Our neighbors were down in warm Loreto, having escaped the cold Canadian winter, to claim the dubious honor as the first homeowners in Agua Viva to do their CoSP walk through. I am most appreciative with only a couple of days there, they were generous to slice out a piece of it and take some photos of our place.

They also got confirmation that the exterior door “knobs” I have seen are temporary ones for construction and will be replaced with the nicer door “levers” I have seen in Founders.

The gate in the back garden is still the iron one but by all accounts I have received confirmation that it will be replaced with the opaque, wooden gate (gate #2 in our options) that we had originally chosen. To be fair, the mix up was not completely one-sided. Ideally, I wanted gate doors that would open outwards from the garden. However, because of the clearance on the other side, doing so would not have met code…something to do with liability issues of hitting a person walking on the other side.

However, my preference order of:

• Opaque door opening outward
• Opaque door opening inward
• No garden gate door
• Being bitten by 10 mosquitos
• See-through iron gate that looks straight into our bathroom and having me reveal too much information to my dear Loreto neighbors

…got lost between my account manager and the construction team. Fancy that! Anyways, I have been told by Loreto Bay the doors have been ordered from Guadalajara a couple weeks back and need to be made and then delivered to Loreto Baja. All’s well that will end well!

I am still getting mixed reports from various sources on the actual status of the permanent utilities in the Agua Viva phase of Loreto Bay so I am looking forward to being down on the ground next weekend to make my own assessment of the situation. I am, by no means, an expert but I do hope to ask the right question and try to make good use of my eyes and ears.

Besides checking out the construction, Clint and I hope to just chill and relax by the water and with other Loreto Bay homeowners.

Our neighbors, the Stepps, on the other side chose my second favorite color so I am very excited about having both my favorite and second favorite colors so close by.

The solar water heater is different than any others I have seen so I will also be asking about what the differences are between this model and the others. You would imagine they would try to keep these the same so that maintenance skills needed for all of them would be streamlined. However, my understanding is that Loreto Bay puts out specifications and the subcontractors can choose their own suppliers as long as they meet specifications.

Another photo of our interior courtyard garden which I love. It is just enough greenery while still being relatively low maintenance.

The cabinets above the refrigerator are still not fixed. I got word from Loreto Bay many weeks ago that the cabinets will be replace with larger ones that extend down towards the refrigerator instead of having such a big gap. There was a question on the height of the cabinets and LBC has told me that they were measured and according to the design specifications.

Notice how the air conditioner is now in the right location in the first floor bedroom. It took ages to get this resolved but LBC finally did. Yeah!

I can’t wait to go down to not only see our Loreto home in person but also to check out the beautiful pool and landscaping that has been put into Founder’s. The latter just gives me encouragement and inspiration that the Agua Viva phase will follow suit in having its courtyard landscaping look as beautiful.

For those in Loreto, see you soon! Save a margarita for me.

Loni Kao Stark
Co-Founder StarkSilverCreek, Creative Director and Wine Collector

Loni is a self-professed foodie, adventure travel seeker and aspiring artist. It’s been said her laugh can be heard from San Jose all the way to the Golden Gate Bridge. The former Ms. Global Petite runner-up is host of several SSC shows including WineTube TV, StarkSilverCreek Presents, Loreto Live, and the new series The Artist Diaries. Between busy travel schedules to Washington, Napa and global destinations such as Australia, the Baja and Europe, she expends the rest of her energy collecting wines, practicing “escape artist”-style cooking, and building what she hopes, one day, will be a real estate empire. She catches her breath by writing about her adventures.
Twitter: @lonikaostark More: articles bio

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