Welcome to the Cantwell travel blog!

Hi everyone! We are preparing to head to Kazakhstan to adopt our son, Evan! This is the first installment to chronicle our journey to Shchunisk, Kazakhstan (we still don't know how to pronounce it!). We are hoping to leave by the end of June, but are packing this morning as if we're leaving tomorrow! We will be staying in the neighboring larger city of Koksheteau (don't know how to pronounce that one, either), population 120,000. This whole experience has so far been an emotional rollercoaster for us. Right now we are excited, but yesterday we were scared out of our minds. They tell us that our travel from Almaty (our touchdown point in Kaz) to Koksheteau is likely to be on an old Soviet jet of "unknown" make. On this plane ride of 3 hours we can expect a lot of vodka, and varying temperatures depending on where you sit on the plane. One couple told us that there was frost forming on the interior of the plane by the time they touched down! Whoohoo! Yep, freaking out a little bit...

So, hopefully very soon these posts will include NEW pictures of our little dude, and happy, smiling pictures of all of us safely in Kaz! We will post this month as we hear news of our impending journey.

Love,
Jen and Brian