Back in the good old USSA with more sojourns planned

SACRAMENTO, Calif., USA - Two days back in the USSA and I think I am finally rested enough to write something coherent.

You get to be the judge.

Pool and view from our condo

After Adm. Fox left Mexico in a cloud of dust (quite literally) driving from Puerto Vallarta to Sacramento, I stayed behind, wrote a little but mostly closed up the condo at Bahia del Sol, said goodbye to, well, so many Canadians that I wonder if anyone stays there in the winter.

Adm. Fox's trip went smoothly, with a stop in San Diego before landing here at Dr. Pam and Steve's house where I joined her two days ago. My flights were good, all luggage is accounted for and now civilization is being enjoyed.

You can drink water from the tap! Eat lettuce without soaking it in a disinfecting solution! And the wine not only is drinkable, it's inexpensive. At least the wine I buy and drink.

Rinse before eating, but nothing else

I do miss the sound of the ocean, replaced here by the distant thrum of the freeway. And I miss our Spanish lessons with arguably the best Spanish teacher from whom I have ever taken a class. But it's on to new adventures, including a trip to the Northwest then across the Rockies and back to New York sometime in mid-April.

Before that, I have to finish up the writing on my book The Fracking War and - perhaps equally important - find a camper or camper shell for our newly painted Toyota Tundra to make our expedition more fun.

We had the Tundra painted before Adm. Fox headed north. There were more than a few dings and scrapes from living in the village and some small truck vs. car mishaps. I will miss the cost of Mexican repairs. The body work, repainting and bumper straightening cost $546 U.S.

Time to start checking Craigslist for that camper... like the one shown below...

Looking for this kind of camper...

Tonga talk and parachute jumping all in one afternoon

NUEVO VALLARTA, Nayarit, Mexico - Adm. Fox and I gave a talk/slide/video presentation Friday at the Vallarta Yacht Club to a group of folks about to sail across the Pacific Ocean to the South Seas.

They are self-named "Puddle Jumpers" a pretty understated sobriquet, considering they might be at sea for 30 days jumping the Pacific puddle.

Video of the pie eating (throwing!) contest

Still, there was lot of excitement in the group, as they watched our show about our visit to Tonga last September.

We went to Tonga - Vava'u specifically - to watch, photograph, video and participate in the 4th Regatta Vava'u, a week-long celebration of sailing, culture and Tonga itself. We had a great time - much of it already described in earlier blogs. But reliving it Friday has us already scheming how to get back for Regatta Vava'u V this fall.

A Regatta Vava'u shirt from Tropical Tease

The islands sold themselves easily to this group of cruisers, many of whom only know for sure they are leaving in a week or two. When they get to the South Pacific, they have a vast number of places - and a vast ocean to explore. But it sounded like at least a half-dozen boat captains are leaning towards a Tonga stopover. And one young woman - a registered nurse - said she was interested in maybe spending six months there.

At the end of our hour-long talk, we gave away a number of items from Tropical Tease, a clothing shop on the main drag in Neiafu. Owner Cindy Russell makes arguably the finest T-shirts and other clothing I have ever bought and worn. Her Tonga Dirt Shirts are famous here in Vallarta among the cruisers.

At the end of this blog is a video we produced this fall, parts of which are in the videos we showed the cruisers.

There's Daddy!!!!!

Photography can be dangerous

After the presentation, we scurried over to the beach at Nuevo Vallarta in front of the Hard Rock Cafe where a group called SkyDiveMex has been doing parachuting jumping all week, often taking tandem rides with some of my amigos here at Bahia del Sol.

We watched some of the folks jump a little before sunset. A second group never got jump - it just got too dark.

But just as the last few jumpers were coming down, one of them collided with a photographer on staff with the group. He took his bloodied head in stride, even grinning for Adm. Fox's camera as he left the landing site.

 Below is a video of that crash.

Here's a trailer for Regatta Vava'u IV - the movie...

Hitching a ride on Richard Branson's SpaceShipOne

NUEVO VALLARTA, Nayarit, Mexico - I have had a great run in the news-journalism-writing business, starting at the Napa Register newspaper in Napa, Calif. and now with the Finger Lakes Times in Geneva, New York.

