Year: 2023

Sunrise December 27th.

What a wonderful end to 2023, we couldn’t be happier. We are so very much more relaxed and nothing is better than living in paradise. Yes I am behind but I will share the highlights. Here are some photos of the Plazuela, Machado dressed up for her holidays.

As we left Gaia the other night we saw this table setting. Someone is about to have a very romantic evening.

Lots of loving going on here….

The girls are enjoying their best life possible.

They keep a constant watch for Colin when he leaves here – even though I am here.

Lots of action at the shrimp ladies a few days ago. We get our shrimp from our favourite lady at the mercado.

We try and purchase most of our veggies here on the Isla. This bunch came from what we call “The Garage”. This cost us a whopping ( not ) 240 MXN or $14.14 USD / $15.76 CAD. You would pay much more back home for these items, 6 eggs, lots of grapes and mandarins, bananas, 2 large avocado, mushrooms, tomatoes, onions, potatoes and cucumber. Oops I forgot the carrots, the ones that actually taste like a carrot.

For all my crafting friends.

Lots of happy hours.

December 26th, the night before the full moon.

A real treat to be able to watch the moon rise come over the hills.

The girls having a romp with their friend Lacey. Pretty high waves.

So happy to not be dealing with snow.

Adios 2023.

I will speak with you next year. Have a wonderful New Years Eve.

Very special holiday greetings to you all.

Beautiful Blue Heron relaxing just below us. But this post is actually about pelicans.

What has caused this frenzy of pelicans?

We were having a wee happy hour on December 12th about 5PM when I heard a strange sound. I got up and looked at the water.  Listen to the sounds in this 40 second video.

The noise is because of hundreds of fish jumping up ( both large and small ), if you look closely you will see them. The pelicans are all over the place trying to catch as many fish as they can. This was quite a remarkable moment, none of us had ever seen such a sight.

Definitely a great feast for the birds.

We were all taken up in the moment, the noise, the frothing of the water and sound caused by the fish. The pelicans were mostly silent, concentrating on filling their bellies.

Then to our left just along the shoreline we saw woman trying to help a pelican.

Zooming in, it became apparent that she we was trying to free the pelican from a fishing line that it was tangled in.

Our neighbour Sue went down the rocks in front of her home with something to try and help cut the bird free. The pelican was freed and we all cheered. Thank you Sue for your help, you saved a pelican.

I was a great day for humans and pelicans, not so much the fish!

I spent most of yesterday on the phone and the computer tracking down my credit card. You know, the one that was compromised with a trip to Paris. That has not yet been resolved. DHL does not deliver to the Isla which I suspected and is why I spent a full day holding on the phone  for them. My credit card was rerouted to a fairly close DHL office just across the shipping channel from us. And the card finally came into my possession today.

During the afternoon DHL is open until 2 -5 pm.. We left at 4:30 and hopped onto the launcha from the main Embarcadero just as it was pulling away for the dock. Then a pulmonia showed up just as we needed one. No sense taking Didi as we were only a seven minute ride away. If there is a next time we will walk. Very long story short, the pulmonia driver had no idea where Gabriel Layva was. Colin had a photo of Google maps on his phone. I was pulling up the address up on Google Maps. We were a three minute walk away and we had five minutes before DHL closed. Our driver was truly lost and did not listen to our directions ( in Spanish ) but stopped 3 times to ask other drivers where to go 🙄 First time in 14 years that this has happened to us. We did get there and were the last customer of the day. Going to use Didi next time ( if we don’t walk ) as they navigate by GPS 🙂

DHL Express picked up the envelope in Markham, Ontario, Canada late afternoon Friday, December 15th. Today, just 7 days later I picked up the envelope with my credit card at 4:58PM in Mazatlan, Sinaloa, Mexico :  Express WordWide service and I didn’t not have to pay anything. Rather amazing. So back to the embarcadero with the same pulmonia.

A few days ago we went to a huge party ‘in the ‘hood’. Remember that large yellow and white home just two doors away from us. I have photos and view shots to post but it is getting rather close to Christmas so check back next week. It really was fun. Life is good. We went to the Plazuela Macaho last night to see all the lights and decorations. It’d was wonderful.  Dinner at Gaia with G & J could not have been more perfect. We even got to listen to Los Cryps for about 15 minutes who were playing at El Cielo.  Christmas gifts have been purchased, none for us as we stopped exchanging gifts a few years ago. We have all we need in life. So a few gifts to wrap and a few dozen cards to write tomorrow.

