fun in veniee

Venice was built on Piles or large wooden poles harvested from Croatia. These piles have been petrified under the water due to lack of oxygen and the mineral rich content of the water.

This is just one of many beautiful building in Venice. Isn't the architecture awesome?



















This is my first day in Venice. It is very beautiful here in the city. The blue skies are towering above the buildings. and the food is awesome.

the plane ride not to home...

I have got to be honest with you , I don't really know where I am , our plane pilot became to busy

planning for his party at his private beach house in Hawaii.I'm guessing the plane fell right around Mexico city because I see a sign that says " WELCOME TO MEXICO CITY " in Spanish. I'm going to start walking down the road , hitch hiking. Can some one please come get me! I'm all alone

because Eleanore decided to stay one extra day in New Zeland. Once again, HELP!

-AnNa

NICK Name Island

Welcome to NICK Name Island! There is a pretty big mountain range on my island, and in some of the mountains there are caves that have stalagtites and stalagmites. In my favorite cave (below) there are crystal formations. I named this cave Crystal Gleam (nickname: C.G.). Sometimes the rocks in C.G. seem to glow in the light, and it's beautiful!

Do I have any pets? Yes, I do! I have an especially unusual pet. He is a MONSTER! ...named Fluffy (nickname: Fluffs). He is pink and purple and very nice...only to whom I introduce to him and he becomes friends with. I built this castle (below) for Fluffs, and he calls it "Fuffy Caffle". His nickname for it is "Fuffy Home". Fluffs lets my friends and me ride on his back sometimes. He is very fun to hug since he is so very very fluffy.

Oh yes, yes, yes! I have to tell you about the lake, which has tons and tons of fish. Which means really good fishing. So I fish there sometimes and every single time I catch at least one fish. But there is one fish that you rarely would ever see...

...the blobfish! (nickname: Blobby)

My rainforest is a fun place to play. I named it Palm Tree Forest (nickname: Palmy), where I always pick coconuts for their "milk". And there is a stream in this magical place. I usually have a picnic and eat pineapples, mangoes, bananas and pizza (I'll explain why it's pizza later).

Now for the amenities on my island. There is a long running path that leads to a trampoline (which is unusually bouncy) and then into a foam pit. I play on this and learn new tricks.

Back to the pizza. I have a pizza restaurant named Peetsy Pizza. (nickname: Food Place).

I invite all of you bloggers to come visit me and Fluffy on NICK Name Island.

Nicholas

GBWBSJ Island

This is my island. When it rains, it rains lemon drops. I put buckets out to catch them (I love lemon drops).

My island is a volcano. It started in the center of the earth where the rock is so hot it is liquid. It came through a crack in the bottom of the ocean and burped out for millions of years.  It burped and burped until it reached the surface of the ocean. It kept burping until it erupted into my island. At the center of my island is a crater, called Squid Jellyfish Crater. It collects rain.

The crater has an island in it, which has a crater at the center of it, which has an island, which has a crater in it. See it?

Here are some places you might want to visit on my island:

In the northeast, there is Magenta Pineapple Island. You can get magenta colored pineapples there.

In the southeast is my house, which is super small on the outside but when you walk in it's a MANSION. I couldn't take up the whole island with my house so I asked a very NON-famous architect named "Mississippi Granger" (pseudonym) whose real name is John Hancock to build my house.

By pineapple island there are animals that are whales/butterflies. They can swim under water and fly above land.

In the northwest corner of my island there is a graveyard, in which is buried the whale butterflies and the giraffe bumblebees.  The other animals do not die because they drink from the purple lemonade spring next to the graveyard.

On the central southern coastline there is a peninsula. I like to squish putty in my feet on that peninsula.

See you there!

Frances Joy Hamilton

Tick Tack Toe Land

Hello!!! Sorry, but when I get home, you all might want to run into your houses and lock all the doors because I just might eat you! I really like cannibals. You see, ever since I went to Papua New Guinea, I have been ever so interested in them!

