Catch Up

Tom H. (snoozing), Mark (fishing), Me (pre snooze).

A few sunny days followed us home from Hawaii. We took advantage of them as we tried to get accustomed to the cold. I was invited on a trip down to the Clearwater River to try to catch a steelhead, but the 55-degree day kept the fish from moving. We didn’t catch anything but did catch a good catnap along that beautiful stretch of river.

Linda spent her time getting stuff organized for the trip down south. She kept constant tabs on her mom and dad. They accepted our invitation to have Thanksgiving dinner at our place, which gave me something to prepare for. I set about buying all the items needed to create the feast. We haven’t been able to host the dinner for about 6 years and I really enjoyed all the preparation involved.

The dinner went off without a hitch. The food arrived on the table fully cooked, browned but not burnt; a total success. Linda’s mom did comment on the runny gravy. Said I should have had her thicken it. I agreed and countered that we wanted the dinner to be restful for her. Everyone accepted the sloshy brown sauce and we enjoyed the meal.

The weather changed and the temperatures dropped down into the 20’s. It seems that when the temperature gets in that realm our house gets much colder. We spent the last two weeks freezing. We kept packing and by the time our departure date came around, we were really ready to go.

The day of our flight out of Spokane, Judy, our sister in law, picked us up and delivered us to the airport. Flights from Spokane to Los Angles went well and we had no problems. At the LA airport, we caught a shuttle to our hotel and settled into a quiet evening. The next morning we caught a slightly delayed flight out of LA and landed at the Manzanillo International Airport.

First night's sunset. We can never tire of this!

Runway to immigration, to luggage, to entry checkpoint, and finally to our taxi took us about an hour. The taxi driver was very nice and of course, he knew everyone on or along the road into San Patricio.  We arrived tired but in good shape.

Sunset came and we watched it with Larry and Maggie from next door. Then we walked into town and ate dinner at our traditional first night spot, Buen Gusto.

Returning to Casa Rosa we climbed into bed and spent the night tossing and turning.

The next day we talked about our bad night sleep and remembered how we usually dealt with all the noise, heat, and light. Now each night we close up the bedroom by six, turn on the air conditioning and close all the shades. Sleep is a lot better, but we are still working on doing more improvements.

On the third day, I was hit with my usual Mexican protozoa illness. It kept me down until we started treating it with the pills Dr. Rosa recommended. I was back to normal the next day. Linda stepped on a bee (in the grass, no flip-flops on) our first full day here and has caught a cold but is recovering from that as I write.  These little setbacks happen every year, and we have learned to deal with them and move on. It is a small price to pay for the warmth and beauty of the Mexican beach life we choose to live during the winter season. We consider ourselves very lucky to be able to do this.

Saturday we will greet our guests, the Edwards, and on Sunday our “roomies”, Jacquie and Grant, get into town. From that point on, we will have friends around us the rest of our stay. I have been looking forward to exploring with Jacquie and Grant and watching as they experience their first winter season in Melaque. This catches the blog up to date so far. I can’t tell you how much we really enjoy this town and the people we know here. Let the season begin!