Railing against the weather

Edmonton, Alberta, Canada

Tomorrow we are off to Cuba.  The beaches of Varadero to be more specific.
For two whole weeks we will miss scenes like this...

I may actually miss this scene.

In reality we will not be in Cuba tomorrow as we first have to make our way to Calgary, about 300 kms south - our travels are never that straight-forward!  For some reason it was impossible to find a last minute flight out of Edmonton.  We will be travelling with our good friends Russ and Val, who will be providing the ground transportation for this leg of the journey.  We will hole up in some flea-bitten airport hotel for the night before boarding an early morning flight to Varadero.  Of course, on the way back we will have to reverse this whole procedure.  Oh well, at least we will be going somewhere, doing something other than sitting around watching TV and playing computer games.

Meanwhile, down in San Carlos, one of our boat projects has made some headway (No, not the still-drying bottom).  Before leaving for Canada, we had contracted a welder to replace our ailing lifelines with some solid stainless-steel rails - better for safety and mounting of things like more solar panels.

This project is now complete.  From what we can tell from the pictures, it looks good.  So, some progress is being made!

With any luck, this is where we will be in about two days...

 

{GMST}53|35.3868|N|113|32.3568|W|Edmonton, Alberta, Canada|Edmonton, Alberta, Canada{GEND}

Watching paint dry

Edmonton, Alberta, Canada

I guess this is really not like waiting for paint to dry since, as yet, there is no paint!

Here are the latest moisture readings from the bottom of the boat.  As I understand it, we are looking for the magic 5% mark before proceeding.  Your guess is a good as ours as to when this will happen.

I hate it when they point at things.  Never a good sign...

Meanwhile, we are still here in lovely wintery Edmonton.

Interestingly enough, this winter could go down in the record books as one of the mildest ever.  We have had very little snow and it has been a rare day that the daily high temperature has fallen below zero.  This last few days have been the first taste of winter since back in November.  We had a couple of days of minus 30s (more normal for January) but this is easing up as I write.  All in all, if we have to be stuck in the frozen north during the winter, this has been the best winter to do it in, so far.

Time spent with friends and family during the holidays does make up for some of the pains of missing out on the prime cruising season down in Mexico...

In spite of the great weather, we have decided we need some sort of break - preferably somewhere warm.  So, with that in mind, we scoured the available flights and destinations available to us.  Not too surprisingly, with this current cold snap, this is not a unique idea.  What flights are available are mostly really expensive and the selections within our budget are not very numerous.  We did finally manage to find a reasonable package for two weeks in Cuba.  So, come the end of the month, we are off to Varadero.

We will have to start all over again on our tans.

{GMST}53|35.3868|N|113|32.3568|W|Edmonton, Alberta, Canada|Edmonton, Alberta, Canada{GEND}