Sorry to leave everyone hanging! I know you´ve been waiting with baited breath for the most recent installment (yeah, right) of our adventures, but it´s actually been a little difficult to both get the time to update the blog as well as find an Internet cafe.
So now we´re actually in Bogota, Colombia and about to start the third leg of our trip through this exciting country. After we purchase a few kilos of cocaine and some automatic weapons, we´ll be all set. Of course, I´m only joking. You know, it´s funny, all the dramatic generalizations that people have about countries they´ve never set foot in. We had innumerable warmings about how dangerous Mexico is and even how the Mexican people don´t like Americans. Yeah, uh, not so much. There are definitely very dangerous places in just about any country one would go to and it´s certainly advisable to avoid those places, but our trip has been just about totally devoid of anything dangerous (other than our crappy rental cars) and anyone wishing to do us anything but kindness.
Well, so I don´t have much to report about Colombia yet (and please notice that it´s spelled ColOmbia and not Columbia....we aren´t taking a vacation at the outdoor clothing company) so I´ll let you all know how Costa Rica went. I´ll break it down into the four parts that we had time to check out - Manuel Antonio on the coast, Monteverde in the cloud forest, La Fortuna near the Arenal volcano, and (briefly) the big city of San Jose.
Manuel Antonio - Just down the road from the town of Quepos, we stayed near the Manuel Antonio National Park in a pretty blah hotel called Arenas Cabinas or something. The hotel was mediocre and we should have stayed at the hostel down the road. C'est la vie. The cool thing about our hotel was that it was just a couple hundred meters from the entrance to the National Park. We ended up doing a guided tour of the park, which turned out, despite my skepticism, to be a fantastic choice. The guide carries along a set of telescopic-ish binoculars and can spot the most well-hidden wildlife that normal human beings would have zero chance of seeing. We saw both two and three-toed sloths, a raccoon, some frogs, cool spiders, and even a Jesus Lizard (the creature, not the band, you crazy punk rockers, you). Good times despite the pouring rain. I also tried my hand at surfing the next day with one of the locals as my instructor. I suck, even though Leann got some pictures of me standing that make it look like I know what the hell I´m doing. God bless you, misleading technology. Other than a pretty brutal walk up a massive hill to get some cash, a quick trip to Quepos to get bus tickets, some grubbing down, and extensive soccer watching, that about covers our time in Manuel Antonio. We caught the most indirect and winding series of busses of all time and made our way through the mountains to....
Monteverde - Now this is a pretty cool and unique town. It was settled by Quakers from the United States back in the 1950s or 60s and has tried to balance its massive tourist appeal with a more ¨green¨, ecologically responsible ideology. We stayed at a neat little place called Pension Santa Elena, pretty much a cool little backpackers joint. Anyway, we tried our hand at zip lining (easy and fun), which included a fast ¨Superman¨ ride where you zip along facing down, hands out, a la Superman. The last leg of the zip lining tour was an attraction called a Tarzan swing. Now this thing was f´n cool. You climb across a hanging bridge to a kind of a cage where they strap you in various ways to a long bungee-ish cord. They open a small metal gate in front of you, instruct you to bend your legs, and you step out into relative nothingness. The free fall only lasts a second or two, as you plummet 75 feet or so before the cord catches and swings you back and forth a few times. Now, I´m not normally the type to scream or squawk when I ride rollercoasters or the like, but this thing elicited a primal noise from inside my diaphragm or somewhere that came out sounding like a Neanderthal mating call. Heart aflutter I waited for Leann to complete her ride, which she admirably did despite a distinct fear of heights. My woman is pretty much a badass (even though she did do it with her eyes closed and a scary grimace on her face). In Monteverde we also took a nighttime tour through a portion of the rainforest called the Children´s Eternal Forest. This area is run and maintained by a non-profit which is funded by schools and children from all over the world. Only about 5% of the reserve is available to see by the public, as the company decided to maintain virgin wildlife and ecology over touristic income. Cool stuff. Anyway, we got another guided tour here and saw the biggest tarantula on the face of the planet. This thing was way bigger than our guide´s hand. We also saw a bunch of other neat wildlife (how neat is seeing firefly larvae in the dark all over the ground when you turn your flashlight off?), including a poisonous pit viper, some walking sticks, and the Mot-Mot bird which makes tons of different calls and apparently harbors no fear of human interaction. Walking around the rainforest while it´s dark is a pretty exceptional experience and definitely unlike anything I´ve ever done. We spent a couple days in the Monteverde area, getting the lay of the land, cruising around, meeting some backpackers from all over the world, and then booking our next leg of the Costa Rica adventure in...
