will review the 'wedding of the year'

In Oz I would have been a mess of stress of anxiety. Here under the palm trees It was a very different story.

At lunch on the day, Nick asked Mey's mother and I if we'd read a poem at the ceremony.
Adrenalin kicked in and the missing anxiety arrived. I had another rum punch and all was ok until the family arrived for pre ceremony drinks at our bungalow.

Champagne on the balcony.
Here are the famillies in all their glory.

Paul, Myles and I. He did change the shirt for the ceremony, and I think Myles made as many changes as the bride as well.

Manda, Ben, Emma, Scott, Jessica and Annabel.

Leesa, Tony, Alexia and Mia.

Jen, David and Colton.

The groom and 'mother of the Groom' and 'father of the groom' arriving.

The Bride and her Mum arriving.

Me reading the aforementioned poem... By EE Cummings..... Notoriously difficult.
( note the attention seeking silver nail polish)
Mey's friend Susan officiated.

Husband and wife.

...and at sunset they were toasted.

Girls, check out Mey's shoes!

The young ones made a beeline for the bar.

The cake and the reception.

I think they're now well and truly married!

Mr and Mrs Nicholas and Mey Cooper.

will talk about spas and boa constrictors

The days are merging into one long haze of sunshine then thunder storms, cocktails then snoozing, eating then snoozing and lovely family time.

Occasionally there are moments of bliss and exhileration.

For Colton this means steering the boats.

For the divers it's exploring the depths.

Finding unexpected treasures.

Manda, Jen and Emma relaxing poolside before beauty treatments.

Mey's mother Mary and I being mani-pedi-ied....

......which brings us to the boa constrictor. While we were being pampered in this tropical garden there was a boa constrictor lurking in the undergrowth.
It was discovered by one of the beauticians as she stepped on it when she went to fill the water jug. There went the serenity!!!
Screams and the little dog living there being taken to safety.
The story doesn't end well for the snake, but we managed to carry on undaunted.

My brother in law Tony interracting with the dolphins (thankfully not a boa or shark in sight)

The evenings are very beautiful.

...and as it's 4th July, there's a fiesta, complete with limbo competitions. I'm happy to say that our party took out the junior and senior events. Here's Emma demonstrating her prowess.

Today is Wedding Day.

The bride and groom have returned to the spa to have some private time and work on their vows.
Paul and Myles and the 4 diving Boersens have gone out for their final dive for the day.
The rest of us are chilling...

So, depending on the level of hangover, the next post will show you the shenanigans.

have adopted the Caribbean lifestyle mon

It took us very little time to chill out here. I keep losing things and forgetting what I'm doing, so I can honestly say I'm having a holiday.
Here's the type of thing we have to put up with.

Breakfast view.

View of our bungalow as we approach it via the water way (the only way)

The snorkelling team off on their first adventure.

Colton navigating for the bus driver who drove us to the boat to go to Maya Keys.

Colton then circumnavigated the island in his own way.....3,2,1, blast off!

More snorkelling off the pier.

The pier from my perspective.

The bride and groom at lunch.

After lunch we met some of the locals.

The usual craziness at dinner.

And nobody grouchy!

Can't wait for tomorrow's serenity.

am relaxing in Roatan

Well folks we did it.
12 months of planning, researching and ignoring travel warnings from the Oz government has led all of the Marshall/ Coopers to this island in the Honduras.

The grand reunion took place in a coffee shop at Houston airport.

Here I am with my sisters Manda and Leesa and my brother in law Tony.

Preparing for the departure at the gate lounge.

All of the Marshall sibs..... My brother David.

Leesa and her beautiful daughters Alexia and Mia.

Myles is always a little camera shy.

The bride Mey and I as we listened to the briefing as we arrived at the resort.....
A horrific list of activities and early meeting times and training programmes and fish identification lectures.

Luckily that's a rum punch in my hand so I'd virtually blanked out by then

Lunch at the grown ups table.

Some island fun for the young at heart.

We've decided to pursue the time honoured tradition of trying every cocktail on the list.
I'm making notes and have instigated a rating system.

Here's cheers to this phase of our holiday and the culmination of months of anxious planning.

.

explored Denver

"sunshine on my shoulders feels so lovely"

Actually it was far too hot. We preferred to reflect a little more on what could be at Vail. Did we tell you it was really pretty.

Oh and we found our ski field. Could this be part of Paul's lost heritage?

Anyway, back to Denver.
It seems like a happening and groovy place. We did the Main Street Mall, which had a very useful eco friendly bus shuttle system which runs constantly down the 1 mile strip.

Here comes one now.

It's hard to maintain that air of authority when your horse maintains an air of it's own.

We then ventured to another Mall in the burbs to ask Mr Apple a few questions.
..... And our first Chinese food of the trip.

I'll skip to today Friday 29th June US time. Here I am diligently blogging at Denver airport.

When we returned our trusty steed to Alamo, we found out we'd ridden 2000 miles over the last 10 days. Not a scratch on it or us......plenty of dead bugs and red dirt however.

Paul and I checked in and got through security for our flight to Denver with barely 2 hours to spare.

Before we left Brisbane I thought about today often,and how we'd all be making our way towards the same spot a long way from Oz.

Paul and I arrived in Houston at 1400 ish
Myles has been in Houston for 2 nights, and desperately anticipating our reunion.
David, Jen and Colton also arrived in Houston today to stay in the same hotel as we are and have already crammed in a trip to NASA
Leesa, Tony, Lexi, Mia, Manda, Ben, Emma, Scott, Annabel, Jessica on the mega flight from Sydney to Dallas.

Here they are in their hotel's pool in Dallas kicking back soon after they arrived.

...and the bride and groom are preparing for our arrival at St Anthony's Key resort on the island of Roatan.

This is actually in Maine, in case you were confused about the scenery.

They tell us that internet services are unreliable, so if you don't hear much from us it's either because there's no WiFi or I'm just feeling far to lazy to be bothered.... What with all that relaxing, spaing, cocktailing and snorkelling.

Cheers dears!