Kellisa's "Day of Flight" - One Year Ago Today

Lisa Marie Kain

On May 16th, we spent an entire day flying around the country to celebrate Kellisa's 18th birthday.

By now, you may realize that Chris is a bit extreme when it comes to travel. Several months ago, he started talking with Southwest Airlines (his carrier of choice) about the potential to fly as many commercial flights as possible in one day. At that point, he had been working on the plan for a while but realized he needed their help to perfect the route. They were very supportive. A route was selected, and tickets were purchased. I was informed of this plan after the arrangements had been firmed up with Southwest. Chris knows I do not like to travel and gave me limited information about what the day would entail. When I decided to participate, I told him I did not want to know the specifics because I could not handle the truth. If I had any idea, I never would have gone on this trip, but I am so glad I did.

On Tuesday morning, we boarded "our" plane in Tampa, Florida just before 6 am Eastern time (3 am for us West Coast folks). At that point, all I knew was that we would be on that plane all day, and that our plane would travel to 8 destinations. I never expected what would happen over the next 21 hours -- or even that it would take 21 hours!

Mother's Day on the Refuge

Sacramento National Wildlife Refuge

Glenn County, CA

Lisa wanted a picnic lunch in nature and asked if we could go to a place with wildlife. We debated a few spots, but we chose Sacramento National Wildlife Refuge for a few reasons. It's not that far (90 minutes) from our house, this would be Lisa's first visit, and it's always had an abundance of wildlife from our previous visits.

Most of the water in the refuge was gone, although there were still a few ponds left from the rainy season. We observed many birds, but they were difficult to photograph for one reason or another (loud kids, radio, Evie, lighting, etc.). In addition to the birds, we saw a squirrel, two deer, a few rabbits, and four lizards. We enjoyed a short walk to the picnic area where we devoured sandwiches made by Lisa. We planned to hike a short trail, but the bugs were just coming out, so we made our way back to the car. Sadly, we didn't think to take a picture with Lisa and the girls until after Kellisa went to bed.

The best pictures are below.