Travelog for: Muumipeikko

I'm on a first class USPS flight to Virginia. My flight # is
0307 0020 0000 6184 5279.

Wow! That was a quick flight! I arrived today in Virginia to a huge greeting committee! Plaid Moose, Tipsy, Shirley Sheep, & Snuggles were all on hand to welcome me to Virginia!

And once I popped out of my traveling case, I helped out Mausi & HitchaRideMo too!


And here we all are!

It has been super hot here - around 100 degrees each day - way too hot for Toy Voyagers to go out in play (since most of us are wearing fur coats!). But the heat is starting to break, so we are planning an outing for this weekend!

I had a fun day yesterday! It was Father's Day, so we went to Mara's parents' house to celebrate. First, I helped her dad with the grill (can you see me? It was very sunny...)...

Then, I relaxed under the shade of the umbrella...

While we were waiting for lunch to cook, we all played hide-and-go-seek in her parents' yard. Can you find me in my hiding place?

And here we are afterwards relaxing on the front porch!

After we celebrated Fathers Day, we went with Mara and her husband to play softball. They couldn't take pictures during the game (since they were playing!), but here I am at the field!

I had such a fun weekend! I hopped into Mara's backpack with the other toy voyagers and we all went to a scrapbooking convention! Here I am at the entrance...

We started with some shopping. Here I am with Plaid Moose looking around at all the booths to shop at!

Then it was time to take some classes. Mausi and I looked at the class schedule and decided which ones we wanted to take.

Here I am making a summer album:

And here I am making a special layout for some pictures!

What a fun weekend!

We had a busy weekend here! Even though it was really hot, we all went to the Nationals-Orioles game! Here I am in our seats, watching the baseball game:

And here I am in front of the scoreboard, which Mara said has one of the biggest HD screens in any stadium!

Hello! What a lucky toy voyager I am! Mara & her husband are off on vacation for their anniversary, and they took us with them! We are going to Williamsburg, which is exciting in itself, but even more exciting considering that Plaid Moose used to live there! (back when Mara was in college at William & Mary, Plaid Moose lived on her desk!) So he's going to get to show us around! We started our trip by driving to Williamsburg. We tried to help navigate...good thing they knew where they were going!

We spent the afternoon walking around Colonial Williamsburg - the colonial capital of Virginia, and where a lot of early US history took place. Here I am in front of the Governor's Palace:

And here I am in front of the Capital building:

Then we stopped for lunch...Mausi was so excited...The Cheese Shop! It turns out that it's also a very popular place to get sandwiches - we had a very yummy lunch!

Then we walked around the campus of William & Mary. It's the second oldest college in the US. Here I am in front of the Wren Building - the oldest building in continuous use on a college campus in the US. It's where Thomas Jefferson studied...and Mara took classes in this building too! (sorry for the shadows...it was very sunny!)

And here we all are at Crim Dell - one of the most romantic places on a college campus in the world!

We finished up at Mara's sorority house - where both Mara & Plaid Moose lived in college!

Once we were done sightseeing for the day, we went to check in at the hotel. Because they were celebrating, Mara & her husband stayed at Kingsmill, a nice resort with lots of really nice golf courses (pros play here!) on the James River. None of us play golf, but the resort is really nice! Here I am at the main resort building - you can see part of the golf course and the James River in the background!

And here we are on the balcony of our room!

After all that excitement, we were all ready to go to bed...all tucked in for a good night's sleep!

What a FANTASTIC day! I got to fulfill one of my life missions - we all went today to Busch Gardens! It was a rainy day, so we didn't take a lot of pictures, but, as Mara said, a rainy day at an amusement park is still a lot of fun! Here I am at the entrance...

Busch Gardens is divided up into countries from Europe, and each area is designed to look like that country. So here I am in front of Busch Gardens' version of Big Ben in London!

After taking the picture, we had to decide what to do first, so we helped with the map again (still, a good thing that Mara knows her way around!)

