School decided to be an ass and told me to get ready for transfer, so I started to look around for new places to live and schools which I could attend and effort. I think I’m going to end up in Denver, CO. I’m thinking about going to Community College of Denver to get all my gen ed done. And then going to Metro State for my bachelors? Right now there are lots of questions and it’s kind of exciting to move out of this town. I really like Denver and I am SO riding my bike to school in the summer!! haha!

After this semester I’m supposed to get 3 certificates for welding. It’ll be awesome to finally have something on paper. I should be getting my Structural, Pipe, and Basic Level Skill certificates!

Lately I have been thinking a lot about home. I would love to go see my family and have some real dutch food again. I can’t believe I have been back in the United States for over a year now! Tomorrow it would be a year and two months. Gladly enough I have good friends who keep me entertained and keep me on my feet. School, actually, does that too. This math 107 class is kicking my ass!

Well, later more! Comments people.

After waiting for a while, I still had no response of anyone who was willing to go, so I went to the twitter website and searched for people around Colorado Springs area, and that’s when I found @HURRAYYme‘s post.

We tweeted and scheduled to do the incline at 9:00 AM. I left the house early enough to find a spot to park. However, when I got down to Manitou Springs, almost everything was covered with cars. I drove around for about 10 minutes untill I found this spot.

Nick was obviously better in shape then I was, so I told him to go ahead and I would meet him at the top. Nick got to the top in 40 minutes, which is very impressive, believe me. It’s 5000 steps, it’s an old cog-train trail which is 43%-63% incline the entire time. Here is Nick’s post if you would like to check it out.

This was now my second tweetup, and if you ask me, it’s one of the most fun things to do if you want to meet new people!

We did the 4,5 mile hike, we went up the incline and took the Barr Trail down. It was pretty neat, we found lots of rocks to climb on and beautiful views to take pictures of. If you want to check out Debbie’s story about the incline please do because it’s pretty funny!

On the map you can see what trail we walked. The green solid line is the incline, thats the way we went up, and we took the red trail back down.

Here are some pictures of our hike up the Manitou Springs Incline!

Here is a video of Debbie struggling with hiking up the incline! haha.

After I went back home to Colorado from my trip to Ohio, Richie and Melinda from California invited me to come over and visit them. I took their offer and got on a plane to Sacramento, CA. I’m actually there right now until July 19th! I have seen pretty much everything around the Clearlake area which is really nice! However, I really hope I’m going to be able to see the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco. If so, that would be awesome! If not, so be it. Although, I don’t think we are, because the car broke down.

Monday the 19th, I will be going home like I mentioned. I am looking forward to it because of two reasons. 1. It’s too freaking hott out here in California. At least that’s what my iPhone says. (See temperature screenshot) and reason number 2. is that Debbie, Chris, and JoeJoe from Arizona will be there! They are doing a trip all over the United States, so they are in Colorado right now. You can follow their stories right here. The day after I get home, the 20th of July we will be doing the incline at Manitou Springs. It’s going to be pretty hard to do! However, fun! Also, we might go camping and that will be totally awesome, because that will give me a reason to go fishing! I have been wanting to fish for years now, but never found someone who wanted to fish. Or did I not try hard enough? Oh well, Colorado has these beautiful places where we can fish on trout, so it’s time to get on it while it’s still summer! I need to go to Walmart and get a fishing license soon!

About school, I will be going back to school August 23rd. How nice, the day before my birthday! But that doesn’t matter! I will be taking three welding classes. I think I want to focus on welding and get certified! I will be taking: Blueprint Read-Welders/Fitters, Intro-Gas Tungsten Arc Welding, and Advanced Gas Metal Arc Welding! So that will keep me busy this semester!

The weather has been really weird in Colorado. However, I guess that’s normal here. Hehe. I did made some pictures with my iPhone, which I’ll show you in a little bit. The end of this semester is already in sight! I’m excited. I can’t wait for summer, hopefully I’ll be able to do some traveling around the United States. I’m going to see my sister in Ohio for sure already, right after school is over. It’ll be great to see her graduate from BGSU. I have no other traveling plans yet, although, I would love to visit Debbie and Chris in Arizona, and Richie in California. I guess I just have to wait and see what happens.

Biking, is what I have been trying to do lots of. Every time it was nice out, or even when it was raining.. well, let’s say when I had time, I was on my bike.. doing rounds from 12 to 30 miles. I try to do every time longer trips. And hopefully I’ll be able to go up to the Rocky Mountains to bike. I think that would be a blast!

About school, things are really good. Advanced Composition and Advanced Reading are really helping me understanding English better. Advanced Composition really helps me with punctuation, and Advanced Reading with understanding what your reading. besides that I’m doing Welding. I’m totally loving it. I’m doing GMAW (Gas Metal Arc Welding). You would think I’m doing Arc Welding, but it’s actually MIG. So that is totally awesome! Tuesday, March 9th was the first day we actually welded. We had to do the safety test first, though. But I’m sure we all got an A for that. After that, we started to do our own thing and started Welding.

