Mar
02
2010

San Miguel de Allende… it will suck you in

Funny tidbit: Upon arriving to the campground in San Miguel de Allende we met Joachim and Bärbel our new neighbors -a German couple who are driving a really cool and large 4 wheel drive RV around the Americas- one of the first things they asked us was how long we intended to stay for. We immediately replied in unison: “2 to 3 days max”. Bärbel simply laughed and said, “that is what we said when we got here nearly a year ago!” Bärbel’s prediction turned out to be somewhat true; we ended up staying in San Miguel for 3 weeks!

There are many things about San Miguel de Allende that make it an appealing place to stay. For starters the town has a very quaint small town “feel” (even though it is fairly large town of 62,000 give or take). This “feel” could be because of the classic old colonial spanish architecture, with narrow cobble stone streets, neat shops, and a nice plaza with a beautiful church sitting up on the hill (actually several plaza’s and churches). The town also has what seems to be the largest number of resident ex-pats and is a popular weekend destination for Mexico City folks (it seems that people who live in Mexico City tend to get away on the weekends, as just about every town within a few hours drive gets a large influx on the weekends) which means that this town has all the amenities of a larger city. Another appealing aspect of San Miguel, the one that was the impetus for our long stay here is the Instituto Allende. The Instituto offers spanish language classes as well as just about any art class you could possibly desire, from weaving to painting to most importantly (at least for Lacey) silver jewelry making classes. After chatting with Bärbel and some of the other ladies in the campground who were participating in the class, Lacey decided that it would be a great class to enroll in.

We originally planned to stay for a week while Lacey learned to work with silver, and since we would be static for a week we decided to take the time to take care of a series of small things that had been adding up as we traveled. One of the biggies on this list was getting a solar panel we could use to supplement our electrical needs and take care of our battery draining issues. We had already purchased a photovoltaic panel/charge controller at a deep “Bro” discount from our dear friends Steve and Amy Bohner from Alchemy Construction, but the panel was sitting at BajaRack’s warehouse in San Diego waiting for a safe delivery address from us.  Of course the shipping took a little longer than we thought it would and Lacey liked her class so much she had to stay another week. When the panel finally arrived thanks to the diligence of our friend Sergio at BajaRack, the weather had taken a turn for the worse.  I mean much worse. A very unseasonal crazy rain storm in which it poured 5 days non-stop, punctuated by intermittent thunder and lightning and periods of hail as well. We lived in a tarp city for 5 days… and yes, this is supposed to be the dry season, I guess the rain gods are not paying attention to this fact.

Our mini Tarp City during a little break of the storm from Lost World Expedition on Vimeo.

The campground we stayed at in San Miguel has been our favorite so far, The San Miguel de Allende RV Park and Tennis Courts. At first glance the campground itself is nothing special. They do have great bathrooms (some of the best so far) and tennis courts if you like to play tennis. It is also conveniently located in town and the downtown area is just a short walk away; admittedly a short walk uphill at an altitude of close to 7,000 feet sometimes does not feel that short. You definitely get in shape if you stay here for long. The most appealing thing about this campground is the great group of folk who stay here, many of whom return year after year. Everybody is very welcoming and there is a great sense of community amongst everybody that comes through here. We made some great friends, it was hard to say good bye.

Perhaps the only draw back of the campground is that it is located right next to a church that likes to ring its bells allll night long. Since this bell ringing, along with setting off aerial bombs (very loud booming fireworks) at ungodly hours in the morning seems to be a Mexican custom everywhere, you can hardly blame the campground. At some point you just have to go with it…that and buy a good pair of earplugs!

San Miguel de Allende is a lively town and it seems as though there is always something going on to celebrate. While we were here the town celebrated the birthday of Ignacio Allende who is the namesake of the town and a national hero of the revolution. The town celebrated by having a big parade through town and a special mass that we didn’t see (the idea of sitting in church for a few hours on such a beautiful day was enough to overcome any curiosity we had).

Another great place in San Miguel is the Botanical Gardens, Charco del Ingenio. They are located up on the hill outside of town. We took a bus to get up there and as we didn’t quite know where they were we asked the bus driver. He told us he would tell us when it was time to get off. Eventually the bus driver called us forward, pointed up a street and told us just walk up the street and it was right there. We started walking and pretty soon the street had turned to dirt and the buildings slowly started disappearing and still there was nothing to indicate the botanical gardens where anywhere around. Apparently the bus driver had sent us on a wild goose chase, but after about a half hour of walking around in the middle of nowhere and asking directions we finally found the place. It is an amazing preserve of a total of 380 hecatares, crisscrossed with pathways and all variety of native plants. It is a beautiful place to spend a few hours walking around and has great views of the town below.

