friday, nov. 20th hi all, thought i would write a short note today. just finished my swim, hot tub, steam bath and shower and am ready to get something else done. we have been working on the mast boot for the last couple of days. we took all the old glue and junk off the old one, repainted the bottom of the mast and have re-sealed the wood and put on a new boot and sealed it. today i am sewing on the blue boot cover with my sail mending kit. not an easy job and my hands and fingers get really sore after about 10 minutes. i took a break for my shower and when i get back to the boat, i will try to finish it up. the baja 1000 is running this weekend and it is noisy and confused in town so everyone is staying close to their boats and the marina. early next week, we will go into town for some supplies. i really like shopping in town at the open veg & fruit stands. they offer a great variety of fresh ¨ picked this morning"goodies. we also want to stop and get some more jumbo shrimp. they were as big as my foot and really delicious. we got a kilo (25 shrimp) for about $10. also need to check the pharmacy at wal-mart for my prescription. everything else is pretty much the same. blue skies, warm sun, (not too hot) , and happy thoughts. we are doing well, fat and sassy as usual and hope everyone out there in the rain is taking good care of themselves. lol do not know what the problem is with me, but i just don´t miss the rain!!! love u all hugs

well, itś sunday in paradise, we had a swim this morning and have been just hanging around the boat today drinking cervesa and enjoying the day. not much to do around here except enjoy the day. the dogs love it here and we take them up for a run off leash almost every day. there is a beautiful beach where they can go for a dip and plenty of grass to run in. we are going to have dinner tonight at the bar in the hotel. good regular tacos and good fish tacos tool and of course a margarita or two. everyone is good, healthy and actually losing weight. not that we needed to, lol. the swimming every day is helping my muscles cope with all the health problems and i actually do feel much stronger, so i am going to keep at it every day. until the next time, be safe, keep healthy and laugh alot. hugs

we got into ensenada tuesday night, around 6:15pm, it was dark and really hard to see the enterance into this marina, but we finally made it without hitting any other boats. it is so warm and beautiful here and the people are so friendly that when we paid for our moorage wednesday morning, we paid for a whole month. this marina has a hotel, two outdoor swimming pools and a hot tub, indoor pool with hot tub, a spa with sauna and steam room, a beauty salon, which by the way Sue, i need desperately. the marina van took us to town and helped us with customs, immigration and the boat. we are good for a year and it took less than one hour. we heard horror stories of it taking a whole day to do the paperwork, so we feel very lucky. we passed the "Black Pearl" on the way into town and when i have a chance, i will take pictures of it for you, Lori. they also have the set here that the movie was shot so i'll look into that also. we went into town today to do some needed grocery shopping. caught a ride with Terry who has the sailboat across the dock from us. he's also from washington. what a small world we live in. anyway, we went to WAL-MART!!! i checked out my $3000.00 a month prescription with their pharmacist and it will only cost around $60.00 here. what a rip the US pharmaceutical companies are pulling on us. We stopped and bought fresh produce and fruit from some local vendors along a block long street. wow. spent around $5 for lettuce, tomatoes, onions, pomegranite, limes, kiwi, oranges, avacado,and some other stuff. i'm thinking of staying the rest of my life. lol. then we stopped for fish tacos and coca cola. i had a fish taco and a shrimp taco...oooh la la. never tasted better. dan had his first fish taco and is a real believer now. we stopped and picked up terry's laundry. they took it in at 10 this morning and got it at 3pm all washed, pressed and folded. how neat is that??? less than they would have paid at the laundromat. i might have to give that a try. we went up to the hotel bar for dinner tonight and had a hamburger. i also had 3 margarita's on the rocks. much better than blended ones. absolutely perfect. dan had 3 pacifico beers. so that's got you all up to date for now. call on our cell phone 253-670-2702 if you want to., we signed up with a mexican plan that gives us 900 daytime minutes and 1000 weekend and nights, plus they roll over at the end of the month if we dont use them. quite a deal. hope you are all well and i send all our love.....hugs

we took the rental car back this morning and are getting things stowed and battened down. got our mexican fishing licenses and some fishing gear so we can catch dinner on our way to baja. we are leaving in the morning and going to ensenada to check into mexican waters. we will stay tues and wed. then leave thurs for turtle bay. i think we will be traveling the same route as the baja ha-ha so we can pretend we actually did the ha ha. lol. we are still officially part of it and will receive our 3rd place trophy in cabo. lucky huh? after today our cells won't work so e-mail and snail mail will have to do. once we get to LaPaz we will be getting our mail more regularly, so that may be the best way to reach us. we will be staying at the Palmiera Marina in LaPaz so you all know where we are. ha ha. the weather is beautiful here and i really hate to leave, but we must be mov ing on. so until the next stop. hasta manana and hugs, of course.

