Seattle

What a wonderful weekend! My son was at a conference in Seattle last weekend so my niece and I drove down to spend some time with him. It had been almost 5 years since we had visited with each other in Chicago...Covid delayed all plans to visit.

Between Mereille and Mitch they organized every detail of our visit.

UBER was a new method of transportation for me and very efficient!

On Good Friday we wandered down to Pike Street Market

and viewed the tasty displays like GUM ALLEY...

...and fresh produce.

Unfortunately the Art Gallery was closed but this sculpture

outside the entrance was very powerful!

Marika and Adrian joined us on Saturday

and shared the exciting news of their pregnancy!

On Saturday afternoon we enjoyed a fun time

at a downtown Ping Pong game centre.

In the Ping Pong Hall we were surrounded by a gallery

of interesting art that continued into the washrooms.

Downtown Seattle seemed sad due to retail and business closures as well as a large number of homeless people on the streets. When we travelled to other areas it appeared that small businesses were trying to recover from covid. 

The first night we shared dinner at Ron Mai, a small Thai restaurant owned by friends of Mitch in the Capitol Hill region. On our last night we revisited that area for a Mexican dinner at La Cocina Santiago owned by the same family for over 40 years. Both meals were very good! Mitch also took us to Shaker and Spear, a 5 star restaurant in downtown Seattle. The fish and seafood were amazing!!

An ANIMEE conference was taking place over the weekend so the hotel and the streets were full of weirdly costumed attendees. Their conference mandated mask wearing so the combination of costumes and masks created an interesting flow of pedestrians on the street. 

Covid restrictions have been totally relaxed so most people were unmasked. We chose to wear masks in the elevators and in congested public areas. At Spear and Shaker we were asked to produce proof of covid vaccine. I was pleased that mask wearing is mandated in all UBER vehicles...drivers and passengers.

After dinner, in the evenings, we reconvened in the Club Lounge on the top floor of our hotel and shared a nightcap along with stories about covid experiences, family updates and plans for the future. It was a very special weekend! Hopefully we will gather again soon.

Home from Mexico

 

It was a wonderful, relaxing time away from two years of isolation. It was great to be in the company of good friends and to socialize with a small selection of their friends who were triple vaccinated and ready to cautiously return to "normal".

A daily float while listening to the birds.

The house was built around the trees.

Looking back at the house from our evening G&T spot.

Our evening G&T location overlooking Los Arcos.

A day trip to Mayto Beach where the sand extended for kilometers.

I made three trips by bus into downtown Puerto Vallarta. Bus fare is 10 pesos (60 cents) regardless of whether you go for one stop or to the end of the route. You do not need the exact fare because the drivers will make change for you. Everyone is masked including the driver.

Walking around in the city it is obvious that Mexicans take the regulations seriously. They are always masked, unlike the tourists who roam around in various states of undress without masks. During my one evening visit to the downtown area I was appalled at the number of tourists crammed into and spilling out of bars without a mask in sight. My thoughts went to the locals who were working in these bars and risking exposure to the virus in order to make a living. I kept my distance with my mask in place!

The park in Central downtown Puerto Vallarta is being transformed 

with mosaics on all of the surfaces. It is stunning!

The adjustment to my release from isolation was interesting. Initially I was anxious, tightly masked in the airport and on the plane, using sanitizer on my hands and surfaces. Anxiety ramped up in the PV airport where everyone was masked but not observing distances. Eventually, after one week in Mismaloya, I relaxed enough to board a bus into town and to join my friends for a restaurant meal.

Preparing to return to Vancouver it took a while to complete the ArriveCan app and I was glad that I had taken all of my vaccination info. The pre-travel covid test in PV was easy (650 pesos=$40). They gave me a paper copy and emailed it to me as well. Westjet checkin was a disappointment. It took one hour and could have been handled much quicker with re-alignment of the checkin clerks. The line for those with boarding passes had one clerk and apparently most of us had already acquired our passes. As a result there were 150 in line for one clerk and the remainder in line for the other two clerks.

Thank you again to my hosts who treated me so generously!

Mismaloya

After a three year absence, I am visiting Mismaloya again. South of Puerto Vallarta, my home here looks out on Los Arcos. Yesterday was a whale watching morning with several whales playing for about an hour. It is a sunny, warm and relaxing place to recover from the two year stress of Covid.

My days are spent with writing, eating, drawing, eating, napping, eating and listening to the waves and birds. For some reason the blog entries do not appear as neatly when posted from my IPad. If that happens with this post, I apologize. Meanwhile, life is good here in Mismaloya Mexico.

From Cancer Clinic to Spring days

 It has been quite an interesting few weeks. My sister arrived from Campbell River on January 27th. We settled into my other sister's home (because she is in Arizona and her home was available for us with two bedrooms) for the duration of her radiation treatments. The next day we drove to the Surrey Cancer Clinic to meet with the Oncologist and to have all of the necessary prep done. A warm piece of meshed silicon was draped and shaped over her face to keep her head firmly in place during radiation treatments. This mask was given to her at the end of treatments.

