After coffee, we made our way back down the hill to the village of Castara to have breakfast at Cheno’s.  This is such a quaint village and once you arrive, you find that the people are kind and generous.

First we needed to make a stop at the big clay oven where the ladies were going to be baking bread today.  We wanted to place an order because the menu was intriguing.  Kristen, Alice, Susan, and I walked through the gate as they were beginning to fire up the oven, placed and paid for our order:  coconut tarts, coconut drops, coconut roll, raisin rolls, pone,  and pumpkin bread.  She was a sweat lady hiding behind a very serious facade…but I finally coaxed her into letting me get a picture.

We walked back up to Cheno’s for breakfast – which was delicious – and then walked around Castara for a few minutes.  I picked up a couple of souvenirs for Cindy and then we drove back up to Paradise Point Villa to pack our bags.  Today, we would be moving to the Magdalena in preparation for the DISES round table that officially starts today.  But I had to take one last picture of the Castara beach…

Before driving back up the mountain, we all wanted to check our the beach.  The fishing boats were coming in with the catch of the morning.  They cleaned and prepared the fish right there on the beach.  Of course, Susan and Kristen jumped right in to help them out.  I’ve got video of that “cleaning process” that I’ll post soon.  But check out these fish!!

We packed our suitcases and then relaxed for a bit at Paradise Point Villa.  We had to kill a couple of hours while our bread was being baked in Castara.  Finally the time came to make our departure.  Mark and Danny drove the suitcases to Magdalena while the rest of us returned to Castara to pick up the bread…which wasn’t quite ready yet.  We still needed to fill time for another hour.  Fortunately, that’s not too difficult to do in a place like this.  We picked up a soda and sat down but I was too enticed by the ocean so I took a walk up the shore.  Here are a few pictures.

As I walked up the beach, I was able to see these little crabs running along the sand.  When I came up to the rocks, there were hundreds of them – and they weren’t so little anymore.  See if you can find the crabs on this rock.  They are definitely there and they are NOT small – just nicely camouflaged!

I needed just one more picture before picking up the bread – and here it is:

The bread was finally ready for us to pick up – and we had a LOT of bread!  As we walked up to the oven, you could smell just how amazing it was going to taste.  We carried several brown paper bags of bread to the car in anticipation of sample each one.  It was time to leave Castara and make the one hour drive to the other side of the island and to the Magdalena. But the journey was anything but boring.  Along the way, we saw a HUGE lizard cross the road; stopped to help a sheep that had tangled himself around a post; discovered a new fruit that was amazing; and saw two caiman gators as we entered the Magdalena.

Tonight was also the official opening of the DISES Round Table.  We’ve just wrapped up our first gathering over dinner…and the day starts early in the morning.  So, good night.  I’ll write again when I can.

The following morning, after everyone was awake, we made our way down the hill to Cheeno’s for breakfast.  This is a small, quaint restaurant in the village of Castara.  The breakfast menu is extensive – bacon and eggs or bacon, eggs and toast.  The food was excellent and the service was charming.  These small villages have a way of making you feel at home even when you’ve never been there before.  They did make one request of us…don’t feed the chickens.

After breakfast, we explored the village.  There is this amazing area close to the beach where a group of woman bake bread they sell on Saturday.  All kinds of bread but I was especially intrigued by the coconut rolls and tarts.  We’ll be heading back on Saturday to buy some for sure!  But check out the oven.

After a late breakfast, we drove back up the mountain to Alice’s house.  It didn’t see as though the rain was going to stop anytime soon Susan, Kristen and I decided to make the best of it and explore the rainforest behind the house.  The trail leads down the hill to a river and waterfall that dump directly into the bay.  By the time we made it to the river, we were drenched.  Taking the plunge into the waterfall was a no-brainer…and the water was so nice!

The challenge of hiking down the hill is that you also have to hike back up!  What we thought might be really difficult wasn’t actually too bad.  We were soaked from head to toe…and ready for a hot shower!

We chilled out for a bit in the afternoon, took our showers, and then all of us drove make down the mountain for dinner at Marguerite’s.  Rhonda was our hostess and the menu options included stewed fish, stewed chicken, and stewed goat – all service with vegetables, salad, beans and rice.  I went with the stewed goat – and it was amazing.

