Cat news and condo tour

For those of you who have met and read about our foster cat, I am pleased to report that she now has a new permanent home!!  Friends of friends Diane and Luis have adopted her where they live in a 2nd floor apartment with an outdoor enclosed patio and no other animals. Diane is French Canadian, so Mariposa will soon be trilingual. Will visit soon and show pics of her new home. We miss her already, but wish her well and are so glad she has a good home!!!

We took our little gang on a "condo tour" so our Victoria 4 had some other choices for another year here. We started out at Lauren's place, Casita Blanca, and then Bev and Mick opened their home at Los Tortugas to our little gang for drinks and a tour of their complex. Lovely 2 bed, 2 bath condo with a nice pool, hot tub and steps to the beach. 

We had drinks and laughs before heading off in our various directions for dinner. Gwen, Robin, Linda and Pat all leave on Saturday for Victoria. 

Lauren invited Laura and us to eat at John Grays Restaurant with her, and it was our first time there in over 11 years coming to PM. Wonderful meal, lovely surroundings, and of course great company. 

Another music night...

The whole gang gathered at David Lau's for dinner and to listen to the Men in Blues and most especially, the guest singer, Cynthia Davis!















Cynthia and The Men put on an awesome show, as usual, even tho it was raining earlier in the evening, so the whole thing was moved inside the restaurant, and it was very loud and crowded. Didn't stop all of us getting up dancing to the great music.









On the way home, the cactus was doing its thing again....those amazing blooms......











To remind you of the scale of this cactus, here I am standing beside it.....how amazing!!!!!!

House for sale in Parksville!

Well, here is a new and different blog entry for you. We have decided to sell our wonderful Parksville home. I know all the people who know us well will say, so what else is new......but we have owned it now for 7 years and invested a ton of blood sweat and tears into it. We are ready for something new and have an accepted offer on a large 3 bedroom condo in Parksville, subject to the sale of our place. Buying something from 5,000 miles you say....are we crazy....???  Maybe a little, but we have complete faith in our realtor, and have seen many pics, so feel ok about doing this. Our wonderful house sitters have done some final renos for us - painting, new walls and floor in the laundry room, tiling the fireplace, etc, and have been Amazing Angels not only to do all the renos but also to handle all the showings and so on which go along with being listed. If anyone knows someone who might be moving to Parksville please pass this info along - we only need one buyer.....! There is an open house on Saturday, and the MLS listing can be seen at MLS.ca - #311725

http://www.realtor.ca/PropertyDetails.aspx?PropertyID=10436419&PidKey=-1374758113

You can always email me at darmstrong601@yahoo.ca if you happen to know someone who might need more info. Networking rules!!!

Cactus and popcorn....

The giant cactus is once again in bloom - only at night....and has several blooms high up on her arms.














For anyone who missed this last month, this cactus only blooms at night, on one night, and there are some buds low down which are going to bloom any night now. Really beautiful, so I will hope to catch them when they open.









Miki and I have been working too hard, so we ran off to Cancun yesterday afternoon and went to the movies.....air conditioned, of course.......and THEN went to Costco, Wallmart and Chedraui to do shopping for ourselves and 3 others. It was great fun and we saw the new 3D adventure called Sanctum from James Cameron. Don't ask why there is a blender on the seat beside us......we bought it for someone and didn't want to leave it in the car.

More Carnival....!

Oh, yes, she is back, friends and neighbours, the drag queen who was the MC for the dance competitions in the main square....this guy is as good as anyone in Canada or the U. S. and has the entire audience - including aging Mayans and families - howling with laughter.














The dancers have incredible outfits........















Men and women alike












And the float that went by just couldn't get enough of the camera.....!

Sat night on the town...

We all gathered at David Lau's for dinner and the Men in Blues, which Linda and Pat had not heard yet. Great food, great music!

Diego on lead guitar and Jean on the keyboards.....!

Kenny on drums and Manuel on  bass guitar.....

This is a dreadful pic, but this is the band that finally started playing in the main square after we left DL's....local, loud and fun - the last set of princesses and princes are just finishing their dance and then the floor was full!

Carnival in Puerto Morelos

This is the start of our 4 day Carnival....a tradition throughout Mexico and the Caribbean that ends on Fat Tuesday, before the beginning of Lent - one great blow out party! This is the scene from the bookstore window last night.....the Puerto town square was packed with people, food, vendors, and a huge stage for a great local band.










The King and Queen of Carnival were paraded around the square in a decorated pickup, throwing treats to the kids. On the basketball court, which subbed for a dance floor last night, all the princesses and princes were crowned as well.








Here is just one couple before they received their crowns....we wish we had more Spanish to tell you the basis for this custom. I will try to find out and add it later. The final couple to be crowned did the first waltz around the floor and then everyone joined them. There were hundreds of people and families here - it is Saturday night and most people have Sunday off - good thing - , as the band didn't even start playing until 10:30...!!









There were so many lights it was hard to get a decent pic, but you can get an idea of the numbers from this one. Sun night the next party is in the Colonia - our neighbourhood - in the zocolo, Monday is back in Puerto and Tuesday, the finale, is in the Colonia again.