Pic-of-the-Week for February 24, 2015

Hola, Amigos,

Did you miss us last week?  We were on a mini-Baja vacation early in the week, so I decided that you all could just wait another week for our news and photos, and besides, you'll probably get twice as many photos as usual!  We went with friends Debi and Sandy to Magdalena Bay to do some whale watching with our favorite guide, Crispin Mendoza.  He can ALWAYS find whales for you to see and get close to.  

It was a gorgeous day (Ben checked the weather carefully, and chose the perfect one for us!)    We were on the water before sunrise and ready to go find some whales.

The only bad part is that it was a LONG boat ride.  The whales have decided to hang out at the south end of Mag Bay, and San Carlos, where we start, is at the north end of the bay!  We left San Carlos (green pencil) and went almost to the little fishing village of Cancun (near the yellow pencil).

We motored for about 1 1/2 hours before we saw our first whales.  We could get close, but most of them turned away from us or went tail up, so we knew we wouldn't see those for a while.

This is what they call whale footprints.  It's the formation on the water that is made as a whale swims just below the surface.

We saw this beautiful French sailboat (we talked a bit with the people on board).  
And we saw lots of tails!  (See the sails of the same sailboat on the horizon?)

Crispin decided that since more boats with whale watchers hadn't shown up where we were, they must have found a friendly whale further back, so we headed back north. Sure enough, 5 or 6 pangas were gathered around a friendly mama and her nice sized baby.  Each of us on the boat had a chance to touch and/or pet a whale that day!  

I've got some great whale videos loaded to our February 2015 Picasa album, so be sure to check that out!  

Another great part of our visit to San Carlos is fresh seafood for a reasonable price...and we're not just talking about eating it there!  We're talking about bringing home big coolers full of shrimp, clams, and lobster!  Yum!  This year, we managed to bring home a reasonable amount of clams, so Ben and Sandy didn't have to spend hours cleaning the silly things (a full gunny sack last year!)  We had a clam feed at our house on Saturday night attended by people who appreciate a clam bake, Mexican style!  

Other than that, it's pretty quiet here at Casa Purkey.  We're waiting for our springtime guests to start showing up (you have bought your tickets, haven't you, JM and AM???  and DS???)  The flowers keep blooming, the agave stalk keeps growing (see it in the Picasa album).  We are staying healthy, and life is good.  We have noticed that some people are already itching to head north, and some are on their way, but we're perfectly happy to stay here and enjoy the warm temperatures, sunshine and clear skies (and the delicious seafood!)   Besides that, Ben hasn't quite finished all his woodworking projects yet.  He's building some upper kitchen cabinets now for a Mexican amiga from Campemento.  He did finish this item that has been on his list for two years; a glass fronted cabinet to hold all his "toys"  (or...collectables).  The large piece of glass took forever to get to town.  The glass guy says that they're still repairing hurricane damage, and glass is hard to come by!

Nice job Grandpa!  Let's see you explaining to your grandsons why they can't get their hands on these "toys" next time they visit!!

Here's my favorite flower blooming this week.  This thing is at least 8" in diameter...and the colors blow me away!  Each bloom is slightly different.  Some with more yellow streaks and others with more red.  It's too bad they only last a day.

Hasta la proxima semana,

Tus amigos de Baja,

Harriet, Ben, Ryan, Sam & Zoey

Pic-of-the Week for February 10, 2015

Hola Amigos,

Another week has rushed by, and our weather continues to be sunny and pleasant temperatures (around 60F for lows and 80F for highs), and not too windy.  We had brunch on our veranda yesterday, and then dinner at friends in the evening in their beach-side dining area, without the need for a sweater or jacket.  There is still enough wind on some days, usually in the afternoons, for the wind surfers and kite boarders to enjoy the day, but not too much for us to enjoy being outside.

Here's an evening sunset (looking east) when we had a pretty rising moon.  This was from the house of friends in Los Barriles.  You can see that little white spot above the clouds!  

 
I looked out our bedroom window the other day, and noticed that our Agave plant is sending up a bloom stalk.  It was already about 10 feet tall, and that was the first I noticed it.  

These things grow like gang busters...I think it's grown another couple feet since I discovered it.  It will bloom, and the plant will die, and then we'll be done with that agave in that area.  (The leaves are NOT friendly...very sharp points on those things!) 

Zoey is checking for lizards at the base of the plant, and it's a pretty good picture of our new brick path.  

