I'm getting my memories of Boracay all mixed up in terms of the many beaches around the island. They're ALL beautiful! I know this is Puka Beach because of the sign they had by the tents for island hopping... sign-ups. What I liked most about Puka Beach were the bands of blue colors in the water, starting at the sandy beach and going all they way to the horizon.

Last year around this time, Inday joined me on an excursion to Bellevue. We hopped on an Express bus from Bothell to Bellevue, and then we took the new LRT link to the Redmond (Microsoft) Technology Campus. Like me on my last visit, Inday liked the box like office/meeting room extensions in some of the buildings. It was interesting watching the work happening on one of the new buildings. Back in Bellevue, we then went to Bellevue Square for a walk around, and a little shopping, before heading back to Bothell. On our walk home from the Bothell bus stop, we stopped by the "Ambakity" Mexican food truck not far from our place and got one of their giant Burritos. "Ambakity is an ancient Mayan or Purepecha word for bueno, meaning good", and good it is! We didn't have to make dinner that night.

These images (Sesshu 1420 – 1506) popped up in my FB Memories last year. When I worked at an English Language School in Ube City Japan, my boss took us to a temple or garden that was associated with the Japanese painter Sesshu. He was inspired by Chinese landscapes, but "Sesshū's work holds a distinctively Japanese style". I remember being surprised and impressed because Sesshu was one of my favorite Japanese ink landscape painters. I checked on Wikipedia, and I read "Sesshū worked under Shūbun for 20 years before leaving Kyoto for a small provincial zen temple in western Japan."

All of my brothers are creative. This is a photo collage my brother Mike put together from photos he took of my kitchen on Lopez Island. Note, the wood burning stove. Sometime back in the late 70s??

27Jun2025 - This is turning into a journal/journey-down-memory-lane thing. I'm looking through my old photo albums, and at the same time, other memories and thoughts are popping up in my mind. This is what old(er) people do, yes?

I just came across this photo in my Albums, from 2015. This is one reason I'm uncomfortable with taking "people" photos. I remember being aware of this person in my peripheral vision, but I didn't see his focus until I was editing later. It was during one of my photo walks out at the Seatac Airport, and I was looking at the lines and glass and shadows. When I zoomed in whie I was editing, there were small white dots on his glasses. He was staring back at me.

27Jun2023 - After I finished my coffee, toast and computer routine this morning, I thought to myself "I don't feel like walking. We're going over to babysit the twins in a few hours anyway." I got up, and my body started to get me dressed for my walk. It was 6:10am, and I was out the door 5 minutes later.

I think this was my favorite beach stop when we did our Boracay Island Tour: Puka Beach, on the northern tip of Boracay. The lighting and colors were amazing, especially the blues. I just walked along the beach, stopping every few feet to just stare at the horizon. I made sure to take the last boat photo for my brother-in-law Bob.

This post was from my FB 3 years ago ago, on 25Jun2022: my MapMyWalk app says I walked 16.95 miles today. I forgot to turn it off after I returned to my car!... haha. Up until our departure for Cebu in Nov, we lived right across the street from the Landing Park where that foot bridge is located. I wanted to get on the trail right away instead of using 15-20 minutes walking from our new apt. Happy to be on the trail again after 7+ months... It feels So good to be getting up earlier, between 4:30 and 5 today, drinking some coffee, doing my computer routine , and heading out to walk. I was on the trail by 7am. Joy... I still haven't pulled out my Canon, and these shots were taken with the Samsung phone I bought in Cebu. Not bad, but not an SLR...