i'm in the clear. whoo hoo! got the results todayand i'm good to go. i have to continue with the injections for 3 months. i'm in the donut hole for medicare and i had to pay for 30 days worth of the shots, it only cost $3000.00. yes, that is the correct amount of zeroes. hopefully when we get to mexico, it will be a little cheaper. we will be leaving san diego on tuesday, nov. 10th. we are celebrating tonight with steaks and salad. i am really looking forward to dinner, after having hospital jello for so long....yuk. hope all is well with all of you. l love you all. take care. hugs

hi all. sorry this has taken so long, but here goes...got into san diego without any mishaps. has some fog for awhile, but it cleared up and we had blue skies n blue water. we left santa barbara on oct. 15 and in to san diego the next evening around 6 pm. had to wait in the chanel enterance for a submarine going out, that was kinda cool. got fuel and into our slip, #122, put things in order and went for showers. what a beautiful city. the harbor here is so full of boats, you could spend hours watching them. we met a couple from seattle on this dock. they are on the Bristol Blue and they are ned and kristen. they are flying to seattle tomorrow for a grandchild fix, but will be back in a week or so. we have a mechanic coming to fix a small oil leak that we can't trace. after he got here, i started feeling really bad and had an ache in my left back and down to my pelvic area that just wouldn't go away and kept getting more severe. then i started vomiting. after he got the mechanic settled in and working he asked me what was wrong and when i told him he asked if i wanted the paramedics and i said yes. they came and took me away. i was in university california san diego hospital for 10 days undergoing tests. they think i had a kidney stone and passed it, but a few of the tests they gave me showed a blood clot on the artery to my intestine and some swollen lymph nodes. i am taking a blood thinner to keep the clot from getting any bigger, by injection twice a day. we won't know the results from the lymph node biopsy til tuesday or wed., so we are kinda stuck here for a few more days. we missed the baja ha ha fleet, but are still entered so we will get third place when we finally get to cabo. i have to be checked in a week, so we are planning on leaving here on saturday. we didn't have any trick or treaters, but kimberley and garth are here on the irish diplomacy and they came down for a wine cooler. they i went over to dr. dave's boat and trick or treated for a beer. dr. dave is an ob/gyn and has a boat right across the dock from us. he has beer on tap and his wife bought him a cooler for it so the beer is always at the right temp. whatta life. this is a wonderful marina and has a great deli that has daily specials. sometimes they pull out the bbq and have hamburgers and hotdogs. they make great breakfasts, too. we met another couple that left with the ha ha. they are steve n rita on the lady j.. guess it was a good thing we didn't leave when they did. they had 30 foot waves and a horrible storm. one boat was sunk when they ran into a pod of whales. they were all safely rescued, but their boat sunk in about 5 min. not a good thing. so that's about it for now. no worries everyone is safe and sane still. take care and love to all of you. hugs

good morning everyone....it is 11:30, monday, oct. 12. we are in Santa Barbara Harbor Marina. we got in saturday afternoon and were only going to stay for 2 nights, but there is a storm coming in with northeasterly winds, so we are going to stay til wednesday and let it blow over. then on to san diego. we have to be there before too long or they will be doing the ha ha without us. lol. we have met lots of people here that are doing the ha ha also, they are all flying their baja ha ha flags, as are we. they are really noticable, as they are bright yellow.

i had quite a scare when we were pulling into our dock here. i fell off the boat trying to tie us up and had to hold onto the lifelines. i wrapped my legs around the big blue fender and hung on for dear life. the guy on the boat next to us tried to grab my legs, but only caught one foot before the boat drifted away and i was literally hanging over the side. dan finally got the boat closer and dan grabbed my legs and got me onto the dock. if i had fallen in, i would have been crushed between the dock and the boat. not a good thing. but all is well, and i just have a few bruises and a bunch of sore muscles. thank god. i was shaken up pretty good for a while, then everything settled down and i could actually stand up again. my legs felt like jello for a time. lol. it is beautiful here and it is the biggest marina i have ever seen- over 1000 boats are moored here. there is a west marine, chandlery, small market, several restaurants, boat brokers and a haul out yard.

our new autopilot (nicknamed "ray") is so wonderful. it's hard to describe the difference between the old one and this one. we don't have to touch the steering wheel, we have a remote control. how decadent is that? it was pricey ($7800) but omg was it worth it. it is really quiet and we have put in all our waypoints to san diego and it will take us there automatically. even under sail. its darn amazing, i tell ya.

i talked to my nephew David and his is going to try to take Tuesday off work and drive down to see us. it's about a 2 hour drive, but he's my favorite and i'm his. can't wait to see him and we'll be able to spend a whole day with him. we're going to wine and dine him before he has to go back.

before we got here i thought there was a cruise ship convention out there in the middle of the ocean. i swore there were 3 ships anchored and 1 at a berth on shore. dan was sleeping, but i woke him to see what i should do. he said to stay the course or go around them since they weren't moving. i chose to stay on course and would make adjustments if i needed to. dan went back to bed. about 20 miles closer, they took on a whole new perspective. the one i thought was berthed turned out to be vandenberg AFB and the 3 others were oil platforms. honest, i didn't smoke any wacky tobacky either. some things just don't look the same out here. i'll never live down the cruiseship convention, tho. we still giggle a little about it, and of course dan likes to tell people about it. ha ha ha.

so that's the update so far. i haven't had many comments back from you people and i'm anxious to hear from you. please add some feed back. love u all.... hugs