Some people claim they are not spontaneous. Some even say they CAN’T be spontaneous. And of course there are those that won’t be spontaneous, everything has to be planned out in detail. Then there is me…………………… I have the hardest time getting ready to go the more time I have to get ready. I know I know it doesn’t even make sense. But I am pretty good at throwing a few things together and taking off. I think it drives my hubby crazy. I know it drives our friends crazy. We often hear “if you gave us more notice”.
So here we are heading to Mexico. Yep decided on Tuesday to go down on Wednesday. Since we are semi retired it is usually pretty easy to sneak away. But Wednesday morning brought some work that needed to be done before we could take off. Once we finished that up, we grabbed a few items of clothing, some personal items, a tad bit of food and took off. Our trip down was pretty pleasant, nothing too exciting. I tried to listen in on a webinar for doTerra but hit a spot out on I-8 that I had no service so I got booted. Phone eventually came back on but had no service for quite some time. It wasn’t until about half way between Gila Bend and Ajo that my sister got through with a “stop ignoring me” call. I rebooted my phone and all seemed better after that. (Hey ATT you need a cell tower out here!! How is a person supposed to get anything done!)
Had a nice little chat with my sister on the drive about the possibility of a cruise to celebrate her 30th anniversary. Maybe there will be something to read later in the year on that.
Otherwise Tracey and I just chatted, sang along with the radio, and played do you know who is singing this and what year it came out with the 80s channel on Sirius radio.
We made a pit stop in Gila Bend to use the restroom and grab a snack. We chatted with the nicest friendliest employee at a McDonald’s I think I have ever come across. Then we stopped to refuel in Why at our favorite Why Not Travel Stop. After that it was across the border with a green pase light. We were sure to watch our speed through the town of Sonoita, the policia like to nab you for speeding through here. We even pulled over to let someone go around us who didn’t want to obey the speed limit. We noticed some new speed limit signs posted, with different than we are used to limits, so keep your eyes peeled.
Since we didn’t pack much we didn’t stop at the office once we entered the gate, no need for assistance from the bellhop. Parking lot was empty, and we noticed the gate to the dirt lot was down and a ton of debris was piled up. Not sure what that was from. As we unloaded and carried our things up the stairs we now could see more of the dirt lot and it was full of the palapas from the beach. We rounded the corner and approached our condo. I retrieved the key from my backpack only to continually get the flashing red light. What a bummer. We set all our stuff down and tried a few more times without any luck. Now we had to draw straws to see which of us would trek all the way to the HOA office to get a new key. We couldn’t both go unless we wanted to carry all of our things back to the truck. So I stayed with our belongings and Tracey hoofed it to the HOA office. Well I thought he hoofed it. He said something told him to drive over there, and good thing he did as the HOA office has moved and is now in phase 2. We thought it was far before LOL. He was able to find the new office, have a nice chat with Daniel and get new keys made. We were not thinking when we elected to pass by the office on the way in, that it is a new year and we would need new keys. On his way out he ran into Jose, one of our favorite bellhops and chatted a bit and was still back to our door in a short amount of time overall.
Keys worked and we are home, well our second home. We immediately check out two of the bedrooms and the dining area as we had new furniture brought in since we were here last. We love it! It looks great. Thanks to Geoff at BorderMovers for making the pick up and delivery of furniture for us. It looks great, can’t wait for you all to see it.
We opened the doors, which all slide so much easier now, and let the ocean breeze blow in. Okay well there was no breeze but we let the stale air out, as the condo had been closed up for awhile.
We spent the evening just relaxing and enjoying being.
Thursday morning we slept in, some of us later than others! I finished some laundry the cleaning crew didn’t get done, checked messages, answered some emails and just enjoyed staring at the ocean. Tracey joined me awhile later and we had coffee and tea while staring at the ocean. I don’t think we ever get enough of this view.
We enjoyed a walk on the beach after sticking our hands in the pool which was very cold. We braved the cool water up to about mid-calf. Something I noticed while on our walk, I did not see any trash, or broken glass or dead fish. The beach was so clean. And empty. This is such a quiet time of year to come down. We did eventually see a handful of other people and dogs on the beach so we didn’t have it ALL to ourselves, but pretty close. We watched shells roll in and out with the tide. We watched as air and sand was pushed upwards from under the sand. I have always been told those are sand dollars that make those holes but I sure can’t catch one. We met a tiny hermit crab along the way and then turned to head back.
The water was cool or cold enough I would not have gotten in past my knees. Tracey said he would, but he didn’t. There were areas as the waves lapped on the beach that were even warm feeling, Tracey said a crab must have peed there.
We returned to Las Palomas and rinse off our feet, took a long walk around the grounds. The workers are replacing some broken tiles on the stairs near the far side of the pool, and oh yes all new palapas on the beach! The lazy river was cold like the pool and the second pool was taped of and we couldn’t get to it. We did not figure out why it was off limits but it is nice to see improvements being made on property. (Tracey said he saw two guys in the pool in phase 2 when he went to the HOA office so maybe we will check that out tomorrow)
We ended our stroll back near our condo and decided to enjoy a michelada rojo at the pool bar. We see a few familiar faces and enjoy the quietness. We watch two people be asked for ID and eventually asked to leave the property. They had no wristbands or owners ID so were not staying here. The male of the couple acted out in not a nice way. They were all the way on the other side of the pool so we could not hear what was said, we just watched as it unfolded. The guy kept throwing his arms up in the air. The security personnel, one male and one female, remained calm. The guy got right in the female security officer’s face and said something, then pulled out his phone and took a picture of her name tag and then one of her face. He then stepped over to the male security officer and did exactly the same thing. Then he rejoined his female companion who was working her way toward the beach, while he was acting out, and off they went down the beach. Come on people grow up. If you have no rights to be here, don’t blame the security for asking you to leave. Buy a condo, pay rent or go somewhere else!