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By Lacey | Posted in Mexico | Comments Off
Feb
08
2010

Guanajuato, Guanajuato (City, State)

We spent a few days in Guanajuato after Luis’ first visit from the stomach fairy, otherwise known as Montezuma’s Revenge… Oh yeah, he was down for the count 2 days.  No fun.  But we have a pact that goes something like this: if one of us gets any kind of stomach problem we pause the camping and stay at a hotel, it does not have to be a nice hotel, but it needs a bathroom (in the room) and running water.  I know that may be more info than we needed to share, but this blog is also for the Luis and Lacey of the future, a journal of sorts.

Back to the post… Guanajuato is awesome.  We really enjoyed our few days there, tons of walking on ankle hating cobblestone streets. The city was founded in 1554, so it has been around the block and you can tell (in a good way).  The city is also designated a World Heritage Site which is some program concocted by UNESCO to preserve certain spots around the world, neat.

Panoramic view of the wonderfully colorful City of Guanajuato, taken from the statue of El Pipila.

 

The city sprawls over a relatively small valley, the houses spread throughout the valley and climb up the folds of the mountains. This location means that there are tons of narrow little callejons (alleys) winding up the steep hillsides. The locals have got to be in good shape to live here. Some of the callejons are so narrow a young Romeo and Juliet couple are fabled to have exchanged kisses across the ally (unfortunately we don’t have any pictures of this particular ally because every time we went the ally was packed full of tourists lined up to take pictures). A very interesting fact is that the valley used to be a river basin (the Guanajuato River), when the Spanish built here the river mostly flowed through tunnels underneath the city; however, after many years of raising buildings to accommodate repeated flooding a damn was built and some of the water from the damn is rerouted to an underground aquifer, but in our humble opinion a large storm could be trouble. The tunnels where the river used to flow under the city were then paved for automobile traffic. This series of tunnels run all over the city and minimizes vehicle traffic through the city, can’t say that this works all that well, but it is very cool and a point of interest of the city.

One of the underground tunnels in Guanajuato

 

There are tunnel entrances throughout the city, we tried walking through one but felt like we smoked twenty packs of cigs in 30 feet...

 

I think we are not gonna bore you with semi decent descriptions of the city and yada, yada, yada… so we are gonna post a ton of pics and describe them. We will say, however, that Guanajuato is a beautiful city and one of our favorite for historical buildings so far.

But before that… The Mummies of Guanajuato: here is a place we visited mostly to satisfy some inner morbid desire to experience it and understand why it exists.  All of the mummies in this museum are naturally mummified, they do not go through the extensive process that Egyptian mummies went through.  The dead bodies in this museum were part of a group exhumed from the catacombs under the Panteon (the main church) between 1865 and 1958 in Guanajuato, at a time when law required relatives to pay taxes in order to keep the bodies of their deceased in cemeteries. If the relatives could not pay this tax, they would lose the right to the burial place, and the bodies were exhumed. Ninety percent of the bodies in the Guanajuato Panteon were exhumed because relatives did not pay the tax; however, only 2% of them were naturally mummified.  Some of these 2% are in the museum we visited. WARNING!!! Do not look at the following pics if mummies and death may disturb you… we were deeply disturbed after the visit to this Mummy Museum. Most folks in Mexico view death in a very different way than other cultures do.

O.K. now without further a do: the photos of Guanajuato

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By Luis | Posted in Nothing yet... | Comments (3)
Feb
06
2010

Guadalajara to the Interior

Guadalajara is the next stop on our trail, and is our gateway to the colonial interior of Mexico.  Let us start this post by showering you with a trivia tid bit for your next cocktail party: This city is named after the Spanish city of Guadalajara, the name of that city in turn originates from the Arabic word wad al hayara (sp?), which roughly translates to “Valley of Stones”; the literal translation of the Iberian name Arriaca, meaning “stony river”.   What would I do without Wikipedia?

The downtown area of Guadalajara is great for spending an afternoon walking around, but man is this a big city! 4,095,715 people in the Guadalajara Metropolitan area. Lacey spent some time here back in her high school days on exchange, but she didn’t even remember how big this city really is.  It was a bit of a shock for us, our last “City” was San Diego over 2 months ago!

The highlight of Guadalajara (for us) is the Mercado Libre located near the old cathedral. It is the classic Mexican mercado only on steroids, 4 stories and a whole block where you can find anything and everything you could ever want and more. The place is huge, you could spend an entire day getting lost (really lost) in the place and still not see the whole thing.