Also, I have been thinking about my future. What do I want to do? What do I want to get my Minor, Associate and Bachelor in? I think I want Welding as my minor. And I would love to do CIS (Computer Information Systems) and get a bachelor degree. So I still have some brainstorming and researching to do! But I’ll get there. I still have summer to think about everything and clear my mind.

The weather out here in Yoder and Colorado Springs has been really weird. One day it snows and we have about two inch of snow, and then in the morning we have lots of sun, and it’s all gone in couple hours. Makes Colorado pretty interesting doesn’t? OH! By the way, I got a new bike. It’s totally awesome. I got a TREK 4600. I have been riding my new bike a lot already. Riding a bike out here is pretty intense because there are a lot of ups and downs. (Mountains) It’s not just one straight way, like in Holland. Let me show you a picture of my bike, here it is!

Besides school, I’m still waiting for my social security number so I can get my permit and/or license. I can’t wait until I get this, because, living this far from town and having no license and/or car, makes it kind of hard to do stuff. Like going to school, or hanging out with friends. I’m skipping the hanging out with friends right now, because I don’t like to ask for rides. For the “going to school part” we found a solution. In the morning when some of the people I live with go down to work. I ride along, and then when we get there I take the bus up to my college. Most likely this gives me a lot of time at the college, which is kind of nice. Because then I can either make my home work or just do some research in the library. Only it sucks when I’ve done all of my home work already. So yeah.. but you know how it goes. Life goes on!

They scheduled me for Advanced Composition, Grammar and Reading. After I took these classes today, I still felt like there was something wrong. I was in a class full with foreigners. Which is cool, but I didn’t expect. Who had either a little or NO English basic skills at all. Plus I did not want to be in three English classes at the same time. So I went down to one of the people who could help me and talked to them about this. We figured out I could drop Grammar, so I can take an EMS Class. Which is great! So now I need to contact this lady from the Emergency Medical Services to get into a class.. ASAP!

So after classes I tried to go see this lady, but she seemed like not to be on campus today. So I need to contact her through either mail or by phone. — So to be continued about that subject!

After I tried all this, I just relaxed and hung out..Thank god I brought my iPod Touch! .. waiting for Tim to call me, he would pick me up after work he said. He’s such a nice frenchy.

So I left my luggage out there with the lady, and she said that it would get on the first flight the next morning. Which I were supposed to be on too. After I slept for a couple hours in the hotel, I went back to the lady’s desk and asked if my luggage was still good.. She checked and everything was alright, it was scheduled for the same flight I was on. I felt pretty good about it. So I got on the airplane. Oh did I mention I got a First Class seat? That was kind of nice. So after about 2,5 hours or so I finally arrived in Colorado Springs.. And guess what.. No luggage. So I had to claim it, I had to fill out some paper work and wait for Tim and Zach to pick me up. It was a long day. But I can’t really complain I guess, cause then later I heard there was happened some crazy stuff in other airplains like you can read HERE. I could have been on that one.. You never know.

But I’m here, and safe. So thats good. Now I pretty much have some time to get back on my feet. I have been looking for furniture for about 5 days now. It’s harder then I thought. Also I really need a laptop, because now I’m using Tim’s computer all the time.. thats not really a problem though. But it’s easier for myself to have a laptop again. So I can install my email client and all that.

Yesterday I went to visit my old host family, it was nice to see them again. We had fun. And I brought some presents. So everybody happy. haha.

So this is all what’s on my mind right now, when I have some new stuff I’ll post it! Thanks for reading!

So now i’m taking the easy way. I’m starting now, with paper work etc. And then after my work contract is over, I’ll pack my stuff.. and leave.. I guess that works better and easier. That allows me to have enough time to work on the paper work and other stuff what must be done to get back to Colorado. It’s not a small thing i’m doing you know. I have to leave my life out here in Holland and move to a other country. That all is just what I’ve realized.

Hopefully by then I have saved up enough money to attend college in Colorado Springs area. I still have absolutely no idea what i’m going to do, though. I have looked at the programs of Pikes Peak Community College; which you can find HERE. They have pretty sweet programs to offer, so I might go there.. and it’s effort able. But then again, it might be better for me to attend a University. It’s all so hard to figure out. I have no clue what I want to do.. there are lots of Colleges and University’s available. But I have been to Pikes Peak already, so I know how they work. well .. kind of. haha.

Mmhhmm, well I guess I have some research to do.. So i’ll get back to you’ll later! If you think you can help me, or give me some information! Leave a comment or contact me!

I have to sign up for a college or university in August. So I have to be fast !! The big questions for now are: Do I want to go to a Community College? or do I prefer a University? What do I want to do my major in? Where in Colorado will I go? What is the best program for me? and lots more..

All I can say for now is.. I hope I do find something !!