On the way home again - 5 January

How do you start the day in Bucerias, Mexico, at +25 C and end the day in Winnipeg at -20 C?  Well, you take a taxi from the condo (sniff, sniff) and get on a plane.

Breakfast in Mexico...

We ordered up a taxi yesterday, but I guess my reputation precedes me - they sent a 12 passenger van!  Well it was a nice enough vehicle, but we sat in the first row behind the driver, which was very cramped - there was some kind of a compartment across behind the front seats.

Asked for a taxi to the airport, got a van...

On the way to the airport, we saw something interesting - notice the nativity depicted above the Wal-Mart entrance.  I'll bet you wouldn't see that in Canada!

Look closely and you will see the nativity depicted above the entrance!

And we saw a VW "thing" while on our way to the airport.

VW "thing" - we saw a few of these in Mexico.

Eric had arrived home a few days before, so he came to meet us at the airport.  It turned out that he couldn't track down keys to my De Ville, so he had to bring Dayna's little Alero to pick us up.  Oh well, we fit in just fine.
 

Reluctantly back in the 'Peg!

So Winnipeg is a little chilly compared to Mexico, but at least it is home.

By the way, when I had remote start put into my car the following Saturday, they found the other set of keys.  I think they were under the seat, sigh.

One of the condos in this little complex we're staying in, is for sale!

So for the low, low price of US$163,000, condo unit # 3 could be yours.  What a pleasant thought!  Oh well, no time soon, but it sure would be nice to have someplace to run away to.  And I must say, Barrie and Helen have found a nice little hideaway here in Bucerias.

http://elementsofmexico.com/realestate_detail.php?id=2407

Deflation, Flaky's Fish & Chips, one last dip in the ocean - 4 January

Sadly, today is our last full day in Mexico.  We were up at the usual time, about 09h00 or so, can't remember, ha ha - that's kind of the definition of "vacation".

We needed to vacate to let Estella, the maid, clean the condo.  So at 10h00, we zip around the corner where they've just put up a sign that says they can inflate tires, toys, balls, whatever.  Rather interesting, I think maybe it's a small commune of young folk, and they are having trouble making ends meet.  This home on the corner has been alternately quiet and loud for days.  A few days ago, a sign appeared on the corner, advertising the availability of a shower.  The next day, another sign.  And two days ago, this sign about inflation of balls, etc.

You may recall (well I hope I blogged it back when we first arrived anyway) that when Eric bought the little football to play with his cousins in the ocean, it was flat and needed inflation.  We had a devil of a time finding someone with a needle to fill it up!  Too bad we didn't know about these guys on the corner, then!  Oh well.

Anyway, today I wandered into the compound (almost every home is in a walled-in compound, should add this to my observations) and called out a few times, but nobody answered.  Again I wandered, but again didn't go right to the back.  Then just before I was about to leave, I saw a sign on the door that said something about "timbre" and had a small cowbell hanging there.  I shook the bell, and a young fellow jumped out of the far building.  I showed him the football and said deflate, and he said yes, yes.  On the window ledge, he moved an image of the Virgin Mary, and there was an inflation needle!  Great!  Then he started off with the football.  I kept saying, "empty", "let air out", "deflate", but he went into the garage where an old dusty car was kept, into the corner, and fired up the compressor.  "No, no, no," I kept saying, and took the ball and started squeezing the air out.  He held up the hose end and pressed the release, letting out a burst of air, saying something in Spanish which I would imagine was, "This will fill the ball up!"  But i kept squeezing and saying, "No, deflate!"  Finally he twigged to what I meant and turned off the compressor, grabbed the ball from me, and squeezed it flat, chuckling.  We both learned something, I think.  I asked him, "How much," and he protested, "No, no."  But I gave him all the change I had anyway, about 9 pesos, and we both went away happy.

Lesson learned: look up the key word(s) in Spanish before going down to get the ball deflated!  I just looked it up on Google Translate (wow what a service), "desinflar" is the key word here...

