Paul and Marg's Sailing Adventure

New Adventure – Lake Ontario to Nova Scotia, August 2010

Paul & Marg — Tue, 15 Jun 2010 15:46:16 +0000

We have just committed to help fellow sailors move their boat from Hamilton ON, to Cheticamp, Nova Scotia (Cape Breton Island).

The boat (a Columbia 38) is being refitted with electronics and when ready (July 26th) we will depart for about a 4-5 week journey up the St. Lawrence through the Thousand Islands, Montreal, Quebec City, the Gaspe, possibly PEI and then on to Nova Scotia.

The trip will offer a slightly different perspective (from the water) of some of the most beautiful and remote locations in Canada. We will be posting the pictures and the stories here…..please join us. We hope to inspire you with beautiful pictures of this part of Canada.

Marg and Paul

Florida, March 15

Paul & Marg — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 03:29:58 +0000

The sun and sea are a powerful medicine. We have spent a lot of time in Florida, but this time it did not capture our sense of adventure. We entertained the idea of just “hanging” for a month or two but even that didn’t excite us. We even connected with a sailor friend who was heading to Cuba to shoot a sailing video and we still couldn’t become engaged. We decided after a great deal of discussion that after 4 months on the move we just wanted to be home.

On Saturday evening we had dinner and danced at our favorite Fort Lauderdale restaurant, Mangos. Sunday we loaded our car and headed home. With a few stops planned we should arrive home late Tuesday evening.

We have spent much of our driving time talking about the “wonder” of our fantastic adventure and our plans for moving forward with The Forerunner Project, our ARC Project and next winter’s “plans” – the future looks like another great adventure!!! Stay tuned……

Blessings,

Paul & Marg

Laredo Texas, March 3-5

Paul & Marg — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 03:01:59 +0000

We arrived in Laredo expecting to cross the border in the morning. That evening the local news covered a major shoot out which happened that afternoon just across the border in Nuevo Laredo between the police and a caravan of “soldiers” from the drug cartel. Until now, the “trouble” had been contained to one city near El Paso, TX. On Wednesday the “drug war” took a new turn. In every border town there were shootings between the military and the cartel. The US Government has warned people to not cross into Mexico unless they have to.

We decided to take a few days to see how things progress. We traveled to Corpus Christi and continued to monitor the news (which is extremely limited due to the cartels habit of killing journalists who report on the shootings).

March 5th – Additional events and a chance meeting with a sailor (owner of a restaurant) who has been traveling to Mexico regularly, and who now has stopped, left us settled that our decision to cancel our trip to Mexico was the right thing to do.

We’re now driving I-10 across lower Texas and Louisiana (enjoying the Texas BBQ and Cajun food) on our way to Florida. We will update as the story unfolds.

New Hamburg to Guadalajara, Mexico – March 1

Paul & Marg — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 03:38:30 +0000

We have been planning the trip with our Lonely Planet book and the internet and here are a few places that we will visit in Mexico – they are marked in red on the map. We have done a lot of research and plan to visit many of these places because they have something amazing to offer.

We will cross the border at Laredo, TX and then proceed to Guadalajara to visit our friends Norm and Joanne from Collingwood. On the way we will pass through Monterrey, Matehuala, and San Luis Potosi. We hope to visit and sight see in the the Guadalajara area.

After seeing the story of the migration of the monarch butterflies in the film “Four Wings and a Prayer” we knew we wanted to go to Mariposa to see the phenomena. In March, millions of monarchs wake up from their winter sleep, mate and eventually fly back to Canada – we hope to be there to see this miracle!

The Pacific coast is amazingly beautiful. It is dotted with tourist cities like Puerto Vallarta and Acupalco – places we will visit briefly. There are, however, places we have more interest in like Puerto Angel, Salina Cruz, and Puerto Escondido where we plan to spend about a month just chilling and visiting the surrounding beaches and fishing villages. Marg and I were also intrigued with Oaxaca (pronounced - O -Wa-ca) a city know for its artists and musicians.

