An Old Man and His Dog - A Love Story

Would you like to see some photos of Walter? asks Mr.Hunt, who is as proud as a parent is of an adorable child. 

Dave Hunt, almost 83, and his pooch, Walter, practically seven, are early-morning fixtures outside Tailholt Coffee CO on Main Street in Rogue River, OR, a small town where a man and his 125-pound black and tan coonhound draw a lot of attention. 

The dog's name is Walter, and he is one lucky dog.

I’d noticed Mr. Hunt several times at his Main Street morning post, curious about him and his floppy-eared friend. Years ago, as a newspaper reporter, constantly scanning for a story, I wouldn’t have hesitated to approach him.

Decades later, as an ordinary nosy person? It took me a few months.

But one recent sunny morning, I parked my Suburu and made my way to the man and his dog, remembering how much most people enjoy positive attention. I patted the dog, smiled at the man, and inquired, “Do you have a few minutes to tell me about your furry friend?” "Sure!" he said, waving at a chair, "Have a seat!"

About everybody whose caffeine needs are fulfilled at Tailholt stops visiting Walter, the Tailholt Mascot, and Mr. Hunt.

I had no preconceptions about what, if any, story might emerge. But it didn't take long to think of it as a love story. It turns out that when the man and the dog “found” one another, each had a compelling need for someone to love and be loved by—a caring companion.

Later, Mr. Hunt’s landlady, Virginia, was delighted to help me unearth the tale’s beginning more than a decade ago.

She told me that Mr. Hunt moved from the Portland area to Rogue River in 2011 to be closer to family. He needed a rental, but there was a complication. It was considerable.

He’d arrived with his best girlfriend, Mona, a St. Bernard/boxer mix weighing 100 pounds.

Cautious landlords prohibit dogs, especially massive beasts, and for good reasons. But when Mr. Hunt called to inquire about the rental, he quickly disclosed he had a dog, and she was not “medium-sized.” 

"We paused a bit,” Virginia recalled. "We'd just fixed up the house, but we are dog-loving people ourselves and wanted to hear what he had to say."

And what did Mr. Hunt say? Only this:

Oh, don't worry about your house! Mona will spend most of her time on the couch!

"Right then, we knew he was our kind of person," Virginia said. "And he has been a wonderful tenant and friend through the years.” 

During the ensuing years, Mr. Hunt and Mona had a grand time making friends on their daily walks and coffee talks around town.

But as loving pet owners know well, a cherished dog’s life ends too soon. Mona died at age 13, just as her loving master, then in his late 70s, felt the aches and pains of his own decline.

"Mona was a tremendous dog," recalled Mr. Hunt. "I mourned her something terrible for months. I knew I couldn’t  live without a dog, but how could I ever replace her?"

Virginia recognized that Mr. Hunt was having a difficult time. Mourning, loneliness, and health issues were a dreadful combination.

But she and her daughter, who happens to be a local veterinarian, had their eyes peeled for a suitable companion dog for Mr. Hunt. 

Photo credit Mr. Hunt

   The  fabulous                 Walter 

    was poised

        to enter 

     Mr. Hunt's life!

Around the time that Mona ascended to dog heaven, the tall black and tan coonhound was being retired from his “job” as a show dog. He was between four and five years old and named Mr. Thorin, after a character in a Hobbit book. 

Virginia and her veterinarian daughter had put their heads together and determined that the show dog could be a good fit for Mr. Hunt. 

“Dave is used to having large dogs, and Walter had a great temperament and personality!” Virginia said.

So it was that soon-to-be-named Walter wagged his way into Mr. Hunt's life.

“Virginia and her husband, Paul, took me to meet the dog, and Walter came home with me the same evening,” recalls Mr. Hunt. 

Walter made it clear during his "homecoming" that he hated riding in a vehicle, something he’d often had to do for dog shows. The ride to Mr. Hunt’s home was his last time in a car!

Photo courtesy of Mr. Hunt

Walter required about a week to adapt to Mr. Hunt, who also had some adjustments. 

“The hardest part was getting Walter to understand that his bed was a double recliner, just like mine,” he said. “He was quiet and shy and wasn’t used to having someone urge him to get up on the furniture!”

 

Walter's double recliner is behind him, with Mr. Hunt's identical recliner along the adjacent wall. During my afternoon visit, the dog kept a close watch on his master, staring at him most of the time. 