During the days leading up to radiation we managed to shop, eat, walk, eat, nap, eat, shop, eat. Finally, on February 3rd she received the first treatment. On February 10th, after a total of five treatments we boarded the ferry for Vancouver Island and drove to her home in Campbell River. Other than fatigue, she was doing okay.

Searching for sea glass at Campbell River

After spending two nights in Campbell River I drove over to Comox for my "Christmas" visit with Heather, Chris and August. All of my travel plans were cancelled at the end of 2021 due to Covid so we exchanged Christmas gifts and shared much needed time together for three days. August invented a new game that kept us in stitches(Blue balls Frapuchino), Heather prepared amazing meals and Chris introduced me to the addictive pursuit of WORDL!

A sunny day visit to Filberg Park

On Valentine's Day I returned to Campbell River to check on my sister and enjoy a couple more days with her. With her improved balance we toured the neighborhood on daily walks, inspected new building sites and looked for budding crocus along the way. Finally on February 16th I boarded the ferry and headed home to sleep in my own bed for the first time in three weeks!

A sure sign of Spring this morning!

Two months has passed

 

I just realized this morning that it has been two months since my last post...two months of Omicron! Christmas was a non-event. I had shared a pre-Christmas celebration with Adrian and Marika and three days later they tested positive for Covid. My travel plans to Vancouver Island were cancelled due to the possibility of carrying the virus to family on the island. I stayed home with a pasta dinner on Christmas Day. Fortunately I did not contract the virus. Adrian and Marika struggled with lasting symptoms for two weeks.

Then I had to make a decision about my travel plans to Puerto Vallarta. After much agonizing I decided to cancel the flights. My sister and her husband, desperate for warm weather after Christmas, decided to head south in their motorhome to Arizona. So life has been quite solitary for these first weeks of January.

I am extremely grateful to share coffee visits every 3-4 weeks with Susan, my long time friend. These occasions give me the opportunity to talk with another adult, reminisce and share our covid experiences. Regular FaceTime conversations with my special people in Puerto Vallarta lift my spirits. Emails and telephone chats ease the loneliness. Daily walks are a necessary tonic and were sadly missed during the week of snow and ice. This combination of living alone and isolating from others can be very unsettling. 

My sister who had the brain tumor removed has experienced a resurgence of symptoms and has decided to have radiation treatments. She will travel next week from Campbell River to Surrey for treatments and I will live with her at my other sister's house for the duration of her stay. 

Throughout this epidemic I have managed to continue painting in a sporadic way. There is so much time to fill but not much inspiration in the air.

This is one of the paintings that has emerged during the epidemic.

 It will be exhibited in Puerto Vallarta soon.

Brain surgery and an Atmospheric River

 

So much has happened since my last post. 

It will be a challenge to catch up.

At the end of September we learned that my youngest sister had a tumor on her brain. She is a survivor of breast cancer (10 years ago) and lung cancer (2 years ago) so the prognosis was worrying. Surgery to remove the tumor was presented as an option. The surgery would take place at Royal Columbia in New Westminster but it was impossible to confirm a date for the surgery due to Covid complications in hospitals. These complications, which have impacted thousands of people waiting for surgeries, are caused by the unvaccinated in our province.

She flew from Campbell River on Vancouver Island to Vancouver on November 8th for preliminary tests and on November 12th at 2:00pm she finally had surgery which successfully removed the tumor. By 2:00pm the next day she was released from hospital...24 hours later!! Unbelievable! She was walking, talking, eating and eager to get out!

The surgeon requested that she stay on the mainland for 10 days and have a CT scan as well as a Cancer Clinic appointment before returning to Campbell River. In the meantime we are keeping a close eye on her for seizures and possible stroke. When she is given permission to travel we will take her back to her home.

On the same weekend as her surgery our province was visited by an "Atmospheric River". It was an ongoing deluge of rain and wind that decimated farm lands, wiped out sections of highways, forced evacuations of towns and stranded hundreds of people. Lives were taken, the food chain was halted...no truck, train or ship deliveries into or out of the city of Vancouver. It will be days/weeks before transportation routes are restored. Thousands of farm animals have died. Fuel for our vehicles has been rationed to 30 liters.

One week has passed since this disaster and the forecast is for another "Atmospheric River" to hit the northern coast of our province with potential flooding. More rainfall will also arrive later this week on the south coast which has not had time to rebuild and recover. Smaller highways have reopened with one way, slow traffic. The main highway, the Coquihalla, will take months to repair.

Vancouver Island again

Just returned from another trip to Vancouver Island.

Fanny Bay - oyster shell beach

Beautiful sky and calm water