November Already!?!?!?

Just realized that Summer is over.  Actually, I missed the start of Summer, since my last post was the 24th of May but, then, it's summer here most of the year.  So what's been going on since then?



There was the trip to the Bacolod for my 50th High School reunion.  A whirlwind trip of eight days, three of which were spent in airports, in the air or on trains.  Had a great time catching up with classmates, most of whom I hadn't seen for fifty years.  How they got old, I don't know.  We ate too much, drank too much and stayed up way too late, but it was a worthwhile trip.

Then it was off to Maine for the MS Society bike ride and all-too-short visits with the family and friends.  Having sold my car and motorcycle, I had to cycle from home to home, which was fun and kept me in good shape.  My only complaint was about a ruined wheel caused by hitting a pot hole during a thunderstorm in Augusta.  I was enjoying the downhill rush in whitewater until the impact. Didn't get up to Oakland or the County to visit friends, as I didn't have the time to cycle there.  My stay was only 28 days long, but couch-surfing from Bruce and Sylvia's to Nick's and Shan's and Dyl's took up most of the trip.

Ten days after my return, Is and I took a bus trip to Viella in the Pyrennes, spending six days in the cool mountains, winding up and down hills that would daunt most cyclists, but are actually a big draw for those looking for a challenge.  One side trip was to Luchon, in France, which was the site of one of this year's Tour de France.

There were at least three bike tours to Puerto Mazzaron, Sierra de Espuña and La Colonia de Santa Eulalia, all involving many kilometers, much good food and moderate quantities of beer and wine. They all helped push my total toward my goal of 12,000 km for the year.  Sounds like a lot, but one of our group, Tom Tychesen from Norway, set a world record for the month of July by cycling 6276.6 Kilometers-more than half what I will do for the year.

October brought the olive harvest and a couple of batches.  My tree produced only five, but they will be ready for eating in eleven days, and I will do so with gusto.  I have since found out that, though olive trees self-pollinate, they produce much more when they cross-polinate.  I see another tree in my future.  The second batch was harvested from public trees (with permission from the ayuntamiento or town hall) and will be ready 12 December, all 298 of them.  If the experiment is a success, we will do many more next fall.





We had a two week exhibition at the town library, started Spanish classes again, joined a drawing class, a T'ai Chi group (the latter two done individually) and went to Madrid for a couple of days to renew Is' Philippine passport and meet old friends.  Naturally we visited our favorite restaurants and caught a couple of art exhibits.

And that brings me up to date.