While Walter and Mr. Hunt are best known for their early morning Tailholt presence, they also enjoy daily afternoon forays. Gas stations, Lil’ Pantry, the Dollar Store, and sometimes the Rogue River Pharmacy and Evergreen Bank are on their itinerary.

Sometimes, with Mr. Hunt's assistance, Walter has trained people at each stop to provide treats. 

Walter awaits a withdrawal from his biscuit account at Evergreen
bank in Rogue River, where  Mr. Hunt ensures he always has a balance.

,

The dog is Mr. Hunt's reason to get out of bed in the morning and away from the house at least twice a day, breathe fresh air, and have fun. 

 

            I accidentally caught Mr. Hunt on his motorized scooter 
with Walter towing him. All the places they
 visit in a day are within six blocks of home.

 “Walter is my link to other humans,” Mr. Hunt says. “He takes well to most people and is a conversation starter. He’s also a chick magnet.” (Wink, wink.)

But unpleasant realities loom on the horizon.

Walter will be seven in July. His breed’s lifespan is 9 to 13 years. Mr. Hunt will be 83 soon, but his lifespan could reach 100.

His daughter recently suggested that her father moves into assisted living housing, where he would be safe and all his needs addressed.

“No way!” exclaims Mr. Hunt, who went online (he’s quite the computer guy) to research the topic and found information supporting his independent stance. 

17 Signs It’s Time for Senior Assisted Living

But the reason for "no assisted living" that matters most? Dogs are not allowed.

“How could I live without that dog, and what would  Walter do without me?”   

Good question. 

Mr. Hunt was enthused that morning as we visited outside Tailholt Coffee CO: Dogs are a joy! They are such wonderful companions! 

Honestly, he was almost breathless as he leaned across the small table outside the coffee shop. 

Juicy jowls aside, this is a dog's "look of love."
Photo credit, Mr. Hunt

“Dogs look you in the eyes, and you know they love you,” he continued. "And you know you love them."

At a particular time in life, and in a festering world somehow hoping that "every little thing's, gonna be alright," What else matters but loving relationships? 

And loyal pets and their devoted humans create tender emotional bonds daily.

Mr. Hunt is delighted by this quote:

Until one has loved an animal, a part of one’s soul remains unawakened.—Anatole France

Here's a man with an awakened soul and the dog he loves.
Give em' a hand.

Change is Strange

Dear Readers,

And I do mean dear. Thank you for sticking with me and my Ordinary Life blog, which I have been posting on Google's free Blogger platform sporadically since my first entry on June 2, 2009.*

 

Lost in techie wilderness!

The freaking tech giant (Google) announced a couple months ago that it would be discontinuing emailing posts to blog subscribers as of July 1, 2021. They suggested bloggers find some other way to get their posts to subscribers. 

What was a techie dunce to do?  The answer arrived in a timely email targeting bloggers left in the lurch. A company called follow.it offered to take on the subscription task and extended technical help to install a new subscription "gadget" on blogs and to import existing email subscribers at no charge. I did end up paying someone to help me, but I appreciated follow.it for their gesture. 

Perhaps you'll notice on this post the new email subscription form on the right, which is larger than before. If you got this post via email, no need to reenter your email address. (If you have a minute, though, I'd appreciate knowing that this post arrived in your mailbox, even if you're reading it on Facebook.)

How and why you subscribed to my blog (thank you again!) is a mystery. Except for family and friends, drawing new readers is a challenge. You might notice in coming posts invitations to "share."  Please consider doing that. 

*That first post in 2009 was titled Another Day, Another Storm.  I accidentally discovered much later that Blogger tracks readership stats for every post. NO ONE READ IT.  Here's a screenshot of my first attempt at blogging 🤪. Probably best it wasn't seen.

Yard Sale Encounter Reveals Reality of Losing a Life Partner

Dear Readers. This post is a departure from my usual photo-heavy accounts of travel and everyday life. Instead, it is a look back to the 1980s when I was a 30-something reporter/columnist at southern Oregon's Grants Pass Daily Courier, an independent newspaper that is still publishing.

I wrote this column decades ago. Now I'm older than the widowed man who inspired it. Now I have friends who've lost their life partners and many others who are facing this inevitability. As are we all.