I didn't go on any of the rides (they were way too scary for a little Toy Voyager like me!), but here I am underneath one of the roller coasters - the Loch Ness Monster - which is celebrating its 30th anniversary this year!

And here I am on one of the bridges overlooking the river and rides - you can see three of the park's roller coasters in the background, as well as the river cruise ride!

Our last day of vacation we spent in Yorktown - the site of the last major battle of the Revolutionary War. We started at the Victory Center, where there is a museum and a recreation of the Continental Army Encampment. Here I am listening to the artillery demonstration:

Then we looked at the supply tent:

And here is the tent where George Washington would have stayed and planned the attack:

Finally, we drove to the National Park site (where the actual battle took place) - here we are on one of the cannons:

I had a great trip, but I am glad to be going home (and glad to be getting some rest!)

Hello! Mara feels horrible that we haven't updated my travel log. But, I am still here and still having fun, even though we lost all of the pictures! It's been super hot here, so we've spent a lot of time inside. We read books, watch baseball, and play cards...I also have been teaching everyone about the Moomins, since they don't have them here in the US! I even stayed up till 2 am to watch the All Star Game! (sorry mommy - I know that was WAY past my bedtime!) As soon as Mara's laptop gets fixed, we can post the pictures that we do have!

Hi! Even though we can't find the pictures of us watching the All Star game (it was very late...Mara thinks she might have hit delete accidentally since we were up till 2 am!), we found a couple of other pictures of what we have been up to! It's been hot out, so we've been spending a lot of time inside. We've been playing cards...

And I taught my friends about the Moomins - I can't believe that they had never heard of us before!!

We've also been reading a bunch of books. Mausi really likes this one, since the mouse in it looks a lot like him!

It was Mara's husband's birthday this week, so we decided to help out with the celebration! First, we needed to bake a cake. Of course, the eggs looked so much like me I thought I could hide in the carton without anyone noticing.

Of course, it didn't take long for Mausi and Plaid Moose to find me!

Then I helped mix up the cake.

After the cake baked, it was time to decorate it. Here I am putting the happy birthday candles in:

And here we are with the finished cake!

Don't you think we did a good job? Mara must have, because she let us come along to the restaurant for dinner. We went to a Japanese restaurant where they cook the dinner in front of you. I liked watching a lot - here I am with our chef!

What a fun night we had this week! We tagged along with Mara & her husband to a concert at Wolf Trap! Wolf Trap is a National Park - the only U.S. National Park for the Performing Arts. It's a very popular place here to see concerts/plays/etc. - it's an outdoor pavilion with a huge lawn behind it. Mara said that a lot of times they will sit on the lawn (since you can bring a picnic, and it's her favorite place to see a summer concert!). But since they were seeing a special performance by the National Symphony Orchestra as her birthday present to her husband, they decided to sit inside. It was hard to get a good picture of the entire thing, since I am such a small hippo! But here I am at the top of the hill in front of the pavilion:

And here I am at the side before we went inside!

Can you see the trash cans at the very bottom? That should give you a good idea of how big the pavilion is! Here's a picture I found online of a good aerial shot of Wolf Trap:

And here I am before the show started. (sorry it's so fuzzy...you can't use a flash inside!) We saw Eric Idle performing with the NSO his new show, "Not the Messiah: He's a Very Naughty Boy".

What fun I have been having! Everyone here is very excited about the Olympics. So I have been getting to watch the games, especially the swimming. Swimming is the biggest story here in the US, as Michael Phelps is attempting to win 8 gold medals! Mara says he's from Baltimore (which is pretty close to here), and everyone is glued to the tv set to watch his races live. Here I am with Plaid Moose watching him get ready to race...

The most exciting race so far was the 4x100m relay where the US won at the very last second. Here we are watching it - you can see the swimmers cheering on their teammate and reacting to the win!

And here I am with Plaid Moose enjoying the games!

Well, I have had a wonderful trip to the United States, but now I am off to my next host! I am on my way to the Netherlands...hopefully the flight will be quick (and have lots of snacks!)