NORTHERN CORTEZ VISITED BY WHITE PELICANS

Feb. 25, 2007, Title Company Bookstore, Catalina Meders, San Felipe, Baja California, Mexico:

Hola everyone from San Felipe, Mexico, where it is nippy this morning but looks like it may warm up as the day progresses. Right now, at 10:45 a.m., it's 68 degrees on the bookstore balcony with 38 percent relative humidity.

It feels warmer than that in the direct sunlight.

Bahia de San Felipe is opal and turquoise today, extremely beautiful.

The other morning a gentleman came into the bookstore with a wonderful photograph of a large flock of pure white pelicans that he had taken right down here in front of the San Felipe malecon right after sunrise.

I had never seen white pelicans before and he had never seen any around here. He said it seemed very unusual. They have moved on, apparently, because we haven't seen any since.

It looks like the Baja 250 race is on after all. At least, the support vehicles are starting to arrive in San Felipe already.

This is great news for San Felipe businesses. A canceled race the size of this one would have been a crushing blow for San Felipe.

The Carnaval holiday celebration at San Felipe this year was "charming" rather than "spectacular." The parade was quite short, but the dancing children were very sweet. And for once we didn't have a huge wind storm in the middle of things, although it has been windy here lately.

There has been a lot of dust in the air which has only aggravated the stubborn "gripa" that hit the town before Christmas and and still has so many people coughing and sneezing.

Spring will not arrive a moment too soon! Until next time, vaya con Dios from the bookstore by the bay.