AV's Weak Attempt at the Blog

Slide Show of Armenia Medical Missions Trip

andrewvilla — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 04:41:33 +0000

Here’s a 4 minute animoto slide show I made to show at our church. Credit for some of the photos go to Ira Petersen, a friend who has a great photo eye.

You may see my iPhone in one of the pics – it is supposed to show that there are 4 bars (service strength) on the phone while we are in a teeny village in Armenia, about 5 hours from the nearest city – while I’m in my home in Chandler, I’m grateful when I have 1 bar!

Last Stop – Monte Carlo

andrewvilla — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 03:59:49 +0000

We’ve actually been home for the past two weeks but, as expected, it’s been a zoo at work and had multiple meetings, etc. Anyway, here’s a few pics from our last stop on the trip – Monte Carlo, Monaco. There was a Kart Racing Grand Prix event while we were there. While the kart pics look like kids driving them, there were actually professional drivers going extremely fast – can’t tell from the picks.

Monte Carlo is a very picturesque place but my favorite spot is still Portofino and Renee’s is Barcelona.

It was an amazing trip! It is good to be home (but I could have tolerated another week on the ship).

I’ll continue to update the site with event pics and pics of Dave’s football games, lacrosse game, etc. so family/friends can keep informed as to what’s up.

Thanks for visiting…

French Alps - flight from Nice to London

View of Monte Carlo from the port

"The Casino"

Kart Grand Prix

Close up of Kart

Prince's Palace

View of the Port - our ship was the large one on the left

The Vows

andrewvilla — Sat, 17 Oct 2009 18:21:44 +0000

By the way, unbeknownst to Renee prior to the cruise is that I arranged for us to renew our vows with the captain of the ship during our stop in Portofino. Despite her not quite getting into her wedding dress, I held up my end of the bargain. : ) A few pics of the event (on the bridge of the ship) are below.

A little champagne on the bridge

The couple with El Capitain

The payoff : )

Quite the spiffy couple

Portofino, Italy

andrewvilla — Sat, 17 Oct 2009 18:11:37 +0000

Portofino is a very quaint village and as you drive (by small boat) into the village it reminds one of Venice, albeit much cleaner. The village is very picturesque and has many very enchanting villas, restaurants, and shops. The surrounding buildings and hillside crowd the small harbor and add to its charm and intimacy.

We traveled by ferry to the next two towns, Santa Margarita and Rapallo. Both towns were larger than Portofino with more shops and restaurants but each had its local charm and identity.

For me, Portofino was one of my favorite stops due to its intimate nature, friendly locals, and scenic beauty.

Next up Monte Carlo, Monaco for a brief visit prior to getting back on the plane and a long travel day back home (Nice-London-San Fran-Phoenix) – ugh!

Santa Margarita

Christopher Columbus statue in Santa Margarita

Watering hole in Santa Margarita

Santa Margarita Church

Santa Margarita Church ceiling

Rapallo

Shop in Portofino

Unassuming entry into Portofino

Portofino

R & A enjoying the view

Portofino Harbor

Portofino church

Afternoon in Portofino

Coast of France

andrewvilla — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 21:15:36 +0000

So the seas of the coast of France were getting a little rough. After our visit to Sete we ended up aborting our port of call at St. Tropez due to large swells. We ended up going to Toulon instead – a larger town west of St. Tropez.

Sete is a very small town on the southern coast of France. The town is trying to build up its tourism so at this time most of the shops and restaurants are very authentic French without the tourism hype. It has the atmosphere of an old fishing town – which still accounts for one of its main industries.

Toulon has a naval port and a reasonably large military base. It is really not a touristy city so we traveled north to a town, AIX – Provence. This is a bustling town with many spider-webbing small streets and a main wide avenue where much of the local commerce is located.

After a moderately rough morning due to high winds the seas improved and have been relatively calm since.

Renee continues to do well on the boat – although she caught a cold that has been improving.

Next we are off to the small Italian port town of Portofino.

Bien au revoir amis.

Local winery in AIX-Provence

Port of Toulon

Renee on the canal bridge

Entry into AIX-Provence

"Main Street" in AIX-Provence

Canal in Sete

Coast of Spain

andrewvilla — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 07:13:22 +0000

After the ship recovered from its rough first day at sea (40% of the crew and 75% of the passengers were sick) we had really nice visits to the Spanish island of Mallorca and the to Barcelona. Both days were very fun. On Mallorca we took a bike tour and in Barcelona we were on foot for most of the city. Both cities were heavy in gothic architecture and had significant renovations to the original building designs. A Spanish architect, Antonio Gaudi, whose work transformed both of these areas, designed the renovations.

Mallorca is a favorite summer vacation area for many Europeans, especially the Brits and the Germans. The island is very picturesque and has a pretty active nightlife.

Barcelona has a lot of old world charm with many very narrow streets and apartments/homes crowded lining these streets. There is a mixture of old and new buildings often creating significant contrasts on the same street.

Renee is holding up well with her patches doing a wonderful job in keeping the seasick bug away.