I borrowed this off of G’s FB page. We are all too busy at Gaia eating our gourmet meals that we neglected to take photos, so glad we were captured in this photo. Proof that we were there.

As you know we always create a Christmas photo that I send out on Christmas Day. Somehow this years family photo came together just an hour or so ago. We weren’t certain that it would actually happen, but it did.

Our December 2023 calendar photo. Not sure that we will ever top this.The girls were so very sweet and patient last year. They were about 22 months old when this was taken. So happy to have these two in our lives.

Yesterday was a very special day fo us all in the hood! First we had the spectacular sunrise, then midday a large pod of dolphins were frolicking directly in front of us feeding on a school of fish. There were so many all at once in various directions that it was almost impossible to capture them in photo.

I only was able to capture a small fin but Colin got three in single photo, including the end of a breach. So many were breaching and were moving in all directions that it was best to just watch them and enjoy the moment. Just another significant moment in yesterdays very special day.

Once again this photo has NOT been enhanced in any way. Mother Nature painted the sky this way. I have never seen such a red colour in all my years here. Yesterday my post included two spectacular sunrise photos taken by Colin. Just as we were about to leave for the Plazuela Machado the sky became full of so many colours. He went across the road and climbed up those large rocks to get this.

Thank you Sue for including our home in your great sunset shots last night. Also the large white & yellow home just behind us is where we had the most wonderful ‘in the hood’ party that I mentioned earlier. Sue, Colin thinks this is a fabulous shot.

Everything is definitely coming together.

Thank you Colin for getting up and taking these splendid shots. Happy to share these with you. The last shot is a panorama created from ten individual shots. No colour enhancement was done – this is just like Mother Nature painted. I believe that most of you can click on the photo once or twice to see the full image.

Actually I have a great deal to share and I like to do so as it makes for a great diary recording details of our life. We love, love, love being here. I can’t think of anything major, nor minor for that matter, that we are not happy about. The palapa is great, the weather is perfect and the girls and us enjoy the beach as often as we can.

We did get some R & R in about three weeks after we arrived.

I even got my moss rose seeds planted, the ones that I saved from our garden back home. That small beige fence was to try and keep the girls in the yard. It is a steepish drop down to the rocks and ocean. However nothing will stop the chocolates when a feral cat goes past. Colin has since added a higher fence but I don’t like it because I want a clear view. Solution in progress.

As you know there are 3 sites here in ‘our’ RV Park. Sometime last September I shared with a few people that we had two spots available. By the end of that month G&J had snapped one up. They moved into our compound as I sometimes like to call it December 10th. I always wanted to live in a compound just like the Kennedys 😉 Their original check in was January 1st but they couldn’t wait another day.

Thursday December 7th, three loads of soil were delivered and then placed all over G&Js site in order to level it. Here they are shovelling the dirt out and then they would carry it over to level the area. That took several hours.

As well an electrical 50 amp RV plug needed to be installed. Water had to be hooked up and a sewer need to be dug. But by the time the fellows came back from a late lunch the sun was getting lower in the sky. As I explained before, the isthmus is built on huge rocks. These guys used a pick axe to dig down to install a sewer pipe to reach G&Js RV.

They did the same for us but in the daytime. Colin put our Jeep in position and let it run with the lights on. Colin and I came up with a few large beam flashlights. They just kept working until they were done.  Such very hard workers.

The pea gravel for G&J site arrived as planned the morning of the 8th, however the wrong size gravel had been delivered. Our handyman called the patron who authorized that he pay for the mistake and not G&J. Meanwhile a front end loader arrived from another construction site and moved the gravel to the entrance to the park. Amazing.

The next day, the morning of the 9th, the proper pea gravel was delivered. All that landscape cloth you see had to be covered shovel by shovel before they could move their RV in. It took us hours to get that gravel moved in our site. Suddenly the handyman and his workers began to help J move the gravel, shovel full by shovel full. That huge full truck load was spread in 90 minutes. G&J kept giving the workers both water and coke and I think at the very end beer. They generously tipped the workers for their extremely difficult work in all the heat and humidity. Now they could finally move their RV in.

Sunset on the 8th.

Colin had arranged for some tree trimming. We got a dent and a few scratches on the roof of our RV. The road was now clear.

