Well big news, our oldest daughter Trish and her partner Graeme had a baby boy on Sat. April 7 at 0145. Baby Martin, as yet unnamed, was a light weight at 6 lbs. 5 oz. arriving on the scene 3 weeks early. Mom and babe are fine although in his hurry to arrive in this world he decided he should exit face up instead of face down like most other babes. This necessitated a drive into Cranbrook, over an hour from home, where a cesarean section was performed. I spoke to Mom today (thanks to Warm Rain and their sat. phone) and she is anxious to get home but they want to keep her and baby Martin at least another day to make sure all is well. From my point of view it was really hard not to make Barry turn around and go back to La Paz so I could fly home to help out our little girl. She is a competent 32 year old woman who has a loving, caring partner so I am sure they will be able to cope just fine with our grandson. She must be a real Lange though because her water broke as she was re potting her tomato seedlings!!!!! Her Grandpa Sam would have been proud of her.
We are really enjoying the Sea of Cortez. We are about 15 miles north of La Paz at Isla Espiritu Santo. The group of islands it belongs to has been designated a world heritage site and it is not hard to see why. The crystal clear water is surrounded by mountainous hills that are covered with reddish stone and soil. The cactus grow wherever they can get a footing and some of them are over 30 feet high. There are white sand beaches in all of the coves and the clarity of the water makes the snorkeling wonderful. There are coral reefs on almost every rocky shoreline and the fish and mollusks as well as the plant life are unusual and quite varied. The variety of plant life we noticed while ashore was astounding, all the small flowers that grow out of the rocky soil and the myriad of types of cactus everywhere. We have been exploring on land, walking on paths through desert conditions, through mangroves, and down coral beaches. We won't be near an internet cafe probably for the rest of the month so I will have to make sure to add a lot of pics once we hit civilization.
We have met up with boats that we haven't seen since we entered Mexico. We had a lovely pot luck dinner with 2 other couples on Easter, what a nice way to share that day. More buddies are crossing the Sea of Cortez as we speak (can I say that??)so as well as beautiful countryside to explore we have friends in almost every small bay, life is good, I guess you can't have everything, my heart really is in the Cranbrook hospital with our daughter, baby Martin, and his Dad.