We've seen in the news where the price of gas is much cheaper in the US these days.  Unfortunately, here in Mexico, it is still going up and up.  The other day, we paid about $3.66 (US) per gallon for diesel.  Diesel is priced about mid-way between regular and premium.  We're not sure how Mexicans afford to fill up their cars!

We make up for the expense of gas with cheap property taxes.  Ben paid our yearly tax bill the other day; $138 for our casa...for the year!  Not bad, with twice a week garbage pickup service, and occasional grading of our road!  

Our Community choir, OK Chorale, sang at the weekly Open Mic last Wednesday, and I heard several rave (or at least good) reviews.  I was able to take my "new" portable keyboard, and it worked very well.  Our group sang an African song (Babethandazah in Zulu), then Dona Nobis Pacem in Latin, then "Soon and Very Soon" by Andre Crouch.  Our director is a very talented lady; she makes it a lot of fun, and we've all learned a lot!  

One of our favorite restaurants in town, Pisces, has hired a local artist to brighten up their space with some ocean scenes.  He's done a really nice job, I think.

We need to go there often to check out his progress!  This scene includes Flat Top on the right, and The Tuna Slides on the left, encompassing the entire bay in a panoramic type view.  We'll do another photo when it is completed. 

I told Ben we need to hire him to do a scene at our casa on an outside wall, but I haven't convinced him quite yet!! 

 

We are having yet one more "home improvement" project done at our casa (no, not painting a pretty picture on the wall).  Rick, the contractor who did our sidewalk, is putting the Cool Deck finish on the carport roof, and they also removed some of the original parapet walls in front of the bedrooms for easier access to the roof.  He also repaired some chipped and low areas on the roof of the original house, so we're hoping they will drain better (flat roofs are nice for extra living area, but miserable in the rain when they don't drain!) 

 I leave you with the view from my kitchen sink!  Costco sells these orchids down here, and we can rarely resist buying one or two....or three!!  Good thing the store is a long ways away!  Anyhow...we're enjoying them, and thought you might, too.  We've usually gotten them to re-bloom for us, if they survive the summer. 

Some more photos are posted in our February 2015 album.  

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

Pic-of-the-Week for February 3, 2015

Hola Amigos!  

It's a beautiful day here in Baja this February morning.  I guess the groundhog would see his shadow here, whatever that means!  I'm just enjoying the bright sunshine!!  And look!  My green bean crop is up, and I got it strung yesterday (a skill I've never lost, evidently!)  I'm looking forward to lots of yummy beans in another month. 

And for your flower pic of the week, my Cattleya orchid is blooming!  Yeay!  I really need to repot it, but this close up of the blooms makes it look pretty impressive!

Today is also our grandson David's 5th birthday.  Wow.  I remember when I traveled solo from Baja to Jordan to be with our daughter Rebecca and her husband Tim to help with the new baby and entertain all the guests (making tea and serving cookies and baklava) who came to visit.   Last week was also our granddaughter Eleanor's 1st birthday, and I remember that frigid visit to Chicago very well!  They grow up so fast!!  She is almost walking.  Rebecca is very good to send photos of the kids to us, and here's one that was on Eleanor's birthday, I think.  (Sorry, Aaron is missing from this one.) 

We had a very nice time celebrating our anniversary in Cabo San Lucas last Tuesday.  We went out for dinner to a fancy restaurant (Pitahayas) and enjoyed the view, the food, and each other!  

This is a plate of sashimi that they served us first.  Very nice presentation throughout the meal, and hovering waiters to see to our every need.  












One morning last week we were surprised to awake and see FIVE shrimp boats out in the bay in front of our house.  We found out later they were from Sinaloa (a state on the mainland) and were here re-supplying and getting out of the wind for a while.  

Ryan pointed out all the birds on the rigging of this boat, so I zoomed in and got a good close up shot of them.  Not sure what they are, but they might be Frigate birds, which we normally don't see roosting....just floating around up above our house, dropping white bombs with regularity!!!  (Ick!  Don't hang out laundry on days you see Frigates above!) 

We have had some nice sunny days, and some windy days, and we had a downpour the other day that really tested our new replacement gargoyles! You might notice that our sidewalk  was a river there beyond the tile! I imagine the weeds will really start sprouting now!

We have also been having some work done on the roof of our carport.  We've hired Rick and Alfredo again to put on the water-proofing and cool deck, and while they're here, they're repairing some cracks in our house ceiling and replacing the cool deck there.  Hopefully, next major rainstorm I won't have to worry about water dripping on my piano!!  









