Proposal, Marriage and Ever After

The night before we flew home, Bill asked Bryan out to the hall. I thought it was weird, but knew I would find out what it was about later.

Arley picked us up at 3:30 AM and we got to the airport.  Bill was still feeling poorly.  We asked the lady at the front of the Copa line if he could go sit down.  She said yes, but then bumped us to the front of the line.  I can't get over how nice the Colombian people were.  Despite the fact our Spanish is bad, and no one spoke any English, they went out of their way to help us.

We were pleasantly surprised when we boarded the plane and it was only 2 seats on each side.  Since we didn't have internet, we were not able to check in early.  We were in the back row, which was nice that I had no kids kicking me.  Right after we took off, Bill said he talked to Bryan about something and didn't know where to talk to me now or wait till we got home.  I told him that he could have me hound him the whole way home, or he could talk now.  This is what it looked like from the plane.  Dawn was just peeking through.

Bill asked me to marry him and all I could do was laugh.  We just had a rough 3 days of him feeling bad.  But I said yes.  He asked "Catholic or Baptist?" and I said JP.  He said good.

So after 9 years together, 10 states, 6 countries, 220,000 miles logged in the car together, countless cat rescues, we decided to make it official.  So I will not die an old maid!  This is my first.

We suspected Bill was passing kidney stones and Monday morning he went to the doctor and he was.  So I took Friday afternoon off and we went to the courthouse on Cypresswood.  There was no line, so we were able to get the license.  We went to James Avery and picked out a ring that I had already looked at.

I had no meetings the next Tuesday afternoon, so we made an appointment with the JP in Magnolia.  He was wonderful.  My sister Becky made me this beautiful bouquet with hummingbirds.

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Here we are dressed up for us! 

 

My sister Becky came in for the ceremony.

 

She also made these yummy cupcakes.  We took some to the JPs office and she said I could take some to work.  We decided to eat them instead.

Rio Claro, The Ameobas and Kidney Stones

We took off from Rio Blanco to drive over the Andes to the Rio Claro.  It is a very long drive through the mountains.  The views were beautiful, but the drive was treacherous.  We had numerous delays because of road construction.  Meanwhile, Bill was not feeling well.

We got to the lodge which was quite nice.  However, it is very hot.  Jose managed to score the only fan in the place for us since Bill was under the weather.  Scott and Chris were not there yet, but Arley was on the road, and found them.  Bryan decided to stay with them that nice, which was a wise decision.  The next morning Arley and I went into town to get drugs and the pharmacist told us Bill needed to see the doctor.  We were pleasantly surprised to find a doctor in town.  We thought we would have to drive 12 hours. 

So Arley and I drove the 12 miles back to get Bill.  We loaded him in the car and Arley blew through all the road construction screaming "hospital".  Here is the storefront.  It was a pharmacist and doctor all in one.

 

This is the outside sign.  We thought it was hilarious.

 

This was next door.

 

The put Bill on IVs, and gave him a bunch of pills. The next morning he still had horrible gas so back we went to see Dr. Martin.  More IVs and Bill was much better.  Here is Dr. Martin, Nurse Sandra and ambulance driver Arley. 

 

All was well, but then 30 minutes from Pereira where we were catching the plane, Bill passed a kidney stone.  By this point we were tired of rain, humidity and heat.  At least it was cool in Pereira.  We didn't see much of Rio Claro, but I did get to hike to the oilbirds and we saw the screamers on the way out of town.  The lodge was lovely and the food was pretty good!  I did get some good birds from our room, which was in the trees.

Rio Blanco, Manizales, Colombia

 

Rio Blanco had some amazing birds.  The lodge was very quaint, but the food was not good and the beds were awful.  Flora was also beautiful!  We suspect this is where Bill got sick.

The butterflies were amazing too!

 Johnnier, the biologist was amazing.  He could whistle the birds to come in.  Every day he feeds the antipittas.

There were surprises everywhere we looked!

 

 The most amazing hummingbirds!  The Long-tailed Sylph!  .

 

After one walk, we came back to the car and Arley had the snacks laid out for us! It was pretty hilarious!