Chuck Goes To New Zealand/Australia-Sydney & Melbourne (Cayden Brown)

Chuck went and visited the Sturt Family who live in Melbourne, Australia. He went on an adventure to Sydney where he visited the Darling Harbour and Circular Quay. He saw Maritime Museum, the Sydney Opera House and of course the Sydney Harbour Bridge. He also made a stop in Wellington, New Zealand.

Chuch with Emalee at the beach

Sydney Harbour Bridge

Aborginis In New Zealand

Sydney Opera House

Melbourne Temple
Sydney Harbour Bridge Harbour

German Town @ Huntington Beach (B1 Mr. Anderson - Kasey Anderson)

Huntington Beach @ latitude 33° 41' North and longitude 118° 00' West, is an affluent seaside city of about 200,000 people. It is situated in Orange County, California and close to Disneyland and about 40 miles south of Los Angeles.

HB parks and recreation features one of the largest recreational piers in the world, public parks, riding stables and equestrian trails, a marina, and a wildlife preserve, and an eight-mile biking, inline skating, jogging, and walking trail along the ocean. HB is known for it wide expanse of beautiful and spacious beaches, where large crowds gather to watch professional sporting events as the U.S. Open of Surfing, AVP Pro Beach Volleyball and the Surf City USA Marathon.
Teran visited the Old World German town in HB with all kinds of fun shops. This place is known for it’s Oktoberfest celebrations each September and October. Even though the music, food, dancing and socializing of the Oktoberfest is over, the German roots of this place is very evident. The entertainment lively, the German beers tasty, the waitresses pretty in dirndl skirts and a big wooden floor ideal for dancing the Chicken Dance - all part of this German experience. Weekend nights are just crazy, however, Friday and Saturday are suitable for adults only.
While in Old Town, Teran could not resist posing in the traditional German outfits after enjoying shopping and eating here. Auf Wiedersehen

-Tasting the flavor of places across the globe,

Teran and Pepper (aka Kasey).
(Pictures include : Pier, Old Town, Teran in German outfits and Bird of Paradise flower)

Rosarito Beach, MX (B1 Mr. Anderson - Kasey Anderson)

Rosarito at latitude 32° 31' N 117° W (pic) is about 35 minutes south of the Californian border. It is a tourist town with a small town atmosphere which is in contrast to Tijuana. Many tourists descend on this town on weekends. The population is about 60,000.

Some Americans choose to live in towns like Rosarito because of the cost of living is considerably less south of the border while still enjoying the close proximity of US, and enjoying the best of both countries.

Rosarito has miles of beaches (pic) , hotels, and dance clubs and all the souvenirs and crafts you wish to buy. Americans crowd this town, especially on holiday weekends for shopping and partying. Nearby at the Popotla are the Fox Studios (Titanic filmed) and museum and Calafia (beautiful resort hotel, see pics).
Teran loves meeting the locals at the Swap meet, beaches, and taco stands. This iss an ideal place for shopping, you’ll discover traditional Mexican crafts, quality leather goods, silver jewelry and much more in our artisan shops. Furniture stores, wrought iron, pottery, marble and handmade goods are plentiful all around town. Custom wrought iron furniture, for example, is a fraction of the price.

Wide sandy beaches, water sports, North America’s 3rd largest bike ride held twice annually, golf along the ocean, surfing, deep sea fishing, horse back riding, spas, ATV riding on the beach and the sand dunes, a host of night clubs, home of Hollywood’s newest international movie making studio Fox Studio
-Tasting the flavor of places across the globe,Teran and Pepper (aka Kasey Anderson).