On Sunday, we took another quick trip to Cabo San Lucas to have lunch with my Uncle David and Aunt Evelyn from Harrisburg, and friends from Bend, Mike and Ruth, who happened to be traveling on the same cruise ship!  David is the last surviving brother of 6, and my Dad was the oldest.  Believe it or not, these two are in their 80's and are still very active.  

Mike and Ruth were enjoying their trip very much, and were the inspiration for us to go meet them in Cabo.  (We can't get Mike to fly down here....he thinks we have too many bandidos!)  

I've started a February 2015 Picasa album, and I have made it public so you can look at it, too!  

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

PS. Happy Birthday (tomorrow) to my brother Rich!  I won't mention how old you are.  *grins*  

Pic-of-the-Week for January 27, 2015

Hola, Amigos,

Today's letter is going to be short.  We have places to go and things to do!  

We won't be taking the '28 Woody, which we enjoyed driving around last week on a nice sunny and warm day.  We are going to Cabo San Lucas to celebrate 47 years of wedded bliss!  Today's the day... we were married on a cold and snowy winter's day in 1968.  We appreciate very much the sunshine and warm temps here for our anniversary.

Wow.  That was a long time ago!  How the time flies!!!










Weather-wise, it has been a strange week.  We had some nice warm days, and then the rain clouds appeared and we've had cloudy and rainy days for quite a few days in a row.  Today is supposed to be sunny and clear and warm, then another weather front is moving in with more rain and clouds!  Well, Baja can certainly use rain!  It is still green here from the summer rains, but by this time of year it is usually starting to dry out.  It's nice to see things still green.  And we still have the gas on in our heater, so it's nice to take advantage of it!

Here are a few more pictures from this week to share a bit of our color of Baja.

A Cardinal enjoying sunflower seeds in our garden.

A bee gathering pollen from some of our wild Sunflowers.

Zoey's sister Lala.  She's a dapple. 

A Hawk who flew into our yard to check out the fat dove population.  Of course, they were all gone by the time this guy showed up!!  

This street vendor was selling some more delicious strawberries!  He knows this is a good house...I usually buy some (and give him a drink).  He happened to catch Ben this time, so he bought enough for a pie (6 crates).  I did tell Ben he'd have to clean the berries if he brought more home like he did several weeks ago from La Paz!!  Small and hard and many bruised....Ugh!  He promises to be more careful in the future.  (The berries he buys from that vendor are usually quite good...maybe it is too early in the season so far).

I've put some more photos in our January 2015 album, and that's it for this month!  Zoom, zoom....here goes 2015! 

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

Pic-of-the-Week for January 20, 2015

Hola Amigos,

This morning finds us with sunshine, clear skies, and no wind, so far!  We have had some fairly cloudy days in the last week, and the Lord of the Wind Showdown event managed to get enough windy days to have some very good competitions.  One of my neighbors  placed 2nd in the Stand Up Paddle Board competition!  Way to go, John!  

Ben and I visited Casa Cal Sunday afternoon, which is right on the beach with a great view of the competition.  We went to visit with our Eugene friend, Jack Gossard, but I took advantage of the view and got a few pictures, too!

 Right outside the gate!

 A colorful mess of kites! 

Anyhow, driving through Los Barriles main street during the last week was a joke!  The street is so narrow, and parking is allowed most places, and the businesses, for the most part, don't have parking available, so with all the people here, it's rather difficult wiggling your way through!  We tried to avoid it as much as possible, but our favorite restaurant is on the other end of town!  Oh, no!!!









Our dogs have been enjoying having Button come over to play.  She is the pup of our friend Pat, and she has learned how to get in the middle and play tug of war with them.  She is a light-weight, so Zoey still pulls everyone around, but it is cute to watch!  Our rugs do tend to get messed up when this game is going on!! 

Ryan has been busy this week entertaining his friends, so we haven't seen much of him!  Lots to do and see when vacation time is short!  They are heading back to Portland this afternoon, so hope to get in some beach time this morning.  They went to La Paz yesterday to swim with the Whale Sharks!  Hopefully, they had some wet suits...I think the water is cooling down somewhat.  Probably in the low 70's these days.  