Here on Tick Tack Toe Land, I convinced some to come and live on my island with me.

Okay, enough with them and on to my island.


My island, Tick Tack Toe Land, is not necessarily beautiful or perfect or a #1 travel destination, but a raw, dangerous place in the middle if the Indian Ocean. But that is why I like it.

There are killer blue birds that circle above you every day, waiting to attack but they never do; there is a sound house on the very end of the peninsula that makes really scary noises to keep people away; there are snakes, bats, big insects, quicksand, and dead rats all over the western side of the island.

But, like all places there are some good things too.  

 TTTL has the longest river in the world, 4,146 miles (one mile longer than the Nile). The river is called, Wonder Stream, but everybody calls it Bay to Bay because it comes in on south east side of the island and goes out the north side, through the delta. 


The whole Island is a meadow (except for one part which is a mountain range that has the tallest mountain in the world that has just been discovered by me), and there is only one type of flower that grows here. It is an orange and pink poppy. It is wonderful to look at. 

These are the orange and pink poppies.

In the center of the island, there is a soda fountain. But it is actually is a fountain of soda!
 It is soooooooooo cool! And, it has the best flavors! My favorite is strawberry. Mmmmmm. I should go get some right now before the line forms.


See you all soooooo soon! LZ

a land... without a name

I'm sorry that I couldn't name my world, I just couldn't decide on one. Anyways, you probably

don't even care about the name, in fact, you're only reading this to find out what my world looks

like. You couldn't care less about the name. However, I do care about the name. And you should to! But you know what, if you don't care about some thing that I do care about, then I'm not going to care about something that you care about. Now lets not forget why you're reading this. ( if you are having trouble figuring out what I'm talking about read words 27-37 ) I'm not going to describe it to you the way that the other children did, I'm only going to tell you what you need to know about: transportation. There are only 7 ways to get around in my world:bike riding

roller blades/skating, skiing, po-go sticking, walking, and dolphin riding. The thing that probably caught your eye most is dolphin riding, let me get one thing straight, this is not the kind of dolphin you're used to. These dolphins are professionals and know where they're going. In my world, D.S. stands for dolphin stop and there are several D.S.s across my territory. The dolphins are all on a track that goes around the land, the track is filled with water ( as you might have guessed.) The only way to get to my world is to wait for a cold snowy night, at midnight you

go outside in your pajamas into your street and this part is very hard, I'm not sure you're ready

for it : you do the chicken dance. ( it helps to cluck) after about ten minuets of chicken dancing

( or at least enough time for me to see it ha ha) you will look at your street sign and discover that

it reads D.S. and right next to it will be a dolphin named Stanly. ( don't worry he doesn't bite, most of the time anyways)

hope to see you in a land... without a name soon!

- Anna

Logie Land

When I first arrived in Logie Land I thought I was in a dream. I was floating in the
pitch dark with only the stars and the moon to light up the night sky. When the sun rose the next morning I woke up, still floating in the sky, but on golden clouds above a HUGE island shaped like a bear. This was so hard to believe, I pinched myself to see if I was truly awake, OUCH! Slowly, I started sinking out of the sky until I landed at the bottom of a ginormous mountain. Next to me was a rock sculpture about ten feet tall in the shape of the infinity symbol. On one side of the sculpture was a raging waterfall which sprayed me with mist, and on the other side, was a gigantic tree growing in the shape of broccoli.

I started looking around and suddenly a gondola appeared so I jumped aboard. Once I got in I realized I didn't have my skis and I was praying for a miracle in the form of fat pow skis. As the door of the gondola opened, a brand new pair of Jaguar Shark Moment skis appeared. This was my lucky day! Nothing but POW, POW and more POW! I looked behind me and I couldn't see my tracks,then I looked at my feet and the snow was magically filling them in. While I was looking at my feet I went off a HUGE cliff, who knows how big, but surprisingly I stuck it. All of a sudden there was a sweet kicker built on a blind roll over, I did the floatyiest superman front flip I have ever done!

