Steve
09/17/2011, The River (Colorado)

It kind of funny that after sailing, my other boating interest is high powered Jet boats and/or waverunners. I Sold my 215 HP Seadoo before I left on my cruise and I haven't been back to "The River" since. My good buddy Frank also sold his waverunner and purchased a high-powered Yamaha Jet boat.
We left san Diego early Monday morning for our guy trip to Lake Havasu and Laughlin Nv.. We were able to get to Havasu early enough that we launched the 17 foot rocket and headed out on the lake. Now I gotta tell this little boat hauls ass, it turns on a dime...and you can even spin 360's on it. As we were flying along Frank decided without warning to crank the wheel and spin the little boat into a 360...completely unaware, I grabbed the first thing I could, which happened to be a support for the bimini cover, which in turn snapped right off. We secured the Bimini and Frank gave me a turn at the wheel (pic). Driving the small Yamaha was a blast...and after a few practice turns I was cranking it around in tight circles.
Being in the warm desert environment made me very homesick for Si Bon, the landscape looks the same as most of the areas that I've been in in Mexico, only instead of a lake or river, there is an ocean. I have rented a condo in Mission Beach (San Diego) next week and Sharon is flying to San Diego on Tuesday. Within the next two weeks we will be returning to San Carlos to begin our next adventure together.

Comments [1]

Steve
09/11/2011, San Diego

Well I finally made it back to San Diego. I had an overnight weather delay in DC, but arrived in San Diego Thursday morning and within hours was in the middle of a blackout which effected over 7 million people. There seems to be a rumor going around that there is some sorta black cloud following me around. I have been in several areas over the past month and a half that have experienced some sort of weird weather or other strange occurrence. I have decided that I'm going to blame it on Global warming.
It's nice being back to my hometown. Thursday night I spent a dark night at Amber and Jeff's house (pic) and Friday Amber and I drove up to visit Ashley in her new condo in Angura Hills. It was REALLY great seeing both the kids (now adults) and after Ashley gave as a quick tour of the Pepperdine campus we went to happy hour at a place right on the beach at Malibu. I have been more and more anxious to get back on Si Bon and as we sat sipping drinks we watched a sailboat heading out into the sunset, my mind wondered to the tranquil waters of the Sea of Cortez.
Right now I'm at Kim and Paul's house where we are going to watch the Chargers opening game later this afternoon. Tomorrow Frank and I are taking his Jet boat on a five day trip to Lake Havasu and Laughlin Nv.. As anxious as I am to get back to Mexico and Si Bon....there's no place like home.
PS. This pic is looking across San Diego towards Downtown..an area that would normally be awash in city lights.

Comments [2]

Steve
09/05/2011, Brattleboro, Vt.

Today is my last day in Brattleboro, tomorrow I'll start my journey back to San Diego where I will spend about three weeks visiting my Daughters and my friends. While in San Diego I will also start the process of stocking up on things we will be needing to take back to Si Bon. I have had an amazing time here in New England, Shaybo and I have been camping, we've been to New York City and we visited Boston and Portland. We've attended many parties, a Pop Warner fundraiser, a couple of birthday celebrations and a funeral. I've met so many new friends it's almost unbelievable...I was going to try to list them all on my blog...but the list was soooo long I decided to just give out a few thanks and hope I don't offend anyone I didn't mention. Thanks to Lara, Delaine, Chris, Matt, Pam, Courtney and Chris for allowing us to stay in your homes while visiting and/or after drinking to much. Thanks to the McKenney's, Ogden's, Currier's and Millerick's (pic) for welcoming me into your circle of friends with open arms...I will always refer to you guys as the Kampersville Klan. Thanks to Ryan and Brian for showing me the proper way to drive a golf ball. Thanks and condolences to the entire Fletcher family. So many other people are popping into my head right now...Megan, Robyn, Pat, Karen....ohhh s*&$ I've gotta end this blog now before it gets any longer. Last but not least A VERY special thanks to Kathy Brooks for welcoming me into her home...there's a saying comparing house guests and fish, that after three days they both stink...well Kathy put up with me for over a month. New England is a beautiful place but you guys (and anyone I may have left out) are who makes it a special place.
God Bless, and I hope we see you in Mexico soon.