Then we went down to the Royal Decameron Resort and ordered our taxi to the airport for tomorrow morning, one step closer to home, ugh.  [ it may always be nice to get home, but I hear it's a little cold and breezy back home so I'd rather stay here, thank you very much! ]

We wandered down to the market and picked up a few things, including a couple of gifts.  A couple of them were pottery and were heavy, so we took them back to the condo.  Estella wasn't quite done, but she let us dump them off.

One of the places we stopped at is run by a bit of a character - a nice guy.  For the month of January, he accepts Canadian Tire 'Money' for payment!  He gives it to a Canadian friend who takes it back to Canada and buys tools, etc. that he needs and ships them back to him.  He showed us his present wad of Canadian Tire 'Money', it was quite a bit, six inches or more thick!

For the month of January, they take Canadian Tire 'Money' in payment!

Proprietor of the shop that takes Canadian Tire 'Money', a nice guy!

A craftsman making objects of art from pieces of wood, with a Dremel tool.

The craftsman talking to tourists about his work.

A glass shop in the market where Dayna purchased a few things.

Now, I had seen this little hole-in-the-wall restaurant run by a fellow from California, as it turns out - Flaky's Fish and Chips, just had to try it.  We went for a late lunch at Flaky's, it was quite good!  I'm not sure the dietitian in Dayna really liked the battered fish, but hey, once in a while, come on!

We returned to the condo, chilled for a bit, then I ran two blocks to the bank for a bit more cash to cover tonight's dinner out.

On the way up to the bank (and I mean "up", see below, it's quite an uphill walk), I saw a newly fallen coconut sitting along the side of the road.  It was still there on the way back, so I grabbed it and brought it back, just for fun.  I had never had my hands on a more-or-less fresh coconut before!  Well, this one had gravel on it from being on the roadway, and it had split on one side and was gooey from losing some coconut milk, so it wasn't going to be eaten, but it was interesting just the same.  Dayna hadn't handled one before either, so I handed it around.  Now I guess it goes out, so sad.  Actually, there are old, dried coconuts and pieces of coconuts all along that street, as I guess this is not a new thing.

The steep road to the bank.  Notice the grazing horse, it has been tied up on that lot the whole time we've been here!

Dean's prize coconut, ha ha.

This was our last day to catch some rays of the wonderful Mexican sunshine.  So, with the bank & the coconut out of the way, we zipped down to the beach to grab our last few rays of Mexican sun.  I went for a swim in the ocean and Dayna went for a brief dip.  I got a mouthful of salt water, wow, sputter sputter.   After flopping on the beach and drying off in the sun, ahhhh, I went back to the condo to shower & change.  The rest stayed on the beach for another hour and then came back to do the same.

Dayna ready for last dip in the salt water!

Dean has goggles in hand, ready for last "laps" in the ocean!

Barrie and Helen went for a walk on the beach before supper, and Dayna and I chilled on the palapas.

Next up, a dinner at Eva's Brickhouse restaurant.  This being our last night here, we decided to eat out, and a bit upscale at that.  Now, the highest of the high end is Mark's, which is a half block away, but that's really a bit much for us.

Eva's Brickhouse restaurant.

Barrie, Helen, Dayna and Dean at Eva's Brickhouse restaurant.

Three of us had the special, which was a slow roasted pork, 7 hours on a mesquite fire, wow, so tender!  And the fixings, great too!  Dayna had the jumbo prawns dinner.  And for dessert, chocolate lava cake, oh my word!

Now down to packing, then chilling out and time for bed.  Tomorrow the crazy airport and the excruciating 4-3/4 hour flight back to the ice and snow of the 'Peg.

Later, we took one last walk down past the square.  Joe Crow's was rocking out, but the big news was the house party about a block from the condo.  Yikes, sounds like they might go late.  Very loud, live band, disco lights, the whole works.  I guess Tuesdays are special here?  Or at least this Tuesday.

