Torres del Paine - Patagonia - Chile

We figured we are in Patagonia so we should probably do a serious backpack trip. After some research we decided to see the Torres del Paine National Park via the 'W' trek. It's a 5 day/4 night trek, covering about 48 miles. It takes you to the base of the Torres del Paine at sunrise, the face of a huge glacier (Glacier Gray) and into the French Valley, which is a huge glacial valley/bowl. Check out the photos by clicking on the photo slideshow or link on the right hand side.

Patagonia, Argentina

We're so excited to have made it to Patagonia! Our first stop was Glacier Perito Moreno, just outside El Calafate. It was very impressive with a height of about 120 feet. You can hear the ice crack, and once in awhile huge pieces break off and crash into the water of Lke Argentino.

Next, we went about 200 km northwest to El Chalten to do an ice trek on Glacier Grande, below Cerro Torre. El Chalten is a tiny, cute mountain town at the foot of the beautiful Fitz Roy and Cerro Torre peaks. We were really lucky and had spectacular views the whole time (which we heard people have come here several times without ever seeing them). The trek was a long 12 hours (round trip), with a cool single-rope (harnessed in) river crossing. Walking on the glacier was awesome! We felt so rugged with crampons. We also tried some ice climbing on the glacier!

Patagonia is known for it's beautiful snow capped mountains and glaciers, but also for it's consistent hurricane force winds (we are in the roaring 40's after all). We almost got knocked over by the wind (video to be uploaded soon).

Here are a few pics. We are now off to Chile for a 5 day hike around Torre del Paine. It should also be amazing.

From Patagonia - Argentina

From Patagonia - Argentina

From Patagonia - Argentina

From Patagonia - Argentina

From Patagonia - Argentina

From Patagonia - Argentina

La Bomba de Tiempo

Wow! We were blown away by this amazing band in Buenos Aires last night. They are an improvisational percussion group. It was wild to watch the director create songs as they performed.

If you are ever in Buenos Aires on a Monday night, head to Ciudad Cultural Konex at 7pm. You will be amazed at what you hear and see.

The World´s Most Dangerous Road

WE SURVIVED THE WOLRD´S MOST DANGEROUS ROAD!! We road mountian bikes down the road from La Paz to Corico in Bolivia, desending about 12000 feet in only 64KM. It rained almost the entire way which greatly reduced the visability. Mentally it helped because you couldn´t see the 3000 foot drops on your left. No one in our group crashed, except one of the guides who was goofing around at the start of the ride and landed on his head.

We´ll write more and add photos when we have a proper internet connection.

Trekking in Peru

Wow, trekking in Peru was amazing! We met some new friends in Huaraz from Holland and Germany and joined them for a day hike to Lake 69 in the Cordillera Blanca. The scenery was absolutly amazing. The Cordillera Blanca has many snow capped peaks over 20,000 feet.

The hike started in a huge glacial valley at about 12,000 feet. The lake was 3,000 feet higher at 15,088 feet (new personal record). With only 1 day of acclimitization, we were lucky we didn´t have any issues with the altitude. It was pretty slow going on the last steep section, but overall everyone did great. The lake was an amazing color blue and was surrounded by towering peaks. It reminded us of Hamilton Lake in Sequoia National Park, but much higher in altitude.







A few days ago we did an overnight hike into one of the deepest canyon in the world, Colca Canyon. It is about 2 times as deep as the Grand Canyon (peaks to river below). The walls are not as vertical as the Grand Canyon, but it was still very impressive. We hiked down from Cabanaconde to Oasis where we stayed the night in an adobe hut with a dirt floor. They also had a spring feed swimming pool. The views were amazing. We were also lucky to see a number of Andean Condors flying along the canyon edge before the hike. They cruise right past you as they float on the warm currents of air lifting from the deep canyon below. It was an amazing sight.

Machu Picchu

Machu Picchu in the morning mist



It cleared up later in the day

Machu Picchu really was as amazing as we hoped. The misty morning added to the majestic feeling of it all. It's hard to believe that the Incas could build such a beautiful city so high on top of a mountain. They even built on top of the mountain peak in the background, Huayna Picchu. We hiked to the top and were equally amazed, and scared, by the carving of steps into the shear rock face. We were awarded with amazing views from the top of the Incan world. From Huayna Picchu you can even see that the city of Machu Picchu was layed out in the form of a Condor. The Incans believed in three levels to the world: the higher world (Heaven), this world (Earth) and the lower world (Hell). They represented these with the Condor, Puma and Snake. The Incan capital, Cusco was laid out in the form of a Puma, Machu Picchu was laid out as a Condor. So some believe there might be a lost city in the form of a snake way down in the Amazon jungle.

Learning some of the Incan mythology while standing in this awe inspiring location was an experience we will never forget.


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Primitive Travel in Ecuador

Publish Post

Riding on the top of a train through Ecuador.

