Goodbye MEXICO, Hello WINTER

So today is our last day in Mexico, tomorrow morning we board the bus for our 3 connecting flights to Calgary. One flight is pretty tight, so hopefully we won't get stuck in Mexico City! Last time we were there, it wasn't that fun

My top 10 list:
San Agustin beach and road
VW Beetle
Zipolite beach
Shrimp tacos at Baccocho beach
Carrizalillo beach
Oaxaca city
Fried Plantains at Manzanillo beach
La Punta surfers
Zicatella lifeguards
Teotitlan rug weavers

Bottom 10 list:
No Salads
Cold airports
Sunburn
missing wallet
No Soy milk = No Cappuccino
drowned IPod touch
stomach aches
Getting Wave tossed X3
no red mole
no Oaxaca city Torta

Our next trip will be a cross country ski trip to a ACC hut in March, what a difference a couple months make!

Adrian wants to go skiing this weekend just for the contrast of Hot to Cold weather, I think it is a fun idea!

See you in Calgary!

Marinero Beach and other places

It has been a while since I updated the blog with any pictures. We have been to Zicatella, Zipolite and Marinero since I last posted pictures.

On Wednesday we went to Zicatella for the day, but the waves and the tow were so strong, we couldn't even wade in, so we walked West. to check out the rest of the beach past the rocks.

We have hit all the beaches in PE except Marinero. Marinero is east of the main beach, or what the locals refer to as "Playa Principal". Every beach town has a Playa Principal, and it appears to me that it is where the fishermen bring in their catch, but also where they park their boats.

Marinero has a pretty fair swimming beach. The palapa restaurants were busy, but we seemed to find one that was poorly served, even though the guy really sold us on sitting in his area.

The beach is surrounded on the East side by rocks, and on closer inspection, the rocks are covered in little black crabs! eek, I just leaned on that rock :)

Check out the little black crabs!!!

Our Casa is close to the light house on the cliff

Rocks that separate Zicatella from Marinero

Playa Principal

We only have 3 days left. All in all a great holiday and an experience to remember. We've learned a lot about future vacationing and retirement. It was much harder to stay busy for 5 weeks than we had expected. We now know that a vehicle makes adventure travel way more fun! Even if the vehicle is frequently passed by mopeds! Road tripping (is that a word?) in Mexico is not as difficult as one might think, especially if you stay out of large cities and off the roads at night. Motorhome travel, in south Mexico anyway, is a foolish idea! The roads are just much too narrow. 

Hasta Luego mi Amigos and Amigas!

Last days in our Casa

Today we found out today is the last day in our Casa, the property manager made a mistake by a day so we are moving tomorrow. I think we will be moving within the same complex, there is a vacant house next door for us to move into for 4 days then it is back to good ole Canerda!

We had a relatively boring day today, didn't even hit the beach and the reason was COMIDA! no this is not a disease, it is the Mexican lunch meal which is the biggest of the day. Our friends are headed back to Rhode Island tomorrow, so their soon to be in-law Nancye invited all of us, and some other friends over for the traditional time of Comida 2:00. Nancye is a New Yorker with a Georgian accent and has a great house keeper and cook from Mexico.

Comida totally takes up the entire middle of the day and leaves you drunk and full by sundown. The meal was to die for. Salad (I was dying for a salad), Chili Rellanos, Rice, and a great dessert of Lime Pie, and way too much Sangria. I couldn't even tell the time after that, not because of the Sangria, but because Nancye's dog Yakadoo ate my watch right off of my wrist! P.S. family, my birthday is approaching and I need a new watch......

Once we were released from the oppressive Comida, we came back home and it was only 8:00! I thought it was at least 10:00 and was ready for bed. Since it was so early and we hadn't hit the beach today, we went to our pool and swam.

Tomorrow I hope to have something more interesting to blog, but rest assured we are alive, well and ready to hit the beach tomorrow.

Hasta Manana!

Manzanute, San Augustinillo, and Zipolite Beaches

We have been here for over 30 days now and have not made it out to the Puerto Angel beaches, while only an hour away, we have been very busy with closer beaches. So Yesterday we headed out to look at the area.

On the way there, we finally got a picture of the "hotsheet" or "car motel" just on the outskirts of Puerto Escondido. These motels are everywhere, and are for rent by the hour! Many people traveling through Mexico have funny stories of pulling in to these for the night and getting woken up in the middle of the night to leave! The motels are for elicit meetings with someone other than your spouse or girlfriend!

this picture doesn't show the garages with the sliding doors to hide your car...

We made it to Manzanute where the Turtle Museum is, around 12:00 and we were starved, but we couldn't find the restaurants that are in the tour book so we walked around a bit to see the town. The beach was beautiful.....as usual. So we jumped in the VW and headed to the next village of San Agustinillo, which is reported to be the best of the 5-6 on this stretch. WINDY! However, we found a great little cafe and I had a glass of red wine (hard to find a good one here!) and Adrian had orange juice while we shared a sandwich and some home made cookies, which are also hard to find good ones!

