Pic-of-the-Week for October 7, 2014

Hola Amigos!

We are HOME!  Hooray!  We packed up and left Bend on Tuesday, September 30th, and were back home on Sunday, October 5th.  We had several short days, and several really long ones, but managed just fine.  The roads were not bad after Hurricane Odile (not sure how they'll be affected after Hurricane Simon goes by about mid-Baja).  The road crews are fast about repairing things so trucks can get through to deliver food and gas and other important commodities.  The roughest parts and longest waits were where they were doing new road construction and repairs from a rock fall that happened before we left in May!   We saw the aftermath of several truck accidents but all in all, it wasn't bad.  Here are some travel log photos:

From the driveway of Ben's brother Ken's home near Bend.  Loaded down, loaded up...whatever.  We're ready to go!  

In Oregon, from Highway 31 (La Pine to Lakeview).

The Sierra Nevadas had a sprinkling of fresh snow.
 

 Mono Lake, with a very neat mountain range to the south east.  Can anyone tell me the name of that range?  My California map didn't say...maybe it's in Nevada.

More of the Sierra Nevadas near Bishop.  The Aspen trees are turning color, as you can see on the slopes.

From the Bishop area to San Diego is not that pretty, unless you like Joshua trees, which were blooming nicely.  

Just entering Tecate, and Mexico.  Get out your Spanish dictionary, or dig up those seldom used words again!  We stopped this time to declare our "new to us" used generator, since our old one died after Hurricane Odile.  Ben did it by himself while I guarded the truck and car.  The Customs lady didn't speak any English, so she found a Mexican who did.  Ben told her all about the new Solar Oven, the new expensive coffee pot, and a few other items.  She told him she'd just charge him for the generator, and not for the new items in the truck!  We paid $50, and were on our way.  While we were parked there, many people walked by and took photos of the 28 Woody and asked questions about it.  That car makes great friends for us!  
 

There is an area about 200 miles wide in the northern state of Baja California where Boojum trees (or Cirio trees) grow.  Here, and in the Mexican state of Sonora (same latitude) is the only place in the world where these grow (even though Ben has tried for years to get a crop growing.)  Funny looking trees, but always great to see.  

 The Boulder Fields near Catavina...this is where God put all his extra boulders when he was done creating the earth!  (That's my story and I'm sticking with it!)  

The Woody is still looking good and drawing admirers as we park at Catavina and get a cup of coffee and muffin.  
 

Lake Chapala had lots of water in it this year.  We saw a group of about 10 horses wading and splashing in a little pond beside the road.  They were so happy and playful!  Great to see.

Here's something you don't see in Baja too often... green grass for as far as the eye can see!  Amazing.
 

A cruise ship in Loreto!  We didn't know they stopped here, but according to a friend, have been doing so for a long time.  She thinks it's the Princess Star line.  
 

You knew I couldn't do a Pic-of-the-Week without a flower, right?  This was at the Oasis Hotel in Loreto where we stayed.  
 

Mountains south of Loreto were green, green, green...all the way to the top!
 

Road crews are improving the road where a major rock fall occured last spring.  We waited quite a while to pass, and the crews were working on a Sunday!
 

 The fellow on the front end loader at the top is yelling at his friend below to look at our Woody! 

Beautiful and serene Sea of Cortez; north of Loreto.
 

On the way to Ciudad Insurgentes (heading south west).  There was a lot of rain here in the last 24 hours due to Hurricane Simon passing by to the west.
 

Got some groceries and headed out of La Paz for the last 60 miles to home.  Ugh.... some serious looking rain headed our way...or we're headed to it.  Either way, were going to get wet!  Notice the smoke line in the middle of the picture?  That's left over from a lightening strike.
 

Yes, there are a few sprinkles on the windshield, but I can see our home from here!  (Look just to the left and a bit above the traffic sign on the left.  Our house is square and pink).  

Sitting on our veranda and relaxing after unloading a bunch of our things, we noticed the clouds over the Sea of Cortez to the east.  Beautiful!
 

The "guys" are happy.  Sam is in his favorite lap and position at the table, and Ryan has a dog to pet!  Oh, happy day!  
 

