Back in Baja

Start at the bottom please.

My trailer was in good shape but the old Explorer didn't want to start and is currently in the shop. Hopefully it is just sticky injectors as I did not put in stabilizer when I left it in March. Most of the gang is here already and it's good to see them all again. The beach is to the right of this shot about 100 yards away and two volleyball courts seeing a lot of action. Temps in the mid 70's and I have already had two dinners at friend's campsites.
Travis is seated in the center. We have been camping together since 1997 and its been interesting to watch him grow. Pablo, the owner of the store across the street from the campground is on the right and his youngest son, Nelson, is in the foreground. The walls show a typical small country store with a quite limited selection but enough so I don't have to run 30 miles to town every other day.
I don't have a title for this 1983 Yamaha SR 250 so I thought it would be a good camp bike and I can sell it before returning to Prescott. This shot is in Santa Rosalia and is the first time one gets to see the Sea of Cortez on the drive down. It is over half way, so it feels good to see it. The road then follows the coast for a hundred miles or so and is my favorite part of the trip.
My brother Jerry and his company truck in Borrego Springs, CA. It's always good to see him on my way back and forth to La Ventana in Baja. More uncertainty at his office as they have recently elected three new members of the small board and have axed the director. Jerry prepared dinner and Greg from the office and friends Mike and Teri also came over. Breakfast in the morning at this restaurant and I headed south to Tecate. Lots of construction and bridge building on Highways 3 and 1. Their stimulus program but they must not be printing money as he exchange rate is 12.5 pesos to the dollar. Last year I could get 13.5 pesos for a dollar. Gasoline was up again to 8.37 pesos per liter from 7.4 last year. But that works out to about the same price as in Arizona. The Infinity got 22 mpg on the way down - I should try driving at 65 more often.

Back home

Jim and AlexaNana
Fred and Bridget
Doc Peter with his daughters
Rian at Lake Superior walking her dogs.

I returned to Prescott on September 12th after 6 weeks and 11,300 miles on the Burgman. A good trip all around and especially sharing it with my brother Joe. After leaving Newfoundland, we attended the Island Rally in Prince Edward Island and watched an old tractor plow day at the county fair. We then headed west to Saulte Ste Marie where we stayed with Rian and her family. Brad from San Diego was also there and we did a bit of drywalling in the basement and Joe taught Rian's mom how to make stained glass. I moved on to Peter's new home on Lake Superior and Joe went over to Marquette, MI to see one of his friends. He kept on going south from there and I followed a day later, visiting Mackinac Island and riding a bicycle around it and then spent two days with Joe Hindley, an artist friend of mine in Sawyer, Michigan.

A short ride down to St. Louis and I enjoyed a dinner with Recie and her children, her boyfriend Skip, Nana, Fred and Bridget and Danny. Then south to Charleston and I spent a day with Daddy before heading west. I stopped by Oklahoma City to meet Jim and Judy's latest grandchild, Jennifer and Alan's first child Alexa, then continued on to Santa Fe and had lunch with Isabella Klein. The ride from Sante Fe to Prescott was especially pretty on the back roads to Quemada NM, Springerville, Payson, and over Mingus with the afternoon temperature a perfect 75.

It has been an interesting year of travel. Two months on the beach in La Ventana, Baja in my trailer and in the midst of many friends, two months in the Greek Islands by myself and doing the tourist thing, and then six weeks riding, camping, and living with Joe.

But I believe it was on page 144 when Zorba said 'Boss, if I took the time to write about what I do, I wouldn't have time to live it, now would I?'

It's good to be home. Otto

Newfoundland

Joe and I crossed into Newfoundland last Thursday after a 17 hour ferry ride. One of the four engines was out of commission, so the trip was longer than the anticipated 14 hours. We had a bunk in the dorm and found some good bluegrass music in the lounge and made some new friends. The country here is much hillier than Nova Scotia and has tons of lakes as well as being surrounded by the ocean and all ofl its inlets, bays and fjords.

When you mix two wheel travel with camping tents, we tend to be a different type of person, character even.