An update on our truck from last week:  Evidently it was the low energy batteries that were causing the problems.  Ben bought new ones, and the problems went away.  They couldn't find any issues when they did diagnostics on it after installing the new batteries.  Yeay!  It cost us very little for the work they did, so all those trips to the ATM in preparations for a big bill means we probably won't have to visit an ATM again for the rest of the month!!  

It's time for you fence-sitters to plan your vacation to visit us.  How can you miss some perfect beach walking time like this?   Even Zoey was walking close to the water this day! 

We did find out the other day that two sets of friends are going to arrive on their cruise ship in Cabo San Lucas on Feb 1.  We've made plans to go have lunch with at least one set to visit with them.  The friends don't know each other; one couple is my Uncle David and Aunt Evelyn from Harrisburg.  The other is Mike and Ruth (he's our Model A mechanic) from Bend.  Maybe they'll manage to meet each other on the ship!  And maybe there'll be six of us for lunch, but Aunt Evelyn said she was thinking about signing up for the snorkling cruise when in Cabo.  We'll see!  
 
One of the nice things about cloudy days is the chance of a beautiful sunrise or sunset.  Here is a sunset from our roof-top from a few days ago.  

I'll be adding some more photos to our 2015 January Album this morning.  Thanks to friend Jill for reminding me to make it public so you can look at them, too!  

FYI, our church is going to have a Ladies Retreat here March 20 - 21, so if any of you are interested, let me know and I'll send you more information.   

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

Pic-of-the-Week for January 13, 2015

Hola Amigos,

Well, the results of yesterday's big game weren't as satisfying as the Rose Bowl on New Year's day.  Oregon was outplayed by Ohio, and it just wasn't to be a win for the Ducks.  We again met at Ellis' home for a potluck, and had a great crowd, and great food.  I'm sitting here writing this eating some leftover carrot cake for breakfast and drinking a cup of my Good Earth tea!  

I had fun making the cake; it is a recipe I got years ago from my friend Wilma Ausland in Eugene.  Everything she made was delicious, so I am happy to still have this recipe!  (Let me know if you want a copy.  I still have her hand-written index card!)  

Ben, who is not the Duck fan like Ryan and me spent yesterday and last night in La Paz again; this time because of issues with our 2006 truck.  It was running rough, so he took it into the diesel mechanic he's used other times, and hopefully, the only problem is tired batteries.  Evidently they didn't have enough power to run the truck computer properly, so things were not happening correctly.  He'll find out this morning, since he got new batteries yesterday, but too late in the day for the mechanic to check it out.  That would be nice if that's the only problem!!  We've been hitting our ATM machine here in town for cash to build up a supply, since the mechanic shop deals only in cash, not credit cards.  Sigh....

I told you last week about our windy, cool weather.  Well...it changed for the better last Tuesday!  It has been calm and warm and just wonderful weather, with a few fluffy clouds floating by.  The Lord of the Wind Showdown starts here this Thursday, and we did get a bit of afternoon wind yesterday.  The forecast shows low winds, but I'm sure a lot of folks are praying for more wind!!  (Crazy people!)  But in the meantime, we're enjoying some great January weather.  I don't get out every day for a beach walk with Sam and Zoey, but this was just about a perfect day!  Other than the fact that Sam wimped out early, and Zoey tends to bark when I'm walking within 15 feet of the edge of the water!  

  
With this nice weather, I've had opportunities to take more bird pictures.  I caught this little Costa Hummingbird out our family room window the other day.  He looks like he was a bit cold, he's so fluffed up!   He's roosting here on our Bougainvillea bush.  Notice the thorns!  You've got to be careful where you sit on those things!  

My friend Pat invited me to go with her to Santiago yesterday to pay her water bills, and to have lunch at the Palomar restaurant right down the street from the Water Company.  She has trouble getting her water bills delivered to her casa, so took the last one she had to make payment.  The clerk in the window said, and pointed out on the bill the word "vencido" in the payment date column.  OK...what does that mean?  I couldn't remember the word, and Pat didn't have a dictionary in her car, so we shrugged our shoulders and waited.  The clerk went in the back room and came back with a new bill, and a little bigger amount due.  Pat paid her bills (she had 2) and was good to go.  I had taken my bill, and last summer's pre-payment receipt, and told her I hadn't received any bills at my casa since last June.  Do we owe anything?  Well...she had to go in the back room for quite a while at this request, as the line behind me got longer and longer!  She finally came back and said I owed $838 pesos after all the adjustments.  That cleaned me out exactly, other than a few little peso coins!  I told her I needed to have the bills delivered to my house, and she told me "proximo mes" (next month).  Right.... Anyhow, lunch at Palomar was delicious.  They don't maintain the grounds like they used to, but the food is still very good.  By the way, I looked up vencido, and it means defeated, or beaten.  OK; explain that to me, my Spanish speaking amigos!! 

