Travel with Kevin and Ruth

Speaking of snakes...

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Read) — Sat, 29 Aug 2026 12:28:27 +0000

Just an update of our activities the last two days.

On Thursday we drove a half hour or so over to the town of Windsor to meet friends Aron and Owenita. This is one of the couples that was on our last RV caravan to Mexico in the winter of 2019-2020.

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The swimming hole

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Read) — Thu, 27 Aug 2026 12:23:52 +0000

Growing up where I did in Ottawa, there was no nearby popular outdoor swimming area. We didn't have one where we brought up our kids either. Ruth was lucky in that regard, with a swimming hole in the river that was walking distance from her house.

She says she remembers many great summers spending time at the swimming hole.

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Finally bought a VPN

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Read) — Wed, 26 Aug 2026 12:15:44 +0000

We're not really planning on doing very much while we're here. Just kind of helping out around the house when we can, and driving the kids to various places.

On Monday, I drove granddaughter Sadie (will be 13 on Saturday) to a friends cottage. She'll be up there for two days and should return this afternoon.

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Well that was a long 21 hours!

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Read) — Mon, 24 Aug 2026 11:45:43 +0000

We just drove from Gravenhurst, Ontario to Wolfville, Nova Scotia in one shot! A distance of 1,928 kms (1,200 miles)!

It took us 21 hours start to finish. We left at 1:00am Sunday morning and arrived at 11:00pm Sunday night. With a one hour time zone change.

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The gang's all here!

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Read) — Sat, 22 Aug 2026 18:09:26 +0000

It was a gorgeous day yesterday here in the Muskoka region of Ontario.

This area, about two hours north of Toronto is known as "cottage country" because of its roughly 1,600 lakes, rocky granite shields, and thick pine forests.

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That was a long 20 hours...

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Read) — Fri, 21 Aug 2026 14:34:34 +0000

A couple of weeks ago on our daily walk, we were passing a guy out washing his truck, and we said good morning. He stopped us, and said in English "where are you guys from?". So we ended up talking to him for a few minutes. It turns out he spent 25 years in the state of Georgia, but recently returned here to Mexico to "retire".

Instead, he ended up opening a taco shop to keep busy! So before we left for the airport, we took our friend Chago out for lunch.

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And we're off!

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Read) — Wed, 19 Aug 2026 14:12:53 +0000

It's been a nice relaxing time for us here at the house in Mexico over the last four weeks. We met some new friends, kept up with our daily exercise program, and got all of our internet projects complete.

And today, we will take the bus into the big tamale (Mexico City) and fly to Toronto overnight tonight.

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Our upcoming flight to Toronto

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Read) — Tue, 18 Aug 2026 14:56:39 +0000

I never told you this story.

Our flight to Toronto tomorrow is with Aeromexico. But (against my better judgement), I had originally booked with Air Canada. I won't make that mistake again.

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No wonder retirees move to cheaper countries

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Read) — Mon, 17 Aug 2026 14:58:00 +0000

I follow a few facebook and youtube groups of expats and retirees who use their government retirement benefits to make a better life for themselves in a less expensive country, and some have posted their income from those sources.

I noticed that the Americans seem to get a lot more income than Canadians, so I did some digging.

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Our upcoming Canada trip

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Read) — Sun, 16 Aug 2026 14:40:44 +0000

Our five hour AeroMexico flight departs at 11:15pm on Wednesday the 19th and we arrive in Toronto at 6:20am the morning of the 20th.

Then we take a local GO bus from the airport to the Ontario Northlands terminal for our 9:30am departure to Gravenhurst, Ontario where our son will pick us up. That's a two and a half hour bus ride.

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Was it worth it?

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Read) — Sat, 15 Aug 2026 14:26:51 +0000

When we return to Mexico on October 5th, we will have had our house here for one full year. So now we can do the math as to whether or not it was worth it to us from a financial perspective... and from an enjoyment of life perspective.

We're headed back to Canada on Wednesday for six weeks, so we now know how many nights of that one year we will have spent in the Mexico house.

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Just an update

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Read) — Thu, 13 Aug 2026 15:33:10 +0000

Not much happening around here. We continue to do our morning 5 km (3 mile) powerwalk, and our daily exercise routine.

And we've been watching a lot of Blue Jays baseball... they've not had a good season, especially compared to last year but they've won 10 of their last 15 games, so maybe things are turning around in time to manage a playoff spot by the end of September.

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Could we live there?

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Read) — Mon, 10 Aug 2026 14:18:30 +0000

One of the ways we rate a country and our experience there is by asking the question "could we live there?"