Whew sorry I went off on a tangent there.
We finished our drink and headed back up to the condo. I changed out the laundry, and Tracey took a nap. Why? Because we can! I stared at the ocean some more and played a game on my phone. I am not much of a napper so I just enjoyed the peace and quiet, until I got hungry. I began fixing us some lunch, homemade tamales (thanks Sonia and Miguel). Maybe it was the smell, more likely the noise, but Tracey woke up before I had lunch ready. We enjoyed lunch, listening to the waves crash on the sand.
After lunch Tracey cleaned the glass panels on the patio and I put out the patio furniture. Tracey did some work on his computer and I lounged on the patio soaking up the sun until the breeze picked up and was a bit chilly.
We will let you know what the evening brings.
We decided we were much too relaxed to go anywhere for dinner, so thanks to our dear friend Laura remembering us each Christmas we enjoyed some very tasty clam chowder in sourdough bread bowls! Yummy!
After dinner we decided to watch a little tv before bed but couldn’t find anything worth watching. We did find some “Friends” reruns and just chatted and enjoyed the sights and sounds of the ocean. I texted with our daughter about her day and homework but it was not too late when we decided to head to bed. Tracey locked up and off we went. Something about the ocean air always makes me want to go to bed early.
Originally we were going to head home Friday but Tracey’s plans for Saturday canceled so we elected to stay another day. It was a tough decision haha. After showering and getting ready for the day, we both did some work related things and answered phone calls and emails and then headed off to Wrecked at the Reef for some breakfast. Tracey commented on the way over about Omar, a friend we made a few years back, and who is the first person we see when we walked into Wrecked? Yep Omar. We shook hands and exchanged hugs. It is always such a great time seeing him. We picked a table outside and close to the sand and water. We order up our bloody marys and breakfast and caught up with Omar. We chat about the holidays and families, travel and business. I asked Omar if they were ever going to finish the pier they started about 2 years ago, he laughed and said no. You see they were building a pier for cruise ships to dock at and bring in more tourism. Everything down here is done on what we lovingly call “mexican time”. Much slower than we are used to in the states. And it is true we have seen some projects never be completed. Omar brings our drinks and another server drops off silverware and condiments. We ask about bags for the cornhole game, that has now been moved down to the beach area. It is not far from our table so we leave our drinks and begin a game of cornhole or bags, depending on where you are from. We are not far into the game and we have had to go chase the birds away from our drinks 3 or 4 times! The next time I chased the bird I decided we should wait until after we eat to play and bring our drinks with us. We return to the table shortly before our food was brought out. And oh yeah by the way I was winning 7 to 1 ! Breakfast was really good, as usual, especially the tortillas. I don’t know what it is about the tortillas down here but they are so so so very good.
Once we finish breakfast we gather our drinks and move back down to play cornhole. Yes I ended up kicking Tracey’s butt the first game woohoo, go me. But of course he made a come back and made me pay the second game. We had so much fun and it was so relaxing. Once we finished the two games we just sat chatting enjoying the sunshine.
We said our goodbyes to Omar, paid our check and went on our way.
We decided to stop off at the spa here at Las Palomas and see about getting pedicure. They were busy but said we could come back in about an hour. We went back to the condo, where Tracey took a nap (I think he would nap every day if I let him ) and I blogged.
When the hour was up we headed back over to the spa and had a nice pedicure. The girls didn’t talk too much to us, so we chatted with each other. I answer some work calls (getting an offer on a listing we have!!!!) We can see the ocean through the windows, it is quiet and someone is rubbing my feet. I mean really what more do we want?
Once back at the condo, I snack on a cookie, oh my gosh people my husband makes the best ever chocolate chip cookies!!! We decide to get out the telescope and take some pictures of the fishing boats. It takes us quite a while to get it set up and focused with the phone attachment. A frustrating endeavor to say the least, each couldn’t understand the other, and no one was doing it right and the communication sucked at best. But take a deep breathe, slowly release it and yes we got it set up and ended up with some half decent photos. I think we need more instructions and more practice. Oh yeah and less sun blazing in our face while we are trying to see through the little hole in the telescope.
We had just sat down inside to check out the pictures when a neighbor walked out on the patio next door. Tracey went out to chat him up and I sat down to blog some more. I ended up joining the gentlemen shortly after as I was having a moment of non-motivation where my writing was concerned.
We enjoyed meeting the renters next door and even gave them a tour of our condo.
Now we are deciding what to do for dinner. We saw a sign there was wine and jazz at Citron tonight, so maybe we will head over there.
#lifetogetherisbetter #journeyfor2 #laspalomas #wreckedatthereef #HOAofficeistoofar