In Napa, I was hired just as I graduated from college and spent a summer writing obituaries, chasing firetrucks and generally dealing with all the stories that the veteran reporters didn't want to touch. With the daily Finger Lakes Times, I write a once-a-week column on the topic of my choice. The freedom to do that is awesome.

In between these two bracketing media experiences, I worked at six newspapers in a variety of editing/writing capacities, almost always with fun people. Fun or not, they were always interesting. Thanks to Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and few other social media outfits, I have reconnected with many of those fun/interesting people.

Just yesterday, after I posted a story about entrepreneur Richard Branson, a former colleague told me about the time her husband - also a journalist -  had interviewed Branson. She was kind enough to send along this photo.

The fellow interviewing Branson is Dave Koenig, who, along with his wife Darlene Bryant, worked with me at the Chico Enterprise-Record back in 1981. Gawd that was a long time ago. I came in as news editor, Dave was a reporter and I was lucky enough to get Darlene to move from reporting to copy editing. She was an excellent copy editor.

My experience at that newspaper - because the publisher was, to put it kindly, a difficult man - wasn't all that good, except for interacting with people like Dave and Darlene.

How difficult was that publisher? Well, my first day on the job, before I had even met the staff of about 25 people, he gave me the names of five people he wanted me to fire - that day. I declined, saying I needed time to evaluate everybody before any action was taken. I am still surprised to this day I kept my job for the five months that I did before I joined the faculty at Chico State University.

But, all that nostalgia aside, my big question for Dave Koenig is this:

Can he get me a complimentary ride on Branson's Virgin Galactic SpaceShipOne? I don't get seasick anymore. Promise!

A concert on the Nuevo Vallarta beach - with Latin rock star Juanes

NUEVO VALLARTA, Nayarit, Mexico - Practically every flat surface around Nuevo Vallarta and Puerto Vallarta was plastered with a poster contained the mug of Juanes, a Latin rock star who brings in fans from all over wherever he plays. This is a holiday weekend in Mexico and his concert was part of the celebrations.

Juanes - related to Antonio Banderas?

Juanes a huge star around the world, with his Unplugged tour getting five Grammy nominations. Our amiga Laura McCartney caught his act in Madrid. Yes, the Madrid, as in Madrid, Spain.

But back to the beach here.

The concert was held in an open area next to the Hardrock Hotel (yes, it's a hotel). It was supposed to start at 8 p.m. But, being Mexico, the crowd didn't even get very restive until about 9:30 p.m. when Juanes jumped up on stage and started a rockin' show.

The security guards said they expected a paid attendance of about 5,000. It was hard for Adm. Sylvia Fox and I to get a good look at the crowd. We attended the concert sitting on the beach side (read: Free) where we were joined by about a hundred gringos and vacationing Mexicanos.

And we had our own huge Jumbotron right in front of us. (Huge Jumbotron? Is that an oxymoron?)

Here's a link to Road Trip Zumba in which Sylvia talks about Juanes and the concert. She had a great time at the concert, even doing a few Zumba steps as she listened.

LINK: ROAD TRIP ZUMBA

At one point the staff who run the beach area where we were squatting came by and starting asking people if we were staying with them - generally being kind of obnoxious. After he hassled a couple of people (me included), a hired security guard (with a .45 caliber automatic on his hip) chatted with the staff fellow and he disappeared back into the building.

It was reminiscent of our days in San Diego when we would go by dinghy to Humphrey's By the Bay and listen to the concerts there. We heard the Righteous Brothers, Arlo Guthrie, Judy Collins - even Joan Baez, among others.

Here's a short video of some of the concert - from the beach perspective:

'The Lotus Eaters' helps relive- not relieve - the Vietnam War

SAIGON, Vietnam - The Vietnam War has been the subject of many books - fiction and non-fiction - and remains an often-sensitive a political topic in America. I know because I have read about a dozen Vietnam books, including Frances FitzGerald's excellent Fire in the Lake. And I get into Vietnam debates, still.

In my generation - those of us who hit draft age right at the height of the war in the mid 1960s - we are divided between those who served in the military and those who did not. For the record, I had a draft deferment while in college, then in 1968, I dropped out and for about a year was prime-grade draft material with a 1A classification.

I was never called, though I have many amigos who were.