General observations on first visit to Mexico

Here are a few arbitrary observations on my first visit to Mexico.  They don't seem to fit in elsewhere, or I neglected to note them way back:

• The large majority of the vehicles here are standard transmission.  All the buses are standard, and have huge stick shift levers over to the transmission in the centre of the bus.  Even SUVs and large pickup trucks have standard transmissions.  Most of the automatic transmission vehicles I've seen are from outside Mexico.
• There are a lot of stray dogs here.  Just hanging around in the street, eating out of garbage.  They do not threaten, they just flop in the street.  In fact, at night, they sometimes sleep in the middle of the street - probably because it's a warm spot, or something like that.  
• The people here are genuine and warm.  They are not pretentious about their lot in life.  They don't look down on those who sell stuff on the beach, or do supposedly lesser jobs, or jobs that would be lesser in our culture.  Wow, they just do it, and don't complain.  They don't take our "no, gracious" personally, they just move on.  We could learn a lot from these people!
• And speaking of jobs, they use a half dozen people for a job that would be done by two in Canada.  I think it's their way to cope without welfare.  For the smallest little job, they have someone doing it.  This seems to be a good thing - it gives them something to do, dignity and self confidence.  Even for tough, difficult jobs that we would get a machine to do - like digging for a foundation or a pool, for instance - they get a bunch of guys with shovels and wheelbarrows to do it, wow!  And, I understand that the vast majority of building projects are done with concrete that is mixed by hand on site, wow!  Tough, tough people.
• The roads here are, um, interesting.  The main roads are well paved.  The main streets are stones with pavement between them.  Pretty nice.  The side streets are not nice at all.  They are stones but with clay or packed sand between them.  The side streets are rough, an ankle sprain waiting to happen!  But, when they need repair, the boys just dump sand in the middle of the street and get out their shovels.  They dig up the stones they might need to dig up, put stones back in, pack sand or dirt or clay or whatever it is in around them, and walk away.  As a result, all of the vehicles here have rattles, squeaks and bad suspension, or so it seems.
• I've heard that Mexicans are legendary for being laid back, slow and tardy.  Well, it's not all true for sure - our cabs have always been right on time, our buses have driven like mad to keep some kind of schedule (not sure whose).  But overall, they don't get fazed over anything.  As per my notes when I was parasailing, if they get worried, you should be worried.  But, as a result, the garbage piles up in the streets - because it seems, nobody worries about garbage.  Especially at the end of the street at the beach, there is garbage laying around, it smells awful - but the Mexican folks, in their laid back way, just walk right past.  Wow.
• There are a lot of Canadians down here.  Like, we are talking, there can't be many left up there in Canada!
• Most houses are built as part of a walled-in compound.  Some are more isolated than others.  Dave's observation was that you never know what's behind the wall.  The wall can look awful and crumbling on the outside, but then one day you see the gate open to let a car in or out, and there's a beautiful house inside.  On the other hand, some places seem to be better fortified than others.  The one shown below, for instance, I call "the embassy" because it has broken glass on top of the brick walls, and the walls that are made of wrought iron have outward facing "hooks".  These are typically used to fortify diplomatic residences in other places in the world!

Sayulita, surf, and world famous chocobanana! - 3 January

Well, today started lazy enough - I was slow to get going.  Actually, both Dayna and I were, but, as usual, I win the prize.  The four of us finally got out the door at about 11h00.  We caught the same bus that brought us here from Puerto Vallarta - these buses, which already bring you a long way for the ridiculous cost of 12 pesos a person (right around a dollar), actually run alternately up to Villella and to Sayulita, something like another 3/4 hour.  Well we were lucky enough to have a Sayulita bus waiting for us as we arrived at the stop on the highway.

The ride was, um, interesting.  Shortly after leaving the populous area of Bucerias, the road went down from 4 lane divided to 2 lanes, and snaked through the mountainous jungle.  It reminded me a lot of the drive up number 10 highway through Riding Mountain National Park, but of course with very different vegetation.  There were beautiful mountain streams, clearings where you could see the treed sides and tops of the mountains, and curve after curve after curve, as the road followed the passes and the streams.