After skiing I went down to the longest river in the world it is 590,450,765 miles long. I took off my ski clothes and my long johns magically turned into waders. Weird! I saw a golden fly rod in the middle of the river!!! I waded into the water and grabbed the golden rod. Let the fishing begin! The next thing I knew I had a huge fish on my line, I tried reeling him in but I couldn't. All of the sudden I was being pulled down the river by some sort of crazy, huge fish!? After wake boarding on my butt for quite a while, I got washed up on a beach.

I got up, dusted off, and then realized I was in my bathing suit. As I looked around I saw a water fountain, but it wasn't water coming out, it was something dark purple and red. What a weird place this is! I went over and tasted it, my favorite POMEGRANATE JUICE!!! I got a cup that was sitting on the side of the fountain and chugged so much that I started turning purple! I sat down on the beach watching the waves and wait for my coloring to come back.

While sitting of the beach I kept hearing some rustling in the bushes. I saw a little dwarf run in front of me, then he grabbed me and threw me off the Head Peninsula and into Fire Cove! I got super mad at him I chased him right into the Delight Forest. Fresh, delicious fruit was everywhere! Wait, I'm trying to catch a dwarf, not eat fruit! I finally caught and tackled that pesky little dwarf and as I was getting ready to pelt him with fruit I saw that it was Cody! I asked him how he got here and he told me about floating in the night sky and riding on golden clouds in a dream world. It was starting to get dark so we finished eating our delightful fruit and headed back toward the beach. Just as I was dosing off, I felt like I was being lifted and into the clouds again. Good night, sweet dreams!

Logybear
P.S. I think I might want to stay here for awhile.

Codyland

When I first got to Codyland, I landed my helicopter in Cody City. Cody City sits in the southern portion of Codyland, just north of Strawberry Peninsula and every building is as high as the Empire State Building. It was dark out and you could hear the dogirds (aka dog-birds) yawn from 590,678,510,660 miles away. I could feel the light, wonderful breeze. The next day when the Ooga (sun) came out, it got so hot (500*F) that I had to head to Snow Volcano to cool off and ski. The greatest part of Snow Volcano is that every time you jump a cliff and make a bomb hole, the pow immediately fills in your hole. All tracks are first tracks!


After my legs got too tired to ski any longer I headed to Paintball Land. Thing One and Thing Two, my head scientists in Paintball Land, make robots that are programmed to shoot paint balls at me. The robots roll across the land like rolly-pollys and make my target practice challenging. Unfortunately today I lost the battle when one of my robots caught me and threw me all the way to Air Bag Valley, just east of Mt. Everest. I hit the suction shuttle button which vacuumed me to the top of Mt. Everest. With my skis I dropped in from the highest points and launched a triple cork 1620* onto one of the airbags in the Valley.

I got so hungry I had to take a break and headed for Spaghetti Tree Peninsula, my very favorite place to dine. Yuuummmmm! My tummy was too full to do anymore bouncing so I went to Zero Gravity Land to take a nap while floating amongst the stars. Goodnight, sleep tight.

I just couldn't get enough of Codyland, so the next morning I got up and went to Dogird Land. My favorite Dogird in all the land is Duke. Duke and I spent all day flying around WaWa Mountain. Waterfalls, lagoons and geysers are everywhere! Whenever my Mom visits she always loves Wawa Mountains the best. Dogird worked so hard carrying me around all day I treated him to Snow Cone Land before heading home.

I may never leave, so I apologize if I miss a few of my classes and blog posts. I hope you understand.