The other sight not to be missed in Guadalajara is the Teatro Degollado next to the cathedral in downtown. It is a beautiful building and the inside has a great mural on the ceiling.

Not the greatest image, but I think it depicts the grandeur of the Degollado Theater

At the theater we met Carlos Hernandez and Enrique Manzo two  industrial design students who had meticulously  created a huge sculpture of Mary Joseph and Baby Jesus, a floating angel and a reproduction of the theater out of cardboard. Pretty impressive stuff.

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By Lacey | Posted in Nothing yet... | Comments (0)
Feb
01
2010

Arts and Crafts and Falling Trees

The town of Patzcuaro does not seem to show up on the radar of super touristy places. It is not one of those towns that when talking to people back home they would know where you are such as they would with Mazatlan or Puerto Vallarta. It does however, have quite the reputation with other travelers and a visit to the town was recommended by many people we met on the road. We really enjoyed the town which is great for walking. There are two main plazas, both with lots of activity going on all day. The main plaza was torn up for renovation during our visit, but the multitude of shops and outdoor cafes around the plaza were perfect for sitting and enjoying a tasty beverage while people watching. Patzcuaro seems to be a popular destination for Mexico City folk (Chilangos) on the weekends, so there was no end to the amount of time we could sit and watch people from all different walk of life go by. We were particularly entertained by two very energetic local children, who serenaded the patrons of the cafe in exchange for whatever donations people would give. They gave quite the performance, and we couldn’t resist some photos.

One of the best things about Patzcuaro and its surroundings is all of the unique crafts that you find at the local stores. You can spend a whole day walking around town checking out all of the stores and galleries, and if you are not careful you might end up with a full bag or vehicle to take home.

The history behind these crafts is fascinating, I will not bore you with details, but here is a rundown: the Spanish Bishop Vasco de Quiroga a firm believer in More’s Utopia, was living in the area in the 1500 and he decided to teach different crafts to indigenous communities.  So the majority of the items you find in Patzcuaro are made in communities that were educated hundreds of years ago by Quiroga. Each town specializes in a particular item or material, and if you feel like bargaining or finding the good deals you can go directly to the artisans for a reduced price. The town of Capula, northeast of Paztcuaro is known for its pottery work, particularly the beautiful Catrina dolls they make.

La Catrina dolls are based on this 1913 zinc etching by Mexican printmaker José Guadalupe Posada (image from Wikipedia)

The Catrina doll is a skeleton dressed in elegant clothing and is most often associated with the day of the dead celebrations. You find the dolls dressed in all variety of elegant dress, all though the styles tend to the classic upper class dress. We fell in love with the Catrina dolls and tried for a long time to figure out how to store one in the Landcruiser without breaking it to no avail. The fingers on the dolls are so tiny, the doll wouldn’t last a day with us. Another town to check out is Santa Clara del Cobre which specializes in copper metal work. You can find plates, beautiful pots, and even sinks made out of hammered copper.

We stayed at a great campground just outside of the downtown in Patzcuaro where we met Al and Marilyn. We really enjoyed hanging out and talking with them, and even had the privilege of helping to celebrate Al’s birthday. We won’t say how old he turned, but he doesn’t look a day over 50!

Danza de los Viejitos (T’ARCHE UARAKUA, The Dance of the Old Men) from Lost World Expedition on Vimeo.

We ran into this street performing troupe in Patzcuaro, Michoacan, Mexico. This is a typical dance of the Tarascan or P’urhépecha natives of the region. The video is short and of relatively poor quality (point and shoot camera), but these guys danced for hours non stop it was quite amazing and enjoyable to see.

One day while driving around the lake we found an interesting place called Centro de Ecotecnias. They are a small non profit that builds and sells alternative low technology items for rural households. Their biggest seller is a version of the Patsari stove which is a cook stove designed to improve indoor air quality of homes by funneling all of the smoke out of the house. Many households, especially rural houses, still use wood fired ovens for cooking. Most of the smoke from these ovens goes directly into the house causing health problems for many. These stoves are specially designed to burn wood thoroughly and carry any byproduct of the burn (smoke) out of the house.  The thourough burn of the wood provides another benefit of this stove: less wood consumption . They are also in the process of developing a biodigester to harvest methane fuel from animal waste which can then be used for cooking in the kitchen. Another one of their projects is to help preserve the traditional non-genetically modified strains of maize (corn) in the face of increasingly industrialized farming in Mexico.