Below are a few picks from Mallorca and Barcelona.

Hasta luego.

Mallorca Harbor

Cathedral

Light reflecting through stained glass onto organ pipes

Cathedral alter

Barcelona street

Barcelona Cathedral

Street musician - had a great voice -playing classical guitar

Barcelona city view from harbor

Barcelona city view with Christopher Columbus statue

Barcelona city view

Bon Voyage

andrewvilla — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 14:59:37 +0000

We’re currently on a ship in the Mediterranean heading towards Spain. The sea is very rough with 15-18ft. swells. Many of the people on the boat are not doing well. There are some strange sounds coming from their cabins. Luckily, I don’t get seasick and Renee is doing well with her scopolamine patch. There are not a lot of people out and about on the ship. Only 9 people showed up for a blackjack tournament, which I came in second – losing to a 72 year-old grandmother card shark from San Francisco.

By the way, our luggage woes actually got worse when leaving Yerevan. We had left a large suitcase with the team to take back to the U.S. for us in order to limit our bags to 20kg (44lbs each). When we arrived at the airport we were informed by the luggage Gestapo that we are allowed only 20kg each (total), despite the fact that we flew to Yerevan on the same airline with two bags each at 20kg. They wanted to charge us $600 for one bag and $350 for the other bag (20 Euros per kg)! Their policy seems to be a moving target. So, we hurriedly redistributed some of our stuff and left another bag. We also hid our carryon bags from their site and they gave me a couple of folding/stick tags to put on my backpack and camera bag. I made it look like I put them on these bags and when we left the counter I actually put them on our other carryon bags – it was time to alter our previously honest tactics. It worked almost flawlessly until they made us check one of the bags in Vienna – but at least they didn’t charge us. Aaron, (and whoever else ended up with our stuff) thanks for helping us out with the bags.

We arrived in Rome, stayed at a great hotel and did a tour of the Vatican and St. Paul’s Cathedral. Ate gelato a few times and shopped for some items on a list given to me by my mother. Apparently my mom thought she would ask my entire family brothers, nieces, etc. if anyone wanted something from Italy – who wouldn’t! 150 Euros later we were done.

A couple of pics of our sweet cabin are below with a few pics from Rome.

Arrivederci.

Renee in front of the Pope's apartment at the Vatican

Painting on ceiling in Vatican

Inside St. Peter's Cathedral

Apparent heavenly rays in St. Peter's Cathedral

The back of our cruising vessel

A view of our sweet cabin

Reverse view of our cabin - thank you Amex!

Our first food on board - gotta have Skittles!

More Armenia Pics

andrewvilla — Sat, 10 Oct 2009 08:53:00 +0000

Ok, so Renee and I are now in Rome for a few more hours before getting on a boat for a week. The mission trip in Armenia was great – not Renee’s cup of tea, but she was a big help and survived the week : )

One of the villages we went to was like the land that time forgot. The village is about 200 meters from the Azerbaijan border. It was like a living Life Magazine from 1941. The people in the village had minimal services – no running water, some had electricity-some not. Many had significant hypertension and most had muscular skeletal pain from working so hard. Needless to say our chiropractor, Dr. Don, had a very busy day – including tending to some of the teams’ own aches and pains.

The people that we have seen all week have very little and are greatly appreciative of receiving what little medical cafe we provide. They are grateful for receiving just Tylenol or aspirin. For our team, and for me, it is always a humbling experience. Most of them are gracious and occasionally some will offer gifts. I received some home made apricot vodka. I didn’t taste it – didn’t have to ’cause I think I got a buzz just from smelling it. Karen (one of the local pastors) told me it’s 70-75% proof – that’s stronger than our hand sanitizers that we bring!

Well, off to the boat. I hope to post a few pics from the cruise if we get an internet connection. We’re starting to miss home (not work) and we hope all is well there.

God Bless.

Mom and her baby with a heart defect - will need surgery

Joni and Maria

Littel girl from village

Local village Crypt Gang

A village popi (Armenian grandfather)

Village trucking company - at least it's reliable

Villager hauling firewood

Village alleyway

Man in a village potato mill

Typical village men

A couple more village men

The team after a day of clinic

Armenia update

andrewvilla — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 18:25:08 +0000

Quick update – just packing for Italy – leaving in a few hours. When we get to our hotel in Rome I will post a more informative post with some more pics.

Overall, the trip has been awesome with a great team. Not sure it’s Renee’s cup of tea, but she has been a great trooper.

Arrived in Armenia

andrewvilla — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 17:07:52 +0000

Well, we made it to Armenia. Our luggage woes continued until we got here. But that’s all behind us now.

We had our first two days of clinic in two small villages about 5 hours south of Yerevan – the capital of Armenia. The pics are from these first two days. Also there are some pics of Mount Ararat in Turkey, when we were at a historical church built in 640 AD, about a couple hundred yards from the Turkish border.

Janna (sono tech at NHWC) needed to be with us today as I did about 30 ultrasounds myself – including gallblader and breast scans – next time I won’t accept a raincheck!