Almost January 2012???

It's the day after Christmas, and I am just realizing that our last blog post was November 19th! How time flies when you're having fun! (this never seems to happen when I'm at work though). Haha!

We have been having a great time. Our days are filled with walks with the dogs, great mountain bike rides, kiting if it's windy, visiting with friends new and old, reading, enjoying the simple pleasure of sitting out in the sun in December, and even squeezing in that afternoon siesta. :)

The Christmas "vacation" has brought in lots of people we know from back home that are down here for a couple of weeks to enjoy the sun and wind. The wind for kiting has been averaging about 3 good days a week up until last week. It has been blowing consistently since! Yesterday (Christmas), we did a downwinder (5mi) kite session with friends. In the middle of the ride, Steve ended up jumping and having his board come off. Unfortunately, when he came down from the jump, he ended up slamming into the board that was now lying on the water. He is now nursing a huge goose egg and bruise on the back of his right leg. He is hoping he is not off the water for long, but he says "it hurts to walk". Yikes.

We sure missed seeing family and friends over the holidays this year, but have been able to catch up via email and facebook, which has been nice.

Anyway, that's it for now. I've included a few more sunny, warm, and windy pictures!

Steve and Kris

Downwinder from Hot Springs....

Ally and Jada enjoying the beach!

Steve getting ready to kite!

Morning beach walk

Looking back down the beach at La Ventana

Sweet Ally :)

La Ventana.....home for the winter!

We've made it to La Ventana!

After lots of white knuckle driving, and many hours of sitting, we arrived in late afternoon almost a week ago now. The campground that we had stayed at 3 years ago was full, so we ended up at a new spot just down from a great spot to launch our kites.

So far, since arriving, we have unpacked and set up camp, visited with many friends that are back down this year, have gone kiteboarding, went on a great mountain bike ride this morning, and have taken the dogs on lots of long walks. We are so happy to be here! The weather is perfect. Warm days near 80 degrees, but cooling off in the evening for sleeping. The water is still around 80 degrees, but should be cooling down here rapidly in the next few weeks. I am loving the warm water though. :)

Not much else to report other than we are having a blast so far. :)

Heading out on a walk....

visiting with our friend Brian

outdoor kitchen set up

our camp!

random cow on our walk

backroads of baja

great mtn bike ride with John and Martha

lots of fun singletrack, but lots of prickly things on both sides......

Steve and I riding towards the water

our group this morning

view from the ride (tons of cacti)

South on Mex 1....................

We finally have headed down "the baja penninsula"! We crossed the border Thursday morning, and drove 8 hours straight to our first overnight stop in Catavina. We were so exhausted that we actually fell asleep before dinner, woke up, made some dinner, ate, then went to be at 7:30pm, not to wake up until 6:30am the next morning. We decided that maybe 8 hours of driving the motorhome with a tow vehicle behind us on the narrow and mostly rough roads of baja, was a bit much. Time to slow the trip down a bit.

We drove day 2 for only 5 hours, and spent the night in San Ignacio and checked out the town in the morning.

Day 3 and 4 were in Mulegue visiting Steve's cousin Sherri, which was great!

Today we only made it another 2.5 hours south and are checking out Lareto. Had a great dinner and are now relaxing in the motorhome, getting rested up for the final drive to La Ventana tomorrow. (maybe 7 hours or so for us).

The weather started out cloudy, with rain for one day while in Mulegue, and now nothing but clear skies and upper 70's.

First stop 8 hours south of the border..... the dogs were glad to get out!

Steve. and a very large cactus.

Night #2 was spent in San Ignacio. We checked out the town the following day.

San Ignacio

3rd day we arrived in Mulegue to visit Steve's cousin Sheri. She kept feeding us, so we ended up staying a 2nd night also. :)

The back of Sheri and Ken's house

Jada out on the front patio in Mulegue

Steve, Ken and the neighbor, Don

Lunch stop on Monday in route to Lareto

(this is one of my favorite beaches)

Dinner spot tonight in Lareto

Entire plate of 3 tacos de pescado = $3.40!!

Sunset tonight while walking the dogs on the beach in Lareto.

Valley of Fire--Nevada......

Me and "wild-woman" (Jada)


During our travels in Utah/Colorado, we ran in to a couple from Switzerland that are travelling around for the next year and a half. During an evening hanging out with them, they told us about a place in Nevada called Valley of Fire. They had heard about this place from someone in Pemberton, B.C. that they were talking to at a campground there. We wrote it down on a piece of paper thinking "maybe" we would try and pass through on our way to Las Vegas.

Cool cactus pic.

Well, we made it! Worth the visit, and we plan on returning next spring to stay a little longer!

(see awesome pics below...) :)

One of many really nice campsites here

Wow, actual un-vandalized petroglyphs......nice!

One of the many views of the white/red sandstone

Funny picture of Jada enjoying the view!

Ally always has to do something scary.

Steve herding cats, uh, I mean dogs, for the picture.....

Cool view with Al.

4 days in Zion!

Leaving the snow and cold behind in Bryce Canyon, we headed to Zion National Park. Cool mornings, but nice afternoons in the 60's while we were there.

The first day we set up camp and drove around a bit checking things out. There is one trail in the park that dogs are allowed on, so Jada and Ally got a little bit of exercise too.

Day 2 we were going to do the Angel's Landing hike, but after seeing there was no room in either parking lot at the trailhead, we decided on hiking to Emerald pools instead.

The 3rd day we got up at 6:30am, were at the trailhead of Angel's Landing at 7:30am and were the 2nd and 3rd person to summit that morning. It was perfect. The last .5 mile is basically a "one way" route due to how narrow and exposed it is. I would not want to be on there with other people travelling up or down. Anyway, we were on our way back to the car, and counted at least 30-40 people on their way up!

Day 4 we woke to rain, wind, and cool temps. Packed up and headed further south....... Getting closer to baja!!!

The pictures below are of Angel's Landing.

At the bottom after the sketchy .5 mile climb up!

This is the spine (.5mi), to the top of Angel's Landing.

Looking back down the spine we just climbed

Just don't look down!

Proof that I was on this hike. :)

On our way up to Angel's Landing

Cool, winding trail on approach

View! (Angel's Landing)

Steve calls this next hike "our aborted Angel's Landing hike". Actually it's called Emerald Pools. Angel's Landing was so crowded, we saved it for the next day, and tried this one instead. It was nice, but the "pools" weren't much to look at. I think they may be better in the spring with more snow melt and runoff. Still a fun hike among the "walls" of rock.

View on approach to the Emerald Pools

Weaving through the "walls"....

Even our campground had incredible views!