From Patzcuaro we headed to Morelia for a night then on to Los Azufres. Los Azufres is a national park in the mountains that has sulfur springs everywhere. The area is very beautiful, surrounded by a towering pine forest at an elevation of over 9,000 feet. There are lots of thermal springs in the area and large thermal power plants all over the place. We stayed at a place called Rancho Viejo which had been recommended to us. It had been overcast and rainy for the last few days and when we got out of the truck we knew we were in for a cold night. Rancho Viejo has a campground and most importantly several pools fed by the thermal hot springs, with the temperature of the water in the pools decreasing as you get further from the source. The place is very picturesque, with green hills covered in pine trees and lots of pools filled with steaming hot water. They even have an enclosed room built around the hottest pool in order to create a natural steam room of sorts. We high tailed it to the pools as soon as we got there for a nice long soak to thaw out. While we were sitting in the comforting hot water the wind picked up, then it started to rain, then hail. We knew we were in for an interesting night in the tent when thunder and lightning started going off all around us.

We weathered the night even though the crazy rain and wind kept going all night and we woke up numerous times to the sound of trees falling all around us (well at least Luis did…Lacey did wake once, but managed to sleep through most of it). Hearing trees fall around you while sleeping in a tent is not a comforting thought, believe me. When we woke up at sunrise, we saw 4 downed trees laying around us. The weather had decided to give us a break for a bit, so we quickly packed up while we could. After the long night of rain and cold we briefly considered heading for the beach for some warm weather. However, we really wanted to see the interior and historical Mexico so we sucked it up. While we were finishing packing up, another tree cracked and fell in slow motion not 100 yards from us. We looked at each other and said let’s get the hell out of here! But not before we got one last soak in the nice hot water…we needed to thaw out a bit before hitting the road :)

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By Lacey | Posted in Mexico | Tagged | Comments (1)
Jan
29
2010

Fruit post I

We love food.  One of the wonderful things about travel is not just seeing new places and meeting new people, but trying new foods.  Different spices and cooking techniques make all manner of dishes taste completely different even within the same towns we visit, but nature’s bounty is what has us mesmerized and constantly titillating our taste buds with its cornucopia of fruits. As we head closer to the tropics this bounty is apparent and fresh.  We have not even left Mexico at this point and even though we are both seasoned travelers we have encountered new fruits.  We will try to catalog a few here on the website.  Some of you may know a few but not all of you will know all of these fruits… please enjoy.

First we will post our most amazing discovery.  A fruit very similar to the revered and stinky South East Asian fruit: Durian.  This fruit is called Yacca by the locals in the coast of the State of Nayarit (have not found a more scientific or generic name). It is a very large fruit of irregular shape, I would guess that a good sized Yacca could way more than 10 pounds.  The outside skin -unlike the Durian- is not spiky but it does have segmented dimples of sorts. In order to minimize my destruction of the english language via my description I have poached a picture from wikipedia (of a Durian)… the inside of the Yacca is very similar.

Photo of a Durian NOT a Yacca. Courtesy of Wikipedia.org The inside structure of both fruits is very similar.

Describing the fruits flavor will be near impossible for someone of my near nil literary caliber.  My best shot at it would be to call in an ice cream flavor: Tutti Frutti. Tutti frutti literary means all fruits in Italian, granted the ice cream tastes very synthetic… but this fruit really does taste like an amalgamation of fruit flavors. If you take a bit and close your eyes there will be hints of mango and apricot, or is it honeydew melon and strawberries?  You decide, if you ever see this fruit please do your taste buds a flavor and try it!

The following entry is still of impressive size, but relatively disappointing flavor.  It is known as Cidra and it looks like a lemon on steroids.

The lemon on steroids of the citrus world: Cidra. Notice the diminutive lime next to it.

We found this behemoth of a citrus near the town of Patzcuaro.  I asked a local what it was and if it was good, he did not answer and proceeded to climb the tree cut one down and said: “It is good, sweet and 20 pesos please.”  We paid for our fruit (even though the guy obviously did not own the tree, he just happened to be walking by).  I cut into it and noticed a very large amount of pith. I removed as much pith as possible and wound up with a fruit very similar in size to a grapefruit. The flavor was very disappointing, because there really was no flavor to speak of.  I cannot blame the fruit because it may have been picked before its prime, so the verdict is out for the time being.

The following fruit I (Luis) am quite familiar with and I happen to like it and other members of its Passion Fruit or Passiflora family. In Mexico they call this fruit Granada China and it is not the same as the commonly known Passion Fruit. Passion fruit is very tart and sweet, this fruit is just sweet no tartness here. It has a thick and relatively plasticky feeling outer shell and inside is a sac full of seeds which are themselves surrounded by a small bag of slimy juice.  You cannot really bite down on the seeds just swirl in your mouth and take in all the flavors of the juice.  Very good fruit, but a caveat is necessary for those of you with an adversity to slimy textures.