We really enjoyed Ecuador! Such a beautiful, friendly country. But its travel network is a bit primitive, we had to ride on the roof of a freight car during one leg of our journey to Peru. It was a beautiful train ride through the Andes and no one fell off. The route includes a famous ridge called "Nariz del Diablo" (Devil's Nose), which included two "V" switchbacks that were carved into the cliff wall. It was wild to be on the roof of the train as it pulled into the switchback, then proceeded to traverse the cliff backwards on the lower track.


Pulling into the first switchback.
About to proceed backward on the lower track.

Galapagos!!

Wow! What an amazing place. We had such a great time in the Galapagos. We saw so many animals and loved that you can walk or snorkel up to them and they don't even flinch. The mamas didn't mind us nearby while nursing or feeding their young. The sea lions and sea turtles were playful with us in the water. Even the sharks seemed less intimidating.

We were there for nine days (hence all the photos), and spent a few days on Santa Cruz island, Isabela island, and then took a three-day cruise around the northern islands. Given that we don't plan or research ahead of time, we were a bit surprised by how arid and cool it was on the equator. The water was also much colder than expected due to the Humboldt current coming up from the antarctic. Which explains why there are flamingos and penguins here.

Due to it's isolation and unique climate there are numerous species that are endemic to the Galapagos (found only here) like giant Galapagos tortoises, marine iguanas, Galapagos fur sea lions, and many more. Even from island to island some of the species have adapted differently. There's an owl that stalks it's prey like a cat on the ground. One of my favorites was the blue footed boobies who dives into the water from 70 meters above like a kamikaze to catch fish. Their bright blue feet were wild.

Here is a little video we recorded of a whitetip reef shark while snorkeling. We'll upload a couple more videos soon.


Whitetip Reef Shark - Galapagos Islands

Panama

Only one more day in Central America. We fly out to Quito, Ecuador on Oct. 10 from Panama City. We're sad to leave Central America, but we are really excited about South America. Also, we bought a return flight home! We fly from Santiago, Chile to San Francisco on Dec. 22. 5 months and 2 days on the road. Hopefully the country will not completely meltdown before we return!

We've been busy since our last update. We've managed to up load a lot of photos, click on the link to check them out (on the right side bar of this page).

Panama has been a lot of fun. We visited Bocas del Toro first. It's a group of beautiful islands on the Caribbean side, very close to the Costa Rican boarder. Mike was there 10 years ago. It has been developed a bit since then, but it still a great place to visit. The islands' beaches are mostly white sand, palmed fringed and the water is crystal clear.

We had three days in Bocas del Toro. Day 1 we took a bus to Bocas del Drago / Star beach on the main island of Colon, where we were amazed by the huge starfish. Day 2 we rented kayaks and snorkeled at Hospital Point on Isla Solarte. We also circled Isla Carenero and finished with a late lunch at a dock side resturant (Cosmic Crab). Day 3 we hired a local boat to Isla Bastiamentos and crossed the island by foot to spend time on the beautiful Playa Wizard. Bocas is a great surf destination during the right time of year (Nov. - Feb.) but we didn't time the visit well.

However, our next stop was 3 days in Playa Santa Catalina, which has a very consistant reef break. Mike was able to get in a lot of surfing until he broke his board on our last day there. Santa Catalina is a small fishing \ surf village on the Pacific coast. It has a couple of nice beaches that are much mellower than the main surf break, so even Melissa was surfing. There's not too much to do there other than surf and hang out, which was nice after a few busy days in Bocas del Toro.

Now we are in Panama City, and we went to see the canal today at Miraflores Locks. We watched a couple large ships go through, lowering 52 feet on their way to the Pacific Ocean. We hope to see more of the city tomorrow, as long as Melssa's cold (fourth one on this trip) doesn't get in the way.

Nicaragua

We decided to venture up to Nicaragua because we heard good things from other travelers. First stop was San Juan del Sur, a fishing village on a beautiful horseshoe shaped bay, and stayed for a week. It's close to several good surf spots, so it's loaded with surfers. Actually, I (Melissa) finally started surfing and I loved it! The small waves at the town beach and Playa Remanso were perfect for me. Beside that, there's not much to do which is great because it was so hot. We met some wonderful people there - Shannon and Steve, from Canada who just opened a smoothie place on the beach, which we went to everyday. Michael, a local who worked there was fun to chat with and practice our Spanish, and Tom and Suzie from Vienna that we surfed with a bit.

One day we woke up so itchy and cranky from all our mosquito and sand fly bites that we decided to take a break from the beach and head to the city of Granada. Granada is considered Nicaragua's finest colonial town, and is on Lake Nicaragua (the largest lake in Central America). Lake Nicaragua is the only fresh water lake in the world with sharks (bull sharks). We spent a couple days exploring the town then took the ferry to Isla de Ometepe, a beautful small island formed by two volcanos on Lake Nicaragua. We stayed on the beach at Santo Domingo, and attempted to explore the island by renting bikes one day but got a flat, and renting a motorcycle the next but also got a flat. Lesson learned, don't rent poorly maintained rides in third world countries.

