Do pickleball lessons with pros make a difference? We put our last five month's worth of lessons to the test to find out. Over almost four years of playing, a quick and dirty, very conservative estimate of the numbers of different people we have played with would be well over 3,000. Rather than becoming bored by it and going on to another sport, the game just keeps getting more interesting to both of us. There is still so much to learn, and even more fun and laughter to be ha
R.E.S.P.E.C.T. It was our honor and pleasure to take a pickleball lesson with Helle Sparre. A grand dame is defined as a woman who is socially prominent, respected, and experienced, who is accomplished, influential, and a senior figure in a particular field. That is a perfect moniker for Helle; grand dame of pickleball. Helle was born in Denmark, and she has a incredibly impressive resume in tennis. By the age of 19, she was the #1 ranked player in her country. She competed a
Have you ever been away from your home for quite a while, and during that time you stayed extremely busy with social and physical activities? You might have come home exhausted, needing sleep and needing to go back to more sane eating, exercise and spending habits. You weren't really ready to go back to work or your routines, so you might have said or thought,"I need a vacation from my vacation" As full time nomads, homeless by choice travelers, we have asked ourselves, how d
Don't worry, everything is working fine. It's not that kind of "out of order". This blog title refers to the fact that I've had to skip a couple of blog posts (which I hope to go back and fill in - sorry Wales) to catch up to near current day. Ky and I were thrilled to learn that there would be an inaugural English Open Pickleball tournament around the time that we had been invited to come pet sit for Zoe in Teddington, England. We planned our entire trip around this event. T
For the sake of completeness of a record of places to play pickleball in Southwest England, this post will be brief but hopeful. In Devon and Cornwall there is currently a woeful lack of pickleball players. But what the area lacks in pickleball, it makes up for in sheer beauty and history. We were so fortunate to return to Teddington, England and pet sit for people who offered us time at their beautiful vacation home in Devon. When people asked where we were headed next on o
Zoe was happy to see us, and we were very happy to see her too. For a bit more than a fortnight (two weeks), we petted, snuggled and cared for this sweet 14 year old kitty for the second time in less than a year in the lovely town of Teddington, just west of London, England. In case you don't already know, we pet sit for people around the world. It's one of the ways that we have been able to afford living a full time nomadic lifestyle for over four years. We sit for well beha
Who doesn't know about Seattle? Even those reading that live in foreign countries likely know about it, and many have even already visited. Our Pickleball Road Trip took us to the Emerald City, and just north of it are the small towns of Shoreline and Edmonds. We have long-standing ties to the Pacific NW. We lived east of Seattle, in Bellevue and Issaquah, from 1988 - 2002, and both of our children were born in Bellevue. We actually had our own pickleball court at a home we o