Hope everyone had a great 4th of July!  This update covers our activities for the past month and, as usual, seems to revolve around eating.  What is it about food that makes me grab the camera?

Many of the cruisers here in Ensenada joined together last night for a potluck party at the picnic area of Cruiseport Marina.  It was fun to meet many of the "voices" that we've come to know on the cruisers' radio net every morning.  However, Linda fell down on the job as a party photographer (probably because of too much partying!).  She took the snapshot on the left just as folks were starting to arrive.  And before the party was over, at least had the sense to arrange for a shot with our good friends.  Pictured right are Ian aboard Witch Way from New Zealand, Dave from Bella, Linda (where is her other leg?), and Mike holding Gigante from Bella.

Linda is doing great after shoulder surgery on June 10.  She has 3 little scars from the arthroscopic procedure which involved shaving off bone fragments in the shoulder joint and removing a lot of scar tissue.  The surgeon was somewhat surprised at the amount of scar tissue he removed and reported that it was the type of thing he typically finds in heavy-duty weight lifters!  Mike wasn't surprised, and told the surgeon it was because Linda has been carrying him for many years.

We spent the weekend after surgery with Lance and Kimberly and the grandkids.  Everyone was very attentive to her needs.  Linda had a Lidocain pain pump in the incision setup to last for the first 48 hours, so she did not experience any pain.  The only tense moment was on Sunday morning when Mike removed the pain pump tube from the incision, and Linda almost fainted (from fear, not pain).  But all went well, and we returned to Ensenada on Monday.  We needed to get back so we could proceed with the fitting of the canvas for our dodger and bimini.  Felix arrived on Tuesday and took measurements as we attempted to communicate exactly what we wanted via sign language (or I should say arms waving around) and Linda's limited Spanish vocabulary.  He seemed to understand.  There was a lot of nodding and smiling. We drove back to Moorpark the next day for Linda's follow-up appointment with the surgeon on Thursday.  Then returned to Ensenada again on Friday.  Lots of driving.  It takes about 6 hours each way.

Joe and Patricia came down to take Bamboozled home.  They have completed their 90-day yacht club commitment.  Boaters from California will know what that means.  They are leaving early Saturday morning for San Diego where they will berth Bamboozled at the Kona Marina.  We all went out to dinner on Friday evening (pictured right).  Joe and Patricia are fun to be around and we always laugh a lot with them.  We all plan to stay in touch and get together whenever possible in the future.  We're hoping they will be able to sail with us next year in the Sea of Cortez. 

Lee and Linda (left) drove down for the weekend to sail Stanhaven over to the Baja Naval boatyard for hull paint and several other projects.  The winds were really strong so it was a nail-biting experience getting Stanhaven out of this marina and into the tight haul-out slip at Baja Naval.  Mike and Dave went along to help, and Lee took all of us out to dinner to thank them (pictured left).  Lee is a film producer, currently making a movie which stars "The Rock".  Linda is a successful realtor in Westlake Village.  Due to their busy schedules, Dave will be over-seeing Lee's boat projects here in Ensenada.  And since their boat is "on the hard", they are letting us use their dock step, which makes boarding Aquila from the side much easier.

During the following week, progress was made on the bimini.  However, we weren't happy with the finished edge on the leather trim of the dodger.  Felix agreed to re-do it.  I'm a bit nervous about the quality, so we need to stay close to this project.  And that's hard to do because we have such a busy calendar this month.  We drove back up to Moorpark on Wednesday, June 22, in order to attend Priscilla's retirement luncheon on Thursday.  As always, it was great to see so many good friends.  Then we flew to Boston early Friday morning for granddaughter Kailyn's baptism on Saturday.  Even though Sean and Keni live in Santa Clarita, California, they wanted to have Kailyn baptized in the same church that Sean, Mike, Sean's mother, and her father were all baptized in.  So everyone flew to Boston for the ceremony.  Mike still has many relatives and friends living in the Boston area, so the baptism and luncheon afterward were well-attended.  We spent the weekend visiting relatives and old friends.  We enjoyed sunset at Bob's beach house and Auntie Cleta baked her special apple pie for Mike on Sunday.  We got to spend the afternoon hanging out by the pool with Mike's high school buddy, Jimmy and his wife Cindy (pictured right).

After returning to California from Boston on Monday, we picked up our grandsons Blake and Garrett and took them back to the boat with us.  They spent the week with us in Ensenada and had a blast.  This was a first for all of us.  They had never been away from mom and dad for 5 whole days.  

Gary and Jeannie from the fishing boat Bad Attitude invited us to ride along with them to the fuel dock at the Coral Marina.  That was definitely one of the highlights of the week for the boys.  We packed the week with activities.  Mike took them out in the dinghy, out in the kayak, we went to the beach, to the fish market, walked into town for a pancake breakfast, washed the boat, did the laundry, watched DVDs and popped popcorn in the evenings.  Kimberly and Lance enjoyed receiving their email messages during the week.  On our return drive home on Friday, we stopped in San Diego to tour the USS Midway aircraft carrier. 

Saturday, July 2, we loaded all of us in Lance and Kimberly's new Suburban and headed out to Agua Dulce to attend a pool party celebrating Sean's new career with the Pasadena Police Department.  We had a great time seeing everyone and enjoying the good weather and great food.  On Sunday morning, we caught a ride back to Ensenada with Lee and Linda (Stanhaven) only to discover that one part of our bimini was just NOT right.  Felix had to completely remake one section for us, and now we are ready to go.

Comment Added July 6:  We've got our paperwork in order and we're leaving early tomorrow morning.  Sean will meet us in San Diego and sail with us to Ventura where we will spend the summer.  Our new friends on Tuna Time a couple of slips over on our dock just invited us over for homemade fish soup.  I'm grabbing a bottle of wine, Mike's going to switch our laundry from the washer to the dryer, and hopefully we'll get all the rest of our projects done today.  It's only noon, but, hey, Soup's On!