Paul, thirty something from Vancouver went out and bought a 1980 Honda 750, put on new tires and a chain and sprocket and headed east 4000 miles. He is now burning a quart of oil every 500 miles, so we hope he makes it home OK.

Coleen, a young and attractive airline flight attendant from Austin said she rode a bike as a child, but recently bought a 1200 RT and has put on 9000 miles in the last 35 days, camping along the way.

Marcel of France rode his bicycle across the states, turned around and rode back and is now ending up his ride at Cape Spear, the easternmost point in North America. Marcel is 63 years old, keeps a journal and blogs frequently.

A 70 year old Brit took the cake though. He had flown to Santiago, Chile and decided to buy a motorcycle. He found a new Honda 250, loaded it up and rode north. That was 20 months ago. He also criss crossed the USA before coming up here. His plan is to turn around in Newfoundland and return to Washington, DC and return to England.

Joe and I must fit in well as two of these people mentioned us in their blogs.

We are still enjoying ourselves and staying safe. It has been cloudy and cool the last couple of days with light rain at times. The Gros Morne National Park that we are now in is quite spectacular. This is the first hotel that we have stayed in since entering Canada, camping the rest of the time except for the night at Bob and Janis's home. Tomorrow we will head south and leave Newfoundland on the Thursday morning ferry, arriving back in Nova Scotia just after noon.

Ohio to Nova Scotia

We are now in Baddeck, Nova Scotia and rode the Cape Breton Cabot Trail yesterday. We are taking a break now, Joe to attend a Rotary meeting and me to put on some new tires on the Scooter. Easy trip so far. Lots of friends and relatives. Joe and I really enjoyed Bob and Janis's place in Western Nova Scotia. Big old house with 5 or more bedrooms and six of us staying there.

The weather has been great except for today where it is overcast with some rain drizzles. Since leaving Arizona 18 days ago, I have camped 5 times, stayed in a hotel 4 times and the balance has been with friends and kinfolk. The factory tours, sea faring stuff and catching up with friends have been the best. There are a lot of bikers on the road, doing the same as Joe and I. Yesterday we met up with a Brit on a 250 Honda Rebel that he bought in Santiago, Chile a year and a half ago. He is a tall guy, 70 or so and just pokes along on his 50,000 mile epic. We're looking forward to Newfoundland tomorrow after a 14 hour overnight ferry boat ride.

Otto

Arizona to Ohio

Good friend Gary MacIntyre and Donna on top of his Sty in the Sky in Ohio.
Paul and Mary Bradley in Cincinati, Ohio. Paul and I were in class together at Texas A&M.

Our Sister Betty, her husband Carl and son Richard in Louisville, Kentucky.

Joe and I getting ready to leave from his home in Nashville, Tennessee
Daddy, sister Mary and brother Ron in Charleston, Missouri

On the road to Nova Scotia

Hello, I have just finished up the deck off of the kitchen and a new 8'x12' sculpture studio in the back of the house. The studio is not quite finished but it is close enough.

Tomorrow I am off to Nova Scotia with my recently retired brother, Joe. The first leg is back to his home in Nashville with stops at a camping party at Lake Powell, a visit with Jim, Judy and their family in Oklahoma City, then a couple of days in Charleston, Mo. with my dad and brother Ron. Hopefully my sister Mary will pop up from Montgomery to visit while I am in Charleston. Thursday afternoon, August 6th, I will go down to Joe's and Friday we head out. I'll be on my Burgman Scooter and Joe on his ST1100, both of us with full camping gear. We are both quite excited about this trip as it is the first long ride for Joe. He has done a super job of route planning to take us by the best sights, factory tours and museums as well as a motorcycle rally in PEI.

