Traveling around for 8 month came finally to an end. We were not ready for this, we didn’t look forward to this and we were asking ourselves: why are we going home already?

Returning in January means ( for Edith): it is cold, wear boots and a warm jacket! For Ted it means: California, here we come!

So we arrived at 8am at the cruise terminal in LA when Timo & Dana picked us up and we went to breakfast.

Sticker Shock #1: we ordered 3 breakfast dishes (Ted and I shared one since we have had breakfast on the ship already), we ordered 3 coffees, 1 tea and 1 orange juice. Breakfast was very good, service was very nice, the price was a shock: $100

We love to go to farmers markets, markets, Mercado, Mercado Central, etc. Discovering fruits and herbs, spices and vegetables and all kinds of goodies. Tough was the cruise ship voyage, where the general policy is to not take any food or drink off the ship and not bring anything onto the ship. So our market visits always ended without goodies, the only thing we could take were photos! Being back in California, we immediately visited our local farmers market in Templeton. There we finally could buy stuff to cook our meals and enjoy local fruits and vegetables. But we had forgotten, that out of all 20+ countries we visited these last 8 months, by far the most expensive place is called home!

Sticker Shock #2: we bought 1 spaghetti squash $13, 1 bread $12, 1 frozen chicken $23 and some more veggies. The idea of having lunch somewhere was not so appealing anymore. Better go home and cook some soup!

We also went to a local supermarket where we saw this: next to the cash register are the batteries. And they are locked up! Wonder why? Do people steal batteries now? Or are they afraid that little children will eat them? Or do you have to be 21 years old to buy them nowadays? Questions, we have lots of questions…..

Coming home and getting settled in will take a while I guess…..