Granada China or Parcha. It is more oblong than the more popular Passion Fruit. The pic on the right is a small individual seed in its juice bag housing.

Last but not least in this post is the Mamey Zapote (pouteria sapote). The brown outer layer has a texture somewhere between sandpaper and the bark of a tree.  We have seen it made into milkshakes at street fruit bars. The fruit’s flavor is variously described as a combination of pumpkin, cooked sweet potato and the texture is smooth creamy and sweet.  I cannot say this is my favorite fruit, but I may try it in a milkshake which may be a good vehicle for its flavors.

Mamey Zapote

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By Luis | Posted in Food | Comments (2)
Jan
24
2010

Tequila!!!

This post is dedicated to Robin, Jodie, Laurel, and Rico, for your love of tequila… we thought of you the whole time!

After Puerto Vallarta we said goodbye to the coast for a little while and headed inland, making a stop in Tequila. We took a really nice back road from Puerto Vallarta into Tequila that was recommended by a few different people. It was a small road that wound through the lush vegetated mountains. If you are in the area, there is no missing the town of Tequila, where “it” (meaning the beverage of tequila) supposedly all started and has given the town its fame. The story of this drink made from the Agave plant is more complicated and in reality it may date as far back as Mayan empire days, but we will talk about it when we get to Oaxaca.

If the agave plants dotting the hillside didn't clue you in to the amount of tequila here, the sign welcoming you into town will. I guess if a town was called Whiskey I would expect the same.

Driving into the town, all of the surrounding hillsides are covered in blue agave plants for as far as the eye can see. It is really quite beautiful for the blue hue the plants impart on the hillside.

All of the hills surrounding town have the blue hue of agave

The town itself is quite beautiful and even without all the tequila factories is well worth at least a day of walking around.  There is a really nice old church in the center of town and some nice plazas for people watching. For most people tequila is the real reason for visiting this city, and there are people offering tours of tequila refineries and the plantations bugging you as soon as you set foot on the plaza.  There are also liquor stores all over town selling everything from the best of the best of tequila, to big plastic jugs of what appears to be tequila (just looking at the plastic jugs gave us a headache!). We decided to do a tour of the Jose Cuervo distillery which is located just off the plaza. They had a bunch of different tours with the price going up for each “attraction” that was added, and we were a little skeptical at the quality of the tour we were buying, so we opted for the standard tour with a tequila tasting at the end.  The tour turned out to be well worth the price of admission and we got the low down on how tequila is made (we also got quite the buzz since you get to try the tequila at the different stages, and they are more than willing to refill). At the end of the standard tour we sat down to learn about the aging process of Tequila and the fine points of tasting. We did a taste of the Blanco, Reposado and the Añejo. All three tequilas were the same brand and same alcohol content, but it was pretty amazing at the differences in flavors. Our take on the explanation of the aging process is that Blanco is only aged for up to 3 months, the Reposado is aged for anywhere from 3 months to a year, and the Añejo is aged for more than a year. Or something like that, at this point in the tour we definitely weren’t paying attention to details. With aging the tequila starts to take on more of the flavor of the oak barrels it is in. We decided we liked the Reposado best, but the Blanco was good for shooting.  The Añejo had too much flavor for our buds. But, that is just our unrefined tastes talking. We’re more used to shooting tequila with lime and salt, not sitting down with a cigar with tequila in wine glasses and swishing it around while watching the legs form on the side of the fine crystal while sniffing the aroma and trying to guess what tonalities may be there.

How tequila is made, The Tour:

Before you can go inside the distillery you have to put these fancy hair nets on. With Tequila it is all about sanitation!

The agave plants are harvested and all of the blades are taken off. It takes 8 years for an agave plant to mature before it is ready to be made into tequila.

They randomly select some of the agave hearts for quality control testing. These numbers indicate the ones selected.

The tools used for harvesting and de-blading the agave.

The agave hearts are then roasted in big ovens. The roasting process brings out all of the sugars in the plant.

Roasted agave leaves out for us to taste. They are extremely sweet, they taste like the product of baking sugar cane... sweet and smoky.

The hearts are then mashed up and go through two phases of distilling in these big copper vats.

The tequila right after fermentation is 50% alcohol. It is surprisingly smooth, with a nice clean flavor. Care for a refill anybody?