I found this yellowed clipping in a tucked-away "miscellaneous" folder. I was surprised that the younger me kinda got it about this time of life. The older me sure does. 

                                                                                   

This was an early weekly column of mine published in the newspaper.
 Later it was called Second Thoughts. 

I was driving between Rogue River and Gold Hill late in the afternoon last week, reveling in the richness of spring, when my car swung a quick left into a yard sale.


The drive led through high brush and opened onto a rough clearing. It was the kind of clearing that looks like the forest would gobble it up if your back was turned too long.

An older fella sat on a straight-backed chair at the edge of an unkempt yard. He tipped back in his chair to look me over as I stepped out of my VW van. 

The yard sale was disappointing. There wasn't much in the way of toys for my little boy, who was with me. No plaid wool shirt for my husband, no vintage clothing or kitchen gadgets for me.

The old man, however, was interesting. He followed us around the sale, offering a comment here and there. He seemed disoriented like it wasn't really his stuff at the yard sale. He seemed to feel a need to explain. 

"Ya, I've been alone now six months," he said. ""No need for all these things now. No one to answer to when I get up in the morning. No work and no wife." And he laughed a dry little laugh.

I poked around in the yard sale: a pressure cooker, polyester women's clothing, a few colored bottles, ashtrays, books.

My son spotted a tiny electric organ and wanted to try it.

"Oh, it's all full of dust," the man apologized. His light blue eyes were watery and bloodshot. His face was blustery. He spat tobacco and shuffled around, wanting to talk.

"My wife got this for me," he said, nodding toward the organ.
"Never did learn to play it."

Together we got the thing to work. It wheezed thin organ noise, but the sound was lost in the racket of a near-by mill and the roaring traffic on the I-5 corridor.

I fiddled with a lawn decoration, a donkey that kicked its heels when a propeller it was attached to was spun around.

"Wife got that for me," the man said. "Almost don't feel right selling it. She said I was a jackass and got that for me when I come home from a work trip," he said, a smile trying to happen. "It has real sentimental value."

The plastic donkey kicked up its heels while my little boy spun its propeller, oblivious to sentimental value, growing old or losing a life partner.

"I got a call in Alaska that she was sick," he said like he still could not believe it. "Six months later, she was gone."

"Cancer?" I asked. 

"Yes," he said and spat into the dust. 

"We had plans," he told me. "We were going to do so many things when we retired, but now all that is gone."

We spoke a bit about how nothing on this earth can be counted on to last. He told me of his plans to travel and, like the plastic donkey, kick up his heels.

"Maybe one day I'll settle down again," he mused, but it didn't seem like he was ready for any heel-kicking. 

"We pretty much got wiped out this last year," he said to no one in particular. "Hospital bills came to about $75,000 and not much covered by insurance. About wiped us out. About wiped me out," he amended.

His words leaked out in slow motion and hung around his head a while before disappearing into the woods. His trailer house squatted against a lush Oregon hillside. An old log structure sat incongruously nearby. The yard sale surrounded him.

"I'm selling everything," he said, sweeping a hand around. "Everything."

Together we looked at what represented everything in his life. Old boots, a folding cot, his wife's clothing, cracked dishes. The donkey yard decoration.

Another potential customer drove into the yard. A young man busted out of his pickup as if he was afraid somebody else would get the juicy bargains if he didn't get to them first.

"Well," I said, lamely. "Goodbye. And good luck in your travels."

The man did not respond but looked past me into the Rogue Valley's afternoon haze.

My empty words spiraled and fell flat into the dust. 

On the Road in Baja Part 1

This is the first of what I hope will be a series of posts about our Baja travels earlier this year. The blog is best viewed on the website. Just click on the title, if you are an email subscriber. Thanks for checking in!

Many landscape photos that appear in this blog were shot through the windshield with an iPhone7plus. My blue shirt is reflected here. This scene is representative of the dramatic and beautiful northern Baja terrain. Baja scenery overall is outstanding. 

We were 50 days on the road earlier this year driving to the Baja Peninsula and back. Fifty days, most of them in our Class B RV - a Sprinter van all dressed up with camping conveniences crammed into space about a quarter to half the size of a walk-in closet.

I have toured closets that could sleep five or six adults. Believe me, our van can handle only two. And it's good that we're average to small-sized shrinking adults. And that we like each other.

