Saturday, January 16, 2010

Time to Leave La Paz, and getting the boat ready.

   Today is our second day of getting things ready to leave our safe next here in La Paz. We arrived just days before Thanksgiving 2009 and will depart January 16 th around noon.

   We spent Tuesday provisioning (food) and yesterday picking up some boat items plus some prescriptions.  We put some non-skid on the top of the pilot house where we stand to lower the main sail and move the boom. Also, I baked some cookies (necessary) and cleaned the barbeque.  Of course when we took the barbeque off its stay, it had cemented itself on, so it broke the plastic regulator stem which the propane hose attaches itself too...so later we had to walk to town and buy a new one!!! That friends is the nuts and bolts of owning a boat and using it because if it sits in the marina everything lasts longer.
  
    Today we or I did laundry and we did an errand or two, I remembered something I needed at the fabric store and so we took the shuttle bus to town and a taxi back, after having a fun lunch in downtown La Paz.  There are many places to eat and so far all have been good.  It is sunny and around 82 degrees, however it has started a 3 day blow...with winds up to 20-30 knots our on the Sea of cortez.  Hopefully it will do as the report projects and the wind will  die down on Saturday and won't blow again until next Wednesday and that should give us time to get to our next destination further up into the Sea. That was not our original plan but instead of that we have decided to see some more of the sea before going over to the mainland.

    We have stowed everything, but something will manage to fall on the floor and break or spill. The fridge is as full as we dare. We eat simple things like a small tortilla with cabbage, avocado, salsa or mayo and meat or fish on it maybe some cilantro but it does not last well. We have plenty of fruit and I may make a soup tonight in the pressure cooked.  Don filled the propane tanks, the barbeQ is clean. The water tank is full. We said  good bye to friends here at the marina and announced on the cruiser website that we are taking off today at noon.

    It is hard to leave La Paz and we are not alone in having a hard time taking off.  Others have decided to stay or come back and we will probably return but not this year. The wind has calmed down but the seas will take a couple more days to really calm down but there is another blow coming so we need to be where we are going which is Agua Verde by Friday.  We will stop tonight on the island of Espirtu Santo and then go up the Bahia Evarista to meet friends on s/v Happy Nest.

    It all depends on the internet connections but I suspect it could be a week or two before I am able to write on the blog again.  So chow for now; s/v Little Christian; Don & Jacquie.

Sunday, January 10, 2010

A New Year _ in Mexico and What we did for Christmas???

     I was getting so homesick the week before Christmas that Don bought us tickets to fly home, he said, " it is probably better to take her home that look for a new woman".  So we flew out of Cabo on December 24th at 4:27pm and arrived in Seattle at 8pm in the same evening. At 11pm we caught the airporter shuttle to Yakima and walked in to our condo at 2:40am on Christmas morning.

    Don busied himself with turning on all the things we had turned off and when he got to the main bathroom and tried to turn the water on in the toilet the knob flew off and cold water began blasting all over our bathroom and Don, it was so cold that he was freezing and the force of the water was so hard that he could not get the knob back on...so after getting the handle to turn off the water from our neighboring condo owner and calling the fire department we mopped up and fell into bed around 5am, slept for 2 hours or less and then the fun really began.

     I was dropped off and Laura's (and family) home and rang their door bell (lights were on) and Jack my oldest grandchild opened the door are was very surprised, everyone was in shock. After the big surprise Don left for Newport, Oregon where he surprised his kids royally...and it was lots of fun to be able to do that. The day after Christmas two of my sons and their families came for game day and let the cousins play.  They also were very surprised to see Nana had come home for Christmas.  Mike couldn't make it because he was heading south for the Rose Bowl Game in Pasadena.  (still sad about our loss)

    Don returned on Monday and we did some maintenance in our condo and got ready for New Years Eve.  We went dancing at the American Legion (we have to get some new places to dance in Yak) but alas we were so used to going to bed at Cruisers midnight which is 9:30pm that we could not even make it and went home to bed.   I guess we are OLD. We had most of our evening meals with Laura's family and the food was delicious. Don managed to eat at Bert's Pub his favorite and Laura and I took in a movie "It Complicated", and I would wait to see it when it comes out on video....just okay. Anyway then it was pretty much time to fly back to Mexico. Which we did on January 8th, Elvis's 75th Birthday.

   Now we are here on the boat, Christmas was wonderful, all the grandchildren are growing and so much more grown up. We are busily getting ready to set sail to Puerta Valharta or PV as it is referred to down here. We will leave here on the 15th of January for some snorkeling on the Island of Espirtu Santo and Isla Parrita.  Then the plan is to go acrossed to the mainland and see the area around PV and perhaps a bus trip up to Guadalahaja (spelling???). 

   Many of our new cruising friends are all dispersing to other directions and they will be missed, some we will see in the future and others will be heading to the further parts of the World where we have not planned to go.  We will follow their blogs and keep in touch hoping to cross paths in the future. 

   We have been invited to travel along with some others to destinations that all sound fun, but we are thinking that would be too soon for us to leave this part of the world. So far God is showing us to continue our planned course for this year and return home for the summer, returning to the boat and Mexico in the Fall of 2010.

   Please pray for us that we will know God's will for our path and He will keep us in His safe care.

HAPPY NEW YEAR 2010.   Jacquie and Don