So, we've just been to three new countries... China, Hong Kong, and Japan, and here is the answer to that question regarding these countries...

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Have never been to a Mushroom Festival before

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Read) — Sun, 09 Aug 2026 14:47:41 +0000

Our friends Fernando and Jessie invited us to go with them to a mushroom festival in the indigenous villages of San Simon and San Antonio, in the mountains about 20 kms north of here.

And they also invited some new friends, Chris and Michelle, an American couple who live here in Valle de Bravo.

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A little update on our South America camper

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Read) — Sat, 08 Aug 2026 14:28:43 +0000

So we got the ATV back from the mechanic, and took it for a drive into town yesterday morning. It fired up right away, but didn't seem to idle properly, and even died while we were getting on it ready to go. It had never done that before.

We rode it into town and back without a problem, but it's not running right. A little disappointed, but already spoke to the mechanic and will be bringing it back to him on Monday.

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Got the ATV back from the mechanic

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Read) — Fri, 07 Aug 2026 14:27:42 +0000

Well, we haven't been able to solve the problem we're having with accessing this blog. If you're reading this, you're one of the lucky ones!

Anyhow, this is our daily diary, so even if it's just for ourselves, we want to keep it going.

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Photos around our neighborhood

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Read) — Tue, 04 Aug 2026 14:10:21 +0000

I've mentioned that we do a 5 km (3 mile) circular power walk every day while we're here at the house. It's actually uphill from the lakeshore to the town of El Arco, so it gets the heart pumping a little bit more than if we were totally on flat ground.

Most of the regular vendors recognize us and say good morning as we pass.

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The older you get, the more important it is...

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Read) — Mon, 03 Aug 2026 14:45:49 +0000

Over the coming months, we will both turn 65 years old. Ruth in November, and me in February... and we will then be official senior citizens! We'll be able to retire and travel the world...LOL!

Regular readers here know that we try and stay physically active. And while traveling, we find that it's fairly easy to get in a sufficient amount of cardio exercise... but the muscular exercise has been lacking.

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We hopped on the ATV and drove to the other side of the lake

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Read) — Sun, 02 Aug 2026 14:20:14 +0000

Instead of our daily 5 km (3 mile) power walk, we decided to drive over to to the community of Avandaro and go for a hike to the Velo de Novia waterfall.

We've been there before, but not for many years, and never during rainy season.

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July Expenses

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Read) — Sat, 01 Aug 2026 15:49:43 +0000

Well, we knew July was going to be an expensive month, and that's exactly what it was.

We started the month in China, and ended it in Mexico... with stops in Hong Kong, Japan, and Canada in between. So we were in a total of five countries in July! No wonder it was expensive.

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Enjoying this time of year in Mexico

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Read) — Fri, 31 Jul 2026 14:35:42 +0000

First of all, yes, we know that there has been some kind of glitch accessing this blog. But if you're reading this then you've obviously got through it.

This happened once before, a few months ago, and it resolved itself on its own after a couple of days. Hopefully this time will be the same.

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I'm pretty sure we've made our decision...

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Read) — Wed, 29 Jul 2026 14:51:36 +0000

The other day, our blog post went over some of the different types of vehicles that we were looking at as possibilities for our South American motorhome or campervan.

Well it didn't take much research to narrow the list of possibilities.

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How much did it cost for three weeks in China?

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Read) — Tue, 28 Jul 2026 14:32:59 +0000

We recently spent three weeks in four different regions of China. We arrived in Chengdu, then took the train to Xi'an, then flew to Zhangjiajie, then took the train to Guilin.

I won't include the cost of getting to and from China. That's useless information, because it depends on where you're coming from and going to! And this doesn't include our three days in Hong Kong.

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Sunday market day

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Read) — Mon, 27 Jul 2026 14:30:15 +0000

They were calling for a thunderstorm after lunch, so we got out early and did our five km (3 mile) power walk around our nearby town of El Arco.

It's not a nature walk, but I commented to Ruth yesterday that it's much more interesting than the same distance walk we used to do every day when we were house sitting near Ottawa the last few years.

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It's definitely going to be fun designing and having an RV built exactly the way we want it!

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Read) — Sun, 26 Jul 2026 13:49:46 +0000

Our original plan was to take Igor to South America, provided we were happy with him so far. But we've decided that Igor isn't the right vehicle. He'll do fine for us this coming winter in Central America, but South America presents a new set of problems.

The first problem is shipping him from Panama to either Venezuela or Colombia.

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