Sep 18, 2015
Things are happening….
…and not just that the leaves are turning color and starting to drop on the ground. Today was the day to turn the water off to my plant pots. Time to let them dry out for the clean up. I also received a surprise today and won a badge.
This was from FitBit. It just showed up in my inbox.
So I’m guessing this is an acknowledgment of how far I have walked to date. Quite cute as I have a thing for penguins so I’m happy.
I really don’t understand all things FitBit. My purpose is to walk 10,000 steps per day for health and to earn an extra glass of wine on my Weight Watcher points. By the way I am still stuck at the same weight so for the last few days I am just eating within reason and seeing what transpires. No change. Back to FitBit….this device is quite accurate. I used to get up to 10,000 steps and more each day with my Weight Watcher pedometer. For the first 10 days of using my FitBIt Zip, I wore both and found that I easily got 2500 – 3500 more steps on the WW pedometer. It seems to measure movement whereas the FitBit measures actual steps, it is programmed very specifically. I have a hard time getting 8000 steps per day right now. Wait till I hit the beach in Mexico 😎
Went to the chiropractor a few days ago. Bottom line, I am spending way too much time at my desk which causes my back to be stressed. Yes, well of course I would prefer to be out and about getting more steps on my FitBit but I do have to work. So I am setting the stove timer for 20 minutes and then I have to get up to shut it off and I walk about for a very few minutes and wish I was outside 😥 Reset the timer and back to my desk and repeat the process.
This is the kind of weather we have been dealing with this week. Not perfect but enough to get some jobs done. Still waiting for those blue sky and sunshine days to get the big jobs done.
Today was the day to buy your US dollars. Yesterday the rate was down a tad to 1.3424 and today it dropped down to a whopping low rate of 1.3249. Guess who bought their USD yesterday 😐 Well you can’t win them all. The good news is that I got my Mexican Pesos at a good rate, much better than last year. A real guessing game and it was taking too much time so I just went for it. Last year at this time we thought 1.13 was a high exchange rate for the USD. If only we had known.
Colin just keeps working and I keep dreaming about leaving. No matter what, we are heading out on October 31st. That is now cast in stone or so I hope. I have always been able to collect payment for all outstanding invoices before we leave but I have a strong feeling that that will not happen this year with so many jobs being done at the last minute. The bigger the company the longer it takes to pay. We have to be very careful re cheques still being alright to cash in April and not being stale dated. No one opens our mail while we are away so the money just sits there.
Our friends Jannose & Colin came to visit last weekend. They are the ones whose driveway we stayed in last May while in Edmonton.
My Colin worked from 6AM till 10PM on the Saturday so I went out to dinner with our friends, well we did have appies on the patio first. What a treat to get out of the house. However the four of us were able to get together for happy hour and dinner here at our home on the Sunday. Loved the visit folks, sorry it was so quick.
Got an email today from blog readers Penny and Doug asking the following question.
We are thinking of going to Mexico on the Baja side for a two month period of time to stay in a RV park, taking our Class A Motor Home and tow, and were wondering about RV Insurance. Do you do or recommend a ‘day in & day out insurance’ or insuring your rig for the whole time down and parked?
Appreciate your thoughts,
Rather than just give them my answer I thought I would put it out to you and see what you have to add to the discussion. The more thoughts and ideas, the better. Even if you don’t RV to Mexico what would you do? Colin and I have known people who just insure their RV until they get to the RV Park they will stay at for the winter. Of course they should insure the vehicle that they will be driving around in while there. One year when first RVing we did that when we went to the Baja for six weeks. However now we insure both the RV and the car for the entire time. All Mexican Insurers will do a six month policy which is the amount of time one is allowed to be in Mexico. We use San Xavier Mexico Insurance out of Nogales. You just have to call them on their toll free line and in less than 10 minutes you are insured. One year while heading North to Acapulco ( yes we were far South ) the car broke away from the RV and caused a lot of damage to our toad. With little hassle the claim paid for full repairs and the cost of our insurance the next year did not go up.
