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Sunday, March 01, 2009

Cooling Down With Our New Best Friend

At the end of January, Shawn and I flew back home to try our luck at selling a few sun-filled inspirational guides on the Sea of Cortez to the winter bound Pacific Northwesterners at the Seattle Boat Show. While we always look forward to our trips back to Washington, our 4 ½ hour flight delay, which was due to thick fog throughout the state, did not encourage us to leave the warmth of the San Jose del Cabo airport and turn our icy Pacifico beers in for scalding cups of Starbucks coffee. The show was a success, while not as large or as well attended as the previous year, we still managed to talk a few cruisers into escaping the cold, dark northern winters and heading for the land of eternal sunshine and warm Decembers – no foul weather gear necessary.

After the long nonstop 10-day show, Shawn and I took a break for a day and sat in luxurious silence before heading east of the mountains for a visit with my family. While in Yakima, I was lucky enough to live my cowgirl dreams, chasing cows and riding through the sagebrush with my mom and her 2 beautiful horses. And what trip to
Washington in February is complete without a play day in the snow? Armed with snowshoes and a thermos of coffee, we joined my parents and headed into the mountains to visit my grandfather’s cabin. On the way up, we stopped at both the elk and the mountain sheep feeding stations to view the well-feed, pampered wildlife. We spent the afternoon plodding through a brilliant sunlit


prairie, backed by snow-covered mountains, and hot coffee back in the heated comfort of the cabin.

Anxious for our 3,000-mile road trip back to La Paz, we loaded the truck down with an amazing assortment of boat goodies including a fuel tank, water tank, canvas material, and the life-altering refrigeration, before hitting the highway once again. Shawn was visibly excited at the thought of so many big projects, which would surely require the use of every single tool, gadget and screw on our boat to complete all the necessary repairs and installations. I on the other hand, was a bit apprehensive for all the exact same reasons. I most definitely appreciate a difficult, but fulfilling project. However, the thought of living once again in a tool-filled war zone with approximately 4 cubic feet of uncluttered, non-oily living space is not

necessarily my “happy place” like it is for my other half who seems to relish in the beauty of being surrounded by saws, grinders, dirt, and thirty some odd different kinds of wrenches. It is worth any amount of chaos and project frustration however, for the chance to convert our wet and funky icebox into the miracle of refrigeration.

Our trip southbound was pleasantly uneventful and quick. We crossed the border this time at Tecate, which to our surprise was a very nice experience – friendly and hospitable locals, quick customs and immigration, and a very clean town. A far cry from the chiclet-insanity of Tijuana. We spent our first night back in Baja, which also coincided with Valentine’s Day, camped at our favorite spot in Catavina. In honor of Valentine’s Day, we celebrated in style sipping cold beer and eating bacon-wrapped hot dogs under the stars while sitting on the tailgate of the truck in front of the mini super convenience store. Romance is all in the eye of the beholder I suppose, because we loved every minute of it!


We hit La Paz just in time to celebrate the start of Carnival. The majority of the downtown waterfront was taken over by rides, games, food stalls, beer tents and the infamous blanket vendors who hawk their wares over a blaring microphone at sonic speeds. During the last 3 nights of the celebration, the parade is held with colorful floats adorned with even more colorfully dressed dancers. Carnival in La Paz is a very wholesome and family oriented event, with the closest thing to a beaded necklace being thrown is a confetti-filled, hollowed Easter egg. And the closest thing to “chichis” being flashed is watching the Tecate (a local beer) Girls bounce around to music in their bikinis.


Carnival was definitely a welcome distraction from nonstop projects, but an even more welcome distraction has been Dishes (named for doing the dishes). Dishes visits numerous times a day without any prompting to jump onboard and ironically lingers in the companion way after dinner. But, after nearly 2 weeks of projecting, we now have a new water tank, fuel tank, cushion covers, bilge pump, reinsulated icebox, and we are moments away from refrigeration. If all goes well, tonight we will be listening to the comforting sound of a compressor working to chill our beer and freeze our ice. Keep your fingers crossed!

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

So is Dishes yours? The pretty pup sure looks at home there...

Anonymous said...

Ice! Wishing you luck with the ice! How exciting!

Alicia Bradley said...

Congrats on the refrigeration!