Cancer Remains Dormant

Barbara and I landed in Sydney on our Qantas QF12 Airbus A380 (fabulous plane) from Los Angeles at 6.30 am, Tuesday June 26.  Within fifteen minutes we had deplaned, passed immigration and customs and met Alison.  Al brought the liquid I had to drink between one hour and half an hour before my CT Scan.  So, I drank it from 7 am to 7.30 am on our way to and at home.  7.45 am I walked from home to my 8.00 am appointment for the CT Scan, returning home by 8.30 am.  Amazing how much can be fitted into such a short time frame when you live close to the airport and the medical centre.

Tuesday morning was meant to be simpler as we were due home on Monday morning.  However, a severe storm in New York City on Friday night meant that we arrived Saturday morning at Buffalo Airport to find our flight cancelled   We were rescheduled to Sunday morning.  We spent a lazy and comfortable Saturday in a motel across the road from the airport.

Wednesday morning I went to the Royal Prince Albert Hospital for my blood test, bumping into a couple of the chemotherapy suite nurses who greeted me like a long lost friend. Early in the afternoon Alison and I met with my oncologist, Dr Lisa Horvath.  She gave us good news.  The CT scan showed that one liver lesion grew 2 millimetres and another shrank 2 mm – the cancer had remained stable even with no maintenance chemo for the last seven weeks.  My blood test showed everything is working well.  Lisa was happy for me to continue without chemotherapy – whoopee!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I will have another blood test on Monday 30 July and see Lisa.  She expects to take another CT Scan in about three months.  If the cancer continues to remain stable, I can continue without chemotherapy.  Lisa told me to keep up the busy lifestyle and travel schedule, which I will happily do.

Naturally, I, and all the Heyco’s, are thrilled that the cancer remains dormant.

I continue to have annoying side effects from the chemo being weaker fingernails that break, slight numbness in my fingers and toes, and bumpy skin on my forehead.  But this is a small price to pay for being alive with the quality of life I am enjoying.

Today, a friend emailed me to say I had been on his mind for the last few days and he had been praying for me.  He checked my last blog entry and realised we were due home from our US five week holiday.  It is fantastic to have caring friends and family who are wishing me well and praying.  Thank you all.

Travelling America

Barbara and I had a wonderful five and a half week holiday in North America.  Here are a few highlights and photographs.  We arrived May 18 in Vancouver, staying with our friends Brian and Bonnie.

We enjoyed walking in their local area of Richmond, travelling by public transport (train ferry and bus) to Grouse Mountain, a ski field on the north shore, sampling coffees and food, attending their church, visiting Bonnie’s research workplace, ICORD and more.

Brian, Barbara and Bonnie with Leon, her service dog at Minoru Park

Barbara testing a wheel chair at ICORD, under Bonnie's supervision

Tuesday we caught a bus to Seattle, picked up our Hertz hire car and began our two plus weeks of meandering to San Francisco.  In Seattle (only founded in 1853) we stayed in a restored log cabin at Lake Haller in the northern suburbs, visited Boeing production facility, Tillicum Indian Village , Underground City Tour, and Smith Tower (1914 at 30 floors was fourth tallest building in world after three New York buildings).

Friday morning, May 25 we left Seattle and drove around the Olympic Peninsula, visiting Olympic National Park from the north to see Hurricane Ridge and from the west to see forest areas and Ruby Beach – fabulous place.  We also stood on continental USA most north-westerly point, Cape Flattery (excluding Alaska).

On the Oregon Coast, we spent two nights in Webb’s Scenic Surf Motel (right on the beach, reasonable price, place to stay) at Cannon Beach walking three miles down the beach where we met a young Swedish American man who had begun walking the coastal trail in Alaska in February, visited art and craft shops, salivated over the seafood and had the world’s best coffee at the Sleepy Monk Café, established in 1989.

At the Sleepy Monk Café I was offered a wet, dry or traditional cappuccino.  I enquired what this meant.  Wet – means extra milk, dry – means extra froth and traditional is normal portions of coffee, milk and froth.  I asked for dry!

In Portland we spent a night and day with Drew, Barbara’s nephew who spent a year and a half in Australia a few years back, mostly staying with us.  He drove us east along the Columbia River where we walked the Eagle Creek trail, saw Multnomah Falls and other falls, the original Route 30 highway built during the WWI and the Rose Gardens.

We stayed in a number of interesting motels, among the most interesting being The Woodsman Country Lodge in Crescent on Route 97 where we stayed on our way to Crater Lake.  They are real bullets in the toilet seat!

Crater Lake is truly one of the World’s special places.  I am so glad we saw it.  When we arrived it was raining and cloudy.  Like, in 1978, when we visited the Grand Canyon in cloud, God rolled back the clouds and we saw the very blue lake and its magnificence.  This photo shows Wizard Island.

Then we entered Northern California, home of the Redwoods and Sequoia trees – truly majestic, these trees appear to stretch to heaven.  We adored the time we spent amongst them in a number of places – driving through and hiking some trails.  We started in the Redwood National and State Parks.  Further south we drove The Avenue of the Giants on which we saw the certified largest tree.  I also achieved the aim of driving through the three drive-thru trees, one at each of Klamath, Myers Flat and Leggett.

Driving down through the redwood country we discovered an historic Victorian era town of Ferndale where we stayed at the beautiful Victorian Inn. It is an old bank and office building converted to a hotel.  The owner and host greeted all the guests at breakfast and told us he had been to Sydney several years ago, with a strong memory of Hillsong Church at Baulkam Hills, which is Australia’s biggest church.

On our US west coast driving we visited a number of beautiful beaches of which McClures Beach in the Point Reyes National Seashore California was a standout.  We were the only people there for the two hours we stayed.  This area is an hour or two north of San Francisco.

In San Francisco we stayed in a two bedroom apartment on Van Ness Avenue and were joined by Jo Anne a friend from Barbara’s days in infants school in Fredonia.  We walked a lot and drove some seeing the Cable Car Museum, the Farmers’ Market, Ghirardelli’s, Golden Gate Park, Haight Ashbury and the Roman Catholic Cathedral Roman Catholic Cathedral a modern marvel of concrete construction.  A highlight was English High Tea lunch at the Secret Garden Tea House on the south of Golden Gate Park.  I have now had English High Tea in two US places, one in Canada, two in Australia, two in Malaysia and one in Zimbabwe but none in England!

Monday June 11 we flew to Las Vegas for one of my ‘bucket list’ items: Cirque du Soleil Beatles Love. Words cannot describe this one and a half hour show – perfect, superb, wonderful, exhilarating, glorious, uplifting, magnificent – the list of superlatives goes on.  The staging, performance, narrative, sound system, music and atmosphere were all perfect.  I cannot show you any photos as none are allowed.  The narrative started after WWII and moved through Liverpool to the 1960s love, drugs and revolution.

For the final part of our holiday on Tuesday June 12 we flew to Buffalo, NY and travelled to Fredonia, Barbara’s home town, for our time with the Lesch and wider family.

Barbara Mom with one of her many great grand children

The four Lesch sisters toasting their sisterhood with 4 Sisters Wine

David with Barbara's brother and partner

The Wild Women who gather every time Barbara comes