Again, we hopped in the good old VW to head to Zipolite which is one of the only nude beaches in Mexico. Mexicans don't typically allow nudity, but some how this beach got a reputation for it and it gained popularity with wealthy foreigners and they keep coming back. We parked and headed in for a look. Great beach, interesting characters, so we stayed. Lots of nudists, not just in the area that we read it is designated for, but the entire length of the beach. (SORRY NO PICTURES:) )

We had a great day drinking beer, we brought along our left over run and coke and had a few and generally lapped up the sun and surf!

6 days left in Paradise. It has been awesome so far and we hope to see a few more things before we leave. Calgary's Winter looms and we plan on squeezing every last drop of sunshine and heat and surf out of this place before we depart! Stay tuned.

Xox
Adrian and Bernetta

Caught our own Supper in Mexico!

It was an early morning, up at 6:00 am, fishing by 7:00. Since we've been here we have wanted to fish, we were hoping Eric would want to but it was way too early for him:) After we got back from Oaxaca we made a list of things we still wanted to do and fishing was on that list.

Adrian on the lucky side of the boat

Me on the un-lucky side of the boat

We hired a guide recommended by the Victoria people who were here at Christmas, his name was Chon, pronounced Shawn. He and his first mate Luis were at the beach when we arrived in their boat Yadira. We had to push dear Yadira into the water with the help of many a little Mexican! Those are heavy boats and the tide was really low. Chon is not a commercial fisherman, and can only take tourists out to fish so it is important to him both for his reputation and his economics for us to catch some fish. Any fish that we don't take with us, they either sell, or take home to their families.

After we set sail it wasn't long before we had some excitement, a baby whale and Momma were breaching just ahead of us. We watched for a while, then it was time to get out there. The fish we wanted to catch are around 3-4 kms out from shore. Dorado, or what we call Mahi Mahi are a well sought after fish with flaky white flesh that can be easily sold by the fisherman and Sailfish, which are a dirty tasting brown meat, very popular with the Mexicans, these were our prey today.

After baiting up we trolled 3 fishing poles, one for each me and Adrian, and an extra for ?? About a half hour in both Adrian and I got a bite! Neither one stayed on the hook. So we tried some more, and during this time we saw a bunch of turtles and dozens, upon dozens of dolphins! The turtles swam solo and I'm sure we saw 7 or more. The dolphins apparently are migrating to South America and pass by here for the months of January and February, then head North sometime later in the year. Dolphins are amazing, most of them were fairly small, but very agile, jumping and playing and belly flopping all around us! By this time we had already had the wildlife tri-fecta! if we didn't see anything more I think our day would have been great any how.....but the day was not over

About an hour and a half in both Adrian and I had bites again, at the same time, again! But this time, Adrian kept his on the line! A great big Dorado, about 25 pounds and it was a handful to get in. It fought and jumped and generally was not giving up. It's too bad I can't post video here, cause i got a great short video of this fish Jumping out of the water very close to the boat. Our guides were almost as excited as us by the catch!

Adrian reeling it in

25 pound Mahi Mahi (Dorado)

As the morning and our 4 hours progressed, it looked like we would only get this one fish, but that is better than being skunked altogether I guess. So we headed back, with our lines still trolling and low and behold, Adrian gets a great bite! A Sailfish. Sailfish fight hard and pull out and jump just as they are being hooked, but it couldn't get away from us. It took Adrian around 10-15 minutes to reel this big boy in. The guide figured it was about 70 pounds. Luis, the first mate couldn't have been more excited if he had the fish on the line himself! I think he was counting on the sailfish for his family.

Adrian pulling in the Sailfish

Proud fishermen

Me getting in on the action

Our small piece of the Dorado for supper

Our Dorado supper, with home made Oaxacena Soup (see the green broth!)

I didn't get any fish, but I had 3 bites, and got to watch Adrian haul in 2 fish. On our way back in we came upon a very large Whale, this time breaching really close to the boat.

After lunch we headed to the beach at Bacocho and sat in the sun and debriefed with a few cocktails, walked to the point, and sunned our selves. Adrian will have a sore arm tomorrow!
What a day.
B&A

A Mexican Weekend

This weekend in Mexico:

Saturday morning was spent purchasing food for the rest of our stay, and for the dinner party/cookout with all of our neighbours. The market was busier than I have seen it. All the indigenous people from the region were there selling their goods. My purchases:

-mangos and a serving bowl for my Paella. I hope I can bring the serving bowl home, but it was only 40 pesos (3.20) so If not, se la vie!
-purchased tomatos and cilantro from one vendor, parsley from another
-coffee and oranges from a little old Mixteca woman
-chorizo sausage from the butcher
-a huge pineapple from a street vendor on the way to the market
-avocados and lime from one of the regular vendors
-freshly shelled peas, a red pepper from one of the regular vendors
- Squash flowers, for soup from an indigenous lady
- finally purchased a rotisserie chicken from the popular chicken guy

The dinner was great, grilled Mahi Mahi, grilled shrimp, my Paella, a tomato salad, almond stuffed prunes wrapped in bacon (!!!), guacamole, brushetta, and on and on.... good company and a few sangrias and beers.

We spent the day at Zicatella, on our way there we came upon a protest. I'm hoping that Vanessa, who works with Adrian can do some translating for us.

