First Wednesday of the new year

 Today we packed up and moved Beluga to a new place.
A big move, about 300 feet from our last site.   Lewis thought that was far enough to ride.  A spot on the bay opened and we wiggled right into it.  Site 42 isn't any bigger than site 98 was, same blacktop with white lines, almost the same distance from the nice grassy dog walk along the water.  But this site lets us sit outside and watch the pelicans and ducks, and geese and grebes and brants, and various wading birds going about their business.  Its so nice to watch the light change on the water, the tides come and go, the smells of salt water, ah....This will be a good place for the next couple weeks.

Lewis is nervous, however, about the new sights.  No big surprise there.  Paul and Polly stopped by this afternoon while they were out riding bikes (Paul rode, Polly ran).  Lew was too unsettled to play...Polly picked up his favorite toy and slowly displayed it to Lewis, no dice....She shook it a bit and looked into his eyes with the purple toy hanging loosely in her mouth, no dice.   She licked his face coquettishly, no dice.  She gave up and lay down quietly next to him - what a good friend she is.

Drip, drip...
I was putting things away inside Beluga after the move and I felt a drip on my head.  I looked up and saw another drop poised to fall from the light fixture over the kitchen counter.   Hmmmmm.   Oh Daaaave....
He took the fixture off and didn't find anything awry, good.   Next he checked the roof.  The caulk around the microwave exhaust looked like it could use a good re-do, so he took care of that and we should be fine. As I've said before, no end to his talents.

Our new site - Dave checking out a little leak on the roof

Paul and Polly came back to share a glass of wine and watch the sunset with us.  As I was inside pouring, Nina arrived....perfect.  We'll really miss these impromptu visits and good conversations when we finally go our separate ways.    Ah well, enjoy the day, every day.

Paul and Dave will play golf in the morning and Nina will slave over the liquor cabinet, soaking raisins, and whatever else she does to prepare her traditional Gloegg  for a gathering at "the beast" tomorrow afternoon.

We can't wait to taste it....

first sunset in site 42

New Year's Day

The first day of this new year started a lot like most of the days of the past year - calm, quiet and pleasant.   Just the way we like it.

Dave and Lewis by the bay

Dave and Lewis on one of our walks along the bay

Nina with Polly and Lewis.   looks like the doggies are about to resume their romp!

  We talked on the phone with Jesse and Cindy K. as we sat outside in the warm sunshine.  Jesse is back home in Eugene after visiting with us here and and then with Erin's family in Wyoming.   The holidays are hectic and tiring, but in a very good way.    Cindy K spent lots and lots of time with family in the Buffalo area and is really looking forward to getting to their Venice, Florida house for some sunny r&r soon.

If you look at yesterday's blog again today,  you may notice that I seem to have moved the pictures around to make a bit more sense.  You'd be wrong - I didn't do it, wonderful Nina did!    She and Polly came round for a bit of holiday cheer and a gentle romp (the dogs romped, we "cheered").   She was able to interpret the HTML speak and showed me how to move pictures around after I inserted them in the blog. (Hmmm, I didn't have much success again tonight, but I'll keep trying)   Still haven't figured out the real problem, but at least I can try to do a better job in the interim.  Finger's crossed!

We drank our New Year's Eve bottle of champagne tonight with dinner.  Dropsy overcame both of us immediately after the Times Square ball dropped last night and the bottle stayed in the refrigerator.  At least we made it until midnight....

New Year's Eve

No, this isn't Dave and it isn't Lewis.....

fellow campers Monica and Lehn Lund and their two standard poodles, Oscar and Finnegan

wonderful succulent window box on  a cottage at Crystal Pier Hotel

not many interesting shells on the beach, but way cool Kelp...

Crystal Pier in Pacific Beach.  See the Christmas tree at the end?

our last western sunset of the year

Well, my organizational skills went for naught tonight, but at least some pictures appeared despite their odd placement.

Beautiful clear sunny skies greeted us this morning.  As we sat outside with our coffees, a couple stopped by to see Lewis.  They had their two black standard poodles with them.  We had a poodlepalooza at site 98!  The young couple are from outside of Calgary and have had poodles for some years.  We stood and talked for a long time.  Their daughter, Ava, tried to make friends with skittish Lewis and made good progress.  They gave us their breeder's name (in Ottawa) and left after much picture taking and a promise to keep in touch.  Fun!

After we took our dogs for a long walk, turned the radio on, gave them cookies and left them to rest,  we went to Pacific Beach for a walk in the sand.  Its our tradition to at least get sand in our shoes on New Year's Eve, no matter which coast we're on.  We walked out on the long Crystal Pier and watched the surfer' dudes and dudettes riding the big waves in.  A  hotel has cottages for rent right on the pier.  They reminded me of the small identical cottages that march along the strand to Provincetown, Mass.  Each one was white with blue shutters and fabulous window boxes outside.

I couldn't stay on the pier too long, however,  there were spaces between the boards and as I walked along I could see the ocean crashing 50 feet below my feet - Oooooh.  You know me and heights.

Paul and Polly stopped by just  as we arrived home and they came in to share a glass of wine with us for the New Year.  He and Dave made plans to play golf on the 3rd.  They'd better make an early tee time that day, Nina has invited us all to "the beast" for a bit of her special recipe Danish Gloegg to get us started on a good year.  Can't wait!