Now, for those of you planning to visit us this year, the San Jose del Cabo airport will be open for the first time after Hurricane Odile tomorrow, October 8th (that's tomorrow, folks!)  If you don't have your tickets yet, book them  now!  We are looking forward to your visits.

I have posted several more photos in our brand new 2014 October Picasa album.   AND, you should really look at this video I took on the road of the CFE trucks (Mexican electric company) ... pretty amazing.  CFE trucks.  You count the trucks as they go by, and see if you get the same number I did!  (Yes, pickups count, too).  

Hasta la proxima semana,
Tus amigos en Baja,
Harriet, Ben, Ryan, Sam & Zoey

Pic-of-the-Week for September 29, 2014

Hello Amigos.... and goodbye to most of you!

We have decided to head south (and gradually east) starting tomorrow, September 30th.  Our plans are to make it all the way to Lakeview, because we haven't spent much time there this summer, and we haven't eaten at Mario's In Lakeview yet!  Can't miss that opportunity!!  Then we'll go on to Reno from there the next day. 

We were able to spend some more time with Rebecca and Tim and their family.  It's always hard to say goodbye, when you know you probably won't see each other in person for another year.  Those kids are growing up so fast!  We got lots of pictures, but pictures aren't as cuddly as these kids.  

They will be going back to Chicago on October 2, and then to Tim's new teaching assignment in the Middle East in late October.  Being a teacher, he gets time off in the summers, so we hope to see them then.

The news from Baja is that our community finally has electricity 2 full weeks after Hurricane Odile took it out.  The CFE crews have been working long and hard to get it restored, and all the locals are very grateful.  Many (probably 100's) of the tall metal high-tension towers were down, and they used helicopter to help set them back up.  The telephones (cell and land line) worked pretty well throughout.  We are sure we'll run into some "questionable" road conditions.  And we will be cautious, since we are hauling the 1928 Woody back to Baja on a car trailer.  (No off-road adventures this time!)   We expect the journey to be 6 1/2 days.  We thought some friends would ride with us after all the airlines cancelled their flights into San Jose del Cabo airport, but they've decided they need to spend a bit more time here in Oregon before they go south. The airport will be open by October 8 for limited flights, which is pretty amazing, considering how ugly it looked after the hurricane.  Instead, we plan on car pooling with another Baja friend who will be driving by herself (and her puppy).  We'll meet up with her near San Diego.  

I'll leave you with some pretty scenes we've enjoyed in the last several weeks here in central Oregon.  It's a nice place to spend the summer!

 Cloud capped South Sister.  The Mountains have got a bit of fresh snow with all the storms passing by.

 Some interesting sun rays in front of the Middle and North Sister.

 Mt. Hood, Oregon's highest mountain, was bright a clear today as we headed back to Bend from putting our trailer away near Tygh Valley.

 And Mount Jefferson was looking very good, too. 

And a little closer to the ground, and a bit under it, our dogs had a blast digging for a mole at our friend's house today.  (They both got baths when we got back to Bend!!  I hope I can keep them out of the vole holes here at Ken & Bea's place until we leave tomorrow.  They have been mice / vole catching machines this summer!)  

Next week from Baja, but maybe not on Tuesday!  

Your Snow Bird friends who are anxious to head south...
Harriet, Ben, Sam & Zoey

PS.  I have added some more photos to the 2014 September album, and I will add a few more.  I'm learning how to access the photos off of my new phone (several of these photos are from that phone) so you never know what you might see next!  



 

Pic-of-the-Week for September 18, 2014

Hi Friends,

Time for another update, due to some interesting things going on down in Baja!  We are still in Oregon, by the way.  Hurricane Odile came through our area of Baja on Sunday, September 14, and it was a nasty one.  Cabo San Lucas and San Jose were hit extremely hard, and the airport terminals sustained major damage.  The airport is closed for a couple more weeks.  Ryan, our son, has been house-sittting for three summers now, just for this reason: to put the shutters on before the storm gets there.  He, and our house, are fine.  Some water came in through the closed windows and doors, but he was there to mop it up.  He was able to call us on Monday to report on the results, then on Tuesday, there was no phone service in Baja.  Phones were back up on Wednesday, but they probably won't have electricity for a good long while yet.  Poles are down everywhere!  And another storm, Polo, is on the way.  Forecasts says it won't be near as severe as Odile, thank you God!