Last year we valued our car at $7,500.00USD and that cost us $263.90USD. Our RV was valued at $70,000.00USD and that cost us $595.66USD for 6 months of insurance. Of that we got an $815.00CAD refund on our Canadian vehicle insurance based on the amount of time we were in Mexico so it only cost us a total of $156.00CAD ( based on the exchange rate of 1.13 ) to be fully insured. Several years ago when our vehicles were valued at a higher rate we actually made a profit with our refund which usually covered all of our tolls. Personally we would not travel without a policy on both vehicles. What if someone backed into your RV while it is parked? Also be sure to check with your homeowners policy to see how much they cover of what is in your RV. So folks, please help Penny and Doug out by giving them some input. Likely we all will learn something in the process.
By the way we do only do health insurance from home until we are parked on the Isla in Mexico. We also insure for our travel days from Mexico back home. We feel that it is cheaper to pay as you go in Mexico for any medical care we might need. Of course if it is really serious we would fly or drive home ASAP.
Yikes, it’s 7:20PM and I need to feed my man. Looking forward to your ideas and suggestions.
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Keep up the walking it sure works, I have hot a couple of plateaus and on one now.But really don’t think I should loose any more weight I fell great and have not been this weight since I was 22 years old.
Ready to hit the road is always exciting.
Hello Contessa:
For those of us that spend more time in the US, I thought that I would pass on this web link, an article from the Toronto Star that gives some suggestions about getting better conversion rates for US$. I checked with our investment guy and he indicates that Knightsbridge charges only 50 basis points (0.5%) to convert compared to the bank rate of 200-250 basis points. They would like you to convert $5,000 at a time. I’m going to try Knightsbridge this winter. They also convert other currencies.
http://www.thestar.com/business/personal_finance/2015/09/14/how-to-cut-your-us-dollar-exchange-costs-mayers.html
Al.
Al, thank you so much for taking the time to comment. Not only myself but my readers have benefited. You always seem to be in the know of what to do. Thanks my friend. Not sure where or when you are heading south but we do have some extra days early in November in Arizona???
Hi Contessa, I’m glad to provide any suggestions that may help! In this case it actually was my neighbour that got me started looking at Knightsbridge. We would actually love to re-connect (we first met you two in that RV park north of Mazatlan, Punta San Miguel). Our plan is not to leave Ontario until early November, we won’t be in the Tucson area until the last week or so with our ultimate winter destination being Borrego Springs California. That means that we will miss you unfortunately.
One year we will meet again.
We used to insure only for the days in and out, but if you have to leave early or decided to move to a different location you are kind of screwed. So we now insure for the 6 months or by the year, because we come and go out of Mexico a few times a year. Find out where they are going to be staying while in Baja, this is our stomping grounds, we will be in the Mulege and Loreto area mid Oct thru Mid Dec, then again mid Jan thru end of Feb. Sometime in March we will be flying over to see you guys again for a short trip.
The Knightsbridge link was a great tip, think we Will use them.
Also in count down mode, probably leave 5 days before you.
Not that many get ups!
We enjoyed our visit with you both. Thanks again. Have also heard of Knightsbridge and are going to check them out as well. I will send you the appie recipe soon.
It’s that time of year!
We have used Lewis and Lewis for many years and thankfully have only had one claim when our Jeep broke loose from the tow bar several year ago. The adjusters were great to work with and even allowed us to continue on to Mazatlan to have the repairs done there. The Jeep could be driven with the hood chained down and to have the repairs done in Mazatlan was so much better for us than in a city we did not know. Both adjusters we worked with spoke excellent English and were very helpful to us. We did have to wait for the head light to be ordered from Tuson and on the box when it arrived was written “for Green Gringo Jeep”. We will use them again this Winter
You are so right – the bigger the company the slower they are to pay. We find the exact thing with our company. I hate that – we pay our bills very fast, both home and company. The Isla is right around the corner! You guys deserve a nice Isla winter after the year you have been through.