Well, we've "closed the loop" and are now back in San Jose (map). Even though we are officially residents of the great state of Washington now, San Jose will always hold a special place in our hearts as our home of many years.

Because we have so many friends, family members, acquaintances, and financial and medical professionals here, we will be here for nearly three weeks. I suspect I will not have much to report here in the blog during that time, so posting will be sporadic until we are back on the road.

We were last here, briefly, in mid-October, so this loop has taken a little more than four months. I'm sorry that I did not record our mileage at that time, but it looks like we have covered between 10,000 and 15,000 miles in that period. We have also traversed 30 states on this loop, and even set foot into Mexico (though Odyssey stayed in the US). While we were traveling we also had one airplane flight (Sean had to fly from Denver to San Francisco for a legal proceeding) and a 7-day Caribbean cruise, along with one night in a luxury hotel in Death Valley. Odyssey also endured four ferry crossings.

In the four months of full-time living aboard Odyssey, she has gotten a proper shakedown, and we've uncovered perhaps a dozen problems and issues that need to be addressed. But all in all, she is everything we designed her to be, and is serving us well. We love our life on the road, and are not looking back.

Approaching San Jose, then, was an interesting experience. Hundreds of times we have traveled these roads into the city with the feeling that we were "coming home." The roads are the same, but the feeling is very different, now that home is with us all the time, and San Jose is just another stop on a long journey. We are still trying to sort through these strange feelings elicited by our former home town.

While we are here, the San Jose Elks Lodge is serving as our base of operations. They have electric hookups here, and it is a short stroll to the Light Rail and CalTrain stations, making it quite easy for us to get around. Odyssey has a few visits of her own to make while we're here, but for the most part we will stay here at the Elks while we are in town.

If you happen to be one of our bay area friends, the reason you have not yet heard from us is that we are still sorting through our schedule and trying to make professional appointments, both for ourselves and for the bus. Feel free to drop us an email or give us a call, though, and we will set something up. We will try to get in touch with absolutely everyone in the next few days, but my brain isn't what it used to be, so call us if you haven't heard from us by next week...