Life after 60...........is good!: Alive and kickin'............

Last week Doug, myself, and our temporary house mate, Kris got our tushes kicked by a horrible flu like virus. I was pretty sure I was going to die..............After three days, Doug and Kris were able to drag themselves to the Doctors office where we found out that we would all, indeed, live! Their joint visit to the doctors office and medicine for all three of us cost less then a pizza back home........

We are approaching our 3 month anniversary of being in Ecuador.
Up to now, we have been living like we are on vacation........ it's been fun, but we are ready to start making Cuenca our home.

We finally got a one year lease signed for the apartment that we want to call our home. We are told that it will be available for at least 4 years before the owners return to Cuenca, so we feel good about setting it up as our home.
We get the apartment August 1st, but we will be allowed to start moving things in sooner.
Yesterday we went to the great anniversary sale at the Sukasa Store and had a great time buying kitchen and household stuff. Sukasa is a smaller version of the Bay stores in Canada, minus the clothes department. They are a bit pricey for Ecuador, but their merchandise is good quality. The anniversary sale prices were extremely good with up to 60% off of some of the things we purchased.
The store was very crowded and we were there for several hours, spending at least an hour in the check out line. Doug showed a great deal of patience for that much shopping time.... Retirement and the" Ecuador way of life" are certainly agreeing with him.

SHOPPING QUEENS

It's a good thing we worked up an appetite shopping, because we stopped for a "light" lunch. We each ordered what was billed as "individual" pizza and this is what we got...............
KRIS"S PIZZA

DOUG'S PIZZA

MY CALZONE- which also became my dinner............

Kris and I are planning on going back to the sale tomorrow or Tuesday without Doug so we can spend some quality time rummaging thru the sales tables and bins.......

Our weather continues to be a mix every day. Some rain most days, some clouds everyday, and some sun everyday. You get a different view from every person you talk to about when "winter" is. but, everyone agrees that the El Nino and la Nina weather patterns have affected the normal weather trend of Cuenca for the past two years. the scientific prediction is that "normal" weather will return soon.

We had one particularly wet afternoon, that caused the river that runs in front of our place, the Tomebamba, to rise about 6 feet in just a few hours. It was amazing to see Mother nature at work...........

Now that the rental contract is completed, we are planning a trip to the coast net week. A few days of sunshine and beach and beer and seafood............ oh boy! We are going to take the bus and getting there shall be half the fun. Luckily Kris still has a camera, so I will be able to take lots of pictures for posting.

Cooking with local ingredients, and on a propane stove and oven, continues to be a learning process. i am pleased to report that I made an apple pie yesterday that would make Mom proud....

During the baking of this beauty of a pie, I learned that you CAN NOT put foil in the bottom of the oven to catch the pie drippings! We had a minor flaming fire that had the foil welding it's self to the floor of the oven, but the pie was saved and the oven didn't suffer too badly.
Tonight we are going to bake what we think might be sweet potatoes. They are a deep rose red potato on the outside with orange flesh.............
I also made a quart of spiced beet pickles that I hope will be tasty in about 3 weeks.

Here are a few pics of our activities as we go about our daily living here in this marvellous place.........