I'll remember Nicaragua for it's scary thunder. One night in particular in Isla de Ometepe, the thunder was so loud I must have jumped two feet out of bed from a sound sleep. It sounded like lightening struck the nighstand! Everyone in the hostel talked about it the next day. I'm glad it wasn't just me that was freaked out.

Guatemala border crossing

Due to our last minute plans to travel to the Caribbean we planned to skip a few countries in Central America. But, we kept hearing great things about Guatemala from other travelers and since we were already so far south in Mexico, we decided to go to Guatemala for a short stay. We went to Quetzaltenango (Xela for short “shey-lah”) because we heard it’s similar to Antigua but a lot less touristy and we thought it would only take about 3 hours to get there from the border (but as usual, the estimates we heard were way off).

Crossing borders by foot is always an interesting experience. Right or wrong, it always seems like everyone is trying to rip you off. And no one ever seems to have any accurate information to share. It all started when we got off the mini-bus from Tapachula at the border town, Hidalgo, Mexico. We weren’t sure where the actual border was and we were immediately approached by pedi-cabs (bicycle taxis). After our experience crossing the border between Italy and Slovenia 4 years ago (i.e. long, long walk with our full packs), we decided to take them up on the offer to carry us and our bags (2 larger backpacks, 2 daypacks and a surfboard bag with 3 boards).



They were going to take us across the bridge that crosses the river between Mexico and Guatemala, for a reasonable price. At least I think that is what we agreed to in my broken Spanish. As we started, they asked if we needed to exchange money. I agreed since I thought it would be good to have a little money when we arrived in Guatemala. They stopped at some random spot and took my $20 and were gone for a while. I started getting nervous. They finally came back with my money, but I’m sure we didn’t get a good exchange rate.

A minute later, we approached the border, which turns out to be 50 feet from were the bus dropped us off (we just didn‘t see it). Then the pedi-cab driver starts asking for more money. I was confused, not sure if they were changing the price on us, or if the price we agreed upon was only to get us to the border (50 feet). Maybe they now wanted more to actually drive us across. Or maybe they wanted us to give them our exit tax money (many countries charge you a fee to leave, just to make sure they get any left over money you wanted to keep for your scrap book). At this point, I was a bit skeptical of the whole thing and felt like we were in the process of getting ripped off. Being exhausted from the heat and the overnight bus the night before didn’t help the situation. So we jumped off the pedi-cabs, grabbed our bags and paid the man the agreed amount ($2 I think).



We walked to the immigration window and realized that the pedi-cab was asking us for our exit tax. But I really didn’t want to give it to him. Ultimately, we walked along way across the bridge to enter Guatemala and probably should have just stayed on the pedi-cab.






Once we arrived in Guatemala, it was the same story. Everyone wanted to drive us to the bus station, but no one could tell us where it was. We decided to walk. However, after asking 3 people for directions and getting 3 different answers, we grabbed another pedi-cab to the bus station. We got a good price and the driver was really nice. We told him where we were headed, Xela. He pulled up to a bus marked Xela and told some guy, we thought was the driver, where we were going. The bus station was an empty dirt/mud lot full of “Chicken Buses“. These are old US school buses that are painted in all sorts of wild colors. This was completely different then the 1st class buses and bus station we were accustom to in Mexico.


(Typical Chicken Bus, Xela, Guatemala, not the boarder town bus station)

Now the fun really begins. Immediately, the bus driver started loading our bags onto the Xela bus. At first we thought, ’wow, how helpful.’ We asked how long until the bus leaves, ‘diez minutos’ (10 minutes). Turns out every chicken bus will tell you 10 minutes, no matter how long it actually is going to be. So we get on the bus, our stuff is already loaded in the back, not on top, which was great, and we pay the fare. We are the only ones on the bus.

At one point, we thought we were leaving, but the driver only moved the bus, making room for another bus to pull up. After about 30 minutes we ask, again, how long until we leave…“10 minutes”. After a while, another bus driver comes up to us and asks if we are going to Xela. ‘Of course, we are sitting on the Xela bus.’ He informs us that his bus is leaving soon, and that our buses is not leaving for a long while. After a lot of broken Spanish with several people, we come to realize that our bus isn’t leaving for another hour and a half, and they guy charged us double the usual fare. I (Melissa) was irate. Hot, tired and completely fed up with the whole day, I went up to our driver, angry as hell, said "You say we go to Xela in 10 minutes long time ago but other buses already go. I know we pay double. Many other man tell me cost 50. My husband pay 100. They say you bad. I want my money now!" He just laughed at me and said no. Good thing, because looking back on it, that wasn’t the brightest thing I’ve ever done - yelling at these three guys sitting in a dirty lot in a border town in Guatemala between some chicken buses and dilapidated buildings (with people sleeping in the dirt or peeing on the wall). I told him maybe I should go talk to the police… that’s when he just got up and went back to tinkering with the engine. Crap… what if I pissed off this guy and now he’s going to call his buddies and say, ‘hey, come out and rob my bus today I’ve got this bitchy gringa…’ We decided that if we were the only two people on the bus when it left, we would get off. Then, just as the bus starts to FINALLY move four locals jumped on.