  Someone wrote a New Year's wish in the sand, so I'm sharing it and our very best wishes for a wonderful, happy and prosperous New Year to all of you dear friends.  Talk to you next year!

Sunday - last one of the year

an iconic picture of "the Del", the Del Coronado Hotel on Coronado Island

</

Ice skating at "the Del" on the beach.   Only in California.

kelp patterns on the Del's beach

unretouched shot of our sunset over Mission Bay...

  Rain, sun, rain, sun, rain, sun.   So it goes here in San Diego.  It rained hard during the night - cozy.  Clear morning walk for the dogs, then rain again.  The sun broke out for our second cup outside, then rain again.  Today's "plan" was to return the Redbox movie and then drive down to the ocean in Pacific Beach.  As I came out of Von's, the sky opened again.  Ah well, nothing we can do about the weather, right?

We came back to the campground, made arrangements to move to a waterfront (or more accurately, a water back site) on Jan. 2, and called it a day.

I'll try to add a few past pictures here.   Good news, they loaded, bad news, they loaded where they wanted to.  For an organization freak like me, thats a problem.   New Years resolution is to continue to work towards "going with the flow"...

Saturday - Reliable

Jesse and Erin outside the Museum of Natural History in Balboa Park

</

this horse statue was made of driftwood, then cast in bronze - incredible

Nurse Sasha administering the hot water bottle treatment on Dave the other day

Reliable means - Reliable.  Thank God.
We needed a propane (LP) delivery and were told to contact Reliable Propane Co., directly and that they would come to our site and fill us up today, Saturday.  Propane fires our cozy furnace and also fuels the stove, so its not something we think about much, til we start getting low....  We waited all day long for them to arrive...I went to the grocery store by myself so Dave could stay back at Beluga and wait for Reliable Propane.  Cocktails came and went, no propane.  We'd given up and started combing the internet for places we could drive Beluga to for a fill.  Dark, rainy night.    Oven pre-heating for meatloaf and macaroni/cheese dinner.  Good conversation under the Christmas lights.   Knock at the door - Reliable Propane!!!!!  What a welcome knock, what a nice guy. He played his flashlight all around Beluga looking for the fill tank, located it, did his job, took his check, thanked us for being patient and off he went to take care of all the other customers waiting for his reliable service....Nice.

Here are a few more pictures from the last few days.  I have to parcel them out a few at a time, it takes almost 1/2 hour for them to load this way.....   Sorry, they are not loading in the order I'm asking for.  Be glad you get to see them anywhere, at this rate!

There is more than one way to skin a cat.....please excuse the format, its the best I can wring out of this blog right now.   Gotta love Google.

Christmas pictures

Erin smiles in the background as Lewis and Sasha join in the gift opening....

Nothing has changed, but I think I've figured out a way around Big Brother Google's roadblock to my picture sharing, so here goes - a few Christmas pictures for you....









                                                                                                                                                                                   

Jesse and Sasha relaxing with a pre-dinner cocktail


Uh Oh, Blogger is acting wonky again, so I'll leave well enough alone with these two pictures.    Read the post below - Friday - to be current.     Sorry.

Friday - they're moving in....

Another nice sunny day but....they're moving in.  I've talked about how weekends tend to make a campground fill up, couple that with the New Years Holiday and its getting very crowded here.  Poor Lewis, he does't take strange people encroaching on his visual territory  very well.  And little people with wheels are even harder to handle.  You know the rest, poodle on the lap, tail hanging down, big round eyes, bla, bla, bla.

Luckily, Nina stopped by this afternoon and invited us all to accompany her and Polly to Fiesta Beach for some off leash romping.  Nina, the Savior.  Thank goodness for Nina.

Fiesta Island is an island right off our campground that allows off leash fun.  There is a dedicated, fenced dog park there, but none of us (dogs included) enjoy that sort of thing.   So we followed her to a parking spot on the beach and then up over dunes to the empty interior of the island.   Lewis took off and ran and ran.  Sasha snoofed every bush and trailed along behind.  This is Polly's stomping ground so she did what she normally does.  Fun Fun Fun for everyone.  One man walked his black lab a little distance behind us and the two dogs (lab and Lewis) kept their eyes on each other.   Finally Lewis ran up and the two dogs sniffed and then parted ways - good boy Lew.  The only other dog we encountered was a tiny chihuahua walking with his people.  Lew and Sasha took him aside and smelled him thoroughly before letting him pass, but no worries from any of them.

We ended our walk back at the cars on the beach.  Nina threw a ball into the water for Polly to retrieve, which she dutifully did.  Lew chased her around in the sand and they both enjoyed the game.

 Our attention was on the two young dogs, but evidently Sasha was simmering in the background.  She waded right into the water and swam a bit, then climbed out and got very silly, scampering around like a youngster.  Once in a while she likes to swim out to retrieve a stick so we all scoured the beach for a suitable branch.  Finally Dave came up with a sorry looking reed but she looked very excited to see it.  He tossed it and we witnessed two or three absolutely perfect water entries from the old girl!  After swimming back and shaking she really got silly, bowed down to Polly several times inviting her to play and then  thundered off down the beach,  water flying!    What a treat for us to see her enjoying herself so clearly!  Theres life in the old girl yet.

I didn't take the camera with me, so no pictures or movies.  Even if I had remembered, I'm still having no luck with inserting pictures here, so.....If I ever get it sorted out you'll have a h ell of a lot pictures to wade through.....