After dinner, we walked over to Marvin’s – one of the local gathering places in the village.  It was a great time to enjoy each other’s company and relax.  After great food and company, we drove back up to the hill and talked well into the morning…bedtime came around 2:45am!

Our last performance of the season was just a few days ago in Englewood, NJ at the Bergen Performing Arts Center.  This is one of our favorite places.  The local crew is awesome and the audience never disappoint us!

It’s good to be home and to be off the road for a while.  Well, I say “a while” but I mean a few days.  On Wednesday, I leave for Tobago to speak at the Division of International Special Education and Services Round Table (DISES).  I’m excited about this opportunity to share the Hocus Focus project with educators from around the world.  And the organizers have made arrangements for the teachers from Trinidad and Tobago to attend the presentation.

I’ll be enjoying the next couple of days at home.  I’ll definitely be posting from Tobago!

Thursday started early and continued throughout the day.  The first stop was Quality Life, a rehabilitation facility for individuals with brain and spinal cord injuries.  What an incredible place this is.  It was a privilege to spend some time with the residents here, visit with some of the therapists, and share a little magic.

The second stop was the ARC of Omaha at the Ollie Webb Center.  There’s something very special about spending time in a place like this.  People with developmental disabilities are not all that different from you and I.  We had a great time sharing magic with the clients here – both performing and teaching them a few tricks.

After lunch, we were on our way to Immanuel Rehabilitation Center.  Here, I was able to do a 2-hour workshop for rehabilitation therapists teaching them how to use simple magic tricks as a part of their treatment program.

The final stop of the day was at Omaha Children’s Hospital for a pizza party with the kids and a little magic show!  Often, the children with low immunity systems are unable to attend our public performances because they are so vulnerable.  This was an opportunity to bring the magic to them and their siblings.  After the performance, we took some additional time to teach all of them how to perform a few tricks of their own.  It was great to hear them laugh, watch them play, and see them have a new experience.

Friday was the day of the show at the Orpheum Theatre.  I had been looking forward to this performance for several weeks.

This is a SPECTACULAR venue building in the 1920′s and restored and renovated to accommodate large Broadway shows.  When they did the restoration, they kept the character and style of the building completely in tact.

We backed the truck into the loading dock.  The crew was there to meet us – and we were on our way to getting the show fully set and ready!

We had a great audience for the evening show – people of all ages.  And the response was fantastic!  Thank you Omaha for being an amazing crowd!  I’m looking forward to coming back!!

After spending a month in the snow, it was great to be in the Florida sunshine!  We would spend four days in Miami doing workshops for the South Miami Dade Cultural Arts Center.  They host a unique festival called the All Kids Included Family Festival for people of all abilities.  For two days, I worked and performed for children with a variety of challenges including sensory integration disorders and autism.  All of us had a great time!

On Saturday morning, the “big festival” was underway – concerts, shows, food, and the giant slide!  I couldn’t resist!  Check this out!

On Saturday, we had two performances – one at 1pm and the other at 3pm.  Audiences were great – just a fantastic celebration for the entire family.

Here are a few more pictures from the Florida trip.  Today, we arrived in Omaha, NE where we will spend the next few days.

This was the first time I’ve been to the Washington Pavilion and I had a great time working with Regina and Michele.  During our five days together, I conducted a workshop for occupational therapists; visited 7 schools; worked with clients at Sanford Children’s Hospital; did an in-service program for therapists at Avera Health; worked with clients at the Veteran’s Hospital; made the rounds at Avera Hospital; and brought the show to the stage of the Washington Pavilion.  In total, we were able to directly impact the lives of more than 300 individuals.  More importantly, we were able to lay the foundation for continuing this work long after my truck left the loading dock.

A reporter from the Argus Leader attended the workshop for therapists.  She did a bit of video to demonstrate one of the tricks and wrote this story.

In advance of the show, I made several area media appearances including four radio stations (from rock to country) and an interview on the KSFY Morning News.  The interview on KSFY went very well but the highlight for me was something that I always ask to do but rarely get the opportunity.  Shawn Cable actually let me do the weather forecast and then tweeted about it!  You can check out the video HERE.

