AstroGypsies

We are Mike and Pamela:) I was just reading a blog about how important this “about you” or “get to know me” page is…interesting read, maybe I just don’t feel like self promotion is the best thing at times, happy having the reader make their own assumptions through our work and travel blog perhaps. I suppose it is fair enough if you are going to take the time to read this and peruse the page you can know something about us;)

I don’t think we were ever quite “normal” whatever normal is. We come from adventurous families full of wonderfully strange and wandering types. I was born in Vancouver, raised by my somewhat, OK, just plain crazy mother with my siblings on a sailboat sailing around the world for most of my youth. The 68′ tall mast was our jungle gym and the ocean our pool. Our Dad in our early years, before our mother ran off with us, gave us a wonderful grounding, something my mother couldn’t, my brother and I took away from him a sense of doing something, right, the first time if it needs to be done. Mike was born and raised on a farm in Ontario, after his parents immigrated from Germany. He embraced nature from an early age and had a love for astronomy from the very beginning.

We met at a carburetor shop in San Diego while he was going to University for Marine Biology and I had returned from several years in the Indian Ocean on a small French Island but those are other chapters. He had his ’69 Camaro, I had my ’65 Vette…true love pretty much right off the bat:) We both love Monty Python and the X Files so what could go wrong? We eventually moved back to his home town of Ontario to take over his father’s sheep farm and that changed after his mothers death when his father remarried, things got difficult. I went out on a limb and purchased the farm across from our house and we slowly built up an equestrian center over the years.  We met so many a wonderful people and horses, sometimes the horses were nicer than their owners but hey, or is that hay, that was the adventure right?;) Ha! Kidding! Sort of;)

But I regress, we were doing this until things weirdly progressed in our lives and…

We threw caution to the wind, sold our home, cars and equestrian center in Canada and moved to a ranch in Northern Baja, Mexico to the darkest sky area we could find…the Sierra de San Pedro Mártir. Home to Mexico’s National Observatory and some of the finest seeing in the Northern Hemisphere, best tacos ever and a wonderful new experience, new language with such fabulous “gente de la sierra” people that became our friends. I had promised Mike if he helped me with my passion of horses for a few years, ha, or more, I would follow him on his…what was I thinking, I should have added stipulations;)

It was an amazing journey, another chapter. We built an adobe home, observatories and cabins, learning a myriad of skills we never thought possible,  but we just never got to do what we set out to do, educate and amaze as many people as possible with a look through that eyepiece at a piece of our universe.

So we have been exploring the open road… looking for dark skies to explore and other travelers to share it with.

The 18″ Dobsonian telescope is tucked in the right cargo bay of the fifth wheel trailer with the help of ramps.

Mike has his telescopes and I have my camera in hand and our mission is to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations…wait a minute…too many Star Trek reruns…to boldly go where no geeks have gone before? I’ll keep you posted…

 We are not alone..uhmmm…thanks Mulder…we started out with our three old Burmese boys, Fitzy, Stinky and Beezil and sadly all have gone to the catnip fields:(

Our new guardians of the Galaxy, the traveling Mewberries, include Groot, the tree climbing/chipmunk killing kitten from a dairy barn in Westport and Gamora, our little girl, a sweet street urchin from Ottawa (unless you are a dog…apparently she has had issues with canines in the past, maybe deer, does anyone have a cat that chases deer away?) and the latest addition-Rocket the orange wonder missing the brain cell kitten;)…never a dull moment:) and lots of cat hair everywhere;) You’d think we like cats;)

Sorry if this went on for too long, It was supposed to be brief but a few more things;)

We love good wine and fine craft beer and food, Mexican, Thai, Indian, Greek you name it, we’ll try it, but real food. Not out of a packet;)

We love horses and cats and yes, even some dogs;) oh, I forgot, donkeys as well;) I guess pretty much most animals…except mosquitos;)

We hate bad politics and all the crap that goes with it, the hatred, the racism and self-important egotistical “me first” asses, seems there are a lot of them out there, but also an amazing amount of open minded kind human beings.

We love nature in all her glory…

Geez, this list could really go on…if you want to meet us, walk right up, take a look through one of the telescopes, we’re really rather easy-going;)

Hope you can join us from time to time as we share our adventures on and off the road and through the night skies! Covid slowed us for a bit and we put some roots down back where we started from so many years ago. Reacquainting ourselves with the beauty of the area and finding all those amazing horse and astronomy friends we had made here. Life is a journey I try to live day by day! I have an additional sidekick now, the little red canoe;) Yes, I have slowed down a bit over the years;) Ha! It’s paddle power, not horsepower now;)

For any questions, complaints or quejas: astrogypsies@gmail.com

Someone might get back to you;) hahahaha!