Gavin's day with Opa

Sapote Tree

On Crest on the property where we used to live, there is a great Sapote tree.  Most people around here don't know what to do with it's fruit.

This is what it looked like in August.  Guillermo cleaned away all the
dirt around it and replaced it with new composted dirt,
so the tree can now breath and be nourished again.

By September, the new leaves are showing up all over the tree.

This is only three days after I took the picture above.

This is the same tree after only two weeks

As I was looking, I found one fruit from last season hanging lonely on the tree.

,














Can't wait for the tree to bear fruit again; I could eat myself sick on this custard like fruit.

A garden of Eden

The roads where I walk have a special bonus: every year I anticipate the five fig trees along the way, and it's now harvest time. The trees are hanging out into the road, so I assume when I go past at 4:30am that the fruit is for my picking, and I do.

Close enough to the road to be public property.

Still a bit green but laden with fruit.

Happy harvesting, when the time comes, is all I can say.

The Yellow Deli

What a great place to eat and relax. Aariel had taken Patricia and me there a while ago.  The other day when we were there just before lunchtime, getting more familiar with the Vista area where we might buy a house, we decided to stop and refresh ourselves.  The Restaurant is called the Yellow Deli.  The food and atmosphere (the vibe) are great, the service excellent and the prices very reasonable.

Read their story; it's quite interesting and inspiring. 

Remembering a story

Whenever I see a citrus tree in a garden, I remember going from Germany to Australia in 1971.  On the ship, I met another German named Klaus; he was with his wife, an Australian from Melbourne, on his way to relocate there. Early on in their relationship, he was staying at her parent's house, and one day her mother asked Klaus to go to the backyard to get her a lemon.  After a while, he came back and said he could not find the box with the lemons. He was then told that they were hanging on the tree, unlike in Germany.
We are house sitting for our friends Sandy and Lon, and they have lots of citrus and avocado trees, which I love going down to harvest.

Avocados like grapes: how many you can find?

Lemons all year round

Grapefruit almost ready to pick

Then there are the blood orange trees, and that is what we are using today.

This is an amazing fruit, very sweet and colorful

Then there is the enjoyment of the squeeze. 

Market Day

Encinitas now has it's own Farmers' Market.
Every Wednesday after I pick up Patricia from the train, we head over to the market.
Great fun and lots of great produce.

Just opened: it's on from 5 to 8PM every Wednesday

What a great display

Beans Beans and more Beans

Strawberries must be in season

And then there is the entertainment, starting with tuning the guitar.

Back in Encinitas

A little while ago, if you remember, Patricia built the raised vegetable gardens at Aariel's, and everything seemed to start out up great, and then some of it stopped growing, and we are not sure why.

So we took some of the earth out and mixed in some compost and replanted.

Lets see if this will work

The radishes were the exception. We still have lots of them.  

We are here again house-sitting in beautiful Encinitas, taking care of Oscar, the cat, and I get a chance to reorganize a few garage things with Michal's permission, of course.
Last week, Osky was frightened by something at night and did the seemingly impossible by jumping on the roof, and there he stayed until Michal also got up on the roof and gently convinced him to make his way over so someone to help him down.

Where do I go from here?

 Let's see what's next in the week coming. Today we were invited by Corina and Maria to practice our Yoga skills.

Not much happened

and yet we are doing things that matter, like doing jobs around the house, sometimes cooking dinner, walking the dogs and making ourselves useful in any way we can.
It's fun sharing a place with Aariel and Ryan and the animals, and we are looking for a place around the area of Oceanside, just to be conveniently close to them when the nanny role kicks in.
I am also busy looking for a job around here, have put out a ton of applications, but not may bites.
Patricia got all her work done in the garden, and the first shoots are looking at daylight.
On Patricia's days off, we visit our old haunts at Encinitas and walk Crest just for fun and to see whats going on and to talk to old friends.  We just like the place.

The first bean sprouts have come out.

And here are the radishes 

and the flowers on the fence. 

Soon this will be hanging on the wall.

It is a lot of fun doing little projects, as long as I don't have to.

One little job at a time

Patricia and I have been busy doing our thing around Ryan and Aariel's place for the last week.
On Monday, I got to spend a little time with Michal, burning some Sugar-pine cones we had collected at Anza.

Sitting there in front of the fire with a glass of Port.

In the meantime, Patricia is building an above-ground garden, well above,

with a little help from Aariel. On the right, you can see a bit of Ryan supervising.

And it's done, just the right height for the veggies.

It's now time for planting

with Aariel inspecting.  She's not supposed to have her pregnant hands in the dirt!

Here I am walking Sasha and Banjo.

One of my job's has been to paint the garage floor.

First everything had to come out of the garage,

so I could paint it

and put it all back again. Here's the finished product.

Patricia and I are still looking for a place to live, an actual settle in place.




















Easy drive home

We were expecting rain, so we wanted to leave early, but the rain never came.
After waking to a clear sky and fog in the valley, we said our good-byes and left at about 9:30.

We are above the fog

We decided to take it easy and go the long way back home.  First we took 79 toward Warner Springs and then route 76 past Lake Henshaw toward Pauma Valley, and this got us all the way home.

The fields were full of beautiful flowers as we approached Warner Springs

All that color from such small flowers, barely an inch across.

On the way, we picked up great fruit and vegetables, grown right here. 

Me too, I am just not as elegant.

Our first known destination

We have arrived, Malcolm gave us a lift to Johns River and Hannam Vale, and we had time last night to catch up with Lorrischka and Luke over a great dinner Luke prepared. I went and have a look at Rosies and was very impressed over the work that was done since we had left here around the beginning of January.

It really felt like coming home again. The night was not all that good for me, having eaten to much, (my stomach), but I take that, it was great sitting around the fireplace telling story's and hearing the latest gossip.

Today we got into the farm work and helping Malcolm to change brake-pads on Lorri's car.

More vegetables to plant

Luke had started making a few planter-boxes for planting vegetables, we knocked out about 3 of them and filled then with great compost before having lunch about 4PM prepared by Lorri and Patricia.

With great salad and a glass of Beer.

Patricia started taking pictures of birds again.
Tomorrow it will be shop time.