Now that we're home with ridiculous comforts, more room than any human beings need or deserve, and calming predictability, I am entertained by my travel notes.

TRIP STATS

• Nights spent van camping - 35
• Airbnb stays - 8 
• Nights in hotels - 3
• Nights spent with friends - 4
• Miles logged  - 5,185 from Southern Oregon to Todos Santos, Baja CA Sur and back (with a quick side trip to Arizona)

 It all went by with a whoosh.

One of few negatives about travel is that frequent relocations tend to shift time into hyper speed. Every day has its own story, beats with its own rhythm, and glows with its own light. 

Well, honestly, a few of those days were far from glowing. I'll get to those later; I know that the bum-luck bad-decision stories are appreciated.

For now, I'll start with crossing the Mexican border at Tecate, a surprisingly anxiety-free experience despite warnings to the contrary. And then an account of our first days on the Baja Peninsula.


CROSSING INTO MEXICO 
We chose to cross the border at Tecate because it is the smallest and least used of the three ports of entry in San Diego County, CA. The reason? It's out of the way. For us, was, coming from Joshua Tree National Park, it meant navigating narrow twisting mountain roads. Yippee! We like those roads.

This one would have been better without snow, however. The snow was an unwelcome travel surprise about 50 miles north of the Mexican border.

At the border, we were almost lonely; one car was ahead of us and none behind.

No would-be immigrants swarmed the area. It was peaceful and the Mexicans working the crossing were friendly and helpful, performing only a cursory search of the van. Our uneventful crossing took about 15 minutes. In another ten, we were out of town.

RUTA de VINO

Who knew? Northern Baja has a lovely wine region spanning from Tecate to Ensenada and beyond. As we drove the deluxe Highway 3 sixty-seven miles to Ensenada, the vines were dormant and, early in the day, the tasting rooms closed

We also spotted vineyards south of Ensenada before lush greenery and intensive farming transitioned to desert. The Ruta de Vino includes 64 wineries spread over seven different valleys in a Mediterranean micro-climate.

We did our part to ensure the success of Mexican vintners and sampled a fair amount of Baja-produced wine. 

     The scenery along the Ruta de Vino close to Ensenada. 

ESTERO BEACH in ENSENADA 
It was the day after Christmas, and we gave ourselves a gift by booking a room at the Estero Beach Hotel, which, we discovered, no longer operates an RV park listed in our guidebook and where we had planned to stay. 

Darn! Too bad. But after several days camping en route to the border, we were ready for a hotel. It was a good place to practice showering without ingesting any water.

The Estero hotel is a beautiful accommodation, and it was off-season, so we scored a half-price room and enjoyed the view (pictured below) from our balcony. It was an odd but great way to start our Baja camping adventure - lounging around in a luxury hotel!


       

The hotel restaurant served fine Mexican fare. PK ordered a combination plate for lunch not realizing it was crowd-sized. Somehow he polished it off. Because it was so tasty.

Mine was served on a cutting board, each crispy taco stuffed with either shrimp, catch-of-the-day, or octopus.  Hmmm.  Octopus. It was OK, but a bit chewy. I tried not to think about the suction cups. Great cilantro salsa.

                                       ****

We headed south the next morning all cleaned up, well fed and eager to explore.

Oops. A military roadblock. This looks worse than it was.

We knew we'd run into "crime-stopping" roadblocks, and had been advised to remove wallets and purses from the van as it was being searched for guns and drugs. Other than getting the stinkeye for taking photos, this and three or four other roadblocks were no problem. 

Oops! Road construction. Quite a lot of it between Ensenada and our night's destination, Don Eddie's Landing.


We waited in a long line for our turn to pass through the construction area. Food vendors were standing by to ease the pain. Candy or pork rinds anyone? 

DON EDDIE'S LANDING - Nice surprise!
When we travel, PK strongly prefers to drive. Fine with me. It is my job to navigate and ferret out attractions to visit and places to spend the night. Since Mex 1 is the main road going north and south in most of the Baja, navigating isn't that challenging. Even though finding side-trip routes can be tricky. And one never knows about camping. 

Our camp spot at Don Eddie's was, umm, Spartan. And big. And not too far from the restroom, which, unfortunately, was hidden behind a palm tree and unlit. There's a story here, but I decline to tell it.