Cody

Yacob land

Ahhhhh. it is so very nice to be here! Yacob land has a mountain, that has one really long chair lift, that takes you to the very top of the mountain and there is only one run, that goes from: powder trees, to park, to more pow pow, to a water fall were you clip out of your skis and ski boots and kayak down a very long river that spells: land. (That is why it's Yacob land.) You can see all of the animals along the river and then you get to my mansion. The water supply comes from The Water Tree. The Water Tree is a tree that hangs upside down from a cloud, (thats where it gets its water from) and has 2 hoses, 1 hot, 1 cold. The hot goes to my crater hot tub, and the cold is my drinking and river water. My language is fwigan, (pronounced: fweegin) this is how you spell hi in fwigan: hi. There is also a colorful forest on Yacob land, and all the trees are different colors and in it lives the rare plada-bird! It his orange, has a long tail, and has a long yellow beak. OOOOO!!!!! There it is!!! I'm off to catch it! Bye!

Yacob :)

Climbing Palm Trees and Dancing in Fiji

When Keegan and I went to Fiji, we went to see a Fijian meke dance where men, women and children all take part. The women danced with fans and the men danced with clubs and spears. The music was a steady beating of sticks. After their performance, they encouraged the guests to join them in a simple dance movement called the taralala. So, we went up and joined in dance with them. It was a new experience because I've been doing hip-hop as my dance, and now I got try a new dance.

After the dance, Keegan and I went to the beach. It was in the evening, and we found a palm tree sticking out over the water. I saw it and the thought came "I want to climb that tree!" So, what did I do? I climbed out onto the tree and I kept going and going and going. When I was almost to the end, something happened... My grip loosened, I struggled to keep on the trunk, but it was too late. I fell down, down, down toward the water and fell in with a SPLASH! It was warmer than I expected, but I still rushed to shore. Keegan and I ran back to our hotel so I could dry off. Anyway, it was a good vacation to Fiji.

See you all soon,

Nicholas

Before and After

Before I got to Bhutan with Cody, I made a list of 10 things I thought the country would be like:
1. It has square houses
2. Cheetahs live there
3. There are no trees
4. There are pyramids
5. The people look Korean
6. The people's favorite food is snakes
7. The geography is desert
8. The coordinates are: 23 North and 32 East
9. They have plenty of fresh, clean water
10. The people are mostly mad.
*Bonus thought: Countries that are nearby: Korea, India



Then I got to Bhutan and here is what Cody and I found:

1. Cody and I stayed in a traditional Bhutanese house, made out of mud, bamboo, and wood. The doors and windows were decorated with animal and flower designs. In the house we stayed in, the cows lived on the bottom floor, the second floor had storage, and the third floor is where we lived.  And the most important part of every house is a prayer flag in the center of the roof

2. One website told us there were cheetahs in southern Bhutan, but most websites talked about the snow leopard. Cody and I saw a snow leopard. It was crouching on the mountainside. This is what he looked like!

3. We saw the Himmalaya from everywhere! We also saw lots of rice paddies. There is flatness and pointiness everywhere here. We couldn't find any deserts in Bhutan.

4. Cody and I went base jumping off the Lakhang, which are monastaries. Check this out. (We got this picture after we jumped.)

5. The people don't look Korean. They come from tribes of northern Burma and northeast India and Nepal. So they look like this

6. "Ema datse," which is chilies and cheese, is one of the favorite dishes in Bhutan.

7. Bhutan is comfortably squeezed into the middle of the Himalaya

8. 27 N, 90 E.  I was close!

9. Glaciers are melting and so water is harder to get. Also, even in Bhutan, there is a problem with dirty water.

10. The goverment watches out for the happiness of its people. For a long time, they knew TV would not make people happy. They were the LAST country to introduce TV. It was the year Eleanore was born. 1999. They don't allow tobacco or plastic bags in Bhutan because the goverment thinks they make the people less happy. The one traffic light they ever had made people frustrated so they took it down and put back the person to direct traffic. That must be sooooo tiring. There is hardly ANY advertising. And Bhutan cares about the environment and the spirit of the people.

