La Ventana November 8, and 9

 It was a noisy day today!  Started with the roosters, then the maintenance pole team and the building renovators, followed by a noisy party outside in the back, and people in the courtyard speaking super loudly for some reason as Graham and I are on separate zoom calls: he learning about avalanche safety, and me in Whistler Public Library’s monthly meditation class.  A bit hard to hear the meditation teacher with the dogs also barking!

After doing a hard 21-km bike ride yesterday in the south trails, I started today more slowly and worked on a grant proposal for the Hornby Island Dragon boat set up team I joined.  I also set up a Skype account so I could call my mom and got a hold of her.  Pure joy!  Mom had a request for what my living space looks like, so here’s the inside of the Casa Arecife (Reef House) building:


Nice king size loft with drawers, and



simple living room and kitchen — interesting feature is the concrete sinks in the kitchen and bathroom. 



Our suite is the centre top, and the room to the right is getting renos through drilling, grinding, pounding, sanding and more!  A team is also on the roof today and the neighbourhood getting concrete power poles installed so the power went out at some point, so I got outside on my bike for a 10-k ride to a few stores.


I went to the 7-11 type store called OXXO to look for birthday cards and stamps as my niece, L is having a birthday later this month, but they had none, so I tried the local pharmacy.  No luck, and I learned that there are no postal boxes in La Ventana — the nearest one is in La Paz, a 45-minute drive from here.  Needless to say, but I was surprised!  I heard that you can get an Amazon delivery at the OXXO store, but it wasn’t immediately obvious to me.  As the queue for the cashiers was long, I thought I’d ask my cooking friend more about that and moved on.

I passed a truck blaring music out of its windows — I could see the entire back seat custom fitted with speakers and pedalled by because the music hurt my ears!  I wondered how its occupants would do with their hearing as they aged.

Further down the road, I saw a car with its door locked with part of a bicycle U-lock: not very securely I’m thinking:


The pharmacy had some toys for kids in addition to electrolytes which seem to be needed as one sweats in the hot, sunny weather.  I noted that I could buy sunscreen from the pharmacy when I run out.

And a few more kilometres away along the sand drifts on the single side of the road’s sidewalk (which are quite challenging to ride through as they can amass unexpectedly), I picked up some fruits, a recommended sparkling water and grape juice, yogurt, and crackers.  The ride back was slightly downhill, and I passed a family of cows in the street.  


Note the horns on the male:



And when I got “home”, the power was back on, and a stir-fried veggie dinner was prepared.  Just in time for the zoom calls!  We are an hour apart in our time zones now as the west coast of Canada set their clocks back last Saturday.  I guess officially we are now on “Mountain time” — even though the snow is now falling back home but certainly not right here.  But the moon is very full at the moment, something we all share!

Tomorrow morning I want to go back into the South trails and show you how the paths are crowded with many kinds of cactus, and the experience is like a Disneyland scene and quite unexpectedly real — it’s so very magical.  As per many trail riding places, the trails are named with silly or weird combinations of words.  Maybe you can tell I liked the Caca de Vaca trail post I picked up to show you:


The cacti are labeled in the first part of the “interpretive forest”, and cacti young and old line the trails.  Can you see the name of the trail in this couple-hundred year old cactus?


It is sometimes like there was a fire and the cacti burnt,

but instead, I think they just self combust.

 It’s quite a fascinating life cycle.

 And since the season is just after the “rainy season” here, you can still see red
 

or orange fruit



in some of the cacti, and many, many yellow-flowered plants:

on leaves that bunch up reminding me of poinsettia plants.

My favourite part of the ride was the vista on an old seabed and reef where you could see old seashells embedded in the rock.  It was my favourite because I could stand and listen to the mockingbirds.  I know because I pulled out my bird app, which confirmed the songs I could witness.

Maybe you can hear them, too: 


I’d leave you with a sound bite of the music blaring out the back entrance, but I’ll leave you to imagine loud Mexican music blaring as you read this; hopefully you can be left with the beautiful sounds of the mockingbirds instead.


Oh, heck!  The music just got louder  I couldn’t resist sharing: 




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