A quick update to the blog to let you know the progress of my knee, 6+ weeks out from the operation. I had surgery on a Friday and stayed in the Ameri-Med hospital in Puerto Vallarta for 2 ½ days. My surgeon, Dr. José Manuel Hernández (all the doctors have at least three names, actually, most people here carry at least three names if not more. I feel lacking in my short two word name!) was professional, but not like a “typical” surgeon, whom in my experience, have no bedside manners. Dr. Hernández was warm and funny and caring. Every return visit is usually ½ to 1 hour long, and we chit-chat about other things as well. He has been very good at pain management, and at getting me to move my leg/walk, and connecting me with a wonderful physical therapist. I do painful exercises every day, and now seem to have excellent mobility, but boy, do those exercises hurt! As an aside because everyone wants to know about medical care prices down here, it is my understanding that a full knee replacement, which is what I had, can be between $45,000-70,000 US. My total bill here was $13,000, which included the 2 ½ days in the hospital, x-rays, meds, operating rooms and surgeons, and all follow-up visits (which at this point have totaled about 8). The only problem with the cost is that we don’t have insurance here that covers it, so we had to do cash, whereas in the States, the majority of people have insurance that will cover most of their health care – I think. (Well, I know many are not insured or underinsured, but that is a whole other issue). But it is amazing to us that the costs aren’t really astronomical for good care, when you get the insurance companies out of the picture, and the practitioners charge reasonable prices! Oh, and I still haven’t paid my whole bill. I paid half at the END of my hospital stay, and the doctor has been fine with me not paying the second half until we see if we can get a bank account here. (Trying to open up bank accounts or get a Telcel telephone account is a long story in itself!) We are trying to keep one US and one Mexican phone.

The first two weeks I was out I stayed in a little casita that is in a cluster of 5 casitas on a beach or with a beach view. My place was surrounded by a bougainvillea hedge, but you could still see the beach from the place. It had a small private pool, although I wasn’t able to use it. Flocks of birds settled into the palm trees and bamboo every evening, chatting up a storm, but would settle down after dark. They were beautiful black birds with bright canary-yellow wings. It was a great little place to recuperate, as there were no stairs, and two walls opened up to the outside patios. It had a cute little kitchen and large walk-in stone shower – big enough for 2 or 3 people! The whole place had detailed stone-work throughout, with Mexican tiles. I am now including some photos of it under “Amalgamation.” Some of the other photos are just interesting sights that you see in Mexico. If you want to google the place, it is called “Simply Baku,” in La Cruz Mexico. (I mentioned other wonderful aspects about this place in the previous blog).

Our cruising friends definitely stepped up to help me along the way. Ron had to stay on board because of the cats (they were freaked out as it was with me being gone for 2 ½ weeks, so a friend Carlann would come over to the casita, bearing food (homemade chicken noodle soup among other things), books, and would help me rewrap my wound daily. Ron came over as much as he could, but he ended up with a hell of a bad cold/flu and needed to stay away so that I didn’t catch whatever he had. I would have been a real mess, having to throw up at the same time I was dealing with my knee, not to speak of me getting an infection that could negatively impact the prosthesis. He is now better, but we ended up taking him to the doctor as well. Luckily we have had a car throughout this ordeal. We couldn’t imagine taking two buses each way to PV every day! And even though Ron was sick during some of my post-op time, he was and continues to be incredibly helpful, dealing with groceries, laundry, picking up take-out food from nearby restaurants, etc.

I have been back on the boat for the past four weeks, but between the pain meds and exercises, I am worn out early every day! I have also been nauseous from the pain meds, so not eating much, which led to some anemia, but that is all under control now. Began physical therapy which has been a killer, but the pain meds they prescribed helped (and by the way, are easy to get here in Mexico, over the counter)(!). I seemed to be doing really well with walking and getting around without a cane or walker, but realized that I was beginning to build a tolerance for the meds and needing more for the same effect, so knew I needed to get myself off the narcotics as soon as possible. Probably didn’t do it as slowly as I should have, because frankly they freak me out. I was having images of becoming a junkie! I guess I worked in the mental health field for long enough to recognize the signs and the ugly road of addiction. So a little over a week ago I started cutting back drastically, probably a little too drastically, and became very sick from that process. I am totally drug, but not pain-free at this point. In addition, Ron and I came down with yet another gastrointestinal bug that has been floating around the marina. We thought at first that he was just having “sympathy pains” with me, but we both ended up nauseous and vomiting, exhausted, sleeping a lot, and unable to eat. We drank plenty of electrolytes, and protein drinks when we could, but both ended up losing over 10 pounds in the past couple of weeks. Not a diet that either of us recommend!!! Yesterday was the first day we started feeling a little more energy, and took a short walk to the beach, just to walk and sit there and get a little Vitamin D in the sun, listen to the waves and remember why we are here. We are going to try to increase my walks every day so that I start building some strength in my legs again. We have to prepare for our summer in the mountains, schlepping up and down the hills and roads/alleys in San Miguel de Allende and Guanajuato.