Tatjana Soli's The Lotus Eaters floods back memories from that time. The book is a combination documentary-drama-romance-potboiler that follows a woman photographer's personal and geographic journeys across Vietnam. The main character works as a journalist, so naturally my interest was piqued from the opening paragraphs. I stayed glued to it.

The book took Soli 10 years to write. Ten years! It makes my self-imposed book-writing deadline of April 1 seem pathetic. But the book's smacks of authenticity and research.

Tatjana Soli

I haven't had the heart to start her second book yet - The Forgetting Tree. The person who recommended The Lotus Eaters to me said The Forgetting Tree doesn't show the same genius.

Then there is also the issue of whenever I read a book as powerful as The Lotus Eaters, I have to ponder what it means for some time before I can pick up another tome.

This is not a light book for the beach. But I suspect most people who read it will come away changed, whether they served in Vietnam or not, whether they were a journalist or not, or whether they have been in love.

Or not.

Banderas Bay whale-watching tops 11 on a 10-point scale

PUNTA DE MITA, Nayarit, Mexico - A quick Sunday whale watching expedition out of this village on the northwest tip of Banderas Bay brought out the inner child in four of us Sunday.

Adm. Sylvia Fox, amigos Marc and Marci and I hired a panga (an open boat) to take us out to check on the whale action just offshore from a restaurant called El Dorado.

The whales put on a show for two hours, so much of a show that I filled my Flip video to capacity. Sylvia probably shot 800 still photos - some of them National Geographic worthy, I am sure.

As many times as we go out and do this, we never seem to get tired of it.

We capped the morning's boat ride with a lunch (and snooze) at a restaurant called the El Dorado where the fish and shrimp were great.

And the Pacifico cerveza wasn't too bad either.

One of Adm. Fox's 800-plus photos

Below is a short video of the whale jumping, whale-tail thumping, gringos screaming action out on the panga.

On the trail of whales and dolphins in Banderas Bay, Mexico

BAHIA DE BANDERAS, Nayarit, Mexico - Admiral Sylvia Fox, Pam DiTomasso and I boarded an outboard-motor-equipped panga this morning at 8 a.m. (Yes, I got up early enough for an 8 a.m. boat trip - hold the comments, please.)

We've done many whale-watching voyages in Banderas Bay, usually aboard a sailboat. We have never been disappointed.

But I was a little skeptical of how much fun it would be, given that in September we were actually swimming in the water with leviathans like these in the Kingdom of Tonga, in the Vava'u Island group.

But a boat ride is never to be turned down. So we went. And, yes, except for my getting a sunburned nose, it was great... Really great.

Think we got close enough?

The captain of our panga, a 28-year-old Mexican fellow named Mario, was fabulous at finding the whales and keeping us close enough for photos but not so close we violated any Mexican rules.

Yes, there are rules about this stuff in Mexico.

Sylvia shot nearly 500 photos

Capt. Mario was a fount of good information. When we spotted the normally placid whales swimming and diving like college students on spring break, he explained that there were as many 10 male whales trying to, um shall-we-say date(?) a female humpback.

On the water, above the water, under the water, love makes the world go around. Si?

He also found us a large pod of dolphins which we stayed with for nearly an hour.

Sylvia used her new (well, it was new when we went to Tonga) Canon camera today, shooting nearly 500 shots in a rapid fire setting. I shot a measly 300 photos with my trusty Canon Powershot 560.

Between us though, we got some great stuff.

Posted below are some of the other photos I pulled from my 300. She will no doubt post some of hers later.

Hmm. 300. What a great name for a movie!

Which way did she go?

Bottoms up!

On the move

Pam and Sylvia

Time away from the beach to view the film 'Lincoln'

BAHIA del Sol, Nayarit, Mexico - Adm. Fox and I checked out the sunset last night and then watched the Spielberg film Lincoln that has been nominated for so many awards you might expect it to show up on a Catholic list of those under consideration for canonization.

Lincoln surveys a battlefield

Most of the feedback we received from people who had seen it was that it was pretty slow, ponderous in fact, and in a couple of cases, people didn't finish it.

It is not exactly a James Lee Burke potboiler.

Still, the movie has good points and focuses as much as passage of the 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution as Abraham Lincoln himself. It's quite a story.

The politics of getting the amendment passed swirl through the movie. And as a long-time observer of American politics, it was fascinating for me to see the politics at work in the 1860s. They were almost as ugly as today. And the politicians were not a great deal smarter.