Our current plans are to start our return trip about October 1, but we might delay a bit if the situation is still poor down there.  It doesn't help to go down and use more water and resources that others need.  

Here are a few pictures that Ryan sent us today.  

 This is the bridge over the Buenos Aires arroyo.  It didn't exist when we first moved there in 2000, so hurricanes used to keep Los Barriles pretty isolated!  

 This was our indicator that there would be a major hurricane this year.  They finally fixed the road in the two arroyos north of Los Barriles after a major hurricane about 6 years ago destroyed the road.  This one didn't do too bad!  The white things on the left are probably the water pipes running out to the north of town. 

This is Highway 1 just north of Los Barriles.  I'm always a bit nervous when we drive by here with those big rocks teetering up there on that cut, but I guess they only come down in severe wind and rain storms!  Yikes!

Here in the Pacific Northwest, Ben and I have been enjoying our summer.  He never did finish our vacation tale, but we got as far north as Whitefish, Montana, where we visited good friends, and convinced my sister and brother-in-law to come over from Libby to visit for the day!  We also enjoyed visiting with friends in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho, and Walla Walla (our "official" home), Washington. 

Ben and I hiked up a hill to a quarry with our friend Jim near his cabin on the Clark Fork River.

Me and my sister Shelley in Whitefish.

We hurried back to western Oregon and met up with our daughter and her family  They stayed again with my cousins on the farm, and we parked our trailer in their driveway.  Now, this isn't just a Grandma boasting; it's the truth, I tell you!  My granddaughter is about the happiest baby I've ever encountered.  There is not much that ruffles her feathers, and she smiles and smiles and smiles!  And she will give a big hug, and pat you on your back!  What a sweetie!  

 

This is a photo I took with my new phone...once she figured out I was taking photos, she just started smiling bigger!   She and her Grandpa Purkey got along pretty well, too!  

Cousin Tom harvesting tons of corn.

 Of course we enjoyed visiting with the boys, too.  They liked being on the farm and playing in the big yard with the toys in the dirt.  And they really liked getting to ride on the big old corn picker with "uncle" Tom (actually my cousin).  And they LOVED eating the corn on the cob!  

 It is really good to spend time with them, and we'll see them again next week when they come over to Bend to spend several days with us.  In the meantime, they're visiting with other family (lots of Purkeys and Malpasses to see!) and friends in the area). 

Last week, we joined my brother Rich at the Pendleton Roundup.  "Let 'er buck!!"  We had a great time as usual, and enjoyed visiting with my niece Anne and her husband Mike.  Mike does a wicked good job at barbecue, and we had some pretty fantastic ribs for dinner one night.  Almost worth the whole trip!!   They are gracious enough to allow us to park our trailer beside their house in Athena (20 miles from Pendleton).   

 Oops.  Missed him!  That's gotta hurt! 

 Now, we are back in the Bend area where we started this summer.  We are trying to be helpful to Ben's brother's family, since our sister-in-law had knee replacement surgery on the 4th.  She just had her stitches out.  (Staples, actually!  Ouch!!)  We'll be cleaning out our trailer and doing our final shopping, and then the magic comes....fitting everything we've collected over the summer into our truck!!  

So, we'll try to keep you posted on our departure schedule.  Oh, yeah.  The reason Ben didn't write this one is because he got a brand new computer, and hasn't finished setting it up yet.  That's his excuse this time, and he's sticking with it! 

I must confess that our 2014 September Picasa album is way behind.  Too many kids to hug and rodeos to watch...and barbecue and corn on the cob to eat.  Maybe I'll work on it tomorrow.  Maybe not! Have patience with me. 

