Back on Board

Lapidus has a full crew of two again.

My trip to California to stay with daughter Kenya and son-in-law Nathan was soooo nice. We spent time in Kenya's studio (www.bewellgroomed.com), at the beach, at farmer's markets, in great restaurants, shopping, and hanging around the house and yard - home of giant sunflowers. The gorgeous weather was made even better by the cool ocean breeze. Most evenings found us in the back yard where we enjoyed a log in the firepit with our dinner and a glass of wine, watching lots of kitty antics. Dinner at Joe's Restaurant where Nathan is a manager was a treat for our friend Pam and me one evening when Kenya was working. The food is always amazing at Joe's: unusual (at least for me) and made with the freshest ingredients. Nathan does a great job and it's fun to watch him at his craft. After dinner, we were off to a Joan Baez concert at Santa Monica Pier. We joined the thousands already there to listen to the legendary folk singer delivering song after song in her pure soprano voice.

While I was in California, Larry kept the projects going. Projects that are completed (or getting close) include new batteries, link 2000, solar panels, upgrade kit in wind generator, restitching and repairing canvas and main sail, and new autopilot. Sea Trials are scheduled for this Friday. Yippee!The new water maker just arrived; Larry plans on installing it in September. Also, we will probably have a bottom job done in August as well as the Max Prop adjusted.

We kept the small solar panels above our bimini and added these two large ones just above the davits.

With boat projects and visiting kids, parents, brothers, sisters, and friends in Oklahoma, Texas, and California, we're having a full and rewarding summer. A year will probably be gone before we get to connect with most of these great people, so we appreciate getting together with them for a bit. We wished we had been able to see many other good friends. We needed another weekend so that we could see our sailing friends at Texoma. But with major boat projects underway, we had to get back. We didn't take enough pictures, but did snap a few.

Larry with his sister Madelaine and daughter Deborah just after dinner in Oklahoma City, at Lakeside Grill. We stayed with Madelaine while we were in Oklahoma City and very much appreciated her generosity.


Traveling north of Oklahoma City to see my mom and brother Rick and sister-in-law Liz gave us a chance to see Rick and Liz's beautiful Manalarga Marchadors, gaited horses from Brazil.


Dinner at Ciola's, one of Austin's many great restaurants, with son Trent and daughter-in-law Cristen. Other evenings, we dined in their beautiful Austin home, enjoying dinners prepared by Cristen, who is an excellent cook. One special night, our plans included dinner and live music at Shady Grove, one of our favorite Austin spots, where the venue lives up to its name. Jimmy LaFave, also one of our favorites, wowed us with his folksy, bluesy music.


Kenya and Paula enjoying lunch at at this cute little vegetarian restuarant in Redondo Beach. They make the biggest and tastiest veggie burger.

Kenya and Paula lunching at the Beverly Wilshire -in Beverly Hills, of course. When you click on the picture for full size, you can see the Rodeo Drive sign! We were actually toasting Larry's birthday. He makes a great martini, but could not make his own birthday martini because he could not find the vermouth or the olives. (He really missed me after that.) He went out for Mexican food and a Margarita.


Hope your summer travels have enabled you to connect with friends and family.

Time for Visiting

The short break from blogging that I planned to take has turned into a long one. We've been busy with projects and we've also been away from the boat.

Leaving Lapidus under the watchful eyes of our dockmaster, our electricians, and our boat neighbors, we spent a few weeks traveling via plane and pickup to visit friends and family, to have doctor and dentist checkups, and to sight see a bit.

We flew to Oklahoma City and retrieved our pickup from storage. Most of our large, extended family lives in Oklahoma and Texas. We traveled the highways and were fortunate enough to spend time with mom, sons, daughters, brothers, sisters, and many of their family members.

Austin, Texas was our last stop to visit family. We had decided that we wanted our pickup on the east coast, so after spending several days with son Trent and family, we left Austin to drive back to Brunswick. Never people to miss a pretty beach, we turned south at Mobile, Alabama and drove to the lovely Gulf Shores area. A one-night hotel stay in Orange Beach gave us time for a couple of walks on the beautiful white sand, which we learned was quartz that washes down the river from the Appalachian mountains. We continued our coastal drive to Pensacola, where we observed beautiful blue-green water paired with the white sand. Then, we were back on I10 for the long dive to Jacksonville, then north on I95, eager to be home on Lapidus.

Larry is working on his boat projects as well as overseeing the jobs that we have professionals working on. No pictures yet, but the new solar panels are up and the wiring is almost completed.
I was back on the boat for less than a week and then traveling again. I am in California visiting our daughter Kenya and her husband Nathan, as well as our ‘grandkits’ here on the ‘kitty ranch.’ The weather is gorgeous and I’m greatly enjoying my stay. We have planned a few projects for me to ‘help’ with while I'm here, but mostly, I’m just on an nice vacation.