*11. I was right on one of the countries that are near Bhutan, which was India. The other one is Tibet.

 Frances Joy

Bird Watching in Madagascar

It was so fascinating to find these awesome birds and see them hanging out in the forest. This is one of my favorites, the long-tailed ground roller. It is rare (endangered) and is a ground dwelling bird.

This is the male velvet asity, which also called a false-sunbird and eats fruit.

Here is the female velvet asity. What have you been eating lately? Burger King? (Ha ha ha.)

I happened to catch this helmet vanga peeking out from behind his nest.

This pygmy kingfisher is so cute! I saw it catch a grub and feed it to its babies.

While I was bird watching, I randomly saw this little fluffy guy here. He is a lowland streaked tenrec and I named him Sparky because he looks like a mini firecracker. He was looking for earthworms when I found him, and I motioned to Logan to come over to see him. Logan looked surprised and said "What is that thing?!" The tenrec scurried back to his family burrow near a small stream when he realized we were there.

I wish I could keep one as a pet, but I can't (sigh). Oh well, he'd be too spiky anyway and I could never pick him up.

Have good travels!

Jacob

Australia

This is the Sydney Opera House

This is a Numbat. Cute right?

This is Mike

Okay I'm finally caught up on my blogs!! Good thing I kept a journal of EVERYTHING that happened on all of my trips.

We are in Sydney, home of the world famous Sydney Opera House. We saw an opera there, but I can't say I'm a big fan. Opera just isn't my style. But the opera house itself is amazing! The architecture is just wonderful.

While in a small town just outside of Sydney ( I can't remember the name) we met a man named Mike. His name may be modern, but don't be fooled. He is descended from the original inhabitants of Australia. He showed us how to throw a boomerang. Mine didn't come back. Mike says it takes years of practice to get it right. I say it takes natural born talent. Either way I had to walk for 100 meters to get mine back.

Okay, the Numbat is one of the most cute animals I have ever seen (okay, I say that to every animal. But still...)!! It looks like a striped anteater (and I think it may be a type of anteater, I can't remember) with just a little bit of chipmunk. It is just so darn cute!!!

Okay, so the two things I always notice about a country is how cute the animals are and the food. We've already covered the cute animals, so on to the food. Now I'm not a big banana person, in fact I don't eat them without peanut butter, but in Australia they grill them on the BBQ. It was amazing ( I use that word waaaayyy to much). The banana caramelizes on the inside and it is delicious!

Well, all for now. I have to get some rest for our trip to the outback tomorrow to (hopefully) see some Kangaroos!! (By the way, Joeys [ baby kangaroos] are so cute!!)

Kelsey

0 degrees, 67degrees west

This is a Black-Faced Lion Tamarin

This is (in order) Yara, Davi, and Thiago

Hey everyone! We are always talking about the equator...but we are always on one side or the other. How about being on both?? That's what Mia and I did when we went to S. Gabriel da Cachoeira. It is right on the equator. It's so cool to have your left foot where the toilet bowl spins one way and your right foot where it spins the other. I'm not going to say what country or continent S. Gabriel da Cachoeira is in. That you have to find out ;)

Our tour guide took us to a wildlife preserve where we saw a Black-Faced Lion Tamarin, a very cute endangered species. Her name was Victoria, and she was cute as could be. Until she decided the banana in my backpack looked good. She pounced. Then off I ran, screaming at the top of my lungs, and Mia and the Guide laughing their heads off. That happens a lot (not the Tamarin jumping on me, the screaming at the top of my lungs part).

We met three children on our journey. Yara, Davi, and Thiago. Yara is 11, and she made us the best rice and beans with bananas. It was amazing. Davi is 8, and he showed us their pet dog, Rio, SO CUTE! Thiago is 10, and he was silent until soccer came up. He loved soccer. He showed us all the moves he knew and told us someday he would be on the national Brazilian soccer team. All three kids were adorable.