To end this long drawn-out story… we made it to Xela in 6 hours with no incident. The bus stopped every 100 feet or so for more passengers, or so it seemed (which just pleased us to no end). At one point, there were 4 people to each seat, and people crammed in the isle. We were in awe of how people continued to stuff themselves into this school bus. Also, a nice local woman on the bus informed us that we didn’t even get ripped off. The extra charge was because of our large backpacks and surfboard bag. Opps.

Happy Birthday to Me

We celebrated my birthday in Manuel Antonio, Costa Rica. We didn't do much, which was good planning since it rained the entire day. We started with a wondeful breakfast at the green, fancy Hotel Si Como No. I was SO excited to drink my cappuchino overlooking the beautiful tropical hillside. (Costa Rica is known for it's dark and strong coffee. You can imagine how intense the espresso was! yeay! The little things in life excite me.) I think the rain kept the monkeys and sloths away. bummer.

Then we both got massages at the Serenity Spa, also at Si Como No. Ahh, relaxation! We followed this up with sangria and lunch at El Avion. The restaurant is centered around a 1954 Fairchild C-123 plane which was supposed to be used to smuggle arms to the Contra rebels in Nicaragua in the 80's, but was never used because the Iran-Contra Scandal blew up. The owner of the restaurant/bar must have a sense of humor since Manuel Antonio is gringo central. By the way, the inside of the plane is a bar.

Thank you for all the happy birthday wishes! I had a great day with Mike in Costa Rica!

Chacahua (More out of order updates)

While we were frying our brains with spanish classes and excessive heat in Puerto Escondido, we decided to take a little break, like a mini-vacation within our bigger trip. If you ever take an extended trip, you'll find you need these little mini-vacations to keep your motivation up to keep traveling. We took the advice of Dan, the owner of our hotel, and headed out to Chacahua for an over night stay. We left most of our stuff at Hotel Casa de Dan y Carmen, so we traveled pretty light.

This was essential because it took a taxi ride to the bus stop, a 1 hour bus ride to Rio Grande, a colletivo ride to Zapiotalita (see photo - left), a lancha (see photo and video below) followed by an off road collectivo ride.

A collectivo is small truck or taxi on a fixed route that picks up passengers as it goes.

The trip wasn't that bad actually, because everything lined up nicely without much delay between rides. It took about 2 hours total. The lancha ride was beautiful, but brief. It's possible to take the lancha across the entire lagoon, which we did on our return trip. Below is a link to a video on You Tube that we took during the boat ride.

Chicahua was a cool but strange place. The people are decendents of African slaves that escaped the Spanish centuries ago. It is now a small community based on fishing and tourism. The beach is lined with small, primative cabinas (one room huts with palm roofs) and accompanying resturants (palm covered beach area with shack that serves as a kitchen). They also allow campers to setup tents or sleep in the hammocks that are strung up between the poles that hold up the palm roofs.

The beach was pretty nice (safer to swim than Puerto Escondido) and a long right point break.

Oaxaca (seriously out of order)

Oaxaca City was our second stop after Mexico City. You may have already seen the photo album and read all the comments, but I still wanted to share a bit about it. We spent 5 days in Oaxaca City. It was quite a contrast from the urban sprawl that is Mexico City. Oaxaca is an interesting city with a quaint colonial city center, bustling zocalo and a nice pedestrian-only street to wander down (sounds like I‘ve been reading too many guide books!). It was the time of the state’s biggest fiesta, the Guelaguetza. Two Mondays in August they have two performances a day to celebrate the different cultures within the state with their dances and music. We didn’t know about this, and it explained why our hostel was available Friday, Saturday and then booked on Sunday.

During the time of the Guelaguetza, there are lots of other little celebrations going on around town. We went to the mezcal festival one night with a new friend from Switzerland. Another day, we watched xylophone performers and dancers in the zocalo. (Mezcal is made from agave and is similar to tequila). On that Monday, we stood in line for the free seat section at the Guelaguetza Auditorium which is on the hill overlooking the city. They had the best fireworks we’ve ever seen! They also threw tons of free stuff into the audience. We left with four sombreros (two we gave away and two we left on a bus by accident, so we have none.) Lesson learned: don’t put stuff in the overhead storage area on buses. It was so hot waiting for the Guelaguetza to start, we had to use our umbrellas while we waited, and it didn’t help that much. As soon as the performances started, everyone put their umbrellas away, except the women next to us. She resisted through the polite requests, yelling, threats, and plastic bottles and cans being thrown at her. This was a little annoying since I was getting hit with some of the stuff. When she finally put her umbrella away (after sundown) everyone cheered. It was hilarious.