Today, Sunday we planned a road trip! According to the guide book there is a really interesting town up in the hills called Nopala. Nopala is famous for it's Aztec stone slabs taken from the ruin close to the town and moved to the Municipal building.

So after breakfast we packed up the VW with some drinks and our guide books and  headed up Highway 131, north of PE. The road is the same one we came home from Oaxaca on so we knew the roads were bad, but it is only 47 km to San Gabriel, then another 7-8 past that on another road.

First we passed through San Pedro, about 15 minutes out. We stopped in the town and walked to the local church which was packed and having services. This town also had it's fair share of tuk-tuks!

San Pedro's Municipal Building

Next we passed through San Gabriel, which like many of the mountain pass roads has dozens of pay banos (restrooms) along the side of the road. We each paid 3 pesos to use the washrooms here. Then to find the road to Nopala.... There are no signs pointing anything out around this part of Mexico. I'm not sure that this is unique or if it is just part of being in Mexico!  However, we used our very marginal spanish and asked a couple of girls if we were on the right road, we were.

Asses on the road :)

The cows look really well fed here, not skinny like in many other areas

Collectivo, these look so dangerous, people hang off all sides

More cows without owners on the highway ?

This is what slows you down on the roads in Mexico; speed bumps everywhere

Once we got to Nopala, we were on the search for the Municipal building, which is it's claim to fame. In the 60's the locals went to their ancestors ancient city and chipped off slabs of site and put them into the walls of the building. Their is talk of building a new Municipal building and they say they will be moving them. Nopala is a very confusing little town, built on a hill and scattered with one way streets and alleys not marked. Unfortunately directions are not always marked so going the wrong way down one ways has been common for us :) But this time we had an even more harrowing experience, we took a road that looked like it headed in the right direction (?) and it did, but it was steep and got narrower and steeper than it was BLOCKED at the top. No way through, luckily Adrian found a nitch to turn around in. We both panicked a bit, but the VW and Adrian came through. We were both a bit shaky after that one....

We found another road to the market and ultimately it was also at the Municipal building to boot. There was a nice policeman who let us into the locked building to take a look around and from the balcony on the building we could see a lot of the town

View from the Municipal building

But the most amazing part was the "frescos" from the Aztec burial site that are imbedded in the walls;

 

We walked around a bit of the town, it was not that busy, maybe because it is Sunday. After a little exploring we headed back to our car to try to find out way back to the highway, but alas we couldn't find our way out at all. No worries, I have watched the Amazing Race enough to know that a taxi driver will let you follow him to find your way! Our little Tuk Tuk drive did that for us, I gave him 20 pesos for his trouble :)

On our way out of Nopala, Adrian set his arm on the window of VW and unfortunately, there was a bee/wasp there and he got bit. Mexican bees seem to be a bit worse than the Canadian variety, he got quite the bite and it swelled and turned pretty red, here is a picture with the bite at it's worst. I was hoping I wouldn't have to learn to drive the VW if he passed out :(

Adrian's bee sting

Bee hives

Mexicans love their honey (Miel) and I guess with all those hives there is going to be a few bees around. I have purchased some honey here, the proceeds go towards the orphanage, and I have been having it most mornings on my toast and sometimes on my fruit, it is absolutely fantastic tasting! I'm bringing the left overs home!

Tomorrow morning at 6:45 Adrian and I are going Fishing! Wish us luck on the ocean, I just hope not to get seasick.

Bernetta and Adrian

The VW is back!

After being car-less for the last week, we have the VW back! We have a few more things to see and do before we head back home;
-Nopales, a mountain town
-Manialtipec Lagoon
-Manzanute and San Agustinillo beaches (side by side)
-Sport fishing (booked for Monday Jan 24th at 6:45)

As a special treat to myself, I had Adrian drop me off on the way to the beach at an esthetic place for a manicure! I've been growing my nails since my manicure in Calgary just before Christmas. I could communicate to the ladies what I wanted and they indicated it would be 120 pesos ($10.00). We all 3 did our best to figure out a few things to talk about, I opened up my Spanish / English dictionary and a few hand signals and pretty soon I knew Gloria and Rosie! Gloria has 3 kids, 1 boy 2 girls, boy was 33, others I didn't get :) Gloria wanted to know if i liked Oaxacan food and what I did, what my husband did etc. We won't be emailing each other when I leave, but we had a nice visit.

Today was hot, as usual, no one discusses the weather here, it is always the same, hot, frickin hot, sometimes stinkin hot. Humidity, yup some of that too..... :) Not complaining, simply commenting.

We hung out at Playa Carrizalillo with Frank and Mary, they don't usually go down to that beach as it is 167 steps to come back up, and they are steep steps. We ended the day by watching the sun go down at one of our favorite restaurants Guadua, rhymes with Ottawa. I had an interesting, but not to be duplicated by me ever again, drink. The spicy Tamarindo margarita. Adrian had a margarita on the rocks then a Green Iguana. Frank also had 2 green iguanas, and Mary had the Tamarindo Margarita, which was awesome!

We finished the day with a pretty darn good pizza from Mediterraneo.

Till Manana!