Don Eddie's Landing, an old-time fishing lodge, turned out to be a bit of a side trip that I found in an indispensable guidebook, Traveler's Guide to Camping Mexico's BAJA by Mike and Terri Church.

It was 3.3 miles off Mex 1 on a paved road, although the short entrance to the "landing" itself was sketchy.  

One wouldn't expect much while bumping along this roadto camp,  but a big juicy surprise awaited. 

Don Eddie's Landing turned out to be a popular stop on the snowbird circuit, and we got lots of "beta" from other travelers, as our son, Chris Korbulic calls information garnered before you commit to something. 

We were still a bit skittish, on day two in Mexico, after friends and relatives questioned our sanity for traveling to such a dangerous place. My auntie Ellen forbid me to go. 

Ironically, the first traveler we talked with, camped next door and headed north to home, was eager to tell us all about the thieving going on in the south. 

His story was one we heard repeated, and that we later witnessed, in the same area he described — Bahia de Conception, on the Sea of Cortez, south of Loreto.

I'll save that story for a later post. The point is, despite the following statement that actually came out of his mouth, we were not deterred by this news.

"With that van, you look like millionaires," he declared. "You will be prime targets!"

Thanks, dude. Would we turn around and go home? No. We would not. But we would take extra care and be a little bit wary.

For the record, we had NO problems whatsoever during our Baja travels and never felt unsafe or threatened.

True, the US State Department has issued "do not travel" warnings for several Mexican states on the mainland, but none for most of the Baja Peninsula. 

The homicide hotspots in Baja are clustered in the north, close to the US border. Tijuana, Ensenada, and Rosarito Beach are cities to hurry through. 

The next person to provide "beta", but with a positive spin, was a woman who frequented Don Eddie's Landing. 

"Where are you going for dinner?" she whispered in a conspiratorial way as I headed into Don Eddie's inviting bar and restaurant to check the menu. 
I didn't know there was a choice, but she sure did. She and her husband led me over some rocks to a path leading to a "hidden" restaurant tucked between buildings. The woman insisted we try it.

"You will not believe it," she promised.

Thus we were introduced to Eucalipto Restaurant, the best place we ate in Baja. With all the great seafood and authentic recipes yet to come, that's saying something.

It was a culinary thrill to happen upon a place such as this that doesn't fit in its surroundings and presents unexpected excellence. For me, at least, although PK is not prone to superlatives.

The chef was blasting something the entire
time we were there. The restaurant was packed.
I'd rename the place House of Fire.

Flames lit a nearby table as the waiter fired up liquor and poured it into a shrimp and pasta-filled Parmesan bowl. The entire kitchen was open-view, and I couldn't keep my eyes off the sauteeing veggies flying around and flames licking fish, meat and even mashed potatoes.

Dinner! Mediterranean swordfish and flamed-finished mashed potatoes topped with done-just-right tossed-in-the-air veggies. We both ordered this and had delicious leftovers for the next two nights of van dining.
Along with local wines, of course. We do our part.

NEXT UP:  We made a bad decision the next day. It will be embarrassing to tell the tale. 

Attitude and aging - Lighten up!

Note: I excavated this post from my draft archive— one of 163 drafts waiting to be finished —as I searched for references to attitude. Why? I participate in a quarterly discussion group, and attitude is the topic for our fast-approaching get-together. The draft is about three years old, and the primary difference between then and now is I know even more women with attitude advantage. 

 Next, I'll tackle the drafts I've started about recent Baja travels. Thanks for staying tuned!

------------------

I'm lucky to have positive, physically and mentally active, smart, deep-thinking women as friends. Most are age 60+ 

Laurie Gerloff and I resting after a 5-mile uphill hike through cacti and cairns near Tucson, AZ, a few springs ago. I was almost 70. Laurie in her early 60s.

An earlier post about ditching hair dye and accepting aging generated numerous responses, mostly on Facebook, where I share links to my blog posts.

Readers who subscribe to this blog by email may be avoiding FB, and I don't blame them, but they miss the revealing conversations that sometimes develop in comment threads. I enjoyed reading hair-dye and aging stories amidst numerous comments about the ditch-the-hair-dye post. 