We still have things that need to be done here in the park but have decided to wait until January.

Here they come the morning of the tenth.

Welcome to the Isthmus RV Parque. Sadly our internet line was somehow pulled down. Of course that took the rest of the day to sort of but we did have internet before dark.

Looking pretty settled the next day.

Spontaneous happy hour to welcome them and the success of our wee park.

So much happens on a daily basis that I run out of time to post. Last week we ate grilled cheese sandwiches three nights in a row. Our time has been taken up doing things for us and for our RV Parque. I love giving however I do need some quiet time for me. I don’t regret anything that I have done the past few weeks. My wish for Christmas is another 20 hours in each day 😎 Today was busy but I did did get a few hours to myself to read.

We have had many impromptu happy hours this past week ( hence the grilled cheese sandwiches ).  Always fun to spend time with others.

We have begun to eat well again. I made a veggie ground round spaghetti casserole in the crock pot yesterday and the night prior Colin make a fantastic salmon fettuccine with tons of fresh mushrooms.

Colin and I put up our outdoor Christmas decorations just this past Friday. This has to be the latest we have ever done so. Then Colin started putting up the inside Christmas lights. While he prepared dinner I put up the rest of the inside decorations. We ere both so relaxed and happy to have it done. I love Christmas but circumstances are different this year.  Setting up an entire new site and developing an original RV Parque takes much more time than expected. But we are having fun doing it all.

Very quick shots taken thru the RV windows.

However we have neglected to take photos of everything we have done but on the other hand I have some very different things we have been part of to share in the days to come.

I am officially getting my crown ( for the tooth  😳 ) this Wednesday. After that its just going to be Colin and I relaxing and enjoying every moment to the fullest.

Last weekend there was a lovely wedding on the beach that music playing until 5:30AM. I didn’t sleep much and finally got up to read. So last night there was another event, don’t know what ( perhaps a pasada ) for, but it was closer.  Again the music went until 5:30 AM. Colin slept through it all, but I woke up every 30 -50 minute but was able to fall asleep again.

Tres Amigos continues to have a variety of events and fundraisers. We have not participated. We have been told how bad the biting bugs are this season. So wonderful that we have no bugs here 😀

I finally finished getting my plants planted and two flowers beds seeded with wild flowers just outside the wall along the road. Took a bit of energy to clean out the beds of debris and old weeds but we did. The seeds were sown yesterday. Hard to believe that we have been here 6 weeks but there just wasn’t time to get that project completed. However we are going to be here long enough that we will see them bloom.

We have been able to see so many fireworks since setting up here. Most are coming from Mazatlan but a few are from the Isla as well. Such a privilege to be able to see them several times per week.

I am very frustrated with using my iPhone for photography.  It is fast and I’m able to get them online quickly using Air Drop. However I really prefer my ‘real’ camera. When I download those photos they go into proper areas, day by day and are dated. I have lost so many photos I think with theiPhone, because they are all mixd together and unless I download everyday they sort of get lost. Guess I need to get more organized. Maybe next year. So I plan to go back to my real camera tomorrow.

A bit of Christmas with more photos to come.That is me working on this very post tonight. I tried to finish this last night but had to stop for dinner. Poor Colin, he was so tired tonight that he went to bed without dinner. Hmm no wonder, I put just over 5 hours into this post.

Credit cards:

~just found out this afternoon that my personal Visa card has been compromised. Somehow Amazon ( ??? .ca or .com ) have been charging me $15.00 US per month since May.  Looks like it could be for Prime which I do not have. The strange thing is that every month I check my Visa statement with each receipt. Nothing was out of line 🙁

We went to the nursery last Saturday and got extra soil and a few plants. However things have happened since then and they have not yet been planted. Very very soon I hope.

~as I was sorting that out with Visa I discovered that charges were made in Paris yesterday on my Visa card at a travel agent for $1671.38CAD. However much I would like it to be true, but it is not.

~thus far I have been on the phone holding for close to four hours. At the moment I am waiting for the FRAUD department to answer.

Salt water pond full of happy egrets.

OOPS………40 minutes later after finally speaking with a human we were cut off and I am starting all over again 😡  I had given her a for certain phone number to call me back on but she said if we were cut off she could only call back to our home number. Well she never even tried as we have phone messages call forwarded to our emails.

Heading to the Isla for some surfing.

