Home of Pic-of-the-Week: Pic-of-the-Week for April 28, 2015

Hola Amigos!

We've had another "vacation" week with our guest Dick here. It's kind of nice to go places and do fun things that we haven't done in a while! I mentioned last week that we were going to go to Zorra Falls and the hot springs. We didn't make it to the hot springs, but we did manage to get to the falls. What a neat place! It has been years since we've been there. (Used to be free, now they charge since it's part of the Biosphere Park). Ryan and Dick took advantage of the deep pool for a swim. Ryan also did several dives off the rocks

Dick enjoying a swim.

In the bottom photo here, Ryan is climbing out to a diving spot. You'll have to look in the 2015 April album to see the contortions he went through to get out there! I was going to do a video of his dive, but that's when the camera batteries died! Getting down to the pool is interesting...someone carved steps out of the solid rock, or where they needed to, placed stone and concreted steps. The first time we visited, there was a rope to hang on to to get up or down! I am very thankful for the rock steps! Of course, there is no guardrail or hand rail, and it's always a challenge doing stair climbing with bifocals!! FYI, after Hurricane Odile last fall, the pool at the bottom was much, much higher! We saw evidence of several palm trees washed out and jumbled rocks at the bottom.

Another day we took a drive to the rock paintings near Boca del Alamo. As usual, it was an interesting place to visit, not only for the paintings, but for the plant life that we see there. Again, be careful on the trail, because there are many cactus growing right by the trail. You don't want to grab a cactus for support as you step up on a rock on the path!!

We stopped in El Cardonal to check out the new hotel there, and the little bit we saw was pretty impressive. Look at this neat table and seating in the pool!! Very clever to put a shade cover over this section (this is where I'd be for sure!)

On Sunday afternoon and Monday we took a quick overnight trip to La Paz. We did some shopping and some touring and some good eating! We met Ryan and some sail boating friends of his at Ryan's favorite Chocolate clam place on a side street and had clams on the half shell for an afternoon snack! (Yes, they were raw clams....Ryan claims he's seen them still wiggling when he squirts them with lime juice!)

You can see all kinds of fancy sail boats in the La Paz Harbor, but this one was about the "least of all". Since the guy was using oars we decided he didn't know how to use the sail, but it was fun to watch from our "bar seat with a view" at the Taildragger and tell him what to do!

And believe it or not, La Paz has finally put up readable and visible street signs in a large part of the city. These signs are going up on buildings at the street corners, for the most part. Truly amazing, after years of navigating this large city with map in hand, and counting blocks from a known street to the desired destination!

La Paz has many sculptures throughout the tourist area, and especially on the Malecon (the street beside the bay), but this is one of my favorites of musicians...nautical musicians, of course, playing their shell instruments.

Today, we are taking Dick to the airport for his trip home. We've enjoyed having him here and just wish more of you would visit us so we'd have more excuses to have some fun!! He also got to enjoy our first corn harvest with us, and there is a lot more to come.

And, being my Mother and Father's child, here are your mandatory flower photos for the week. The first is the bloom of a little bitty cactus we have in a pot (I think the stalk and bloom are taller than the little cactus!) The second is our red Amaryllis.