Carribean Island Photos Uploaded

Just wanted to let you know that we uploaded photos. Click on the link on the right side of the map. I haven't arranged them yet or added captions. Sorry there are so many, but we really wanted to share what we saw.

Just missed the Hurricane

Well we are back in contact with the ´real world´. That small Caribbean island is a trip. They have not seen many changes for the last 50 years, until recently. They are restoring buildings at a rapid pace (nothing is actually rapid there, but it´s fast for them). It's beautiful in a decrepit sort of way. The buildings were gorgeous, when they didn't look like they were in a war zone. Walking around was so strange because it looked like the most dangerous neighborhood in the world. Our internal instincts were saying.. this is everything you were taught to avoid. But this was probably the safest country we'll visit during our trip. The people aren't even allowed to talk to us. Most of the time we felt completely invisible. Except for those few hustlers who risked talking to us to try to make a buck.

The old cars really added to the feeling like we were in a movie. People were waiting in lines everywhere we looked, and the rest were sitting in their doorways or balconies watching the world go by. It was just a strange place. The cocktails were good, but the food was terrible! I just couldn't eat another ham and cheese sandwich or canned vegetables. Sometimes they ran out so it wasn't an option. But they always had rum and cigars available. The fact that we were both sick (colds) probably didn't make the ham sandwiches go down any easier, but the rum seemed to help =)

Now we're in Jaco, Costa Rica (you have to scroll down the map to see the updated locations - hint Google: fix this!). It´s great to be back in a country that has food choices, which Costa Rica isn't known for. We just had fish tacos with an all-you-can-eat salad bar. Oh my GOD! This was heaven! We plan to hang around for a bit, and we really need more Spanish classes!

Swimming with Whale Sharks

Swimming with whale sharks this morning off of Isla Holbox, Mexico was amazing!! These animals are so large, yet peaceful and gentle. That's Melissa next to the biggest shark of the day. It was bigger than our boat, about 20 feet. It was also the slowest shark and it let us swim along side it for a while.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whale_sharks

Mariachis - Mexico City

Here's a little video of the Mariachis band that we hired for a song in Plaza Garibaldi, Mexico City. Sorry that these posts are out of order.

San Simon - Zunil, Guatemala

The strangest sight so far on our trip. This is a Mayan saint in Guatemala, recreated with a plastic mannequin. He had a smoking cigar in his mouth. This effigy is moved to a different house in the town of Zunil each year. People pray to San Simon and offer him rum, cigars, cigarettes and more. It was so strange to see. The Mayans are also mostly Catholic, so this is particularly strange. Many Mayan towns in Guatemala have an effigy of San Simon, but he sometimes is referred to by different names.

From the link on wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Culture_of_Guatemala


"Roman Catholicism combined with the indigenous Maya religion to form the unique syncretic religion which prevailed throughout the country and still does in the rural regions. Beginning from negligible roots prior to 1960, however, Protestant Pentecostalism has grown to become the predominant religion of Guatemala City and other urban centers and down to mid-sized towns.

The unique religion is reflected in the local saint, Maximón, who is associated with the subterranean force of masculine fertility and prostitution. Always depicted in black, he wears a black hat and sits on a chair, often with a cigar placed in his mouth and a gun in his hand, with offerings of tobacco, alcohol, and Coca-cola at his feet. The locals know him as San Simon of Guatemala."

We all agreed (Melissa and I went there with four new friends), that this was extremely strange, yet worth the trek all over this small indigenous town. We'll give more details on Guatemala soon.

Barra de la Cruz

After about 2 weeks in Puerto Escondido, we finally decided to move on. The Spanish classes were great and so was the surf. We will miss it. But I think we will be back again.

Luckily our next stop was also amazing. Unfortunately we only had time for 1 night in Barra de la Cruz. It's a great surf spot, which I don't think I'm supposed to mention by name in my blog because people are trying to keep it a secret. But it's no secret. This is a great wave, which draws a lot of surfers from around the world. I was lucky enough to get a session in the afternoon with only 3 guys out. It was a little windy, but the wave was still amazing. Click on the video below.

The people of Barra really made this place special. They are all so nice and friendly. After leaving our Spanish classes, we were eager to try it out. The people of Barra were very willing to speak with us and give us tips on improving our Spanish.

Mike surfing Barra badly!

Puerto Escondido Surf Video

Here's a short video of Playa Zicatela in Puerto Escondido. It's not Mike. He did paddle out here on a smaller day, but it was still a bit too big for him. Maybe next year, after a year of surfing Ocean Beach in San Francisco he might be ready to tackle these waves.