For more details check out the Google Map ( http://maps.google.ca/maps?hl=en&tab=wl ) or the map below

Click the map to enlarge

Feb. 28 – Ontario to Mexico

Paul & Marg — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 15:43:02 +0000

Sunday we will leave by car for Mexico in what we plan to be a 2 month adventure of exploration in some of the really great places south of south of the border. Some of the high points include Guadalajara, Morelia, Mariposa, Oaxaca, Puerto Escondido and Huatulco. Marg has been studying the Lonely Planet guide and coming up with an itinerary which includes festivals, live music, historical sites and the monarch butterfly migration. There will be some awesome beaches in there as well and a month of relaxation and possibly some writing. I intend to continue to publish this blog with lots of pictures and even more interesting stories of our “off-the-beaten-track” adventures in Mexico. We hope you will join us…….Blessings, Paul & Marg

Toronto, Feb. 20th – Tyler and Maria’s Wedding

Paul & Marg — Sun, 21 Feb 2010 12:44:20 +0000

A perfect day – a perfect couple…..Tye and Maria start their lives together as husband and wife.

I am not in any of these because as usual, I took the pictures.

New Hamburg, Ontario, Canada

Paul & Marg — Sun, 14 Feb 2010 04:04:17 +0000

We arrived in Toronto safely and on time. The weather hasn’t been too bad although a lot colder than Cuba and the Bahamas – we are adjusting. We have already had some time with our family and friends and hope to connect with more of you in the next 10 days.

The Adventure we started on October 31/09 has had 2 distinct chapters (Sabbatical 2 and Sea Saw) and like any good story, there are usually 3 acts. Our plan is to resume our adventure after the wedding. The location is yet to be determined but it will be exciting and beautiful and……you are invited to join us!

We appreciate the many comments and emails over the last months that have encouraged us to keep this blog going (in spite of the work and poor Internet) so others can enjoy the beauty and wonder we are experiencing. It has been a labour of love.

We plan to restart the adventure around the Feb. 25th. Stay tuned……

Paul and Marg

Cuba, Feb. 11

Paul & Marg — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 03:22:16 +0000

Today we leave for Canada to celebrate Tyler and Maria’s wedding on Feb 20th – we never imagined when we left in October that we would be going home for a wedding but we couldn’t be more pleased! We are very excited for them and can’t wait to see our family. We have spent 104 days on a boat and have enjoyed a beautiful, exciting adventure. We have met some very interesting and inspiring people, many of them in the last few weeks here in Cuba. We spent the morning saying goodbye to our new friends with hopes of crossing their paths again. We have been enriched by their experiences and love of life – (IMHO sailors are the most interesting people in the world!!)

Marg and I plan to continue the adventure shortly after the wedding. We are considering Mexico and/or Panama and Costa Rica but we try not to make decisions until we have to. We’re working on living in the moment. That means not making thing happen by letting things come together on their own – when we do, good things happen!

Cuba, Feb. 10

Paul & Marg — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 03:10:41 +0000

Drove back home along the sea coast – beautiful!!!

After talking to some locals, we found out that Fidel lives just outside the Hemmingway Marina in Jeminita which is on the western outskirts of Havana. If we had more time, would have walked by his house…..lots to do to prepare for our trip to Canada…..hope to see many of you while we are there.

Out to dinner one more time with Aussieman Steve before we leave for Canada

Cuba, Feb. 9

Paul & Marg — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 02:39:56 +0000

This morning we visited caves that run under the mountains you see in this valley. They proved to be quite amazing. They had been formed by water flowing through the inside of the mountain. The result was very beautiful!

One of the promoted “sights” in this area is a painting which was done on the side of the mountain. I didn’t know it was relatively recent until I saw it in person. I thought it looked like it had been painted in the 60′s – sure enough one of Castro’s “friends” painted it in about 1966 on “prehistoric” rock. The whole thing seemed a bit hokey but then they served the free pina coladas and I remembered why we came.

From there we decided to head down to the sea to a small village. There were no tourists around not even a restaurant in the whole village. When a foreigner comes into a small town, the locals will offer cigars, rum, and usually lobster – so we had some (not the cigars). We had this awesome lobster dinner washed down with mojitos and cerveza at a local woman’s home for 35.00 for the 3 of us. We headed back to Vinales for the night and stayed in a casa particulaire with Julian (owner) and her son Marco. We also went out to a new music show.

Today is my mother’s birthday. She would have been 97 years old – we miss you mom!