of it, being met right on the pier after work by my good friend and roomate Kate and Kris whom I've known since 2003 at the South Pole.  He had that 6 wheeler with a sign that said "Bride to Be" and a bunch of tin cans dragging behind it on a string.  The first adventure of the night was him driving me up the hill to the "hobo fire" a fire in a 55 gallon drum, since it's my favorite thing on Station.  It's where he (the Waste Guy, and I was Waste Girl there in 2004 & 2005) burns fish bones and chicken bones.  It's so cool, and a fire!

Here is Kristin the Principal Scientist in the blue and pink (who threw me the party) and my boss on the boat April.  They had a hard hat covered in a bridal veil complete with flowers made from Kimwipes, a Kiss the Bachelorette goodbye tanktop, a vial of fish parts and custom made tshirts for all the women on Station that said "Ildi's Boat Trash Bachelorette Bash."  Below is all the women on the boat and Palmer Station, all of whom came to the party.

After dinner and cocktails, we had a Bachelorette cake and some silly games as well as seal pinatas and some dancing.  The girls kept telling me that was their favorite experience in Antarctica...me too!  Another great fishing trip.  More 12-16 hour work days without a single day off in 6 weeks, more storms and 60 knot winds; seas that made even the boat crew run.  I learned how to mend nets and did so for 60 holes in our fishing nets.  We caught a lot of fish.  I learned some great knots and remembered a lot of rope splice skills.  I was lucky to have such an awesome roomate, Kate, whom I can't wait to meet up with again soon.  In addition to the fishing and bathymetric surveys, we also recovered a glider in the Drake Passage and fished for Krill for another Science group.  I'm excited to work with some of these same groups again in October/November.  And before then, I'm scheduled to head south for more bathymetric surveys on the other ship, the NBP from Punta Arenas in the month of August. 

I finally got to see Dave and we're about to head to Idaho to look at rentals, real estate and some hikes, as well as our property up near Donnelly.  So excited to see him again, last time was in Florida.

Venice, St. Petersburg, Florida Keys

Typical Venice Florida sunset.  This was from our first sunset with the Koehlingers near the condos.

Exotic birds every time we went outdoors.

A great blue heron at the jetty's. And below is an Ibis near the beach.

We found quite a few shark's teeth and enjoyed a lot of sunshine together.

Pelicans at the jetty's.

Sunset near our condo in Venice.

Bougainvillea on a day trip at a historical mansion.

Sunset dinner and cocktails with Bette, Roger and Dave at Pop's.  Delicious!

Alligator at Homosassa Springs Wildlife State Park.  We went to see the birds and manatees.

Flamingos at Homosassa.  We saw our first roseate spoonbill there as well as tons of herons, pelicans and other gorgeous birds.  Below is outside the Dali Museum in St. Pete.  We loved it!

 Dave and I at the Dali Museum.  Amazing art and architecture.

 A beer break between museum and beach, with this harbor view.

Roseate spoonbill in the wild!  Hanging out at the beach in St. Petersburg.  How cool!  Below is post fishing cruise, in Key West with my dear friends cutting bait.

My first night after my 6 week Antarctic fishing cruise was here in Pelican Bay at Key Largo.  Thank you so much Dave!  I love you!!  I spent countless hours in that hammock.  Then ate blackened mahi.

Key West susnet from Andrew's boat.  After we set a cute fish trap and cruised the bay.  Below is one of the main beaches on Key West.  A really laid back island with a slow, peaceful pace.

Pink plumerias at the city garden, but they're also in many peoples yards.  Below is Connie and I enjoying the city garden.

Dave and I had a wonderful three weeks in Venice Florida before I deployed!  Before we arrived, we had a few days in Denver (orientation) to catch up with some loved Antarctic friends.  We met up with a lot of our Fuels friends that Dave hasn't seen since 2012 (Jeff, Steph, Keros, Kristy Carney, Tadd, Storm and Joe).

We stayed at a condo down the street from Roger & Bette, and played a lot of cards together, watched sunset, watched basketball, visited downtown Venice, relaxed on the beach and ate a ton of incredible meals together.  The time flew by incredibly quickly.  Because I deployed from Florida, my tickets after my Antarctic fishing cruise returned me to Miami and I stayed a few days to visit my friends Connie & Andrew (from McMurdo Station) in Key West.  Florida was incredibly colorful, tropical, vivid and luscious!