April already!

Long time, no news.....could be falling into a rut here.  Grab your coffee-we've got some catching up to do!

There wasn't a lot of excitement around here for us in the early part of the year.  I injured my back severely in early December,  so spent almost 10 weeks stuck on the boat.  Hard to produce any interesting news or pictures for the blog from the settee in our salon.  Wasn't a lot of fun for Rob during that time either, as he had to fulfill all of our social obligations alone and didn't have me available to beat up on at the tennis court every day.  He convinced me to give acupuncture a go in late April since things just weren't getting any better.  To our surprise, it really did seem to help and by the end of the month I was getting around again....carefully!   Still not back on the courts, though, but I have started with a personal trainer to try to help strengthen things up again.


 
Blew through our boat maintenance budget this year in a big way, surprise!  We had some areas on our aluminum doors and crane where the paint was blistering, so hired a local guy, Andres, to scrape and sand them down and repaint.  Once that job was finished, we had him open up an area on our deck behind the portuguese bridge that had what we hoped was a very long surface crack.  No such luck, so another huge job for him opening the cracks up wider to remove all the rotten balsa core, refill the gaps, refibreglass it all, repair the non-skid and repaint the whole she-bang.   By the end of week 6 we were thinking we were going to have to adopt him, but it finally got finished and he did a beautiful job of all of it.  If you have lots of time and patience, it's possible to get great work done here at a fraction of what it would cost at home.  The key word is patience!


Alfonso and Andres

   We flew home on Feb. 28th so that Rob could (wait for it...) work for 3 weeks while Lisa got a break to go skiing. The first week home the weather was gorgeous-sunny skies and blossoming fruit trees. Of course, the day after we got home I came down with the nastiest cold, so missed that beautiful week of working in the yard and instead spent the next week outside in the rain, cold, and believe it or not, snow...twice! Decided to desert Rob and head back to warmer weather in Mexico with my girlfriend Linda. Okay, well we had pre-planned that, but I would have left at that point anyways!

Linda and I had a great week exploring the area-she had never been to Mexico before so it was a ton of fun seeing things through the eyes of a babe, so to speak. We put lots of hours on our "Mexican Mercedes" (the smaller-than-a-micro Atos) so she got a real taste of driving in Mexico. She deserves kudos, though-she really only grabbed for safety once or twice.... Although likely the first time she was a passenger in a car with no brake-lights or insurance! We made the drive to the Botanical Gardens (definitely worth visiting, and check the size of that fiddle-head!) and did 3 tours with Vallarta Adventures-a trip to San Sebastian, the Rhythms of the Night and their outdoor adventure.....all great times.

 

Filled our spare time with shopping, drinking wine and playing Scrabble - lots of Scrabble. Oh, and Linda got a great shot of a Blue-footed Booby right along the malecon in PV-first time I've ever seen one.

...my favorite  San Sebastian face

  Traded Rob for Linda at the airport on the 21st and enjoyed a few quiet days, then the fun started.  I had to have a tooth pulled here last year, so last week bit the bullet and had a post implanted in prep for a crown in the fall.  My first experience with dental surgery in Mexico, and must say it went really well-and less than half the cost of having it done at home.   Definitely the place to have dental work done!

  Two days later, we had the boat hauled at the La Cruz shipyard.  This is a brand-new yard that just opened last year, and we had heard mixed reviews last year from people who had work done.  This year everyone seemed really happy with them, so we decided to give it a go.  Again, a fantastic experience.  Solemates is 70 tons and has a complicated bottom, but the haul went flawlessly.  We needn't have worried about getting the straps in the right place as they sent a diver down to place them-definitely the way to go.  Spent 3 nights living it up in our friend's condo while the bottom got painted and various little jobs done, then splashed again on Thursday.   Would definitely recommend this yard-the quality of the work was great, they quoted (and charged!) half of what it would have cost at the other yard, and the manager Eduardo was very professional and helpful.

Then...the real excitement.  We added a new member to our bird family last week-a Moluccan Cockatoo named Grady.  He was abandoned by his american owners almost 2 years ago at the veterinary office of our friends Arturo and Lucila.  They have very limited time to spare as well as space in the office, so he was languishing in his cage in a back room at the clinic.  Arturo was anxious to find him a better situation, and I of course fell in love with him, so Rob came up with the idea of rescuing him and bringing him to Paradise Village (which apparently makes him Rob's bird!).  Don Graziano, the owner of the resort, graciously agreed to have him live here and be looked after by Carolina the resident bird trainer and care-giver, who is a wonderful lady.  So.....we bought Grady and moved him in here last week.  It was a big change for him living outside again and having all of the other birds around, but he's starting to settle in well.  He's definitely a star here, being the only resident non-Macaw, and is a real character with a very loving personality........