I was the only person, however, to see the excerpted comment below, delivered to me via email by Laurie, my friend for 40-some years, and a frequent travel buddy. She and her husband, Steve, and PK and me, have explored together extensively, including several trips to New Orleans, Mexico, and in early 2016, the Galapagos Islands and the Ecuadorian Amazon.

This airplane would soon be flying the four of us out of the Amazon Basin on
the same runway. For more about this "old people's" adventure, See Wild in the Amazon

Laurie changed the subject from fiddling with hair and face, boobs and butts, and other attempts to preserve a youthful appearance to instead concentrate on what's in your brain and heart. What comes out of your mouth.

Guard against calcification and becoming old and set in your ways.  She writes:

I’ve spent much of today thinking about aging and my own march to wormhood. I think that the most youthful attribute for geezers like us is not a head of blond hair, but a young attitude. And I think that we, and many of our pals, have it in spades.

As a youngster, I used to think of old folks as cranky, curmudgeonly and stuck in their ways. It seems that many oldsters calcify — they resist change, don’t take risks, and allow their minds to close and their comfort zones to shrink. I struggle to fend against calcification.

Flexible, open-minded, adventuresome are adjectives Laurie uses to describe concepts for ideal aging. These are powerful adjectives for any stage of life, along with thoughtfulness, kindness, compassion, and incessant curiosity. 

Accepting aging is more than just going along with the physical deterioration without nipping, tucking, hair-dyeing or suiciding. It's about resisting cultural pressures to hang onto youth when we could be embracing the fact that elders have insights, wisdom, and historical understanding impossible for people decades younger. Oh the things we've seen!

We also have a continuing capacity to relish life and face challenges with strength and resolve because we've learned how. 

It's OK to get older. Way better than not getting older. At least that's what I think now at age 74.

I love this poem by Janyne Relaford Brown.

 I Am Becoming the Woman I've Wanted

“I am becoming the woman I’ve wanted, grey at the temples, soft body, delighted, cracked up by life, with a laugh that’s known bitter but, past it, got better, knows she’s a survivor – that whatever comes, she can outlast it. I am becoming a deep weathered basket.

” I am becoming the woman I’ve longed for,  the motherly lover with arms strong and tender, the growing up daughter who blushes surprises. I am becoming full moons and sunrises.

“I find her becoming, this woman I’ve wanted, who knows she’ll encompass, who knows she’s sufficient, knows where she is going and travels with passion. Who remembers she’s precious but knows she’s not scarce – who knows she is plenty, plenty to share.”

Blues Cruise Bliss - Concerts at Sea

The great and crazy thing about blues cruises is that they provide hours and hours of back-to-back kick-butt performances and FUN, and they do it all ON THE OCEAN!

    You can gawk in one direction and see the blazing sun dipping into the Pacific.

Then turn your spinning head to see a musical performance bringing down the house on the outdoor pool deck.

   Ruthie Foster's Quintet is a marvel, performing here at sunset. 

You can also chill in the Crow's Nest lounge atop the ship listening to, or jamming with, amateurs and pros, sometimes twice a day. Very popular.

                 
               Then turn and see albatrosses gliding behind the ship.

   
      And you can do this most of the day and all night.

The Legendary Rhythm and Blues Cruise entertainment usually begins by 11 a.m. The last scheduled act starts around 12:30 a.m. and ends ---- whenever. I have yet to stay up past 4 a.m., but the most zealous blues fans don't surrender to fatigue until dawn is breaking and bacon fumes waft from the galley.

Impromptu jam sessions are a huge part of the musical scene, occurring in large venues and small, on the pool deck, lounges or in intimate piano bars. Maybe elevators. All over the place, people are making music, unscheduled and inspired.

One of my favorite 2018 cruise moments: At a piano bar, two members of the California Honeydrops improvise with pianist Bettye Jo Miller w/Mack Davis. Lech Wierzynski, left, is the Honeydrop's lead vocalist and trumpet player. He's flanked by clarinetist Leon. The Honeydrops wowed me big time.  Especially the multi-talented Lech, who, in this shot, had just put down his trumpet and is making eye contact. Hi there!

Indefatiguable Bettye Jo Miller and Mack Davis.

Musical entertainment began the moment the ship left the embarkation port, in this case, San Diego. It continued until the party ended early Sunday morning when blues cruisers were forced to vacate at the same dock. Our cruise began Oct. 28 and ended Nov. 7, 2018. It was the best!

