At first, the moon entered Earth’s outer shadow, creating subtle changes in the way its surface appeared. After a few hours, it traveled deeper into the shadow and began to appear reddish. That process began around 2:45 a.m. Pacific time.
At 4:11 a.m., the moon fell completely within Earth’s inner shadow, making its full face a deeper shade of red. This total eclipse was relatively short, lasting about 14 minutes and ending by 4:25 a.m. Pacific time. Some total lunar eclipses go for nearly an hour.
The process then reversed itself as the moon passed out of the Earth’s shadow, gradually returning to its normal self until sunrise, at which point, on the U.S. West Coast, it sank below the horizon.
I started taking photos around 4:45 AM in El Pescadero, BCS (mountain time). It was amazing looking through our big binoculars too. What a show!
It’s starting to look red.Now it begins to reverse.
I took all these photos from my 2nd floor bedroom deck. Got up at 4:30AM and after this last shot I put on my jacket and took my dog for a walk on the beach. I thought I’d get some more shots, but by the time I got outside it was completely overcast and I couldn’t see anything.
Grateful that I got to witness this before the marine layer shrouded the show.
Early this morning our friend Bill took us to look for wild oregano in the hills close to where we live. There are lots of good hikes to do in this area.
There are many remnants of buildings from when there was gold mining activity.
The sky was an incredible blue this morning and juxtaposed to the grey of the flora, it was magical.
Our pup, Isabela enjoyed her time and all the new smells.
You can see the abandoned buildings in the background.
This appears to be a kiln they used. Perhaps for making bricks?
Here’s where they dug for gold and a deep shaft too.
Bela’s been lucky today. She got a beach and a desert walk. I guess we were lucky too.
We didn’t find any oregano, but Bill had a plant at his house that he got from this area some time ago and gave it to us. What a guy!
I don’t believe there is any herb that can beat the Mexican oregano. We’ll go back after the rains and see if we have better luck. But in the end, we got what we were after anyway, thanks to Bill.
I don’t know if you read my latest blog about growing old(er) or not, but I decided a few things.
I’m choosing five things–
White teeth
Give back in the community
Don’t take things personally (from the 4 agreements)
Smile more
Take time for myself
Had my teeth cleaned and whitened. In the process we discovered I needed a new crown. Love my new mouth full of white teeth (and royalty suits me).
Once a month my husband and I help pack the 300 bags of food for people in our little pueblo. The Pescadero food bank rocks. Ann, Greg, and Debbie are the organizers. It is so cool how many people in our neighborhood go there and work together to pack the bags. We are getting all the food locally. It’s awesome to help serve the people of El Pescadero, BCS. https://www.pescaderofoodbank.org Donations appreciated.
This is a hard one. I’m working on it. I have to remind myself that it isn’t all about me. I don’t need to take what people say or do as a personal affront.
4. With clean, white teeth I smile a lot more. Happiness prevails.
Boy oh boy! I am smiling with confidence now that I can show off my pearly whites. My dentist in La Paz is wonderful. https://cosmedent.mx
5. Taking time for myself makes everyone around me (think husband) happier, because if all is right with me, I’m easier to be around. So, I bake, garden, cook new things (gnocchi, fermented cucumbers (that I grew from seed and now are pickles) , paint, read, write (entered a short story and a flash story in two contests), play the piano (I played as a young person and am taking it up again, though I suck at it)…you get the drift.
I grew the tomatoes, but bought the jalepeñoBird netting over the garden. Love the sunflowers. I recently took out the cucumber plants and am starting new ones. This is called, “The Cove” and I framed it yesterday.Watercolor painting, “The Orange Door,” that I framed yesterday.
It’s funny how when you’re a kid you always want to be older. When you finally get to that first milestone of 16 and get your driver’s license, you think you’ve really made it.
I’ve surpassed all the milestones I thought I wanted when I was a kid. Now I realize that youth lasts a very short time in one’s life, if all goes in the normal way at least. I’m looking back a lot farther than I am forward now. It’s an odd state of mind, but it doesn’t bother me.
I’m lucky. In October I’ll be 75. We had a big dinner party at my favorite restaurant in Todos Santos when I turned 70. But I don’t feel like any more parties. Not that I’m depressed about having birthdays. It’s just that I don’t care to make any more fuss about them. Greg can take me out to dinner and I’ll make myself a cake. No problem.
As everyone knows, our American culture is obsessed with youth. If you have white hair, lined skin, scars, and extra pounds, you think you have to be dyed, pulled taut, hidden, and the weight must be lost. (These days what I lose are my glasses and my keys.)
Our judgments based upon perfection and imperfection have consequences that affect the quality of life. Our perfection standards are limiting, restrictive, and unhealthy. That’s what I read in a article about aging. I agree 100%.
