THIS SUMMER'S PHOTOS

Here are some pics from this summer. Karlene at the aquarium
Al and Libby
Skyler and Felicity
Jennifer and Ellis

Christopher Yevette, Joey, Sunny and Louie


Yevette & Louie

ON TO FLORIDA

Putting some more miles on the Acura we drove back to Long Beach just in time for me to head to Florida for the about 4 months. While in Florida I signed up for a kickboxing/resistance band exercise class that I go to 6 days a week and jog 3 days a week as well. Mom even got to try on the gloves a few times. The trick is that I go early in the morning at 6:30, before the sun starts to really cook and before my Mom wakes up. I wrote a BIG note with a thick black marker pen that says “Mom, I’ll be back soon”, I put it by her door each morning so if she wakes up she’ll be able to remember where I’ve gone. A few times she already had keys in hand and once even backed out of the driveway by the time I got back, convinced that I must have gotten lost or gotten into some predicament. I enjoyed my time there, sometimes it was a little crazy making for me but overall is was a good time spent with my family.

My mom may not remember what she just said a few minutes ago but she has many stories from her early years, which I’m so glad I had the opportunity to hear. She told me that when she was a kid, one of 10 kids, she used to watch her mom sew, always from a distance because her mom would always tell the kids to scram. Anyway… when my mom was about 11 or 12 her aunt asked her if she thought she could so sew a dress for her. My mom figured she’d give it a try, so equipped with one of her aunt’s dresses to use as a pattern, she made her aunt a dress. When the dress was finished her aunt very pleased with the dress, paid her niece 10 cents. That was my mom’s first sewing job. Years later she worked as a seamstress in New York. Over the years my mother made me many beautiful dresses. I remember going to bed while she was still at the sewing machine and in the morning when I awoke there was a brand new dress hanging on the back of my bedroom door. My Mom, she’s one in a million and I love her very much.

In addition to my Mom there‘s my entire family to spend time with in Florida and that I did. We got to go have Italian ices a few times, took a walk across the lake on the elevated wooden walkway, that only a few weeks earlier was totally underwater, thanks to hurricane Fay, and had a few great barbecues. The kids, Mom and I went to a few cheap matinee movies to get out of the heat a couple of times. I even took a pottery class with my nephew Joe and his daughter Katie. Sandra, my sister-in-law tried out a few new recipes and I have now added them to my 1001 chicken dishes. Thanks to my family for sharing their simmering summer with me.

Midway through my stay in Florida I took the train out of the quaint Winter Park station to Fort Lauderdale, then onto Hutchinson Island to spend a with Janet, her family, Cathie and Melissa, all of whom I hadn’t seen in over 20 years. We didn’t get much sun at the beach, again thanks to Fay but we had a good time together laughing and catching up. I learned how to play Rubicube. Thanks again to Janet for being such a wonderful hostess.

Colorado Daze

We flew out of La Paz to LA in mid June just in time to hop in the car and head to Colorado. We had a short but sweet visit with my friends Lorraine and John; they got to meet Al over lunch before we took off down the road for Golden to spend a day with Al’s sister and family. Our date book has September 12, 2009 reserved to come back to Golden for Jill’s wedding (Al’s niece).

Once out of Golden we headed up to Steamboat Springs to “Rockin’ at the Ranch, better known to some as Keri and Spencer’s wedding on the Flying Horse Ranch, hosted by Lou and Lydia, you remember, they’re fellow cruisers that we had been traveling with this past season. It was a great time, sort of a mini reunion with Lou, Lydia and Sean from Chemistry. We danced in the barn, ate New Orleans gumbo, I flirted with Lou’s 90 year old uncle and even got a ride in the helicopter.

Lydia and I had fun drinking wine while cooking lasagna for a crowd and then howled at the moon while sitting in the Jacuzzi. Flying Horse Ranch, high in the Rockies is truly a wondrous place, Lou and Lydia…thank you for our invitation to your beautiful home.

Guests In the Sea

We had our first overnight guests on the boat. We picked up Ray and Carol (the Scottish side of the family) at the marina in Puerto Escondido and began a 4 day excursion to some of our favorite spots in the Sea of Cortez. It happened to be my birthday and had been Ray’s a few days before, so we did our fair share of celebrating. It was the first time that I had provisioned and cooked for 4 people, granted that doesn’t sound like much but I was a little nervous so I was really glad that everything went so well, smoothies in the morning and Pina Coladas for Happy hour We enjoyed exploring coves in the dinghy, snorkeling in Aqua Verde, and a beach party in San Juanico, with several other cruisers in the anchorage. In the evenings we played scrabble, I even won the first night but Carol gave me a sound whooping the next night. Thanks to Ray and Carol for sharing a part of our adventure.

The Volcano and the Dentist

It's time to catch up on my blog. You see, one reason that I don’t get to it is because I’m so far behind but the longer I don’t catch up, the further behind I get.

Let’s see I ended off in the late spring. We took an inland bus trip to Colima to go on a trek up to the Volcan de Fuego, a trek of several hours with the French guide we had heard so much about. He was booked for over a week so we went to the tourist office and got a name of another guide, at least that’s what we thought. I called a few of the numbers and finally contacted a gentleman who agreed to take us up to the volcano the next morning. He was curious how we got his number, turned out, even though he was an avid hiker, he was a dentist, not a tour guide. At this point we weren’t sure if we should just get our teeth cleaned or go hiking with the dentist. The next morning Juan showed up early at our hotel room ready to get going. We had a good day, instead of the 4 hour hike to get up close and personal with the volcano we took a 45 minute walk to view the volcano from further away. Just as we got to a high ridge smoke began to billow out of the volcano, right on schedule. Even from this distance, the view was impressive. All in all we had a really good day and saw many of the local sights, including the “green lake” and the best ice cream in town.