Ciela:

~she appears to be totally back to normal.

Both of the twins love Katia. Ciela especially. Once she saw the massage table being set up Tuesday, she sat at the top of the stairs patiently waiting. I did have to cancel my massage last week because of my root canal. Once the sheet was down she jumped up onto the table from the recliner on the far left. Ciela lay as still as she could be as Katia gave her some attention. when her ” treatment ” was over Ciela jumped up and ran all over like a whirling dervish.

Colin:

~last week he stepped on a rock helping the girls out of a rocky wavy area in the ocean. He had a small cut  on the one foot, which between us we thought we had addressed. Then the pain stopped but started again ( rather aggressively ) last Sunday. So Monday morning before we went into Mazatlan, he went to the local Isla doctor. She confirmed that it was inflamed and then gave him three different meds and a lidocaine gel. Of course he is supposed to be off his feet for several days but this is almost impossible. However he really is trying and if he doesn’t pull his full weight down on the affected area then the pain is tolerable.

Carlie was more cautious and would not lie down and relax.

Contessa:

~I saw Dr Paty ( the dentist ) Monday about noonish. As my pain remained at the same high level I completed the antibiotics and the anti inflammatories plus the self prescribed heavy duty pain killers. I was tired of constant pain, it wore me right out. Dr Paty was not happy that I was taking so much medication but I stood my ground. She had received the X-rays from the root canal specialist and she said that it was a perfect root canal and that there was no infection. There was no reason for me to have pain. Other than the fact  that a perfectly healthy live root was cut from a live healthy ligament 😥  She said that it can takes weeks to heal. Again I stood my ground saying that I have had several root canals over the years with no further pain. She was concerned about my medication intake. I told her that I could not live without the meds re the pain. I mentioned that the temporary filling had not been levelled and could that be a part of the pain? She did another ( normal looking ) X-ray. The she did the graphite paper test to check high points on that filling. Yes the filling actually was high.

Colin managed to get photos of the sunset. Monday. I just slept and slept. My body was/ still is worn out.

~so she filled it down and almost immediately I felt strange tingling sensations all over my lower right side jaw, even between my upper lip and nose. So strange, this went on for over an hour. I surmise that the high filling was being been pushed up by my lower teeth. Thankfully the pain is decreasing.

~so next Monday I see Dr. Paty again and she will remove the temporary filling and redo it, seal the root canals and and she has decided I need a crown as well. 14,000MXN for the crown ( I already paid $5,500.00 ) so a grand total of $1127.00USD or $1534,00CAD. Good thing Santa sent us a memo last month that he was not going to visit us 😎

CREDIT CARD UPDATE:

~back and forth holding for this company or that company. I got dropped at least twice but it may have been three times. Very long story short, my card has been cancelled and a new Visa card is being mailed to me at home. As luck would have it, a very very wonderful friend has my mail key and will be bringing it to me end of next week. Along with a much needed RV part 😀

Does anyone have a prescription for anti drama medication???

The poor girls missed their beach walk today as we both needed to be here to speak with Visa. This compromised credit card thing happened to me long ago while here on the Isla and the replacement Visa card was delivered to me on the beach. Rather amazing 😛

Yes, it is finally complete 😀 Colin carefully followed the construction and made a few suggestions here and there. We are confident that it will be a able to withstand high winds but not certain about a Hurricane 3 or higher.

Very heavy supporting beams. Our last palapa had cement posts.

Colin insisted that the holes be deep and also that cement was added.

We definitely needed some protection from the sun.

Love our view.

It was about this point that Colin had an epiphany. The main beam had to be raised several inches so that when leave we can actually get out. Once our engine is on the airbags start to inflate and the RV rises. Had Colin not thought of this, we would have had a major problem to back the RV out.

Once the problem was discovered and the solution found the building of the palapa continued.

The tall yellow and white house belongs to RVers Drew & Jeannie. The next white house ( closest to us ) belongs to our loverly Mexican neighbours.

It is turning out to be a larger palapa than we expected. No complaints about it though. Once the roof in front of the RV was completed we removed the large window screen.

End of the day.

The next morning the palm fronds arrived.

This old timer came along to help. He kept his unlit cigarette in his mouth the entire time. What he is doing is splitting the palm frond in half by splitting the spine in half by simply using his hands.

Half of the branch is carefully placed one at a time.

At least two layers of palms,, then heavy plastic sheet and more layers of palms, all covered by a net ( my request ).

