Ten years ago we celebrated New Year 2008 at Anza-Borrego Desert State Park where I was presented the opportunity to be one of ten blogging contributors to Airstream Life Online Community.

My first History Safari Express blog post, “All Aboard…,” was launched on January 11, 2008, and began a 10 year odyssey of documenting how we used our custom-ordered 2007 Airstream Safari in southern California, while celebrating the seasons and meeting new friends.

Our Safari was built in 2006, the year Airstream was celebrating its 75th Anniversary.*

As we were celebrating New Year 2008, Anza-Borrego Desert State Park was celebrating its 75th Anniversary.  In 1933, Federal land here was acquired as parkland by the State of California and the first California State Park Custodian was assigned (DesertUSA, “Anza-Borrego Desert State Park California).  See the recent YouTube video, Anza-Borrego Tour.*

Ten years ago, I switched from a PC to a Mac* and acquired the MacBook Pro that I’m still using today!

We returned to Anza-Borrego in January 2008 where I explored Palm Canyon (Palm Oasis and Planet Earth).

Crossing the bridge from 2008 to 2018 has included profound ups (our marriage) as well as downs (passing of our pug Pau Hoa and corgi Mac).  We take strength in remembering the words of Professor Albus Dumbledore, “Happiness can be found, even in the darkest of times, if one only remembers to turn on the light,”* from Steven Kloves screenplay for J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban.*

Happy and bright times in 2017 included taking our tricolor corgi Tasha on many San Diego Corgi Meetup outings (see photos) where she enjoyed showing off new collars and decorations made by Larry (who also made the jester’s collar for Sidney seen below).

I enjoyed visiting Kaiser Permanente’s new, beautiful, state of the art San Diego Medical Center,* dedicated to green design while providing excellent, integrated patient care as well as exciting career and volunteer opportunities.*

Old Man Winter was ringing in the New Year with Arctic air over much of the country as a hummingbird drank at our feeder while I wiggled my toes in sunny San Diego and listened to “The 2017 Song – A Year in Review La La Land Parody,”* sung by Tessa Netting!

*This is a link to a YouTube video.