As you probably guessed, 1999 is the reason our "Almost Annual, Almost On Time" Christmas Newsletter is "Almost"! It got missed altogether. We kept hoping that it would somehow, magically write itself, but here it is April and we'll just have to do with this small update.

To get the details out of the way first, our new e-mail addresses are:
ann@jymann.com or jym@jymann.com or jymann@jymann.com

Our new mailing address is:
Jym & Ann Batey
P .0. Box 466
El Dorado, CA 95623

And our new grandson is Eric Jeffrey Wilson born March 29th at 8 lb. 3 oz and 20" - pretty good sized for two weeks early!

We both retired from our jobs at the end of January, sold our house in Concord and moved (a long and painful project) to the Placerville area property.

The next step in retirement will be to see some of the country. With that in mind, we are jumping on our new pair of BMW Rl100RT motorcycles for an extended (four to six month) ride around the U.S. beginning the first week of May. We have no specific itinerary and no particular time schedule - we just want to hit the four corners of the lower 48, San Ysidro, CA; Key West, FL; Madawaska, ME; Blaine, WA (probably - but not necessarily in that order). Other goals are to visit 50 national parks in 25 states (it's an Iron Butt thing), to stay on secondary roads versus limited access roads and not to eat in any chain restaurants. Depending on the weather, we will be mostly camping with an occasional motel stay to plug into electricity and phones.

If you are interested, you will be able to track our progress (or lack of it) by checking out our web site. There will be a map of our wanderings and where we were the last time we updated the site. We're taking a digital camera and a laptop, so when we have a chance we'll upload pictures of our recent stops and retrieve our e-mail. We are also inviting anyone that has a favorite destination or attraction to e-mail us with particulars. Maybe this year we'll be on time with the Christmas letter (stranger things have happened)!