Greetings to our friends and family, we hope that 1999 was was a healthy and happy year for you.
The highlight of our travel this year was our trip to Baja California (Mexico). We took a small ship cruise in the Sea of Cortez with Voyager Cruise line. Our ship, the M/V Wilderness Adventurer is a small ship with room for only about 72 passengers. The weather was not as cooperative as it could have been, and the seas were rather rough. While the Sea of Cortez is narrow, it is nearly a thousand miles long, with the prevailing winds being north to south. The normal itenerary is mostly at sea and in small inlets. Instead we spent a fair amount of time in port and doing day trips into the country side. In any case, we were able to see lots of whales, see several 300 year old missions, and we took way too many pictures. (Santa Pelican above was sighted in Baja). Hopefully I'll update our web site with some pictures soon.
We were able to attend our usual assortment of auto races, such as NASCAR races in Las Vegas and Indianapolis in March and August, a CART/Indycar race in August, and several other races at Mid-Ohio throughout the summer.
Sandy continued her volunteering at SICSA, a local animal shelter. Besides helping out the dogs, this gives her good exercise from the dog walking, and prevents us from needing to get our own dog! Speaking of animals, our two cats, Sam and LS are well and as spoiled as ever.
Andy continued his obsession with rock climbing. His ankle is pretty much back to normal after his accident late last year. He was able to climb in several new areas such as Foster Falls and Devil's Race Track in Tennesee and in Joshua Tree California.
Andy is still working as a computer consultant for 3X Corporation and was able to do some additional work at some of his favorite clients such as Reynolds and Reynolds and Pet Warehouse. If you want to buy pet supplies online, be sure to visit www.petwhse.com! Andy was able to participate again on 3X's Mini Gran Prix team. This go kart race in downtown Cincinnati benefits the Arthritis Foundation and is a really fun event.
Sandy is still at Lexis Nexis, but is about to change jobs within the company. She will be working on the Science Direct product (use the browse journals/ guest access if you use the site) This will hopefully be a nice change of scenery for Sandy and give her the chance to freshen up her software development skills.
Our parents and siblings are doing well. Sandy's dad Stan just had a hip replaced and is anxious to get back on the golf course and back into the trout streams. Andy's dad Charlie just had cateract surgery and is happy to be seeing clearly again. Melva and Helen are still working. Someone has to be the bread winners after all! We were able to all get together at once for the first time since our wedding when Stan and Melva went to Maryland for a site-seeing vacation. Andy's parents were on their best behavior, and did not embarass him even once.
Chuck is a Montgomery County policeman and has been volunteering for the Make-a-Wish foundation and Camp Sunrise, a summer camp for children with cancer.
Mark and Shelley, and our nephews Drew and Spencer, moved back to California this year, with Mark taking a job at Xylan. We are looking forward to visting them in the Los Angeles / Thousand Oaks area.
We wish you well, and hope you have a safe and happy holiday season and year 2000!
Sandy and Andy Welter, December 1999