Your friends still hanging out in Oregon,
Harriet, Ben, Sam & Zoey

Pic-of-the-Week for August 30, 2014

When a person is retired they just get so busy that they don’t have time to get everything done, which is why I haven’t written any Pic-of-the-Weeks for quite some time!  (“Too Busy!”  That is my story, and I am sticking with it!)

On August 8^th and 9^th we took the Model A to the Bend Flashback Cruz.  My brother, Kenneth, encouraged me to do that as they have all kinds of vehicles at that show.  The weather cooperated and we had a good time.  It is held in Drake Park which is a very beautiful park in down town Bend right next to the Deschutes River.  The organizers were anticipating a smaller turnout this year but they were shocked when about 500 cars entered, about 100 more than they had planned.

My car won a “Sponsor’s Ribbon and Trophy”.  Those trophies are awarded by each sponsor to a car that they like.   

After the car show there was a parade of cars through the down town streets of Bend.  The parade was fun and I picked up my niece and her son who were watching the parade, and later we picked up our nephew.

Finally, we were able to put the Model A away and go camping.  Camping is what we always look forward to each summer.  Our first destination was Hart Mountain where there is the Hart Mountain Antelope Refuge and our favorite hot springs.  We were joined by our friends Sandy and Debi.  It was their first time ever being there.  The weather was cool which was great for using the hot springs, but not so good for antelope viewing.  We probably only saw about 50 antelope which is ½ as many as usual.

This is a picture of the Warner Valley from Hart Mountain.  Sandy and Debi in the foreground looking at the “lakes”.  We have never seen it so dry there.  

After Hart Mountain we, along with Sandy and Debi, traveled on to the Steens Mountains.  This was another place that our friends had never been to, but had heard much about the area.  Again the weather was cool and the skies were hazy from forest fires many miles away, but we still had a good time.

Lots of birds this year ……..

Then Sandy and Debi returned to Eugene, and we continued on to the town of Sumpter.  Sumpter is located in an old gold mining area.  The Powder River basin had been dredged many years ago and there is still some gold mining continuing in the area.  When we heard the train go by near our camp grounds, we decided to take the train ride the next day.  It is a short ride, but still fun.  I got to ride in the steam engine on our return trip which brought back many memories of when my father worked for the railroad and would take us kids on short rides around the round house on steam engines.

 

Then we traveled to Joseph, and Wallowa Lake, and ………….. but that is another story.

Harriet has posted a bunch of pictures in our August 2014 Picasa album; sorry it is so huge.  We should have done 2 albums for August this year!  Too many cool things to see! 

Your friends enjoying the Pacific Northwest!
Ben, Harriet, Sam & Zoey

PS.  We are now in the Eugene area, where we'll be until September 11 enjoying the company of our daughter's family, then we go to the Pendleton Roundup.  Let 'er buck!! 

Pic-of-the-Week for August 5, 2014

Hi Friends,

I bet you thought nothing has been happening since we last wrote in July.  Well, you'd be wrong!  Ben said I have to write this time, since the most "excitement" has been happening to me!  

I had all my annual doctor visits two weeks ago; my GP, a mammogram, my dermatologist, and my oncologist.  It all went very well... the GP changed a few meds, the dermatologist took off one mole, and the oncologist said I have been in remission for 5 years, and can quit taking my cancer medication the end of October!  Hooray.  

We visited a bunch of friends in Salem, including those in our Thursday Night group who met at our friend Judy J's house this time.  It is always good to catch up with these folks, many of whom Ben worked with.  It was nice weather, so we enjoyed the outdoors while we visited.

 

  




We decided to leave Salem on Friday, because there were races to go to in Lebanon (Ben does love his dirt track races), and because the wi-fi was miserable at the RV park where we were staying.  (They knocked Ben off one day, and he couldn't get back on!  Very frustrating, although mine seem to work fine).  

We camped out next to the race track where we at least had water and sewer hook up, and we were joined by Baja friends from Eugene.  I opted out of the races and dog sat while the poor quivering things tried to figure out what all the noise was about! 