Puerto Escondido

Well we finally made it to the coast. It is really hot here in Puerto Escondido and humid too. I’ve finally had a chance to get into the water for some surf. Unfortunately, it has been a while (4 weeks) since I last surfed because of packing up, visiting family in Boston, my bike trip with Dan, and our two weeks traveling around Mexico. So when I first arrived I felt pretty rusty. When I saw how huge the waves are here, I was pretty intimidated. Luckily there are a few other spots nearby that are much smaller (La Punta and the main beach away from the main break). The main break in Puerto Escondido is in the middle/north end of Playa Zicatela. The wave breaks like the world famous Bonzai Pipeline on the North Shore of Hawaii. It is a huge barreling wave that breaks with amazing force in sallow water, just off shore. It is a common occurrence to see broken surfboards.

I don’t think I will be surfing the main break unless it gets a lot smaller. The other spots are really good too, so I’m enjoying my time in the water.

Melissa and I enrolled in Spanish classes here. It’s been keeping us pretty busy. I generally get up at 7am (sunrise) and go for a surf. Then we eat breakfast, do some homework/review, drink coffee and then walk to school. We’re taking 4 hours per day. Combined with the heat and humidity, this really fries our brains. After our classes we go out for lunch by the beach and then we go for a swim in the ocean or the pool at our hotel. It’s a pretty mellow existence, but it actually feels like a lot of work. But I think everything here feels like a lot of work because it’s so hot. When we walk to class, we are literally dripping in sweat. Just standing around we lose about a pound an hour just sweating. You either have to be in water or in front of a fan to be comfortable. But don’t get us wrong we like it here, despite the heat and mosquitoes.

The bet is over… we both had our first bout of sickness. Mike had a little stomach issue that lasted one day, and the next day I (Melissa here now) got a crazy fever. My body aches were torture. My left hip hurt so bad that I couldn’t lay on that side for three days. Thankfully Mike suggested I take an antibiotic and it must have helped because I was fine the next day. No other issues, just pain and a fever.

We’re planning to take two days off this week and head out to Chacahua. It’s a remote fishing village on the coast north of Puerto Escondido. We have to take a boat to get there. It will be very relaxing, with not to much to do but watch the birds and the sea. It will be a little vacation within our trip.

Hope everyone is doing well. Keep the comments coming, we loving hearing from you all.

We made it to Puerto Escondido!

After five days in Oaxaca City (will write another post about that), and a six hour windy, bumpy bus ride we have arrived in Puerto Escondido. The owner of our last hostel highly recommended Hotel Dan & Carmen and we are very lucky to have gotten reservations because this is the high travel season for Mexican nationals. This place is paradise... it's so tropical with open spaces between parts of the building. I love that! It will be hard to go to another hostel or hotel after this. We have two nights in the "main house", and one night in our own private cabana. There is a full size lap pool, and a rooftop viewing deck to check the surf. You can see the entire length of the beach and city. All for just $25 a night. I'll post a photo of the view from the porch outside our bedroom door. Ahhh, now it feels like vacation!

We walked down to the beach, a short block away, and sat in awe of the heavy surf. No one was out surfing today, because it was too windy. This place is so heavy and gnarly that the conditions must be perfect for people to go out. Mike's going to go surf down at the point which is supposed to be mellower. Thus starts his dawn patrols.

Had dinner at Carmen's (yes, of Dan and Carmen) and had a great stir fry - ahh, veggies! We haven't been getting a lot of those lately. Mainly meat and cheese (and mole lately). Topped off our first night with a swim at 10pm with the sky flashing with lightening in the distance. It's so hot and humid, I might wake up in the middle of the night for a dip!

Tomorrow we're going to check out a language school just a few doors down the road. Next we'll back track a bit and fill in the details of the last week...

Mexico City

It’s obvious that we’re having a great time by the lack of time we’re spending on the blog. We’ve been going going going non-stop, and fall into bed every night exhausted (shocking, eh). So here’s a run-down of what we’ve been up to…

To get acquainted with Mexico City we took the Turibus which was a nice way to take it all in, and walked as far as what we drove (or so it seemed). Some sights…. Alemeda Central, a nice park where there are many vendors, performers, and people enjoying the outdoors. We noticed that everyone is holding hands and lots of people of all ages necking; the beautiful marble Palacio de Bellas Artes is at the end of the park with impressive murals by Diego Rivera and other famous muralists. We also went to the touristy Ballet Folklorico de Mexico inside Bellas Artes, but there were more Mexican tourists which was great to see. We checked out Plaza Garibaldi for the mariachis and pulque (original agave alcoholic beverage - from Aztec times). It was mellow when we were there, but we heard Friday and Saturday nights get crazy with all the mariachis playing and people partying.

I loved the outlaying neighborhood called Coyoacan which is where Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera’s house is located and is now an interesting museum. Walking around Coyoacan, I had this sudden feeling that I really AM in another country - maybe because it looked and felt much different than the more urban areas of Mexico City - and I just loved that feeling. I’m traveling again!