You may remember reading last week we had a little trouble with the truck.  I had to replace a fuel injector while we were in Lincoln.  It all worked out and things seemed to be running great…until we left Omaha for Miami.  Suddenly, that familiar black smoke started pouring out of the exhaust and we heard that knocking noise.  Eli immediately pulled it over.

We called a tow truck and, yes, here we are again – held up in a hotel room waiting for them to repair the truck on Monday.  After that, Chase and I have a mad dash driving experience to get us to Miami before Tuesday night.

Here are a few pictures from the week in Sioux Falls:

We called a tow truck who pulled us into the local International Dealership where we left it on the lot and got a hotel room for the night.  We also picked up a rental car so we could continue the trip to Lincoln the following morning.  But that also meant we would be leaving the truck in Sioux Falls to get repaired.  That’s something that always concerns me…

We arrived in Lincoln for a week of great activities prior to the final performance at the Lied Center for Performing Arts.

It was an awesome schedule where Nancy worked to make plans for me to work in many of the Lincoln Public Schools with some amazing kids.  I also had the chance to work with several Family Service groups after school.  I also had the privilege of speaking to the 70 education students and faculty in the College of Education at the University of Nebraska.  While I was a little nervous about this one, it was so much fun – and, I hope, these future teachers could envision some creative ways to teach their students.

After an amazing week, here’s the video summary!

On Tuesday, Chase and Keith drove back up to Sioux City to pick up the truck – hooray!  While I was having a great time working in the schools, they were bringing the show to Lincoln…just in time.  As it turns out, we blew out a fuel injector.  Loud noise and a couple thousand dollars to fix it but, at least we are back on the road again.

In the meantime, the local paper did a great article on the upcoming show at the Lied Center.  You can check it out here.

We had an AMAZING AUDIENCE for the performance on Friday night.  The audience was perfect – energetic, excited, enthusiastic, and ready to volunteer!  There’s no way a performer could ask for anything more.  Check out this theatre – and almost every seat was filled!

In the end, the week in Lincoln was incredibly special.  Thank you Bill, Anne, and Nancy and the wonderful people of Lincoln for making our week so phenomenal!!

Saturday morning, we pulled into the loading dock of the Chester Fritz.  The crew was waiting and ready to start the day….which went very well!  We loaded in, set up, teched the show, and were ready for dinner by 5pm – outstanding crew!

Cases made it from the truck to the stage….

Scenery, lights, sound, and illusions get put into place….

We tweaked the lighting cues, focused the intelligent lighting, and moved quickly through the remaining things that needed to be done.

Doors opened at 7pm and the audience streamed into the theatre.  I could tell they were going to be a fun crowd as there was already a sense of excitement in the air!  Unfortunately, Cindy was still very ill for this show so it was “just the guys” performing on the stage.  Chase and Eli did a great job of picking up the slack and making the show run smoothly…and the audience rolled with us!

THANK YOU Grand Forks for being such a great audience!

After the show, we were told that another Winter Storm Watch was now in effect and the region would be expecting between 8 – 18 inches of snow!  We needed to be able to start heading south as quickly as possible but the snow was supposed to arrive in Grand Forks starting around 4am.

Thankfully, the storm slowed a bit.  When we woke up, the storm was now predicted to hit Grand Forks at 1pm – several hours later than expected.  This brief reprieve gave us a few more hours to get out of town.  We drove for a couple of hours in clear skies on great roads…and then, it all started to change.

We had to pull of the road around Watertown, SD to give the storm some time to travel north.  It was brutal – wind, snow, white out conditions, blizzards, cold, freezing rain, ice….all made for treacherous roads.

Tonight, we are in Sioux Falls, SD just a few hours from our next stop – LINCOLN, NE!

MONDAY – APRIL 8

The first day in Aberdeen was spent working in several places:  first at Project Search and then in some of the schools with incredible kids.  We worked in elementary, middle, and the high school with students who could improve their skills through learning some simple tricks.

Actually, the high school workshop was one of the most fun!  In the photo below, I’m doing a little magic for a group of high school guys.  You can see the expression on their faces as five $1 bills turned into $500.