Lincoln, was clever, of course. And Lincoln had ethics. Ok, there is a stark difference between then and now.

Tommy Lee Jones

Brooding on the movie later, I realized one reason I couldn't take my eyes of it was because the politics in it reminded me of the byzantine inner workings of the university where I taught for 25 years. We nearly had our own civil war there when the university president shifted funds from academics to public relations - then said he had done no such thing.

What I would have done for a General Ulysses S. Grant!

The performance by Daniel Day-Lewis was Oscar worthy. So was a lesser role by Tommy Lee Jones.

In fact Tommy Lee Jones' character really gets the last word(s) in the movie. It's worth watching until the last minute to see him sans his dark wig and you quickly understand why he felt so strongly about abolishing slavery.

Lincoln is worth struggling through.

Daniel Day-Lewis (center) as Lincoln

Quinceañera in Arroyo Seco Thursday and we bring the cerveza

ARROYO SECO, Jalisco, Mexico - The quinceañera Thursday of our amiga Brianda (the daughter of our friends and neighbors Chena and Chon) has been a much-anticipated event for the last year.

For Mexicans, this party is a combination debutante ball and birthday party with a lot of trappings that Americans are more used to seeing at very expensive weddings.

And in our village, everybody pitches in, helping with preparations or simply paying for things. Someone lined up the band(s), a video person, a photographer, and arranged for food preparation, cleaning the town square and - of course - purchasing enough beer for a party in a village of 300 people.

Yes, 300 people. Many of them are children, but still. Watch for Corona stock to soar later this week.

Adm. Fox and I got tapped to bring down the cerveza, perhaps a comment on how much alcohol I usually bring and/or consume when in town. But it means we will be stopping at Costco Wednesday on our way south to load up. There are times when having a one-ton Toyota Tundra pickup really has its advantages.

Christmas tourists flooding the beaches

Besides being the bearers of beer, Adm. Fox and I have been enjoying the beach each day, going down mid-afternoon, often staying until sunset. With Christmas two days away, our beach is suddenly full of vacationistas, many of them from inland Mexico. Lots of gringos, too, with pale white skin one day, lobster-like appearances the next. Ouch.

Regardless, they all love the beach. And the sound of all the children splashing and laughing is great.

We heard the sound of granddaughter Sasha laughing a lot today. We met her at the mall with her mother for a two-hour visit. Between bites of pizza and scoops of ice cream, she and Sylvia did origami and played with toys, including a giraffe hand puppet.

For the record, the pizza was consumed by Sasha, not Sylvia or me. (Damn it looked good though...) But yes, the ice cream was shared by all.

Here's a brief video of our close encounter with granddaughter Sasha. She has learned a piece of Spanglish that we now use in place of goodbye when we leave - Hasta Pasta... Watch for it.

A happy start with a new Mayan calendar and new epoch

NUEVO VALLARTA, Nayarit, Mexico - We had a scare yesterday as the new day began on Tonga.

We lost the Internet here in Mexico - and thus our electronic link with our amigos there. If the doomsday predictions were right, the apocalypse would be heading our way, hitting Tonga first.



Tonga, you see, is the first place on earth to see the new day, tucked just over the International Dateline. It is already Dec. 22 there and Tongans are out at the Tongan malls doing their Christmas shopping, busy buying shirts in XXXXXXXXL sizes and other gifts.

OK, they're not shopping at malls (there really aren't any) and Christmas is a religious holiday, not a secular-buy-more-today fiesta like the U.S. (and increasingly Mexico). And even Tongans aren't that big.

Here in Nuevo Vallarta the dawn broke beautifully and it is another day of writing (this counts towards that) boogie boarding and, well, that's all I have planned for today.

Adm. Fox already taught her Zumba class which drew close to 30 people today, all shaking it on the beach right in front of the Bahia del Sol condos where we live this winter.

And we just had breakfast at Moon and the Stars Cafe in the Paradise Mall (where the Internet is still working)
.
Not half bad as they say in Minnesota. Not half bad.

The cartoon below has been making the rounds of Facebook and other places. And as it references tequila, it is particularly significant to those of us south of the border.

Happy Dec. 21, y'all.




- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Beach music and Star Trek technology all mixed up

NUEVO VALLARTA, Nayarit, Mexico - Sunday was one of those days that mixed the old with the new in the kind of weird juxtapositions we take for granted in 2012.

Adm. Fox and I took a trip to La Cruz de Huanacaxtle where we went to the market to pick up a few items that are hard to get around here: fresh eggplant, homemade pickles and fabulous fruits.

There are also booths selling jewelery, hats, clothing and dozens of other handmade items.

Adm. Fox checks out some exquisite hand-made glass

Comfort food for gringos... not many takers

The market has a requirement that any items sold there must be handmade - merchants can't go to Wal-Mart and load up on crap to sell.

Because of that, all the art stuff, clothing and food is great - if occasionally a little pricey.

We wisely ate a big breakfast before we went. The various booths selling pastas, sandwiches, fresh vegetable stir fries, and some concoction simply labeled Arabian Food all looked and smelled delicious.

That afternoon we were treated to a short concert on the beach played by a quartet of Huichol Indians. The Huichols are natives of Mexico and produce excellent beaded artwork (some of which was for sale at the La Cruz market).

But I have never run into Huichol musicians before. An amiga from Canada caught the whole affair on her camera and passed along this video.

After this musical interlude, we walked to our condo (100 yards away) for a Skype date with daughter Anne and granddaughters Sami and Kami in Sacramento.

We had a great, clear connection and it was fabulous (as always) to be able to chat over thousands of miles and be able to actually see everyone. We were attired in our beach wear. The girls had sweaters even inside the house.

We only tortured them for a few moments with live video of the surf breaking and of our pool, right below the window. I can hear passport applications being filled out even now.

Here's a short video of that conversation. Very Star Trek.

A motorcycle and busy oceanside daze in Nuevo Vallarta

NUEVO VALLARTA, Nayarit, Mexico - Admiral Fox and I have been keeping our usual chaotic schedules but last night took time to go to show at the Vallarta Yacht Club put on by a Vallarta-based performer named Kassiano.

What a character this guy is.

He pulled people out of the audience to sing with him, belted out tunes from Sinatra to the latest music and by the end of his show, had virtually everyone in the room on their feet dancing. As you might suspect, we were right in the thick of things.

Rockin' with Kassiano at the Vallarta Yacht Club

On a break from dancing

We were the guests of Bob and Karen O'Hara who helped make the arrangements to bring Kassiano to the yacht club for a special performance.

When Bob and Karen saw him at a theater in downtown Vallarta, he had his full band with him. Last night it was he, a musician amiga and a guy running a sound board. They sounded like a whole orchestra to me.

At one point the dancing he had the crowd jumping up into the air. I don't know the condition of the knees of the other people dancing, but mine are sore today from the impact on tile floor.

Outside of dancing parties, our days here have settled into a sort-of routine. It's sort of, because if something interesting suddenly pops up, well, there goes the routine.

For Sylvia, Mondays, Wednesdays and Friday's at 8 a.m. she's on the beach right in front of our condo (Bahia del Sol) teaching a Zumba class. Today she added a Tuesday-Thursday conversational Spanish class.

For me, I do my dancing on the computer keys, writing for a few hours (or more) while she is out and about. Or I keep writing until my brain overheats. That happened last week - twice. Or was it three times?

Afternoons we usually hit the beach where the boogie boarding and swimming has been awesome.

On the way to the store

The new additions to our vehicle fleet are getting lots of use, too.

We brought up our bicycles from Arroyo Seco and after some serious wrassling with the Mexican Department of Motor Vehicles, got our Honda motor scooter licensed. Now it's the favored vehicle for all errands, particular for Adm. Fox.

And by the way, there is a helmet law in Mexico. I am not kidding. In a nation where you can legally drive around with an open container of beer in your car, you have to wear a helmet.

Dios mio.

Yelapa, Nuevo Vallarta and Sayulita - on the road again

SAYULITA, Nayarit, Mexico - Adm. Fox and I took a sojourn up the highway to the beautiful surfing village of Sayulita today. Last February, when we were there with Mike and Karen Schamel of Hector, NY, the streets were all torn up and the place was, well, a fookin' mess. (Pardon my Irish.)

Today the village streets are all back together and because it is very early in the season, relatively quiet. The streets are not any wider though and the Toyota Tundra almost acts like a snowplow in spots, pushing everything out of its way.

