I am so happy I inherited “nature-loving” and “adventure-loving” genes from my mother, Ruth Gill. Plants and animals and fish and clouds and oceans and ecosystems and weather, etc…. Just Wow!!!!! So I started my 63rd year with a marvelous adventure to Pohnpei, Micronesia, a tiny speck of an island well west of Hawaii, but east of New Guinea. Sokehs Rock is sort of a symbol for Pohnpei, and still has Japanese gun emplacements from WWII. The island is mostly mountainous cut by river valleys, with high rainfall creating thick jungle and numerous waterfalls.The atoll reef surrounding the island provides fabulous scuba diving and surfing. An early civilization created Nan Madol, a now ruined city, starting around the 8th century AD, by stacking basalt columns like logs, and backfilling with rock, coral, and soil. There are approximately 100 man-made islets surrounded by a network of canals. Local legend is that magic was used to transport the multi-ton rocks from miles away and stack them. Diving on the reef, hiking through the jungle to remote waterfalls, surfing big waves, and flying a 737 for the first time (Jim, my surfing buddy, was the pilot) were all part of a grand adventure.

-James