Visiting Tucson

We left San Carlos a day earlier than planned so we could spend time revisiting some of our favourite places in Tucson. A friend drove us to Guaymas to catch the 11:30 pm bus to Tucson. The seven hour bus ride is very comfortable with seats that recline like a bed and Fred took full advantage of this time to catch a "nap".   I, on the other hand, was dragging when the bus pulled into Tucson at 8:00 am [late because of some hassle at the border].

The hotel was kind enough to find a room for us that early and I had a short rest before we headed downtown. We did some shopping at an artisan area that we had visited with family a few years before. Tucson is as hot as San Carlos, but not nearly as humid so we were able to stay outside much longer.  Needless to say it was not a late night!

The picture of the grapefruit is from a tree in our front courtyard.

Guaymas

Carlos drove us to Guaymas to see the Notario for our last signing of the papers. The procedure in Mexico is very lengthy, but we are now at a point where the banks take over so we can safely say we are the proud new owners of a house in Mexico.

I am a little sad to see the 5th wheel life vanish as I loved the outdoor activities that went with it. With that said, we have been meeting many of the year round residents of Tecalai and they have been giving us lots of advice.

Summer in San Carlos is much like the heart of winter in Saskatchewan - you are confined to the house because of the extremes in temperatures. We are unable to sit outside to enjoy the day and we plan our excursions carefully to make sure we can cool down at the grocery store or at least get on the bus asap.

Like I said, most of the changes we plan to make are cosmetic so tomorrow will be spent painting the bathroom and laundry room - thank goodness for A/C.

Praying to the 'Power Gods'.

If a backhoe cuts through your main power supply and you lose your A/C, pray to the “Power Gods” for help - if the same backhoe cuts through your water supply, get yourself to Froggys!

We knew it was going to be extremely hot today so we had decided to spend the day indoors, near the A/C, taking measurements for new blinds etc. The Parque Tecalai has hired a Mexican crew to update their electrical system and of course the mode of operations is to ‘dig first - locate second’. The backhoe first cut the main electrical supply and two hours later we were still waiting for them to correct the incorrect repair [they spliced together the severed wires wrong and the A/C would not work]. We reasoned that we could live with the heat as long as we could jump in the cool [lukewarm] shower occasionally ... that was until they dug through the main water supply. We could have gone to the pool, but that would mean being in the full sunshine for 1 hour or ....5 hours. We already had too much sun yesterday.

Thankfully the water and power were back on when we returned two hours later. It is always an adventure watching Mexicans create problems and solve them.

A Lazy Sunday?

We have been fascinated by Greg Norman and the British Open, so for the last two days we have not been active until 11:00 am. TV coverage here started at 6:30 am. No problem getting up in time when you go to sleep at 8:30 pm. With golfing on our mind, we caught a bus to the golf course and checked out the summer activity. The course looks okay and the crowds were similar to the winter (fairly sparse).

We decided to ignore the heat and walk from the golf course back to Santa Rosa for groceries. It was not an easy walk as you can see from Fred soaking his head with water. As I told Lenore last winter when we took the same “shortcut” twice, “once is a mistake and twice is just plain stupid”. With that in mind, we decided to forego the bus and walk the rest of the way home. Need I say more? Dumb and dumber.

A Day with Carlos.

We had hoped for Friday to be a day of rest and relaxation, but once we met with Carlos (the man who is handling our purchase of the house in San Carlos) that idea was short lived. He needed all sorts of documents, one of which was our tourist visas. The overnite bus didn’t stop at immigration so we were unable to get them on the way down - that meant a hurried trip to Guaymas to get the papers before we could proceed.

Even though we have always relied on the bus system in San Carlos, not having a car is complicating matters somewhat. We are unable to make the necessary quick trips to pick up much needed items. Thankfully Carlos offered to drive us to the airport to get the visas needed.

Another complication for us is the lack of bikes. Unlike the winter, walking long distances in the summer is a problem for us Gringos. The heat and humidity takes its toll on us whenever we have to walk for water or food.

Because the present owners were kind enough to allow us to live here while handling the transfer, we have been able to check the house over carefully. We can see that we will be doing the usual cosmetic changes such as painting, changing blinds and eventually changing some furniture. Houses in Mexico need far more painting upkeep than at home and this house is no exception.

Also, we have relearned that being in Mexico in the summer means you do not have to fire up the water heater - the water is warm enough!

San Carlos Revisited

We had no intentions of visiting Mexico in the summer, but ...! We left Eatonia on Wednesday morning at 7:00 am and were in Tecalai by 6:30 am on Thursday morning. Rather than flying to Guaymas we chose to try the bus system from Tucson, in case 'interior designers' ever venture down !!

Our plans worked to perfection, except that in Tucson we took a cab to the wrong bus company, experienced an electrical blackout in that part of the city, and the A/C was unbearable on the bus trip from Tucson to Guaymas [11:20 pm to 6:00 am].

We had made arrangements to pick up the key to the house and were pleasantly surprised when it was produced right on time. The house was much as we remember.

Both of us are exhausted from the long hours and the humidity. The temperature is 34 degrees, but feels like 43 [according to the weather channel]. Heat like this reminds us of the summer trip to Akumal with Mo.

We even made two walking trips to Santa Rosa for groceries and water. The first walk was at 8:00 am and the heat had us looking for the bus back to Tecalai. We're sure it's just an adjustment thing.

We are presently seated in Froggys checking on the health of Big Alex. We found no wifi at Tecalai and forgot the password for Totonaka RV so Froggys is our nearest wifi.