The tequila is then aged in oak barrels in a climate controlled warehouse. The aging time depends on the type of tequila being made.

Other uses for agave and the fibers left over from distilling.

The amount of charring on the inside of the barrels the tequila is aged in gives the tequila different flavors. The barrels that are used in this factory come from Tennesse and France.

Tasting the aged tequilas. Where is my lime and salt? This guy kept the shots filled as long as you put the glass in front of him.

The final tasting after the tour. I think the camera is catching a buzz by this time too.

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By Lacey | Posted in Nothing yet... | Comments (1)
Jan
22
2010

Puerto Vallarta

This post brings us way back to our New Years days in Puerto Vallarta… yes we are posting that far back.  Hate to admit it, but it is easier to process the hundreds of pics we shoot and it gives us time to digest our experiences.  This may not translate to good photo albums or good narrative, but it is what it is.

We have to admit that we were more than pleasantly surprised with the tourist Mecca of Puerto Vallarta. We expected it to be just another tourist town with the big hotels and resorts. Instead we found a great old town with neat shops and a great malecon along the beach. The hotels and resorts are still there, but they are for the most part located away from the oldtown area. We also found a really nice campground that is quiet and comfortable right in the middle of town. We spent the weekend of New Years here because we decided (especially after just witnessing an accident with people we knew) it was better for our health and the health of the Landcruiser if we didn’t drive around Mexico on a major party week.

On new year’s eve we walked downtown and checked out the crowds. We were surprised that the majority of tourists we saw here were not foreigners, but were Mexican tourists it made things feel more authentic. We were hanging out on the Malecon when fireworks started going off and everybody was singing and carrying on at 11:00. We couldn’t figure out what was going on, we thought maybe it was a weird Mexican custom to welcome the New Year an hour early. More than slightly confused, we adapted and made the most of it by joining in the dancing and were treated to a great fireworks show. We later asked a police woman who gave Luis a “you friggin’ drunk gringo” look and proceeded to tell us that we had probably missed the time zone change when we arrived to PV, the time zone switches to Central just outside of PV.  Another holiday almost missed by the intrepid travellers.  Even though a little late in the game, we quickly found a little bar and had a shot of tequila to toast in the new year!

Our New Years Eve group... Luis, Lacey, Julie and I wish I could remember Pio's name?

Why are the fireworks going off? Why are people hugging and congratulating each other? Oh... you mean it is not 11:00pm? Happy New Year!!!

Enjoying the fireworks and the party!

Party at the dive bar... we wound up at a cool golf themed pool hall/bar owned by a very cool Quebecois

Extended arm wth Piu (sp?), Julie, Lacey and Luis. Lacey and Piu took turns making funny faces...

Enjoy the pics.

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By Lacey | Posted in Nothing yet... | Comments (0)
Jan
19
2010

Our 6 month Half-iversary…

Friends and family,

6 months ago today we sold all our earthly belongings, left our home in California and moved into our cozy new home: our trusty steed, the tight quartered Landcruiser.  In the last 17,500 miles and 6 months we have grown to love the Landcruiser and its dependable diesel engine even more than we did when CampingLab donated the vehicle to us over a year ago. We have seen a large portion of the United States and we are still enjoying the wonders of Mexico. We have met wonderful folks of all nationalities all along the way, and everyone (even corrupt cops) have been terribly nice to us.

Planning a trip of this magnitude and expecting to complete it in anything less than a lifetime is a disservice to the sights and peoples along the way.  We could have easily spent a year in Southern Utah or Baja California alone!  But we will keep on truckin’ and hoping to see and learn as much as we can.

To those of you following our adventures and sending us notes filled with love and support we send our Love and Thanks.  Hang in there with us as we find our way.

Love,

Luis and Lacey

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By Luis | Posted in Nothing yet... | Comments (1)
Jan
12
2010

The coast from Los Mochis to Puerto Vallarta

This post will have a bit of everything and a lot of photos…

To be perfectly honest the coast of Sinaloa and Nayarit is beautiful, but so far nothing quite compares to what we saw in Baja.  Sorry Edmundo.  Don’t get me wrong there are awesome places all along the coast, but not quite there for us. There is plenty of entertainment on the road since driving in Mexico in itself can be quite the adventure (especially if you like suspense and action).  Luis learned how to drive in Venezuela, so the minute we crossed the border into Mexico he recognized the same Latin American driving style.  No rules hold and every driver for him or herself, sadly the rules do hold for us foreign tourists… we already paid our way out of trouble and we would like to keep that to a minimum.