The Central Historico district and the main plaza, (aka zocalo) was nice. The zocalo is also the site of the palacio national - offices of the president of Mexico and the federal treasury. Inside there are amazing murals by Diego Rivera but we couldn’t go in the first time we tried because it was closed for a protest. The plaza is a place for political protests and we saw a protest every day we were there. Nothing spectacular or dramatic. Although when I saw what looked like the entire Mexico City police force marching in unison toward the square for what I thought was a protest, that was a little intimidating. Also in the zocalo is the Catedral Metropolitan, built in 1543, which has been sinking unevenly since then because it was built on an ancient lake. You could clearly see the cracks and uneven ground. Around the Cathedral There are many dancers dressed up in traditional conchero with feathered headdresses, and they dust people with sage in what looks like a blessing.

I also love walking around the markets - crazy and disturbing yet interesting. Meat, chicken and fish are just sitting out all day waiting to be purchased and hopefully cooked really well. Like most other countries the use the entire animal, nothing is wasted. We saw huge cow tongues, brains, intestines and entire fried pig skins which seemed really popular.

The first time we ate in the market, we weren’t sure how it worked… but it worked out. They have el Menu Del Dia which is usually only $3-$5 and includes soup, bread, rice and beans, a main dish, desert and agua frescas (fruit juice, water and sugar). The food is different here which is what I expected, but I don’t know what a lot of it is. That Spanish isn’t coming back as fast as I would like for it to! I’ve been a little more cautious than Mike in terms of what I eat and drink, but am becoming more adventurous.

We posted some photos with captions. See the link at the top right side of the blog.

Mexico City Photo Album

Here are some photos that we finally uploaded from Mexico City and before we left for our trip. We should have some titles/comments soon.

http://picasaweb.google.com/melissa.olivasullivan/MexicoCity

Teotihuacan

Photo taken at the Museum at Teotihuacan.
Ancient site just outside of Mexico City.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teotihuacan

We were told by friends who had been there to definitely go to Teotihuacan. I read in the book that "it's amazing as long as you don't let the hawkers get you down". No kidding, there were people everywhere trying to sell you the same trinkets. The bows & arrows were very popular with the kids.

We walked down Calzada de los Muertos (Avenue of the Dead), Teotihucan's main street, and took in the size of the complex. The largest pyramid is called Piramide del Sol, and it is the third largest in the world. The base is 222 meters long on each side, just over 70 meters high, and assembled around 100 AD according to my handy Lonely Planet book. We climbed up the 248 very steep steps to the top. I could feel the altitude of Mexico City... at least this is what I told myself! The view of Teotihuacan was breathtaking.

We ventured outside the complex to find a restaurant recommended by our book, Restaurant Techinanco, and it was worth it. It was a quiet, friendly home-cooking kind of place. I had the most delicious mole!!! We continued exploring Teotihuacan - the Palacio de los Jaguares, Palacio de Quetzalpapalotl, and Piramide de la Luna as well as the museum.

When we arrived back into the city, I called Miriam - Karyn's step-sister who lives in Mexico City and we planned to get together for dinner that night. We had a great time with Miriam, her husband Sergio, and her sister Carmen. They took us to a wonderful Mexican restaurant, that was beautiful inside,with mariachis at our table the whole night. We had a great time with them, and look forward to seeing them in San Francisco on their next visit. Got home about 1am and crashed out.

Mexico City

Sorry it has taken so long to update our blog. Hope you weren´t worried about us. Mexico is way safer than we were told (I think by people that were never in Mexico). Everyone that has visited Mexico speaks very highly of it. Here´s a few things I´ve learned so far:

1) The water is safe to drink in Mexico City. It´s highly chlorinated, so that cleans it up, but it does have a strong chlorine taste. No issue with my stomach after 5 days of drinking the water!!

2) We can eat fruits and veggies that are uncooked and unpeeled (i.e. at clean restaurants). We are still avoiding the salads, but salsa fresca is on. Thank God! We avoided it the first few days. A taco in Mexico without salsa fresca is a sad, sad sight.

3) It´s safe. Sure there are some bad areas to avoid but that´s true of any big city and Mexico City is the 3rd largest city in the world. It seemed as safe or safer than most American cities. I even asked Melissa, ¨Does Mexico City not have any dodgy people, or do they just all blend in.¨ She thinks they blend in, so they must be out there, but we haven´t run into any of them.

4) The smog is not that bad. Way better than LA in July.

5) The traffic is also not as bad as LA. Mexico City has an extensive Metro and bus system (20 cents per ride) and has been developing some innovative traffic solutions that have made a big impact. We had dinner with the chief architect that has developed some of these solutions, so I might be biased (more on that later). Also the safest Metro I have ever been on. Police everywhere on their own soap boxes, literally.

6) Saw very few homeless people.

7) Cheap tacos rock and they are everywhere.

8) There are more police then I have ever seen. Probably to clean up all the crime that we heard so much about. Seems to be working.

