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A visit to the USA and a BIG, BIG year ahead

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Starting 2026 with a blast Greetings and happy new year, L'ORIENTals. Lots to report and to preview. We've been back to the US, made huge plans, and, of course, spent kilo-dollars on travel and L'ORIENT.  Brisbane Airport........you get used to stuff like this in Australia To catch you up, we took the short, convenient, and inexpensive (sarcasm alert)  flight from Brizzy to LAX and on to Chicago. After catching our breath, we then went to Wisconsin to visit Kirstin's dad. We were greeted by brisk midwestern temperatures (sub zero)........remember it's trending toward Summer in Australia so our limited inventory of winter clothes was required. An early snow at the beginning of December tested our very rusty snow shoveling skills, as someone close to us had inexplicably bought an electric snow shovel which only worked on dry snow less than 4 inches deep. Unfortunately, the actual snow was wet and far deeper.  No hard feelings, as Kirstin and I recovered the use of bot...
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More from Vanuatu and then back to Scarborough

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How long is the wait? Our restaurant with a view Our journey continued in Vanuatu. On L'ORIENT, we refer to our treks into undeveloped places as getting a taste of "village life". On Vanuatu, the outer islands are some of the most remote places we've ever been. We're talking no tourists, no electricity, no roads and only structures made from palm leaves and rope. And lots (I mean lots and lots) of children running around. The stares and instant child mobs we picked up while landing the dinghy ashore were the telltale sign that they don't see cruisers or white people very often, if at all. We were startled by how many kids were around in the middle of the day during the week until we learned that due to a teacher's strike most of the state run schools have been closed... for the past 11 months! Obviously this is a very big problem in a country where 43% of the population is under 18 (in the US that number is 22%). Some children attend religious schools - in...
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