Pic-of-the-Month for April 2025

 Hola Amigos,

We are already here at the end of April, and another month has sped by.  Less than 2 months until we head north, but it is so nice here right now, we are taking advantage of it!  

 This is what our beaches normally look like.  Gus especially, is always on the lookout for (what he thinks are ) edible bites on the beach.  Little bitty fish, Sea Slugs, fish skeletons, and any trash.  The noses on the pups are amazing, and they can hone in on these little treasures on the beach with no problem (unless I have them on leash and can catch them first before they gobble something down!) It's 6 of one (they find something to eat) to half dozen of the other (I catch them first).  Anyhow, all this to say that Easter Week is very popular for camping on the beach in this area, and after it's over, there are even more treasures on the beach for them to find!  

Hundreds of Mexicans camp in our area of Baja, and this is a very popular beach.  You can see that they have all the necessities, and the county provides port-a-potties and garbage bags, so it is actually quite a bit cleaner when they're done than it has been in years past.  And they have a fantastic time.  This year, the weather was very temperate, and not much wind at all.  I saw people fishing, kayaking and swimming and enjoying the beach to the fullest.  Anyhow, anything they left behind, our dogs are finding!  

We did another home improvement project this month that I'm sure we'll appreciate in June, and also next fall when we return.  We had an AC unit installed in our family room!  That involved the electrician Carlitos to get the electrical straightened around for the 220 power, a concrete guy to build a small pad on the roof for the exterior unit, and an AC technician to install it.  We got it done in pretty decent time, in spite of the fact that Ben was gone one of those days.  In this picture, the helper is holding the box to try to catch most of the concrete chunks and dust.  It kind of worked! 

 

We tested it out, and it works just great!  We are going to put a curtain up over the door between the family room and living room to keep the cool in the kitchen/ family room area, where we spend the most time.  

The garden is winding down.  Ben and I pulled the beans the other day, and put all the old vines in our compost pile.  We also covered it with plastic so the pups wouldn't be exploring and eating any leftover beans and pulling the vines all over the yard!  They do like fresh green beans.  Whenever we went out to pick, they wanted to go with us, and they'd get right in there foraging.  

They weren't always discerning, and Gus would sometimes end up eating leaves or stems!  Ugh!  

Anyhow, the beans, lettuce, spinach, radishes are done, and the tomatoes are close to finished.  We do have a new crop of cucumbers staring up, and we'll be trying to keep up with them, as well as the newer squash crop.  Anyone need some fresh zucchini?  Our new lime tree is putting on a lot of limes, and there are 5 bunches of bananas that we hope ripen before we leave in June.   

I've continued with my daily walking, usually with one dog at a time now.  Pancho has turned out to be a "Pooper-outer"!  He will just lie down in a shady spot, and refuse to move!  So, I either wait until he's ready to go, or pick him up and carry him, or if I need to be somewhere or doing something, I'll call Ben to come get him!  Anyhow, I take Gus first, and he's always willing to go the distance, especially if I give him a drink part way.  When I get home, I'll take Pancho on a shorter route (much shorter!) just to get him some exercise.  So, in spite of the shorter distances for Pancho, I'm reaching my monthly goals, as we continue to adjust to each others' foibles!  

We attended our neighbors Hope and Brian's 2nd annual Easter Brunch.  They know how to throw a party, and believe it or not, we had an egg toss (eggs are very reasonably priced here).  It was a lot of fun, with a lot of good food, and visiting friends and neighbors, as well as meeting new people.  Picture to the left was the start of the egg toss contest.  I was the "official" photographer, and didn't participate.  See a couple videos of the toss in the April 2025 album.

 

 

 

 

 

We hope that you are all healthy and happy, and if you're in Oregon, we'd love to see you this summer.  Send us a note or call if you're interested, and we'll see what our schedule can do!  (Pretty open so far, except that daughter Rebecca and family will be in Oregon mid to late July.)   

Hasta la proxima vez,

Tus amigos en Baja,

Harriet, Ben, Gus and Pancho