More soon....
-Mike

Made it to Mexico City

Well everything actually worked out pretty well. We each received $100 travel vouchers, had a nice stay at the Marriot and bought ourselves a new ultra small laptop. No that wasn’t free from United. But with all the spare time we had in LA we rented a car for only $18, found a Fry’s Electronics store nearby and found a Fujitsu LifeBook 810 that is so small and light weight I could hear my disks in my back re-inflating with joy. We shipped the large Dell laptop that we planned to travel with back to San Francisco. Of course we always seem to take up all the time we have available and are always late for everything. We almost missed our flight but made it with out too much stress.

As we flew into Mexico City, we had a good view of the sprawling city and very colorful buildings. I (Melissa) was a little panicked when I got my pack wrapped in United Airlines packing tape. The front pocket zipper appeared to rip open and some of my things were sticking out. Turns out that the only thing missing is my swiss army knife. I can deal with that.

The hostel owner, Angel, picked us up at the airport and gave us some great info to orient us to the city. We got here about 9:00pm (2 hrs ahead of CA) and walked to get some food. Mike wanted to make a bet to see who gets sick first. I was thinking I might win when he started pouring on all the sauces at the table. Is it ok to eat the salsa here!? I bet I'm going to be playing this game often!

Crazy Day

Crazy day!

We were delayed in SF (The City) the entire day. It started out minor, as it usually does (10:20 am pushed to 10:35). The plane was delayed about 15 minutes because of a ‘maintenance issue.‘ We boarded the plan then had to wait for the ‘paperwork.‘ Once completed the captain announced that we were further delayed because of traffic on the run ways. We finally get the OK to pull away from the gate and then sat there for a while. Meanwhile, our flight to Mexico at 12:59pm is slowly slipping away. We finally start to roll around 11:30am, we can still make it! A few minutes later, ‘we have to return to the gate because an indicator light is on that needs to be checked.‘ OK now we see our Mexico flight slipping away into the sunset. We returned to the gate and start making panicked calls to United’s customer service to attempt a reroute. However, they won’t let us de-plane because they are hoping to fix the issue and continue to LA. After all our other flight options vanish, they announce that the plane’s engine needs to be tested and we all need to de-plane. However, the flight might actually happen at some point so they won’t release anyone’s bags and they won’t let anyone change their flights until the test is completed (‘about 1 hour,’ they lie). After the dust has settled and people stopped threatening the United employee working our gate (’Baby sitting‘ is the term I heard her use on the phone … is that the official, corporate manual name I wonder, or just slang that has developed around the airport over the years), I approached for some guidance. She was actually really helpful and nice to me and referred to me as ’a really nice man trying to get to Mexico City.’ Amazing what a friendly smile or lack of a snarl will do for some people’s demeanor. She booked Melissa and me on the next day’s flight from LAX to Mexico City first class (same flight that we just missed #817). We now had a few options, we could stay in San Francisco for the night and then fly to LA on the same flight that just screwed us, or an earlier 7:30am flight. We also had the option to see if our flight would actually leave SFO today and stay at a hotel, free of charge, in LA. This would make the chance of missing our LAX to MEX flight much less likely. So we decided to do this. However right at that moment they announced the plane’s engine test would not be completed until 4pm. People started rushing the desk with rage in their eyes. The ever helpful United employee (wish I got her name) changed us to another LA flight at 4pm, just in case our flight was canceled or further delayed.

Of course you can probably guess what happened next. Our new LA flight was delayed from 4:00pm to 5:20pm right as the departure time arrived. Luckily our originally flight was just a few gates away and started to board as we learned of this newest delay. We walked over and sure enough about 60 people had left and they still had room on the plane. Now get this, because our flight had left the gate at one point, it was no longer on ’the board’ or in the computer system, so all the newly irate people that were learning about their delayed flight didn’t even know there was an LA bound flight leaving 2 gates away at that very moment, with 60 empty seats. I wanted to run over to tell them but didn’t want any chance of missing the flight myself.

First Post

Welcome to our blog. We hope you enjoy the next four months as much as we plan to. We're going to try to keep this blog update as much as possible, so please check back frequently.

Our advanture starts off in Mexico City. We are flying from San Francisco on July 19, 2008. Our tickets were free thanks to miles and too many credit card purchases. We have 3 nights booked at a Bed and Breakfast, which is really just a hostel, but it received good reviews online (hostelz.com, hostelworld.com). However, we might have some people we can stay with, so we may give up the $10 deposit.

After a few days of breathing in exhaust and checking out the largest city in the world, we plan to take a bus or plane to Oaxaca. From there we will head to the coast, to Puerto Escondido for an extended stay and some Spanish lessons, along with some pumping surf. We figure we will have time on our hands in Puerto Escondido to map the next phase of our trip.

We always want to see everything, but Central and South America are pretty big places. So we will have to prioritize and figure out where we really want to go and how much we can spend to get there. Below is a list of some of our top choices so far. Any suggestions or feedback is greatly appreciated.

Mexico
Guatemala
El Salvador?
Honduras?
Nicaragua?
Costa Rica
Panama?
Ecuador?
Peru
Chile
Argentina
Brazil

Weather could be an issue in South America, since we will be arriving during their winter/fall.