Reunited with Igor... and into Mexico!

We were up at 6:00am Wednesday morning, and down for our included hotel breakfast at 6:30am. It was actually better than expected, with lots of eggs, cheese, fruits, cereals, and yogurts.

Then we had to figure out how we were getting from the hotel to the border crossing. Uber apparently works in Reynosa, but the system showed that any available drivers were quite far away.

Cancun beach time, and flight to Reynosa

We hung out at Carmen's apartment for the morning, and then took the local bus from there to the hotel zone where she works as a property manager, renting out condos to vacationers.

It cost 12 pesos ($0.80 CAD, $0.58 USD) each for the half hour ride.

Welcome to Mexico!

We were up at silly o'clock (3:00 am!) in order to get ready for our 6:00 am flight to Cancun.

We planned on getting the 3:30 am shuttle from the hotel, and we were down there at 3:20, waiting in the area specified by the front desk. But at 3:30 am, the shuttle hadn't arrived!

Next stop, Cancun!

Writing this Sunday evening from our hotel at Ottawa airport.

The hotel was actually paid for by our house sitting hosts. They had asked if we were willing to stay past our original flight date of November 1st, and we couldn't get a rescheduled flight until November 11th. But their returning flight arrived on the 10th (today).

Dinner party

We've spent much of our last week here in Canada visiting with friends, as it could be a long time before we're back here again. 

We had Bob and Denise here on Monday, but forgot to get a picture!

Settle down...? Why would we want to do that??!

We actually missed it, and Ruth only reminded me the other day that we began our 18th year of alternate lifestyle travel on October 15th. In fact, you can go back and read our very first blog post to see when we set off across Canada with our motorhome Sherman.

We're often asked "when do you plan to settle down", or "what is the end game"?

What's the plan for Mexico?

One week from now, we will be sitting on an airplane flying direct from Ottawa to Cancun. We are sooo ready to go! Yesterday, after the ridiculous one hour time change that they still do here in Ontario, sunset was at 4:50pm! That is way to early to be getting dark. And it'll be even worse a week from now. So yes, we are ready!

Then, we have one night in Cancun staying with our friend Carmen who lives there. The next afternoon, we fly Cancun to Reynosa. 

Igor update

We are happy that we receive regular updates from Bjorn and Freya as they make their way to the Mexico border with Igor. It's almost like being there. And, we've been to many of the places along their route, so we are able to give them some hints on things to see and do, although they are doing pretty good on their own!

Friends from the Mexico RV caravan

The other day, I noticed through a facebook post that a couple of our Mexico RV Caravan friends were going to be arriving in Ottawa.

Michel and Louise were on our spring 2018 Yucatan caravan trip. They are the couple who took over when Sherman broke down and we had to gets some repairs done.

October Expenses

Financially, we completed Igor during the month of October. With the mechanical repairs finished, and the new fridge and furnace installed, the major items are done. All of that has been included as a "capital expense", which now stands at a total of $26,325 CAD ($19,000 USD). Anything else that needs to be done will be included as repair and maintenance as part of our monthly expenses, unless it is something that we feel will increase Igor's value.

Will we ever recoup that much when we sell him? It's difficult to say. That figure is certainly higher than we expected it to be when we bought him, but we did a lot of improvements for our own comfort and not necessarily expecting it to be returned to us. Time will tell.

Indian summer

We're having a bit of an end of season heat wave here in the Ottawa area. Temperature got up to 23C (73F) yesterday, so we took a drive down to the village of Burritt's Rapids to go for a walk.

Burritt's Rapids is along the route of the Rideau Canal.

Memories of Zihuatanejo

Yesterday, we went to visit Wendy, the mother of one of my oldest friends, Dave. 

Dave was the best man at our wedding! And his mom and dad were avid fans of Mexico, traveling down there regularly until they were well into their 80's. They really loved the beach town of Zihuatanejo, and we actually stopped in to visit them there a couple of times when we had our motorhome Sherman.

Great photo!

Yesterday morning, I was sat doing some computer work when I glanced out the window. I said to Ruth "oh, look at that" and pointed outside.

There was an owl sitting on a branch just the other side of the back deck!

Two weeks to go!

We're enjoying the down time, but we do admit that we're just about ready to go! It's starting to get chilly here in Canada, although they're calling for a two day heat wave this coming Wednesday and Thursday where temperatures are supposed to get up to 23C (73F).

Two weeks from today, we will be flying to Cancun.

A funny story

Our nearest Walmart is about twenty minutes away. We had to do some grocery shopping, and there were a couple of deals there that we wanted to pick up, so we decided to go to the one at Kemptville where there is also a forest with some walking trails.

So we stopped at the forest first to get some exercise.