The beach, as always, was fabulous.

Sayulita beach

On the way home we stopped by our storage unit where the day before, Adm. Fox and our new amiga Shania had stopped to put a few things into the locker.

Scorpions beware

They were greeted by a granddaddy-sized scorpion, which they dispatched rather quickly, according to their account of the encounter.

But today Adm. Fox told the front desk people about the critter who had taken up residence (and been evicted) and before you can say scorpion in Spanish (alacran), they were sending over an exterminator to give the place the once over with poison.

He waded in with a tank on his back and started blasting away like Clint Eastwood in a Dirty Harry movie.

I'm pretty sure the unit will be alacran free in no time. But to be safe, I plan on staying out of the place for the next few weeks at least.

We had a few other adventures this past week, including catching a power boat ride on Banderas Bay with Elizabeth and Doug.

We went south to Yelapa and then ran along the coast coming back, spotting lots of wildlife, including a whale, dolphins and some wildly colored fish that came to the surface when we tossed out some bread.

We also stopped by the fuel dock to fill up on our way back to Paradise Village. I was reminded why my only power boat these days has a 35 hp Mercury outboard that sips gasoline nearly as slow as a teetotaler imbibes beer at a frat party.

Here's some photos from that round-the-bay expedition:

Yelapa waterfront

More sourdough bread please...

 

 

 

 

 

Las Animas beach and restaurants

Arroyo Seco Express does a 2-day turnaround from Nuevo and back

NUEVO VALLARTA, Nayarit, Mexico - Admiral Fox and I did a light-speed trip from Nuevo Vallarta to Arroyo Seco and back, leaving Friday at 1 p.m. and pulling back into our condo here by 4 today. (Sunday).

Palm trees in front provide great cover now

In between that we opened up the Pink Flamingo, had dinner with Julian, Sondrine, Jim and Vickie in Zapata, rode both beaches on the Honda quad (it started without hestitation) all by noon on Saturday.

But then the adventures began to turn into misadventures.

I will let Admiral Fox detail all that out on her blog http://admiralfox.blogspot.mx/.

But the highlights included finding a few thousand ants in our bed when we wanted to leave for lunch, having to use a toxic bug spray and then not being able to find a restaurant open in Arroyo Seco Saturday night to go to for dinner.

That was especially bad as it was the Admiral's birthday.

Big ouch.

On the plus side, we are back safe with both bicycles, our barbecue, our flat-screen tv and... drum roll please - my Honda motorscooter, for which we will finally get a license so we can motorscoot around Nuevo Vallarta. And on Saturday afternoon - while waiting for the ants to, well, decamp from the bed of our trailer, we went to Palapa Joe's in La Manzanilla, had a great lunch and even caught up with La Manzanilla's Lois Lane (AKA Jane Gorby) still glowing from the winning score of the Ohio State football game.

Our next sojourn to Arroyo Seco will be in December for the holidays.

Here's a few photos from the Pink Flamingo, snapped while waiting for the mist from the ant poison to clear.

The putting green in the center - with Laura's car parked under the roof

Palm trees provide a nice screen to the driveway

Banos and showers all working fine...

A fabulous Thanksgiving dinner on a boat near Paradise

PARADISE VILLAGE, Nuevo Vallarta, Mexico - Adm. Fox and I had a fabulous dinner on board Sea Gnome, a sailboat owned by amiga Elizabeth kept at the marina in Nuevo Vallarta. Sea Gnome is berthed across the channel from Paradise Village Marina (where we kept Sabbatical for several years) and all of the food - served in the cockpit, was great!

Elizabeth (driving) Tim (center) and Devon arrive for dinner

Besides Elizabeth, Sylvia and I, we had two other folks on board, Tim and Devon, who helped chow down on the turkey and fixings Elizabeth had prepared in her tiny galley.

Adm. Fox provided a pasta salad, bread and probably something else that I am forgetting at the moment.

I will know as soon as she reads this. I should be forgiven though, because I have to keep focused - her birthday is Saturday... Saturday... focus...

After dinner, we took a brief tour (in a beautiful Boston Whaler) up the channel past the Fajita Republic restaurant and back.


I have many great memories of that channel.

I used to take my rowing dinghy up there after dark with a spotlight to 'spot' crocodiles snoozing on the muddy banks.