We saw an amazing amount of heavily loaded vehicles driving down the freeway, we think it may be folks bringing stuff back from the U.S., but who knows...

We saw incredibly long military convoys carrying numerous troups, turret mounted 50 caliber machine guns and grenade launchers... grenade launchers!!!

We camped in Las Glorias for one or maybe two days and met two wonderful couples… sadly we can only remember the names of Carol and Bill who were very kind and helpful to us and fed us the best baked mini potatoes ever… top secret recipe.

We meandered to Mazatlan because we had heard that even though it is a tourism Mecca it still has a good personality. This proved to be fairly true in the old down town area.  We stayed at an RV park by the water where we were the smallest rig by a longshot… we’re talking million dollar homes on wheels, with full bars set up under their awnings with portable icemakers and everything!  We parked on the equivalent of nosebleeder seats, cheapest seats in the house right next to the busy road outside the campground.

The highlight of Mazatlan was definitely the old downtown and its famous public market where we had some of the best food ever in a booth next to hangin’ “fresh” meats and wonderful fresh homemade cheeses.  Do NOT miss Mariscos El Tigre if you visit mazatlan.

Mariscos El Tigre, always packed (always a good sign)

Chicken Tostadas served with an amazingly rich broth. The broth is made from the water they boil fish and shrimp, then they reduced it with spices and tomato. Add a dash of lime and some hot sauce and it is the highlight of the meal.

We left mazatlan in search of a little less people and ended up in a place with too many mosquitos and no-see-ums: San Blas.  San Blas is a very quaint coastal town with a lively, but mellow nightlife around the main plaza.  The beach is nice, but not spectacular… however, as I mentioned it is infested with mini flying vampires that pay no attention to eco groovy mosquito repellent or tent mosquito netting.  Luis, who sleeps how he arrived in this world was covered in bites from head to toe!  The highlights of San Blas included a wonderful dinner on the plaza with Marie and Laurent a very cool  Québécois couple we met at our campground and an even better meal Luis cooked at our campground:  fresh shrimp sauted in garlic and butter  accompanied by pasta with a caprese sauce…

Sadly this post sort of ends on a bad note… the day we bid farewell to Marie and Laurent at San Blas we headed south toward Sayulita and after a few miles became disoriented and briefly lost.  When we found our way back to the road we ran into this:

Marie and Laurent's VW camper wrecked on the side of the road.

It was a horrifying and stressful minute while we pulled over and jumped out of the truck to find out how Marie and Laurent were.  Luckily they were rattled, but safe and sound. The accident had just happened so we decided to stay and help as much as we could.  I cannot imagine how hard this was on them.  After several hours (close to 6) they dealt with several different officials, an insurance guy, and every single person driving buy who stopped to see what happened.  They also had to pay what we consider a huge mordida (bribe) that was called a “fine” and a huge tow truck fee that was obviously arranged between the traffic guys and the tow truck owner.  After it was all said and done, the Van ran perfectly and everyone on both sides of the accident was fine.  We spent the following few days with Marie and Laurent and traveled with them to Puerto Vallarta. We hope the rest of their trip goes well and doesn’t include anymore stingrays or car accidents. You can follow their trip (if you can read french or feel like practicing) on their website: guerbilla.posterous.com.

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By Luis | Posted in Nothing yet... | Comments (3)
Jan
08
2010

The Copper Canyon Part Deux

After the long and arduous drive down to Urique it was necessary to sit back and enjoy the amazing views of the towering mountains that stand above the town.  The lush tree covered hillsides and big rock slabs jutting out of the top of the mountains are incredibly awe inspiring.

We found a great place to stay called Entre Amigos (Between Friends), where they rent rooms or a place to camp. The place is owned by a group of friends including the one that was there upon our visit: Keith, a guy from Oregon. These friends have done an amazing job with the little property. What we liked most is the garden which is healthy, well organized, organic and beautiful. It has lettuce, kale, spinach, onions, cabbage, and so much more growing, and best of all you get to pick whatever you want as part of the price of your stay here. It is hard to describe Entre Amigos or how much we liked it there in words (one of our main problems in general when it comes to writing this blog). The property is set at the base of the canyon, not far from the River Urique and with amazing views of the surrounding mountains, in a green lush paradise. Besides the amazing garden, there are trees and plants everywhere: Neem trees, Papaya, grapefruit, and amazingly tasty tangerines among others.  There are small paths running through the property and at the top of the hill, there are two guest rooms, a hostel room, and a communal kitchen area for all to use (the dining room table doubles as a ping pong table). The partners designed and built all the structures with the help of some locals, apparently the entire project has been and continues to be a “learn as you go” experiment and they seem to have done a great job… all the rooms are built out of stone, cement and local dirt as well as locally lumbered and processed woods.