One thing that wasn’t discussed in the article was how one’s bull shit meter goes off the scale with advanced age. That’s my observation. That’s my experience. I’m intolerant of BS. Period. It exasperates me, and I’ll bark my dissatisfaction whether poeple like it or not. If somebody is unhappy about it, that’s fine by me.
And if I don’t want to go where I’m invited, I just say, “Thank you for the invitation, but no.” I never would have done that in my youth. I think it is this knowing myself and guarding myself that I love about my age.
One thing that I’m going to fix though is the color of my teeth. I’m being vain for sure, but I see my teeth in the mirror and I don’t like them. My wrinkles are my wrinkles. My white hair is my white hair, but I’m done with yellowing teeth. I’ll keep the extra pounds at bay with exercise and small portions, so my weight is fine. I won’t give up butter, coffee, or desert. Life is too short now. I used to think that was a weird philosophy. Life seemed loooooong to me. Not anymore. I get it. Life is too short to worry about the things over which you have no control. It’s as simple as that.
It’s fun to walk on the beach with my husband and my dog, and hear the waves, and put my feet in the water every morning. I am fortunate to have a studio where I can paint, play the piano, write, or sing and dance if I want. I’ve got a garden now and that keeps me happy. I’m trying new recipes with the bounty and I’m learning how to make my own dill pickles with the dill and cucumbers I grow.
Tomorrow a friend is going to show us where we can pick wild Mexican oregano not too far from where we live. Mexican oregano is my favorite. Never have I enjoyed an herb so much. It’s good in everything. And it’s not anything like you get in the jar at the grocery store in the US. Trust me.
So, if you’re stressing about getting older, I highly recommend that you stop it. Go with the flow. Mellow out. Be grateful and let that be enough. Take up a new hobby. Go on an adventure. You don’t have to like the aches and pains in your joints. But there are things you can do to lessen that pain…meditate, exercise, take turmeric, drink lots of water, and smile. With those pearly white teeth. That’s what I’m going to do.
Who knew that when we moved here we’d end up in a “neighborhood” with all these commercial buildings? When we bought our property we saw the plot map with many lots, so we knew there would be others seeking sanctuary in this beautiful spot in Baja Sur. But somehow I was naive. I didn’t realize the building wouldn’t be single family residences like ours. Instead of “Pave paradise and put up a parking lot” we have an infestation of commercial building. No rules followed. No rules enforced. These builders just keep going.
For people who want to come experience paradise and then go home, this is great news. For the people who actually live here year round, this is more like a nightmare.
The pressure on the environment is one of the nightmares. People make trash and people make sewage. Both of those things are a big problem here. The landfill here is in no way what a landfill should be. It’s just a bunch of trash piled in a big area. The methane gas it creates means fires all the time and the smoke comes directly to town. So until something is done about it, more trash means more hideous smoke. And occasionally it is completely shut down. Then we have to take our trash to Cabo.
We bought a bunch of bins for recycling and the Todos Santos recycling center takes a lot of our cans, #1 and #2 plastic, paper, cardboard, glass, and aluminum. Now we’re making better decisions about what to buy in packaging. The two of us make one trash bag every three weeks. There are quite a few of us who recycle, but it’s not enough. We keep thinking of ways to cut down.
I won’t go into the sewage problem because nobody wants to read about it. But I will say that there is a long road coming from Pescadero to the beach that often flows with sewage. Disgusting? A health hazard? Definitely.
What are all these builders doing about this? NOTHING. Absolutely nothing except building more condos, boutique hotels (some disguised as yoga retreats) and gigantic houses used for AirBnBs, or like my closest neighbor to the north, a so-called Modern Elder Academy
More and more and more. It doesn’t stop. Raise your hand if you want to live in a “neighborhood” of hotels, condos, retreats, etc. What’s happening here has already happened in Cabo San Lucas and a lot of other places in Mexico.
There is nothing I can do about it. I have to figure out ways to deal. I’ve been doing a lot better lately, and then all of a sudden I’m not doing better. I might be worse right now than ever. Sad. Depressed. Disgusted. Worried.
This “house” is multi levels and buildings. AirBnB.
This next one is beyond gigantic. I don’t know if you can tell the scale of these from my photos.
One “house” on the hill behind us as well.This shows the two of them on the hill. In the foreground, The Modern Elder Academy, but not the whole thing. It is multibuildings. (hotel/resort) three lots down from us.)
There are lots of cars parked all up and down our road from the MEA. This has totally changed the complexion of our neighborhood.
New one going up on the hill behind us. The rebar shows that it is going up another story. Another “shoe box” design.
These are just a few of the things going in or recently finished. It just goes on and on. The pounding and sawing and trucks coming and going (and the beeping when they back-up) has been going on consistently for over a year. On Sundays it is so peaceful and quiet like it was a few years ago.
Another shot taken from behind my house.