Don't Eat Me!!!

Hi everyone! I am presently in a tree house in Papua New Guinea. I am staying near (not with) the Korowai tribe. Some people say that they are still cannibals but others say that they have finally stopped that tradition. They have been around since the Stone Age. I'm serious.   Anna and I weren't sure if we should stay with them or not but eventually we decided that we really didn't want to risk getting eating so we are staying a few miles out of their village.

This is where we are staying. Talk about a tree house!

This is what we had for dinner last night. They didn't taste like chicken.

It was a hard decision weather we should come here or not, considering all of the diseases of this jungle:

• Hepatitis A
• Hepatitis E
• Typhoid fever  
• Malaria
• Dengue fever  
• Japanese Encephalitis
• Plague
• Chikungunya
• Leptospirosis
• Rabies  

But, I will tell you that all the vaccinations were worth it! It is amazing here!

The first three days of our trip we spent on the southern coast. The ocean it touches on that side is called the Coral Sea. We were staying at Port Moresby.

If you look closely, you can see Port Moresby on the southern peninsula.

Papua New Guinea introduced me to my new favorite flower: 

It is a recently discovered orchid found in Papua New Guinea. Isn't it beautiful? I love it because it looks so delicate but also really fluorescent! So cool!

I am very glad I came to Papua New Guinea and let alone had such a good time!

Safe travels!      

Eleanore
P.S. I hope no one is in New Zealand right now! I heard about the big earth quake in Christchurch! It's so horrible!

33'S 134'E - I might just move here after ski season! -

Only 4500 nautical miles & 36 days @ sea

...from icebergs in the Southern Ocean

to great white sharks in the Indian Ocean

and kangaroos on the beach.

  No surfing today!

It sure feels good to be on land, even if only 

for a few days to arrange for fuel and food, 

because Kangaroo Island is NOT my final 

destination, only a great place to pull into 

after the long trip from Antarctica.

I'm headed to 22'S 14.36'E

Can you guess where I'm going?

hint: world's largest ______________.

 

OK - another 4 days with no wind in my sails,

but the coastal cruise was a great way to 

check out the wildlife with my binoculars

- crocodiles, water monitors, some awesome 

red birds called adelaids and koalas.

Now I am finally where I want to be, 

a group of Islands called the Whitsundays.

They are all that remains of a coastal range

which was submerged when sea levels 

rose at the end of the ice age.

There are lots of other boats around,

lots of people sharing dive stories,

great lobster dinners and music in the cockpit.

I think I'll move here - just kidding - well maybe someday.

See ya soon, Cody

P.S. have you guessed where I'm at?

Rugby World Cup 1995: New Zealand perform haka in final

Who here was Heard of rugby??? It's one of my favorite sports ever!!! and it is big in New Zealand. Here is a video of the new zealand rugby team doing their Haka, My favorite player is Jonah Lomu, look him up, this is really cool!!!!

27 degrees S 133 degrees E and 18 degrees S 175 degrees E

This is me surfing

This is a picture of my dad surfing in namotu two years ago

Hello there everybody!!!!! I happen to be blogging a little late ( I had Swollen glands it was not pretty) So here is my post about Fiji and Australia, Australia was really really cool! I loved all of the places we went, the sydny opra house, swimming on the great barrier reef, and so many other places I can not name them all!

This picture is a map of the Fiji islands Niki and I went to a Island called namotu it is so tiny that you can't see it on the map!, you can run around the Island in like 8 minutes! anyway when we meet again on the next webcast meeting im going to show You guys a traditonal warrier club it is very cool.... Did you know that the most deadly snake in the world live in namotu ( I forget the name) but they are accutaly not a threat at all their mouths are so tiny that they could really only get a hold of the web of your fingers, and they are very relaxed they to not care for humans in the slightest.

That's all I have for now!!!!

Elmo