The crocs were not amused but I am here to tell the tale anyway.

Happy Thanksgiving - today, tomorrow and to infinity and beyond!

NUEVO VALLARTA, Nayarit, Mexico - A year ago on this holiday Adm. Fox and I were sitting in the spacious dining room in Sacramento of Pam DiTomasso and Steve Lovotti who had graciously handed over their house to us for the afternoon so we could have a Thanksgiving family dinner.

It was one of those rare convergences of timing and people. It was as much family reunion as Thanksgiving Day dinner. And it was Sylvia's birthday, too.

All our children and grandchildren - except for Sasha who lives in Mexico with her mother - were there. Jason from Colorado, Anne from Sacramento, Dustin from Connecticut, Dylan from Berkeley along with grandchildren Samantha and Kamryn. Added to that we had Adm. Fox and I, Anne and Jason's mom Kay and Kay's mother, Mavis, Sami and Kami's grandmother.

One year later Adm. Fox and I are in a seaside condo getting ready to head out to the Banderas Bay beach for a Thanksgiving afternoon that will include swimming, boogie-boarding, a margarita or two and possibly a big fish dinner on someone's boat this evening.

Not exactly traditional, but the spirit of Thanksgiving is still here, big time.

Thanksgiving is the one day that as a nation we seem to recognize that we have a lot to be thankful for.

Me? As I wake up every morning my first thoughts are about how lucky I am. Truly lucky and truly blessed with a great family and great friends.

Happy Thanksgiving to y'all. 

Today, tomorrow and to infinity and beyond!

In the new office - at Bahia del Sol, Nuevo Vallarta

NUEVO VALLARTA, Nayarit, Mexico - Admiral Fox and I have set up shop here in Nuevo Vallarta, this year splitting our time between here and Arroyo Seco until sometime in April.

I have a book - and other writing projects - with deadlines looming; Adm. Fox has her Zumba to teach, language classes to take and enough other things to keep her so busy it would wear out a teenager. Wait, isn't she a teenager?

Plus, our granddaughter Sasha Fox is right here, who we hope we will get to see. A lot. A lot...

Today we headed out to La Cruz de Huanacaxtle to the Sunday farmer's and artisan market, held where once there was just a beach. Now there is a marina, restaurants and a thriving mercantile economy. More than a few gringo property owners lost their beach rights in the process, but it is Mexico.

And boy, can we relate to their plight. !Tenacatita libre!

We had wanted to have lunch at the famous Philo's but he was closed. Next week he will be open seven days a week. 

Musicians entertain at La Cruz Market

Market on the waterfront, tres cool

 In the meantime, I had occasion to revisit the video Adm. Fox and I produced last fall about this time, Saving Perro Morro. It has stood the test of time. Now we just have to get up the courage and go see if Morro is still alive at his tienda home. I hope so.

If you have a spare few minutes, it's worth taking a peek at. 

In Mexico, but right here it feels more like San Diego

NUEVO VALLARTA, Nayarit, Mexico - Admiral Fox and I stopped by the Paradise Mall to do a load of laundry before heading back to our nearby Bahia del Sol condo on Banderas Bay.

We are moving into our semi-permanent condo digs Saturday a.m. and decided a drawer full of clean clothes was better than dragging a basket full of dirty laundry across the parking lot and up the stairs.

But here in the Paradise Mall - which has a good (if expensive) grocery story and some neat (if expensive) shops, there is also some not-so-good and not-so-neat (but cheap) food among more traditional restaurants.

I suspect even though the sign is obscured, it's pretty easy to figure out I am sitting near the outlets of an American fast-food icon.

Ah, the smell of grease in the air!

Away from this part of the mall, however, this area is fabulous and we have been busy as cats covering, well, what cats cover so industriously since arriving last Sunday afternoon.

Among other things we had dinner the first night we were here with amigos Bill Meagher and Cindy Bader from Marin County. They were taking a mini-vacation in La Cruz. Then Monday we went to a storage unit, picked up the clothes we left here last spring and followed it with a Costco trip.

Chilean wine is very inexpensive - and good.

Admiral Fox is taking a Spanish class several days a week, leaving me home to work on several writing projects. And pretty soon, she will be teaching Zumba on the beach right in front of our condos.

Watch this blog for some photos of that next week.

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