The bus driver shifted down, then down again, as we climbed in the jungle.  There was a lot of traffic, including big trucks, other buses, passenger cars, and much more.  Then, descending the other side, it seemed we were going a bit too fast - but hey I'm not a thrill seeker.

We arrived in Sayulita, and all the Mexican folk on the bus got off.  The driver looked a little perplexed, then we realized that the bridge ahead over the river was out - we weren't going to get to the other side unless the bus started to fly!  There were about a dozen other gringos remaining on the bus too, and we had a good chuckle as we got out.

The bus to Sayulita

There was a temporary footbridge over the river, good thing - because cars and trucks were forced to drive through a "ford" crossing right through the water.

View of bridge out - from footbridge - bus is stopped behind fence on the left!

Autos crossing, from footbridge.

A view of truck crossing through river, from the beach.

As we crossed the bridge, we were solicited to donate into a can for some cause that I didn't understand, and declined.  This was the beginning of about five different people in different places, asking for money with a can.  One of them said they were asking for an orphanage.  If I knew it was legitimate, I would contribute, but as it stands, I didn't.  I don't know if I should feel bad or not.

We wandered down to the beach in Sayulita.  Barrie advises that was significant damage from a huge storm that rolled through this area in August, damaging the beach severely.  Rather than a gently sloped sandy beach to the water, it left a low spot parallel to the shore, where a slimy scummy pond has been created.  At two spots, a sand bridge has been made, with gaps to let the water drain.  At one end, a fellow was digging a trench to the water, allowing the pond to drain.  Well, actually, since the pond is in sand, the water should drain if it's above the normal level of water at the shore.  Since it hasn't drained through the sand, it will be futile to try to drain it with a trench.  Too bad.  The only way is to move the sand back to slope the beach properly - either by machine (probably not feasible) or by the action of wind & waves (which may take a year or two).

Nonetheless, there was an eager class of surfing students waiting to take to the waves.

Row of surfing students wait to hit the waves!

We made our way to the shore by way of one of the sand land bridges.  The waves really were strong, frothy, and consistent.  I haven't surfed (yet), but I can only imagine that it was ideal for surfing.

There are lots of umbrellas along the shore with folding chairs under them.  Hmm, we thought we might sit down and enjoy the shore for a spell.  However, we noticed that the umbrellas have numbers on them - and we saw waiters wandering between them.  They are an extension of the bars on the other side of the pond - you are expected to buy drinks and/or food while you sit there.  Oh, well.

We wandered down the shore then back across another sand bridge and back to the streets.  We perused a couple of restaurants before deciding to go to Chocobanana - where apparently the namesake dessert is both nutritious and delicious!  Behind the counter, they had a hilarious sign - check it out - complaint department, take a number!  Ha ha!

Curses, that lady blocked the sign - but here it is, Chocobanana

Wall behind the counter

Ha ha, I need one of these to put beside my desk!

The Chocobanana restaurant did up a great mushroom & cheese hamburger for us.  Includes salad & fries, but the salad was in the hamburger.  That's OK, it was great, as I said.


Then I ordered the namesake Chocobanana.  There are different types, I got the one with coconut on the outside.  Sure enough, it was a banana (previously frozen?) with a thin chocolate coating, and covered in flakes of coconut.  Well, it was good, but not quite out-of-this world or anything.

And there I am with the namesake Chocobanana - coconut flake outside.  Not bad!

We wandered the streets of Sayulita for an hour, then back onto the bus.

Yes, a big surfing town - three surf shops side-by-side and one across the street.

All too soon it was time to get back on a bus.  Amazingly, as we got to the place where we got off the bus into Sayulita, a bus arrived signed for Bucerias.  We got on and grabbed the choice seats.

It was a nice ride back, especially since I didn't have to stand the whole way!  The bus never did fill up, probably less than a dozen people on it, so we were able to relax and not scrunch together.

The bus was moving quite quickly, so I wasn't able to snap any great pictures, so sad.  Just one of this small church at a village along the route.

We got back to Bucerias in about 30 minutes.  We crossed the highway and visited the butcher shop, picked up some sausage for dinner tonight.