Pictures include map showing Rosarito, Rosarit Beach Hotel pier, Teran went coco“nut” over tropical fruit, T with coned brown raw sugar and cinnamon sticks, Christ atop of hill (between Rosarito and Ensenada)

-Tasting the flavor of places across the globe,

Teran & Pepper (aka Kasey)

TJ Gateway to Mexico [Kasey Anderson (A2 Anderson)]

Tijuana (at 32°31' N 117°02' W) in Baja California, Mexico is the gateway (L) to Mexico. It is the busiest port of entry, about 300,000 people cross on foot or car every day. People cross over for work or fun. Most tourists go for the cheap tourist trinkets, souvenirs and crafts and taco stands while others come for the underage drinking, bar and dance scenes and pharmacies and medical services (both are comparable to US but at much cheaper rates). A popular hangout is Avienida Revolucion (R).

Soccer and bull fighting are favorite sports here. The weather is much like Southern California, hovering between the 60s in winter and 90s in the summer.The current exchange rate is about U$1 = $10.7 (pesos). While there, Teran also met some American volunteers who spent a week building a few small homes for the poor. There are groups like Builders without Borders, Charity Anywhere and Casa teams who contribute time, money and skills to better the lives of the improvised. (In contrast to small homes, there are also the more luxurious ones in this city.)

Teran, Kasey’s gnome is visiting this city :

1) Some sights in TJ include : Tijuana Arch, swap meet pictures, crafts market

2) Typical food : Teran has gone “bananas” here and “nuts” about their coconuts. The aroma of fresh tortillas made every day in the store welcomes shoppers. Pineapples and papayas are about fifty cents a pound, and to die for. Teran also enjoyed the cinnamon sticks. brown sugar cones and baked goods. Though really popular in Mexico but for health reasons, Teran stayed away from the local favorites of pork products such as manteca (lard) chicharones and pickled pig skin.

3) Some of the nicer homes in Tijuana.

4) Corporate America has invaded TJ, such as Auto Zone, Office Depot, Home Depot, Costco and Wal-mart just to name a few. -Tasting the flavor of places across the globe,Teran and Pepper (aka Kasey).

Grabnar goes to Alaska!

Shelby Bassett. Mr. Anderson B4

Grabnar, arrived recently here in Delta Junction, Alaska. Attached are 2 photos of Grabnar taken with me today at the end of the Alaska Highway. This highway stretches from Dawson Creek, British Columbia in Canada to Delta Junction, Alaska and covers 1422 miles. It was an engineering marvel built during World War II before Alaska was one of our 50 states.

Delta Junction is located in the interior of Alaska, about 100 miles south of Fairbanks. The oil pipeline passes directly through on its way south to Valdez.

In the summer, people like to ride ATV’s, camp, hike, and fish. Moose and caribou hunting is popular during the fall. In the winter, snow machines are common, and we only have daylight from 9:30am until 3pm. At other times, it’s completely dark. However, in the summer we have 20 hours of daylight, with only a few hours of dusk-like darkness. The Northern Lights are seen frequently during the winter nights here.

Common food in this area is salmon, moose jerky, caribou meat, and buffalo burgers. Our family’s favorite landmark is the top of Donnelly Dome, a wonderful hike just south of Delta Junction. We hike this on June 21, summer solstice, every year. You can see from the picture how light it is at midnight when we reached the summit. The Alaska Range towers above, with peaks up to 14,000 feet.

Lulu In Delaware!!!

Becky Hinckley (Collins)
Your geo-gnome came to Delaware. It spent most the week at home with us with sick kids. We did go to Longwood Gardens in Pennsylvania yesterday, but I forgot to take him for a picture. I made a picture on the file attached with Lulu in it. I am sorry I didn't get any pictures with Lulu in them!

Delaware is a great place to live. Everyone is friendly and happy. It is not the typical "East Coast" attitude that you hear about. The weather is nice with the exception of the humidity. The summers get pretty hot and humid and the winters pretty cold and humid. The spring and fall is very nice and beautiful because it is so green. It rains a lot and when it rains it really comes down like you wouldn't beleive, but there is not a whole lot of snow. When it does snow, even a little bit all the schools are closed. Sometimes the schools close if there is even a forecast of snow!