 

On Saturday, we took a drive on Highway 20 east of Lebanon through Sweet Home, and then up to Green Peter Dam.  Ben said he's never been there, and I vaguely remember going there with Mom & Dad years and years ago.  (My Dad did love to inspect dams!)  Beautiful place, and lots of boats and campers and fisherpeople.  The picture below is on the Dam; the water behind us is Green Peter Lake. 

When we got to Eugene on Sunday, a pre-dinner drink at Sarver Vinyard sounded like a good idea, so we went there with John H., our Eugene host, and enjoyed the view, the wine, the cheese and bread and all the goodies that went with it.  Yum!

 On Monday, we got to meet Georgina, our newest niece.  She just turned 3 months old!  What a sweetheart!  

Greg looks like a natural here at being a father.  At least he's got a good start! 

Then the excitement started!  I woke up Tuesday morning with an extremely fast heart beat.  What in the world???  I read up on a few things on the internet, tried to count it (18 beats in 6 seconds x 10 = 180.  That can't be right!!)  I decided about 10:30AM that I should go to an urgent care clinic, and by the time we'd been to the old Sacred Heart on 13th and been mis-directed by the gal at the information desk to an urgent care clinic out West 11th that didn't do heart care, we made it into the new hospital's Emergency Room at about 11:30.  They got right to me, asked me a bunch of questions (I felt ok, just a bit light-headed and tired), took my blood pressure and heart rate (175 plus or minus a few).  They tried a few non-invasive techniques with me to get the heart rate down (blowing out the plunger on a syringe with one breath), but nothing worked to slow it down, so they took me back to a room and installed an IV.  After the ER doctor checked me over, I was given an EKG to help determine the problem, and had constant blood pressure and heart rate monitoring.   The doc decided to administer a drug that stops the heart, and then immediately re-starts it.  Well!!  That sounded exciting.  They had me hooked up to the machine that would shock my heart if it didn't start again, so they were prepared!  At this point, I was taking a deep breath and saying "go for it".  They administered the meds via the IV, I felt a heavy feeling in my chest, and then normal, and my heart rate went right down, and continued to go down to about 80 in the next little while.  Phew!  They continued to monitor me for another hour (I couldn't go anywhere with all that stuff hooked up to me anyway), talked with me about the problem, and determined that I was fine and could leave.  That was about 2:15.  My diagnosis was Supraventricular Tachycardia (SVT).  And thank goodness my Medicare started in May of this year!  

The rest of the week in Eugene was fairly quiet.  We visited a fellow who had at least one Model A that Ben lusted after, and a few Model Ts.  This one pictured below is a Speedster, and Ben thinks that would be a fun car to have!  

This is his garage!!  He had all kinds of things on display, besides his cars, including old gas pumps, neon signs, antique toys, a juke box, etc.  Fun!

 We had been inviting people over for dinner on Thursday night before my medical episode, and I was feeling pretty good, so we went ahead with the party.  Ben was able to steal fresh corn (not really, he was given permission) from my Malpass family relatives' farm.  Delicious!  Ben barbecued some fresh salmon, everyone brought a contribution, and we all enjoyed visiting and eating!  One guest even arrived in his private plane on John's landing strip.  That was fun to watch.  Of course, my dogs were dumb enough to try to  chase him, on landing AND take-off!  Good grief.  
  

We are back in Salem for a couple days, catching up with a few folks we missed the first time, and visiting my doctor's office again!  At my appointment today, my doctor and the nurse practitioner decided it was probably the change in my blood pressure medications the doctor made 2 weeks ago that caused the SVT.  Hopefully, it is all straightened out and my heart will behave itself now!  

Yesterday we drove up to Canby and then Vancouver to visit Ben's sister and my sister.  Sharon and I don't look too bad for a 70 y-o and a 65 y-o!   

OK.  Enough for now.  Bet you can't wait for Ben to write then next SHORT POTW!  We have pictures in the July 2014 Picasa album and the August 2014 Picasa album.  Enjoy!  (Watch the video of Bill's landing in the August album...pretty slick!)

Next week, we're heading for the wilderness!  Hart Mountain and the Steens, here we come!  

Your friends, hoping and trying to stay healthy!
Harriet, Ben, Sam & Zoey