Yellowknife (Jan 08/07) - Christmas was hot and humid for the Lange family this year.

Former Yellowknife residents Ann and Barry Lange spent the holidays on a beach in Zihuatenejo, Mexico, as a pit stop during their five-year sailing trip around the world.

"It's been wonderful, we're really enjoying ourselves," said Ann Lange. "But we're really missing the snow now at Christmas."

Instead of snow, the pair enjoyed 30C heat and 65 per cent humidity on Christmas day. Lange and her husband spent the evening walking on the beach, surrounded by Mexican families playing in the sand while jet-skiers shot by in the water. On New Year's Eve there was a party on the beach with live Mexican music and a dazzling display of fireworks that splashed across three bays.

The couple will continue sailing south, but will have to pull the boat out of the water from June to November. They'll take that time to prepare for the month-long journey it will take to cross the Pacific Ocean to New Zealand. Lange said they haven't yet decided if they might hire a crewman to help them make it across.

The couple first learned to sail on Great Slave Lake in 1993. They left Yellowknife in 2004, quitting their jobs and selling their house to start the voyage which they had been planning for six years.

"My husband had the dream," said Ann Lange. "But I made it a reality."

The two started off the trip in 2005 from Vancouver where they had bought the 40 foot sailboat, named The Cat's Paw IV.

They spent a year preparing the boat before heading down the Western coast to Mexico.

Ann, now 51, and Barry, 57, left their jobs to pursue the dream.

"What I tell people is that you can work till you are 60, but what about all those things that you always wanted to do but never could," she said in 2005 before she started the trip.

Now over a year into the trip, Ann said she has no regrets so far about their decision. She reports that aside from a few unscheduled stops to avoid some bad weather, the couple hasn't had any major problems so far.

Heather, one of the couple's daughters, still lives in Yellowknife, and has said she might visit her parents if they go to Africa.

Their other two daughters, Jennifer and Trish, who no longer live in Yellowknife, will join their parents for a surfing holiday in Mexico this year.