       For an official wrap-up of this cruise, click this link.

On our sweet little veranda, leaving San Diego in our wake. PK appeared to be checking my heart, which was pounding with anticipation. We're about to visit ports of Cabo San Lucas, on the tip of the Baja Peninsula, then into the Sea of Cortez to Laz Paz and Loreto. Photo credit: Steve Lambros

But honestly, Blues Cruising is all about the music. Cool excursions on land and sea are offered, but so are in-port performances by on-ship musicians.

Smaller towns, such as Loreto, are visited by just a handful of cruise ships during a typical season and go all out for a cruise ship crowd. 

We enjoyed a fun day in Loreto, browsing the colorful shops and
  dancing with the locals. Musicians from the ship performed at
several different venues around the town.

This little guy was itching to dance, and soon he was boogying with his friends.

Billy Branch is blowing his sweet harmonica into our faces in Loreto. Loved it!

The scenery was A-OK traveling south from Loreto down to La Paz, the last of 3 ports.  

    Rev. Peyton and his Big Damn Band included only a drummer and his wife on the unlikely washboard. The Rev. is a big damn presence and produced
big damn sounds that drove dancers to their feet.

Mindi Adair and the Boneshakers performed at the Cabo Wabo club in Cabo San Lucas, although this photo was taken on the ship. She was one of at least a dozen artists we had never heard of before the cruise and are now fans.  

Tommy Castro and the Painkillers are Blues Cruise regulars. Great stuff!

On regular cruises, you can't count on running into anybody on your wavelength. On a blues cruise, common wavelengths vibrate like crazy around musical performances, creating as much excitement as the waves beneath the boat.

My new friend Gail and I became pals when, after standing a few minutes in a crowded venue, I invited her to step in front me so she could see. We were both boogieing in place, although the dance floor was vacant. "Come'on," she said, "Let's get the party started!" I followed her to the dance floor and the party ensued.

Here's another dance story. I was rockin' around the pool deck, as usual, with about 100 others and caught the eye of this fine woman. She sent her daughter to ask, "How old are you? My mom wants to know." Ha! I'm not the oldest person out there, but I may be one of the more rambunctious. I admitted to being 73 when her daughter introduced me. I saw her the next day and she flashed me this radiant smile. She has 20 years on me. She declined my dancing invitation, although she was having a wonderful time. I hope to still be rockin' out at her age. 

The great band Los Lobos was a headliner. Here they're playing on the Main Stage, which is a large theater accommodating 700 people or more.  Photo credit, Michael McGrath

Blues legend Taj Mahal, with the Phantom Blues Band, still wows his fans. He performed several times in the larger of the ship's seven venues.  Photo credit, Michael McGrath

G Love and Special Sauce, a condiment that  G Love actually makes. He did a morning cooking demo on the ship. Morning shows included interesting stuff such as this. Also, on this cruise, a couple of musician panels discussing such things as how the blues music scene is evolving, and how participants got their start. Best of all, however, was the first morning's 10:30 a.m. tribute to Aretha Franklin. Photo credit, Michael McGrath

Here's the crowd the first morning of the cruise at the main stage, a theater-like venue. They're listening to 20-some musicians creating a rousing and emotional tribute to Aretha Franklin. Although men performed,  women were the heart and soul of this extraordinary show. All before lunch.

The women included Deva Mahal, one of Taj's daughters.

And Zooey Mahal, another of his progeny. 

Interested in cranking up your fun meter? Check it out.
 2019 Blues Cruise  

In case you hadn't noticed, I am recommending blues cruising to any adult who loves blues, rock, Americana, funk, jazz, Zydeco, etc. etc., and especially people who love to dance, sing, or play an instrument or two.

I don't get paid for this. I'm just a cheerful kind of person trying to tell you that if you have the time and $$, you oughta try this. Or perhaps another music-type cruise. Get out the ol' bucket list and write it on there.

PK and I have been on three blues cruises, and we will doubtless go again. 

The only hazard is that afterward, ordinary life can seem way too dull, resulting in an affliction most blues cruisers know: PBCSS 

A post about an earlier blues cruise and the sad aftermath. I have PBCSS right now!
Blues Cruise and the Post Blues Cruise Stress Syndrome 

In the end, it's all a beautiful blur.