Like I said, we knew houses would be built. That’s what a neighborhood is, but not hotels, AirBnBs, retreats, and condos. The condos being built as we speak are over the hill from us, and they aren’t the first ones or the last ones being built. The good news about this one in the photo is they have a state of the art sewage treatment and are providing parking for their owners. Also, they are installing a water purification system in each of the 14 units, so no plastic bottles! There are some developers who care about the environment. They are going to repair the road when they’re done and fix the public access to the little beach. All good news! If you have to have development, then these are the kind of people you want doing it.
To end on a happy note, I’ll post some photos of the beach. We are fortunate to have been here for over 10 years, enjoying it while we could. And the beach, while people are building like crazy on the beach and bluffs, all I have to do is turn toward the water and imagine it is like it was before.
Our own blow-hole.
Even though this place is exploding, it’s still better than anywhere else.
Walking on the beach in the morning brings such joy. It’s hard to imagine life without these Baja mornings. Retirement life in Baja Sur is pure and sweet. The only thing that is working against us now is all the developments. It’s crazy wild with building here now. We have definitely been discovered.
It wouldn’t be so bad if it were just single family homes, but it’s not. It’s condos and boutique hotels and AirBnB places going up as fast as they can. The worst part is the impact on the environment. Without good enforcement of existing environmental laws, the developers skirt the laws.
Covid is rampant here now too. La Paz, Cabo, Todos Santos, and in El Pescadero where we live. Everything is supposed to be shut, but so far everything is still business as usual. The government has upped the level to 5, and still our area remains open. The US is requiring negative tests to reenter the States now though, so that should slow down the tourism.
But, now back to photos of our adventures.
Greg loves his retirement life. Surf on, my husband!
Isabela on a hike with us to the old port,.Hiking down to the Old Port again. It’s almost hard to believe we are in such close proximity to such a beautiful place.A surfboard I painted.
Enjoying our lives means embracing it all. Sometimes it’s hard to accept the changes, but it’s important to be in the moment. We have an enormous number of blessings.
Isabela and I walk to La Playa Los Cerritos. Greg drives as he wants to get in the water at daybreak before all the other surfers show up.
Splendid morning views!
I throw the ball in the water for Isabela and she loves to swim out for it. The water is warm and inviting. I have on my suit under my clothes just in case I feel like swimming.
We should all be as happy a dog on the beach with a ball.
There are some birds out looking for food, and I am lucky enough to capture them with my camera.
There are only three surfers out when we get to the beach, and Greg is one of them. Soon there are many more of them. The waves are mostly closed out, but you can’t stop a surfer from going out if there is a chance to catch a wave.
Greg catches one!And it closes out.
Isabela is really having a great time this morning, and she doesn’t tire of chasing the ball into the water. She shakes the water from herself and goes back for more.
When Greg comes in, I decide it’s my chance to take a quick swim. Just to say I did. It is so warm in the water it is hard to believe it’s Christmas.
Wild life used to be staying up past 2AM. But for years now my life has not been that kind of wild. Usually in bed by 9:30PM and up before 5AM is how I roll these days. But I’m enjoying a wild life just the same.
Yesterday we were visited by quite a few tarantula hawks and across the street on fence posts overlooking the Pacific Ocean were three handsome caracaras. Usually you see them farther back in the desert, but apparently they were enjoying the ocean view for awhile in the morning.
Tarantula hawks are found in every continent except Europe and Antartica. In the United States, they are found in the deserts of the southwest. We have them in Baja California Sur where I live.
The blossoms provide nectar for the tarantula hawk.
While adult tarantula hawks are nectavores and feed on flowers, they get their name because adult females hunt tarantulas as food for their larvae.
An adult female will paralyze a tarantula with its stinger, and then transport the spider back to the hawk’s nest. Once there, the female lays an egg in the spider’s abdomen, then covers the entrance of the burrow to trap the spider.
Once the egg hatches, the larvae will feed on the still living spider for several weeks, avoiding vital organs to keep the spider alive until the larvae pupates into an adult wasp.
Males do not have stingers, but females have a ¼ inch (7mm) stinger. They will not sting unless provoked, but their sting is reported to be the second most painful sting of any insect.
Roadrunners are one of the few animals that will risk being stung to feed on tarantula hawks.
The caracara are carrion eaters, but they also hunt lizards and snakes. They often share carrion with vultures. The Crested Caracara is a medium-sized, bulky raptor with long legs. Around here they sit on poles like this and trees and cactus (cardon) to get a good look at their surroundings. Having long legs means they are as adept on land as in the air.
I see birds on those fence posts a lot, but this is the first time I’ve seen caracara there.
We never tire of our wild visitors, we can often be found sitting on the deck admiring their antics. Life here at our home in Baja California Sur is satisfying even during a pandemic. We are blessed.