After a few tricks, I spent some time teaching all of them a trick or two.  One of the students, Josh, learned several tricks but he also had great stories.  Once again, the Aberdeen News captured the day in a nice feature story.

TUESDAY – APRIL 9

The next day started with a radio interview on one of the local arts programs.  This was broadcast live – and I love these kinds of interviews!  They are spontaneous and you just have to go with the flow.

Following the radio interview, Chase and I were on our way to St. Luke’s Avera Health Hospital to do a 3-hour continuing education workshop for physical and occupational therapists.  When we arrived at the Hospital, Dalita (the director of rehabilitation) had everything ready to go.  I walked into the conference room and we kicked into gear.  It’s amazing to me how quickly 3 hours can go when everyone is fully engaged in learning.  Chase and I spent the afternoon working with clients in various rehabilitation departments until about 5pm.

Eli spent the day driving to Sioux Falls to pick up Keith and Cindy at the airport.  Unfortunately, horrible weather was also moving into the region – horrible as in ice and snow storm!  As a result of all the bad weather, all flights were delayed in/out of Chicago.  They finally landed a few hours late and, by that time, ice  was destroying Sioux Falls.  Trees were breaking.  Power lines were snapping.  Roads were in rough shape, covered in ice and snow.  This turned into a BLIZZARD with more than 20 inches of snow falling.  Thankfully, they made it back to Aberdeen safely and we had avoided the storm.

As it turns out, this was not the end of the adventure.  Once they made it back to the hotel, Cindy started to become very sick.  By 3:30am, we were in the emergency room at the very same hospital where I had done a workshop earlier in the day.  She had picked up a virus or (most likely) some sort of food poisoning during the day.  We spent the next several hours at the hospital trying to get her feeling better.

WEDNESDAY – APRIL 10

After getting Cindy back to the hotel around 7am, I grabbed a couple hours of sleep before it was time to drive over to the Aberdeen Civic Theatre to start setting up for the evening show.  There’s no way Cindy was going to be able to do a show so we were also going to have to do a little “adapting” to pull it all together!  Chase and Eli did a great job of splitting up her responsibilities during the show.  In the end, it all came together well.

We pulled into the loading area, Stacy and Dawn were there to meet us…along with a crew of guys to help get unloaded.  Let the day begin – again.

I made a couple of trips back to the hotel during the day to check in on Cindy.  I wanted to make sure she was resting comfortably and that she was taking the medications she needed.  Stacy was so understanding in all of this and even put together some chicken broth for me to take back to her.

When I returned to the theatre, it was almost time for the doors to open.  The guys had figured out most of how the show was going to run – who was going to do what – but we still had one issue to resolve.  I had promised many of the people in the Aberdeen community that I would, in fact, be “cutting someone in half” during tonight’s show.  It doesn’t make any difference how many new, cutting-edge illusions you have in a show.  If you don’t cut someone in half, it’s just not a magic show!  With Cindy sick in the hotel, Chase volunteered to step into her place.  And he did a great job with the performance!

THURSDAY – APRIL 11

After the show, the snow started coming down in Aberdeen.  We had been spared for the last 3 days while much of the state was slammed with snow.  Interstate 90 from Sioux Falls to Rapid City was closed.  And city officials were still trying to pull together things in Sioux City.  As we o up on Thursday morning, it was clear that we were not going to be going anywhere today.  I was supposed to be doing some Hocus Focus work in Sisseton – a small community about 90 miles from Aberdeen.  At 5:40am, the decision was made to close schools…which means I got to stay in for the day and try to catch up on some work.

FRIDAY – APRIL 12

This morning, we left Aberdeen for Grand Forks, ND…show here on Saturday night at the Chester Fritz Auditorium.  And guess what?  It’s snowing.

For the next couple of days, I’ll be working in the office attempting to finalize our 13/14 tour schedule.  It’s looking very good and I’m always excited to watch how it all comes together – not magical, but miraculous at times!

On Friday, we will start the 24 hour drive from Virginia to South Dakota.  For most of this month we will be working in South Dakota, North Dakota, and Nebraska.  I hope the winter weather is gone!