That's a bit of a story too.  When Dayna and I visited the Mega on Friday the 31st, we picked up chicken with the idea of storing it to have tonight.  Unfortunately, by the time Saturday afternoon rolled around, Dayna and Helen were searching for the cause of the terrible smell in the fridge - it was our chicken!  Not gonna eat that, froze it and now wondering how to dispose of it - the garbage pickup doesn't seem to be on a regular schedule around here, so can't necessarily put it out just before they pick up!  And for tonight, over to plan B - go to the butcher shop and pick up something fresh & interesting.

Fresh & interesting it was.  Bratwurst, yum, made for a nice supper.  And a neighbour lady made "Ohio Buckeyes" and gave us some for supper.  They were grrrreat!  [ I think she prepared them in honour of the upcoming Sugar Bowl football game, where the Ohio State Buckeyes will meet the Arkansas Razorbacks tomorrow night ]

Before dinner, Dayna and I went for a walk down to the Biblio de Gringo bookstore and cafe - yes, that's the name - specializing in used books in English.  I've seen several other bookstores and magazine stands, but everything is in Spanish!  [ go figure ]  Anyway, at the Gringo Bookstore, they sell used books at 1/2 of the cover price, and buy back at 1/4 of the cover price.  Barrie & Helen tell us that they keep track of each person's credit on a recipe card - and maintain the credit until next year.  So, at the end of your visit, you take down all your books, turn them in for credit, and when you arrive next year, you go down and use that credit to get some books out to read.

Gringo's bookstore and cafe!

Well, I need a book because I've plowed through all the magazines I brought with me - hard to believe, but I did - too bad I didn't bring more (I have several feet of magazines at home to deal with).  Dayna read the two novels she brought, so purchased two more.

There is a relatively limited selection of non-fiction, and I didn't see any fiction that appealed to me.  I purchased a hardcover book, very old but interesting - Stick and Rudder / an Explanation of the Art of Flying by Wolfgang Langewiesche.  Some day, I would like to have my private pilot license.  I read part of it and it seems to be a really good practical description of how instinct works against you during flying.  Based on my limited experience, flying with Ryan Fisher, and Flight Simulator, the first chapter already has great advice.

After supper, Dayna and I wandered down to see if a sports bar might have the Canada-USA World Juniors semifinal game on.  Well, Yoyo Mo's had it on, we arrived with less than 2 minutes left in the game, and couldn't find a seat, so we just stood and watched the game played out.  Canada won 4 to 1, and on to the finals against Russia!  It seemed as though the whole bar was full of Canadians, there was a lot of yelling and cheering.

We didn't bother to sit down.  Instead we went across the street to Joe Crow's to see what was happening there.  Not like we couldn't look across and see that nothing was happening!  Anyway, we stopped for a couple of drinks, found out it was karaoke night, heard the other folks practicing, saw that no Long John Baldry songs were in the book, and finished up.

We got home, Dayna read and I blogged.  And blogged.  And blogged.

Bucerias market redux, slack time - 2 January

Today was a pretty lazy day.  We slept in, got up late, and went to the market for vegetables.

Dayna peruses the watermelons near the start of the Bucerias Market

We had a late lunch at Sweet Thing, which was great!  The owners of Sweet Thing are originally from Plum Coolee, MB, for what that is worth.

The day was warm, I was not ambitious, so a nice siesta fit into the afternoon, then a bit of sitting by the pool.  Like I said - slack time!

We're having a late supper, a nice salad with tuna.  In keeping with the mood of the day, I was expecting to do nothing after supper, but we went downtown to a dessert spot with a great view of Bucerias - A Bar Above.  It's on the fourth floor of a building right beside Yoyo Mo's.  We ventured up the long, winding stairs to the third floor, but were greeted by a locked iron door, so sad.  No chocolate souffle for me tonight, too bad.  We wandered around the town square and back to the condo.

Tomorrow we are going to jump on the bus and go to Sayulita, apparently a big surfing destination of the area.  We'll see what we can see!