My 3 brothers and I had planned a bicycle ride meet-up one day, but we had to cancel it. We decided to re-schedule it for later, but we had fun texting back and forth when we were coordinating our plans. JR decided to refer to me as "Uncle Roy" (Mom had 5 brothers, and 3? sisters). Our Uncles theme ended up as follows: Me - Uncle Roy: the oldest brother, who lived in Alaska, and I Never saw him without a cigar in his mouth, all through my childhood and into my early adult years. Pat - Uncle Homer: he was a Square-dance "Caller", and all of our Johnson family reunions had full scale square dances, where the kids joined in with the adults. Fun! JR (John) - Uncle Elmer: he was an Air Force pilot who flew in the Berlin Airlift of 1948-1949. He lived/retired in San Antonio, Texas. Mike - Uncle Bill: Uncle Bill was always my favorite, but I'm Uncle Roy because I'm the oldest. Sigh... Uncle Larry didn't make the cut, but maybe Jimmy would have been Uncle Larry. Uncle Larry was a Contractor in Las Vegas who traded in his Cadillac every year for a brand new Cadillac. He showed up one morning when I was in Vietnam. I was sleeping on my cot because I had been on all night Guard Duty, and I had the morning off. Uncle Larry was there on a 1-year government contract where he worked for really good money, with no taxes! I didn't know he was in Vietnam. John just sent me this photo, with the text "cr giving me a ride on his bike" Ha Ha. That's actually Uncle Roy with John sitting behind him. But it was my motorbike. ps - notice the cigar in Uncle Roy's mouth?

"Flat beer" - here, literally. These shots are from a small beach walk along the Green River in Tukwila, WA, 8 or 9 years ago. In my young adult years, we called beers "flat" when they just didn't taste that good, had no bubbles, etc. That reminds me, I didn't even like beer until I went on my first Heineken Brewery Tour in Amsterdam, back in 1968. They gave us free beer after the tour, and I went once in the morning, and once in the afternoon...

"Lakeview de Jardin" #4: I think this is my 4th post about the "Lakeview de Jardin" gardens in the mountains above Cebu. They advertise their excellent restaurant and amazing gardens, but my main focus when I visit is the mosaic and stonework art along the paths that meander through the site. I actually found the artisan's work area recently, but the photos here are more of my favorites when I walk around.

In honor of Philippine Independence Day, Luz Bay, a representative from Dover, New Hampshire, made a speech in which she referred to the Philippines as her “home country.” Following Bay’s speech, a republican colleague, who has not yet been identified, told her to “go home.” “This is my home. This is my country, and I’m not going anywhere" https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/filipino-american-legislator-told-to-go-home-she-responds/ar-AA1H3pPK?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=U531&cvid=da4707813982419ba9cf7592e3b16612&ei=78

Evening night-lights walk in Boracay... walking through D-Mall to the beach, where the action is. "HaloMango" had shops in the D-Mall AND out on the beach.

I like looking through my folders of photos over and over, and bouncing around when I'm editing/sharing. These are from our trip in May with family members to Bantayan Island and island hopping to the smaller Virgin Island near Bantayan. These shots are from Virgin Island. The earlier post with the sunset shots were from the beach on Bantayan Island where we stayed overnight. The next to last photo was where we stopped for lunch after visiting Virgin Island, and in the last shot, we were headed back to the island hopping area on Bantayan Island. This trip was special. It was our first time exploring Cebu Island and environs after spending a longer period of time in Cebu City.

Our first evening in Boracay was a mix of travel tiredness and "wow...this is so cool..." Our journey had us leaving our place in Cebu by plane around 1:30pm. After taxi and bus rides to get to the airport, and the plane ride itself to Panay Island, it was late in the afternoon. We got a tricycle ride to the port and hopped on a small boat to go over to Boracay Island. There, we took an E Trike to go to our hotel. After checking in, we walked a short 10 or 15 minutes to the "D-Mall", a large meandering village-like area with restaurants and shops between the main N/S road on Boracay and the 4 kilometers (2.5 miles) stretch of white sand beaches with the hotels, restaurants and shops that parallels the main rode. We had a Thai dinner at the "Thai Basil" restaurant in the D-Mall. Many of the restaurants have open air fronts. Inday is shown here visiting with one of the waitresses who was leaning against the Thai woman statue when I wandered out in front to take some photos. These were not my best photos. I got better after a good night's sleep. We bought one of the coconuts displayed by our table to drink with our meal for p100. The vendors who push their carts by our place in Cebu charge p50 (90c US). Following dinner, we wandered through D-Mall to the beach, and walked down the long stretch of beach front with all the hotels, more restaurants and shops. There were coconut trees all along there, between the beach itself and the hotels etc row. My first Boracay photo post in this blog had some night shots from that walk.