Delaware is part of what is called the Del-Mar-Va Peninsula. It is made up of all of Delaware and a small part of Maryland and Virginia. Pennsylvania is North of Delaware and New Jersey is just across the bridge to the East. If you head 30 minutes in North, West, or East from where I live you will be in another state.

Cars are the main form of transportation, although there is a bus system available for those without cars. It is not too reliable though. The Amtrak train is used a lot for those who commute to DC, New York, or Philly for their jobs.

Unfortunately, there are not any mountains around us. If you use your imagination, it sometimes seems like you are in the mountains because there are very tall trees lining the highways and many backyards. As I said before it is very green.

Sebastian Visits Melbourne Australia

My geognome went to Melbourne, Australia where my cousin is serving a mission. He took this picture of the State Library which is in the center of Melbourne close to Flinders Street (where the oldest train station in Melbourne is located). Melbourne is the second most populated city in Australia and is the State Capital of Victoria. Melbourne is often referred to as Australia's "sporting & cultural capital". The climate is moderate oceanic. Their winters usually experience some frost and fog with extremely rare snowfall. Christianity is the most practiced religion. Over two-thirds of Melbourne speak English, next being Italian, then Greek and last being Chineese languages. A popular sport played there, similar to football, is Rugby.

--Brigham Wells

Emily Broughs geognome in Okazaki, Japan!!!

This is my geognome in Japan, and my brother is actually holding it. He's on his mission here, so I'm pretty lucky!

Where is my Geo Gnome? A. Okazaki, Japan!

What is the culture there? A. Shinto and Buddhism are the biggest religions, and everything is backwards to the US!

How is the food? A. Very salty, and lots of fish. They also eat TONS of rice!

What is the main religion there? A. Buddhism and Shintoism

How is the climate? A. Up north in Nagano, it's very cold. Here, near the Nagoya city area, it's still pretty warm, and very very humid.

Anonymous goes to Fukuoka, Japan

1. My gnome went to Fukuoka, Japan.
2. They speak Japanese and English.
3. There are mountains in Fukuoka.
4. For fun they play in the mountains, rivers, hot springs, amusement parks and beaches.
5. The weather is much like Utah except for the high humidity in the summer. In the winter it has cold winds from Russia and snow.

Ross Belliston

Lester goes to Wendover

Lester goes to Wendover Nevada! Lester partys at Wendover! Easton Hood

Harvey Goes to Paris!!!! (texas that is ;)) Lauren Turner

1 – Location Paris, Texas
2 – Language English
3 – Transportation Most private vehicles – primarily trucks
4 - Fun – community activities, ride 4-wheelers
5 – Weather – right now it is pretty nice in the 80’s and partly cloudy

Lauren Turner

LuLu in Baltimore Maryland!

Becky Hinckley (collins)
We've had some interesting weather this past week. It rained for four days straight (there were inches of water in our backyard trashcan) and then the past few days have been sunny and beautiful. Baltimore is much greener than Utah. It is the biggest city in the State of Maryland and is a port town on the Chesapeake Bay. Unfortunately there are no mountains nearby. The most common form of transportation is probably cars, but buses or the metro are also popular for most people who actually live in the city. (Many people can't afford to drive cars and they don't teach driver's education in the high schools, you have to learn at a private instruction school).

Saint Cloud, Minneapolis - Kasey Anderson (B1 ANDERSON)

Teran is in this picture with Jami from Saint Cloud, Minnesota. Saint Cloud is northwest of the capital, Minneapolis. Teran was very curious to learn more about Minneapolis so he asked Jami a few questions.Here’s what he learned. Jami’s favorite place in her area is Munsinger Gardens on the Mississippi River. The most common natural disaster in Saint Cloud is the tornado. The two most common sports there are hockey and ice fishing. According to Jami, the best parts about Saint Cloud are the changes in seasons and that her family is there.

Well, Teran’s got to go since he’s very eager to visit more places, but he’ll be back!

-Tasting the flavor of places across the globe, Teran & Pepper (aka Kasey)