I am not sure if we have made it clear in past posts, but we love taking showers; we love them so much we carry a propane on demand water heater and a 12v pump in order to take them anywhere. I know that is not really roughing it… but have you seen our set up? Well the next best thing to the edible gardens at Entre Amigos is their shower… yes the shower gets top billing. The shower is in the Shower House, a nice purpose built ample room that houses only the shower and a nice bench.  The water is heated by a wood stove just outside of the Shower House so that you have to plan ahead for you shower. You start the fire and keep it stoked until the tank feels like it is pretty hot, then you stoke it up one more time just before you get in, so that you get a nice long hot shower. Once in the shower, the water falls like a downpour or perhaps a warm tropical waterfall with strong flows of blissfully hot water. I don’t know if it was the fact that the water is wood heated or the shower head is just really great, but we both agreed that it was the best shower that we had taken in a really long time, perhaps ever. Keith said he calls it the Orgasmic shower, and we couldn’t agree more! On a side note, Lacey got a little surprise while in the shower in the form of a hairy “little” 8 legged friend climbing over her clothes.

The large sole purpose built Shower House

Lacey's little friend, hairy and friendly!

At Entre Amigos we met Maruka a local lady who is very sweet and talented, she taught a tortilla making class for silly little us.  We provided the Maseca (corn flour) and she taught away.  Lacey turned out to be a natural tortilla maker and Luis the self appointed Chef in the Expedition turned out to fumble and produce misshapen horrible little tortillas no matter how hard he tried… he however can make Arepas.

After a couple of days of enjoying the area and Entre Amigos we drove the 7,600+ foot climb out of Urique through the crazy switchbacks and precipices to reach the road that leads through the Canyon to the town of El Fuerte back in Sinaloa. It had rained the day before we were leaving, and as we made our way back up the winding road, I looked down below at the town. The moisture from the rain was being pulled back skyward by the sun that was shining over the valley, creating a mist that almost hid the town from view. I couldn’t help but think what a magical place this is.

The drive through the canyon led us along new, “not as” narrow, windy mountain dirt roads as we made our way down to the Rio Fuerte, then continued to follow it out to the town of El Fuerte. It was a great drive, and we were glad we decided to go this way. It gave us the opportunity to see some sights that not many visitors to the Copper Canyon get to see.

On a funny side note… we were told by many, many people to avoid The Copper Canyon by vehicle and by ourselves because of criminals and pot growers in the area.  We know they are out there (both), we heard many stories from all the locals.  We had no problems until we got out of the Copper Canyon area and back to Sinaloa at the Municipio de El Fuerte were we were pulled over for the first time in our trip.  I will admit I was driving about 50km/hr in a 40km/hr area, but I was keeping up with traffic.  We were singled out.  A jolly looking cop, came up to us and informed us of our infraction and added that we would have to go back to “the” office to pay some exorbitant amount of money, ”but,” he added “the office is now closed so we can probably arrange something so you do not have to wait until tomorrow.”  Isn’t that sweet and considerate.  I (Luis) decided to go for Naive and said:

“Maybe I should just wait until tomorrow and pay the fine at the office, I would not want you to get in trouble.”  To which he answered:

“No trouble at all” This went on and on and back and forth for a few minutes, a cute little cat and mouse game that was almost enjoyable because we all knew the outcome. But I gave up and decided to pay him off, but how much?  We did not want to give him too much, and too little might insult him.  So we looked at our cash and based our decision on availability: 70 pesos ($5.50) or 200 pesos ($16.00) we went for the 70 with some trepidation, but the Jolly Cop took it with a big grin and said: “have a nice day.” We figured this was his Christmas bonus. In fact, we were pretty sure that was the reason for the cops being out there in the first place. While Luis was talking to the cop, Lacey saw another cop across the street flag a guy on a motorcycle over. The guy on the motorcycle slowed down, pulled over, slapped some money in the cops hand then took off again.

Less than 10km later at the next poblado, we were pulled over again!  This time it was not cute and I was not happy, as I was definitely not committing any infraction (other than driving a California truck).  When the cop came up to the window I said: “Sorry man, we were pulled over less than 10km ago and we gave them all the money we had!”  He thought about it… Lacey says he must have been trying to guess who had beat him to our money… after a moment of thought he said: Please slow down and drive carefully.” Yeah, we thought, Merry Christmas to you too!

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By Luis | Posted in Nothing yet... | Tagged , , , , , | Comments (4)