The first set of support braces.

We decided to not have the roof come too far down so we could enjoy the full vista. I really like how my mini palms make it all come together.

If you look up, you can see a bit of a pattern from the palm fonds. Very neat.

Taken the day after the full moon.

I am still in pain because of the root canal. Thank goodness for drugs.

Even more palapa photos coming.

We have been having at least 2 -3 sets of people dropping by on a daily business. Only one or two from Tres Amigos. have dropped by. Most folks just want to know the cost of our rent and can they get that third last site. Ideally we want RVers to be here long term, ie a 5 month commitment. Many just want a month here and there. We and our friends are firm on renting two sites and hope that the 3rd site will work out as well. Hopefully not a 5th wheel unless they wish to drive in. We all want to have our own private patios.

This past Sunday morning as we were being “interviewed” about the third site, I noticed out of the corner of my eye the girls munching on a small seashell. Basically they ate a bit of the edginding.  Carlie did not look good but she came out of it. Ciela on the other hand could hardly catch her breath and appeared to be choking. I first thought that she had tiny pieces of shell all through her throat that was moving downward. She was visibly suffering. I started googling the situation and other than immediate surgery ( it was a Sunday of course ) a possible solution was to mix tiny pieces of bread with some canned pumpkin. We had the ingredients, the thought was that the bread would absorb the pieces of shell and the pure pumpkin puree would help slide it our of her body. Ciela gobbled up what I served her but just lay still on her stomach. What to do, what to do?

Ciela walked around looked for something green to eat. She then started eating the lower leaves of my mini palm trees. There was some grass growing two sites over and Colin got her this batch. She ate that and then the same amount a second time. Quite a lot I thought.

I held her for a while and then placed her on the chaise. Carlie soon came over to keep Ciela company. So sweet.

We had already scheduled Katia and her fiancé to come by for drinks and snacks. Interesting how Carlie jumped up to sit with Allen. Ciela had settled a bit but she was only about 60%. Once they left we sat with Ciela holding her close. We expected her to start upchucking all that grass but she did not. It took her over ten hours before she had a poop, no sign of grass nor pumpkin. However today, this Tuesday morning, about 2AM she threw up few times in the RV. There was a bit of grass and pumpkin. At this point we have no idea where it all is. She is doing better but still very sleepy but still wanted to go to the beach today and chase birds. Her breathing is back to normal but she is rather tired.

I had tenderness in my mouth off and on Saturday. Saturday night was very uncomfortable and when I awoke Monday morning I knew that I required a root canal. OUCH! 

The last root canal that I had was back in 2014 with Dr. Paty and all remains 100%.  So she was my first stop yesterday ( Monday @ 1PM ). Yes I needed a root canal but she has not done them for many years and in all honesty wanted me to go to a specialist Dr. Wong is an endodontist who only does root canals. Dr. Paty was able to get me an appointment with Dr. Wong just one hour later. I was in so much pain that I was ” okay whatever “. Dr. Paty also asked Colin if he could update her website photos which he took 9 years ago.

Here I am, a full day later and my teeth are aching. I have been told that it is due to extreme inflammation.

Having had a few root canals in my past, I could tell that Dr. Wong was very thorough,

He took an X-ray every step of the way.  It was a complicated situation in a very short tooth.

He competed the job and we left, I was in worse pain than what I had come in with. So I am on antibiotics and anti inflammatories. Part of the pain comes from having to hold my mouth so very wide open for over an hour. On the way home the freezing started to come out.  The pain was intense and I told Colin that I did not think I could make it home – ie pulmonia and lancha to the Isla. I wanted a morphine IV and an ambulance. Neither of my hip replacement surgeries gave me so much pain. Still this morning I have the pain. I guess I just have to let my mouth settle down and wait for the inflammation to go away.

So Dr. Wong only did a temporary filling and has sent me back to Dr Paty.  He has no idea what she will do.  The tooth is too short for a crown.  Meanwhile he never levelled the bite of the tooth.  So I am unable to bring my upper and lower teeth together on my right side or I scream. Dr. Paty won’t see me until Monday so that my mouth settles down.

Definitely  a double whammy. I really don’t like to be in constant pain. No one does.

I took this last Saturday from our site.

Sunday, the day prior to the full moon. Due to our double whammy we did not get any moon photos yesterday nor tonight.