Here are a few things I saw on the grounds at Palomar.

 A little adobe oven.  Not sure if they use it for baking or not. 

 Good looking oranges.

I did get a 2015 January Picasa album started and there are a few more photos in there.  

Ryan has some friends coming to visit this week, but all our "promised" guests have cancelled out so far this year.  There is still a lot of time to come see us this winter and spring...we'd love to have you visit and show you how to relax in Baja style!  

Tus amigos de Baja,
Harriet, Ben, Ryan, Sam & Zoey

Pic-of-the-Week for January 6, 2015

Hola, Amigos!  

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!  What a great start to the new year, when the University of Oregon Ducks WHOMPED  the Florida State Seminoles 59 - 20 in the Rose Bowl!  If you didn't know before, you know now that I'm a staunch UO Duck fan, especially football.  One more game for them next Monday, when they play Ohio State for the BCS Championship!  GO DUCKS!  
  
We watched the game at our friends Ellis' & Marsha's home with about 20 other folks (they have a nice big house with a big screen TV) and we not only enjoyed the game, but enjoyed Ellis' roast beef for sandwiches and countless other goodies he and the rest of us supplied.  He is also hosting the BCS Championship game next Monday.  Those of us without TV are happy he is such a sports fan when it comes to these important games!!   Unfortunately for Ellis, his wife Marsha is in the US for several months, since she needs some serious back surgery done, then rehabilitation; hopefully it will be scheduled before the end of this month, because she's ready to come home NOW! 

Other than that, it has been a pretty quiet week here, and not many pictures got taken.  Ben and I took a quick trip into San Jose to do some furniture shopping.  Ben decided it was time to replace the gate leg table he's been using as a computer desk for 10 or more years with something a little bigger and more "foot spacious".  (This was after he spilled a drink all over his new computer keyboard...he and Ryan got it blown out, cleaned out, dried out and covered in rice right away, and it did work just fine the next day).   We found a used table at a store called "Tienda 17", which sells on consignment.  They don't take credit cards, so we scrambled a bit to find sufficient cash for our purchase, and happily drove home with a big enough new table with a small drawer for pencils and such. 

We did take time to have lunch in San Jose at a restaurant right next to the plaza downtown,  which still had Christmas decorations up, including a really nice, life sized manger scene.  

 This is the church next to the plaza.

Ben took the 2001 truck to La Paz yesterday to a reliable diesel mechanic, and the only thing he found wrong was the cam position sensor, which he replaced.  Ben said it is running fine now, and it didn't need a new turbo, like another mechanic here told him.  Phew!  That's always nice, when car repairs take less fixing than you were imagining!!  

While he was gone to La Paz, I finally got his Christmas present made; a new bathrobe.  I bought the fabric and pattern last summer, and was going to make it one of those days he spent in La Paz, but I wasn't feeling well before Christmas, or more likely, wasn't in the mood to sew!!  I finally got around to it yesterday, and kind of surprised myself by getting the thing completely done.  But I don't think Ben will let me take a picture of him modeling it, so you'll just have to take my word for it that it turned out nice.  He's appreciating the slightly heavier fabric than his old robe, since it is still fairly cool in the mornings here.  

We've had quite a few mornings with low temps in the 50's, but this morning the low was 60.4F.  And looking at the weather forecast, we might get some rain today.  Windy days are the norm this time of year, and next week is the 3rd or 4th annual Lord of the Winds Showdown here in Los Barriles.  These folks LOVE this kind of weather!  The windier the better!  And it seems that this time of year is when the most people are in town.  (I borrowed this picture from the Lord of the Winds Facebook page).  How do they do these races without getting their kite lines completely tangled together??? 

I have NOT started a January 2015 album yet.  I have to take a few more photos before I do that!!  So, I'm going to go back in history for your final photo.  This was in Cancun Mexico (here on Baja.... a VERY remote fishing village on the Pacific with wonderful clamming beds at low tide).  We went there with friends Jim and Pat for a camping trip in December of 2009, 5 years ago.  We came home with lots of clams and shrimp, and were happy campers!  As you can see from the pic, the pelicans like it there!!

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