Otto

Back home in Prescott

 

 

I spent the last couple of days of my trip in Athens doing the tourist thing. Visited the Acropolis for sure, several more museums and took a day trip to Delphi. It's easy to say just see all of this on Channel 8, but is is rather spectacular in person. Just to bad that there are so many persons doing it at the same time. It was a long trip home with Delta leaving four hours late, the customs computer system down for an hour while we stood in line, missing my Phoenix flight and staying at JFK in New York. Delta sent us over to the Doubletree, but they refused us saying they were full. Finally settled at the International for five hours of sleep and arrived in Phoenix at 11 am on May 13th and hopped the shuttle to Prescott. All well here except for a section of lattice fence that was broken by the 70 mph winds they had in April. I wish the best for the Greeks in their current situation. I think that the government employees and unions can afford a pay cut and the Mom & Pop stores, restaurants and hotels will hunker down and hope for a good tourist season. But I still expect the country will have to restructure their foreign debt in 2-3 years. The country will certainly be in a depression and the cities will get dirtier and the infrastructure of roads, boats, and services will deteriorate. These last few days mixing it up with other tourists makes me appreciate more the way I travel. So many others just hit the hot spots and move on at the fastest possible rate. It was a good trip. Otto

Skopolos

I've been here on Skopolos or five days, working my way towards Athens and a flight back on Wednesday. This is a tourist island also and I made friends with two women from Norway, Karina and Wencha (Ven-ka). We drank a lot of wine together, went to the beach a couple of times and hiked quite a bit, both to the beach and up in the mountains to the old monastaries. Out of the four monastaries we saw, one was locked up and looked empty but usable, one had been abandoned, one converted to a family home, and one that was run by a single nun who said at one time there were 30 nuns there. The Norwegians bought some small delicate lace doilies about the size of an open hand for 3 Euros. The nun had made them and we thought that they must have taken her at least a day to make them.

The boat is a hydrofoil that they call a flying dolphin. It is the only way to get from mainland Greece to this island and takes an hour and a half and costs 15 Euro.

The city curves around the bay with only a sidewalk, the main street and then one row of stores and restaurants before the buildings and lanes start climbing up the hill. Cars are only allowed on this main street and on the ring road that circles town. Pedestrians must share the narrow lanes with scooters and motorcycles. The fishermen come in and dock at the port and their customers drive up, jump out and buy their dinner. Fish are expensive here also.

The women and I were both staying at the Captain's Hotel. A real jolly and productive 63 year old that sailed the oceans and became a captain of a freighter, then retired here. He cruises the street by the port on his scooter and hustles customers. Yes, he is good at it and enjoys his business.

Pirgos, Tinos, Greece

This is Lapros Diamandapoulos, a sculpter and marble mason that allowed me to use his tools and workspace to create my Cycladic Dove in marble. An easy going guy that has been in business for a long time and he continually has buddies dropping by for coffee or a chat. Maggie is a fellow sculpter from Bloomington, Indiana and survives by working in one of the cafes. I knew that I was close to the end of the road when she said that I was the first American that she had seen in eight months. She has been here for a year now and was very helpful in getting me settled in.  My masterpiece that took way too long to create and polish, but it allowed me to meet with a lot of locals to buy sand paper and hang out at Lapros's shop. I rented this 125 cc Piagio for four days to tour the island and be able to run back and forth to the port city and to Tinos town. There is a lot of this dry stacked rock walls both in the village and on the hillsides for sheep fences. A colorful boat at the port city of Pirgos. Seems that the villages are up on a hill away from the water and then they have a port city located a mile or two down to the water. As there was only one restaurant open in Pirgos, I liked to walk down for lunch as more were open here as it is more of a tourist destination. Nice beaches to the left of this photo. This is my village of Pirgos taken from my room. It is supposedly one of the prettiest villages in the Greek Islands. It is typical I think with narrow, winding alleys about 6 feet wide. Everything is on the slope of the hill so there are lots of steps and its easy to wind up at a dead end at someone's front door. Delos is an very old town and island next to Mykonos. It doesn't have any A.D.'s in its history as it was abandoned after being conquered and its inhabitants slain in 87 B.C. Only about 20% of it has been excavated and it is remarkable. Much larger than any of the more famous spots and much more pristine. Seems the early acheologists were prone to putting things back as they assumed they should be, but many of their assumptions were premature and they destroyed a lot of evidence while carting off the statues and other items to their foreign museums