In a few days Ron goes home to see his mom and family in Colorado for a week. I will stay here, doing my usual – walking, working on my Spanish, going to yoga 3 times a week, trying out different bread recipes – someone gave me some sourdough starter, which will be a first for me. We have to have the bottom of the boat cleaned again by a diver – keep those nasty barnacles from growing. Then the next step in our adventure is to sail back up to Mazatlán at the beginning of April. We want to get there to enjoy the pool at the marina and continue to work out with swimming. We also have tons to do to get the boat ready to haul out into a boatyard for the 6 months that we will be gone to the mountains. We decided to put it in a boatyard rather than leave it in the water for that length of time. Leaving it in the water requires us to hire someone to check on it periodically, run the engine and other systems once a week, dive and clean the bottom once a month, and the whole thing is generally a little more worrisome if a hurricane comes through during the next hurricane season. Instead we are putting it in a boatyard with someone we trust, and who still needs to do some work on it. The boatyard has security guards and they have a good reputation for protecting boats in the event of a hurricane. We will of course have to do a ton of things to get it ready, including unloading the refrigerators, packing a cooler with what we can take, along with groceries for the summer (we can’t leave any food on the boat as we will need to “roach-bomb” it to keep the critters out!) - yes I know you Californians don’t know about such things. Actually, we won’t take canned goods, but put them in plastic bags in case they explode in the heat. A boat closed up can really get hot down here and do weird things to the innards. We have to fill the fuel tanks to keep condensation out; take down sails and store below (3 large sails, mind you), tie down everything else that can be tied down in case of a hurricane, deflate and remove dinghy and motor, kayaks, dodger and bimini, basically everything up on deck has to go away and be stored in a storage unit. Empty jerry jugs for storage unit, or leave them cracked so they don’t explode in the heat. Propane tanks in storage; Place dryer sheets and bay leaves in closets, under couches, cushions, cupboards, and leave everything (closets, cupboards, floorboards open for circulation. Leave dorades open and covered with “bridal veil.” This allows for circulation without letting critters in. Dorades are the horn-shaped, often polished steel air intake on deck, which brings fresh air below for ventilation. The open end of the dorade faces aft or away from the direction of the wind and sea so that spray does not penetrate below. They are the only things you can have open when sailing because open ports (or “windows”) would allow water in. Put instruments and radios in the oven. This again, in in the case of the boat being hit by lightning. Crazy, huh, but this seems to protect them. And we have to “pickle” the watermaker – putting a chemical in it to preserve it from bacteria. The boat will be hauled out on the 29th of April, and we plan to check in to our VRBO in Guanajuato on the 1st of May. That means spending a couple of days up in the air on the boat in the boatyard, without running water, or toilets. Climbing down a ladder in the middle of the night?!?

I’m sure I am leaving a million little things off the list, but you get the gist, and probably much more than you ever wanted to know. This doesn’t include packing things up for being on a 6-month “vacation,” taking clothes for different climates (which by the way we got rid of in California before heading to warmer climes). We will actually need sweaters! And pants! And shoes other than flip-flops! We haven’t worn pants since October, 2013. And we have to take everything we need for the cats – cat boxes, beds, carriers, etc. As I’ve said before, we’ve never been away from our home/boat for more than 3 weeks, so this will definitely be an adventure. But what isn’t these days?

So check out the Amalgamation photo gallery which covers everything from leftover La Paz shots from Dia de Los Muertos that I found, and my own altar that I put on our boat during that time to honor a couple of loved ones (my Mom and my friend Steve), sailing shots taking from our trip in December across the Sea down here to Mazatlan, and La Cruz and some from the casita I stayed in – some of these were taken by Doris Meier when she and Laurie Richer came down to visit, including some photos from Sayulita, a small town on the Pacific side (versus the Bahia de Bandera, or Banderas Bay where La Cruz and PV are).

Adios, y mucho amor!