Caribbean Vacation! and hard news

I just returned from a week-long sailing vacation in the British Virgin Islands with family and friends who are now family. It was beyond expectations and words cannot convey the amazing time we all had. We snorkeled and talked and ate and played with the kids, and I jumped off the flybridge into moonlit water to swim with bioluminescence. Three times.

My energy level was amazing for most of the trip and I was one of the first into the water every chance. We saw so many fish, I practiced snorkel diving, and my body did so well! The tropics are a fabulous place for me to visit, but heat rash let me know that more northern climates are best long-term! The travel days, especially the flights, were exhausting and tremendously painful but I knew that going in.

The trip wasn't all positives, though. Seeing the scale of hurricane damage up close proved the consequences of how greatly humanity is changing the climate. My cousin and her young family were on the trip; her husband was our captain. The last full day we learned that their home in Redding, Ca, was destroyed by the Carr Fire. There were some tears shed and shock all around, but also tremendous gratitude that they didn't live through that nightmare. They're now making big decisions about their future on an increasingly risky planet.