Week Forty Eight Thursday’s Grateful List 

Today I am grateful for Day Eighteen, Nineteen and Twenty of our American trip. 

Yesterday we spent the day driving from Santa Barbara to Los Angeles. David drove and Adam navigated. I am very very grateful to both David and Adam as we got to our destination safely and David and I are still married! On the way we stopped at The Ronald Reagan Presidential Library. It was amazing. 

Ronald Reagan was an a amazing president. He was the 40th President of the United States from 1981 to 1989. Prior to his presidency, he was the 33rd Governor of California from 1967 to 1975 and before that he was a Hollywood actor and union leader.He was originally a democrat but in 1962 became a conservative and  switched to the Republican Party. He won a landslide election  in 1984 with the largest electoral college victory in history. Foreign affairs dominated his second term, including ending of the Cold War. During his famous speech at the Brandenburg Gate, President Reagan challenged Gorbachev to “tear down this wall!”. Only months after the end of his term, the Berlin Wall fell, and on December 26, 1991, nearly three years after he left office, the Soviet Union collapsed. In 1994 Reagan disclosed his diagnosis with Alzheimer’s disease and he died ten years later at the age of 93. ( information courtesy of Mr Wikepedia). As a result of my visit to the Reagan Library I am much more informed about Ronald Reagan, I will investigate reading more about Reagan and I am extremely disappointed with the standard of present politicians both in Australia and America. Reagan seemed to encourage all people to believe in hope and a better world. For example he said “No arsenal or no weapon in the arsenals of the world is so formidable as the will and moral courage of free men and women.” I do not feel any of our politicians encourage us to be a better person. I feel fear and not hope is used too much in our present politics. 

After the Library we continued on to our hotel the Regis Beverley Wiltshire in Los Angeles. 

We had dinner that night at the beautiful steak restaurant called Cut. I had not had a steak since we got to America and it was definitely a great place to have one. 

The following day David and I spent strolling down Rodeo Drive. We had lunch at a fabulous restaurant called The Ivy. Apparently it is well known for its famous clientele. We saw no one famous but we did have a beautiful lunch in a lovely spot. 

Day Twenty is our last day in Los Angeles and it is time to go home. Our plane does not leave until about midnight. We spent our morning doing a tour at Paramount studios and our last stop in LA was The Getty – an amazing art gallery with a very beautiful garden. 

We decided to come to the airport very early as all the communication we were getting from our airline was there may be long delays due to increased security. We are here a record seven hours before our flight. I have had a lovely shower, a bite of dinner, and I am now blogging. I am so looking forward to coming home. I have had a lovely holiday with David but I am so looking forward to seeing my special special children. 

Until next time thank you for taking the time to read about my travels. I hope you have enjoyed reading about our holiday. I am so grateful to be able to share such wonderful times with David and I am so lucky to be able to have the luxury to nurture my marriage. I am also so grateful that I have such a wonderful family that I feel safe to leave my children with.  Until next time……