                  

......and a big voice!  Definitely not a condo bird.  This is one of his favorite ways to let off  steam-highly entertaining.  We're really enjoying spending time with him and it will be hard to say goodbye for the season when we go home.

  Speaking of going home, our plans have changed yet again this year.  For a variety of reasons both personal and not, we have decided to cut the season short and forgo our trip to the Sea and California.  We weren't sure we'd enjoy it as much with my back still being an issue as well as some knee trouble Rob has been having (ouch!  are we getting old????) and we have some stuff happenning at home that is calling us back.  As all boaters know, boating plans are written in sand and subject to change at any time-and change they have.  We'll try again next season, and hopefully our great friends Mike and Maureen will be able to join us next year as well.  At this point it looks like we'll be back on land April 25th.

  So, think that's the update, hope I haven't put anyone to sleep!
  Until next time.....

Well, looks like we got lucky here in Banderas Bay.......in the marina we apparently had a 3' drop in water level and subsequent big currents coming in and out but nothing to cause any real concern or any damage.  They say it will continue to do this over the next couple days.  We're thankful, and still watching the news to see how things play out for everyone else-hopefully the rest of you will fare as well.

Tomorrow we head  for home for a couple of weeks so looking forward to seeing everyone up in sunny BC.  Pollo is having a vacation here at the hotel while we're away-a lovely girl named Carolina who takes care of the parrots for the resort has agreed to babysit her...wonder if she'll learn any new words from the Macaws?  I'm hoping she won't just learn a new scream!

So, habla luego (will somebody please tell me if that's the right way to say 'talk to you later'???) Good luck, Hawaii.....  

another round of weather????

So.....water spouts, hurricane force winds, and now....a tsunami warning???  We're thinking about everyone in Chile who's living through the aftermath of the earthquake and about all of our friends on the Pacific Coast of anywhere.  We're especially thinking of those of you living in Hawaii and will be waiting to hear from you once this isall over.  We hope everyone stays safe and that all of the worry is for nothing.  Could happen, right?

We're waiting to see how the reports come in during the morning before we decide what to do ourselves.  There's some debate aboard our boat as to whether it's best to head out to sea (although at 8 knots we won't get too far out!!) or desert the boat and head inland in the car.  At least it's happening today while we're here instead of next week while we're back home.  What a winter!

Be safe, love to you all!

An update on climate change....

So, here's the rest of the story.....To those skeptics amongst us who questioned 75k winds "in PV???? in the marina???? in the winter????" and suggested I may have been drinking heavily (you know who you are!) I'd like to let you know that Chiron, a yacht-fisher down the dock from us, recorded 82 knots (90 mph) sustained over 3 minutes. It was definitely a blow of hurricane force and by all accounts travelled all the way to Barra (over 100 miles) within about an hour.

We were lucky to escape with nothing more than a missing pilothouse window cover and a tattered Canadian flag, although we did have a fair bit of water get forced in in various places.  As the day goes by a bit more info trickles in-amazingly, most of the boats we know of suffered relatively minor damage-mostly torn off biminy tops and missing canvases.  We've heard of a few with more damage though, one being Fintastic who had some hatches open that got torn off and cracked.  We've heard sketchy details of how the boats at anchor in the bay fared-mostly alright as far as we know, but have heard there was one that ended up on the rocks in La Cruz.  There was also a waterspout that hit land in Bucerias but don't know what if any damage resulted from that.  (This shot was taken by someone else of one of the three waterspouts that were in Banderas Bay on January 15th)

The locals have said that was the worst storm they have had here....ever, winter or summer.  We're trying to be more ready for round 2 which could be coming up, although right now it's blissfully calm.  The unsettled system in the area is said to be bringing more rain, lightening and possibly water spouts this afternoon and/or evening, but hopefully minus the extreme winds.  I hear the weather in the Pacific Northwest has been better than this-sad!!!

So, enough of the weather for now.  Tomorrow I will try to produce the long-promised novella about what's been going on in our lives besides rain! 

wow

Had to blog this.....we are in the midst of something wild.  We went to bed at 10:00 and woke up at 10:30 to the sound of howling winds.  We have had our first real squall-75 knot winds with driving rain, thunder and lightening...nothing like it ever here before.  May have lost a canvas or two, but have survived Round 1.  The winds have settled now but we're waiting for the latest update on what's to come.  Who says you can't have an adventure at the dock?