Comments [1]

Steve
09/01/2011, Boston, Ma.

Since we were already in Boston to see the Sox vs Yankees, we decided to spend another day and try to see as much of Boston as possible. Originally we were going to take one of those hop on hop off tours, however due to our bad experience with the Duck tour in Portland and the fact that neither one of us mind walking, we both decided to walk the Freedom Trail. The Freedom Trail takes you around many of Boston's historic sites. So, we hopped on the "T" and rode it in to the Harbor area where we set off walking the Freedom Trail. We walked to Fanuel Hall, an area full of shops, restaurants and Historic buildings. We came across a street performer that was just starting his show, he was kinda a goofy dude dressed in a kilt and playing the bagpipes. I'm not sure what it is about me that seems to attract attention...but for some reason goofy picked me out of the crowd to hold his unicycle while he climbed on it. Sounds easy enough..but he made a big part of his show by shimming up the unicycle sorta half on half off, pretending to slip and fall and stepping on our shoulders and heads while he slowly made his way to the unicycle's seat (pic).
After lunch we continued our trek along the Freedom Trail, we walked past the Cheers bar, we walked in and out of several Historic Buildings and thru Boston Commons, which is a beautiful inter city park. For some reason Sharon was on a mission to get to the Prudential Building so we exited the Freedom Trail and headed across town towards the Prudential Building. It was about now that the Hop on Hop off tour was looking like it might have been a good idea, but we had made it this far so we trudged on finally making it to The Prudential Building and riding the elevator to the top for a beautiful view of Boston. We had both had enough of walking by now, so we hopped on the "T" back to the Harbor area where we finished the day with a sunset tour of Boston Harbor.
I'll be spending the next couple of days here in Brattleboro Vt. before flying back to San Diego on Wednesday.

Comments [0]

Steve
08/31/2011, Fenway Park, Boston, Ma.

It was no accident that we just happened to be in Boston at the same time the Yankees were in town. Shaybo and I were going to go to Boston a couple of weeks ago. When we checked the Sox schedule and saw that they played the NY Yankees at home at the end of August, we decided to put off our visit, get some tickets and go to see the biggest rivalry in professional sports at what is one of the last remaining iconic baseball stadiums in the country. We arrived early at Fenway by way of the Boston subway system which is known as the "T". Fenway Park is a grand old stadium located in the heart of downtown Boston. During games the streets surrounding it actually become sort of an extension of the stadium, thus turning the whole area into a lively, festive venue. Sox fans and Yankee fans don't pull any punches when it come to their dislike of each other...however the few Yankee fans that were in attendance were treated well by the Sox fans, although they did put up with a lot of ribbing. One thing that never changes from stadium to stadium is that many fans leave during the seventh inning (not me)....and this game was no exception, so as I normally do, we left our seats in the far outfield (pic) and watched the last two innings from field level behind home plate...the Sox won.

Comments [1]

Steve
08/28/2011, Brattleboro, Vt.

For the past 4-5 days somewhere around 65 million people on the eastern seaboard have been glued to The Weather Channel watching the progress of hurricane Irene. Most of the people in the New England region laughed at the idea that a hurricane would make it this far north...Brattleboro's latitude is 42 51'02"N, which is getting pretty far north. Last night it started raining at 1900...right on schedule. It rained heavily all night and throughout the morning but there didn't seem to be a lot of wind, just a steady, constant downpour. About halfway through making breakfast this morning we lost power and didn't get it back for about 3 hours. The rain let up a little in the mid afternoon and we decided to venture out and see if there was any damage...we didn't really expect to find much because none of us thought the storm was all that bad. As we headed towards the Downtown area of Brattleboro we were greeted by the closing of Main Street where it dips to the Whetstone Brook, Whetstone was now a raging river which basically cut Brattleboro in half. The "Brook" had now flooded a large section of the downtown areas streets, parking lots and stores. It was a very sad sight to see this cute little town now experiencing such devastation. We drove by the Brattleboro Marina and it is basically gone...washed away by flood waters. The rain has now started back up and it appears that there will continue to be additional flooding here in the New England area over the next several days.
My thoughts and prayers go out to the many people who have been effected by this huge storm....God bless.

Comments [1]