La Fortuna - Upon recommendation from an employee at the last hostel, we stayed at a cheapy hotel in La Fortuna. It was Ghetto, capital G intended. Oh well, we only stayed a few sleepless hours until a van picked us up to ----- wait for it, wait for it ---- go white water rafting for the entire day!!!! Wooooo!!!!!!!!!! This was tons of kickass fun and was a very professionally run adventure. I´d had some dire warnings from a couple raft guide friends of mine (looking at you, Keenan) to make sure the trips were safe. This one was safe and just plain awesome. We left the hotel a little after 5 in the morning and drove a long way and hit the water maybe by 8:30 or so after a quick breakfast. We were delayed en route by a protest blocking the entire highway. Kind of annoying for us as we had to walk through the pouring rain, leaving our van behind, but when we hit the actual protest we realized that people were protesting increased taxes on water use. A little humbing for me, especially since I´d only been thinking about how it inconvenienced my experience. OK, humble pie sufficiently eaten, we all got some quick lessons about safety, how to raft, etc. I´ve been rafting a bunch of times but it´s been a while and the refresher was welcome. The waters ranged from class 1 to class 4 rapids. Not too intense but just enough to keep the blood flowing. Every time we´d emerge on the other side of an especially rough patch of rapids, our guide would lead us in a high five with our paddles as we yelled out ¨Pura Vida!!!¨, the national motto of Costa Rica. At the end of the rafting trip, a van took us down to.....
San Jose - We only stayed two nights in San Jose at a very nice hostel called Gaudy´s and the first consisted of crushing tiredness and very little else. We were operating on minimal sleep, exhaustion from the 6 or 7 hour rafting trip, and were just beat. Leann was a little under the weather so she hit the sack while I did a little exploring, grabbed some grub and a beer, and picked up a few snacks and drinks for our room. The next day was mostly spent trying to negotiate our way to and through a San Jose hospital. Never fear, fair friends, all is well with your intrepid travellers. Leann´s been getting a bit of the stomach bug for a while now and we´d just had enough of dealing with it. To boot, she had a weird rash on her face. We went to the hospital, which also had clinics, a pharmacy, and various other medical services. This place was state of the art and very impressive. The doctor was great and assured Leann that her weird face rash was probably just from wearing the wet chin straps either on the zip lines or the rafting trip. She got her blood taken and it was discovered that she had elevated white blood cell counts, indicating a virus. A few prescriptions and we were on our way. Way to go, Costa Rican medical care system. Our last night in San Jose, I went out to meet an old high school friend of mine, Chris Morris, for a couple beers and some dinner. Leann took it easy in the hotel. Chris has lived in Costa Rica for 8+ years and is pretty much a Tico (Costa Rican) by now. It was great to catch up and he even gave me a brief tour of downtown San Jose, which is both picturesque and bustling.
That takes us to the San Jose - Bogota trip, which went off without a hitch on the airplane side of things. We got to the Bogota airport, changed out some money, and grabbed a cab to the hotel that we´d booked in advance. Yes, booked in advance. We got to the address the hotel had provided and there was no sign indicating that it was a hotel. We rang the bell. Nothing. The cab driver called the hotel´s phone number. Nothing. Uh, not good. This hotel has a branch in New York, which I also had the phone number for, and so I went to an international calling cafe and called them. Yeah, turns out they just spaced our reservation or something and went out celebrating Colombia´s Independence Day (which was yesterday.....que viva Colombia!) instead of manning the hotel. Fuckers. They told us to wait for 40 minutes and there´d be someone back at the hotel. Moreover, they´d compensate us for our inconvenience by giving us the night for free. Cool, right? We sat in a restaurant with all our gear and camped out for a while, splitting a plate of chicken and rice and a couple soft drinks. After around an hour, we went back to the hotel and rang the bell again. Nada. So now we´re on the street with all our bags and the day is turning to night and the people appear to be getting progressively drunker and more sketchy as night approaches. Screw this. We jumped a taxi back towards the airport and ended up ¨having¨ to stay the night at a Holliday Inn. Now, this place is seriously fancy and definitely not the kind of place we can really afford. Oh well. It was nice to not have to negotiate weird smells and partial hot water showers for once. As Leann said, great for morale, not great for the bank account.
We have a couple hours before we catch a shuttle back to the airport and then head to the coastal Colombian city of Cartagena. Not 100% sure what we´ll be doing there (aside from not staying in a place nearly as nice as this Holliday Inn). Weather promised to be yet more of the same --- rain, rain, rain. So we´ll probably be doing less beach stuff and more museum / cultural type of stuff.
Hope all is well with all of you and yours. Catch up with you soon with the next installment! Laters, adios, hasta luego, whatever floats your personal boat.
Chris and Leann
Thoughtful, yet exuberant
Thursday, July 21, 2011
Monday, July 11, 2011
Tulum and surrounding area
All right, then. Where were we?
When last I left you, fair reader, we were about to embark on our 11 hour overnighter from Palenque to Tulum. That really turned out to be a bitch of a bus ride. The bus we took wasn't quite as nice as the previous one. Being 6'3", I have the unfortunate problem of being about exactly one inch too tall to fit comfortably into most plane seats (can I get an 'amen', tall people?). This bus was no different. My knees were exactly one inch too long to fit well into the space between the seat and the seat in front of me. No matter how I contorted my body, I simply couldn't get comfortable. Leann slept like a baby. I felt like crying like a baby. Oh, well. I stayed up most of the night, watching folks periodically get on and off and witnessing a couple Mexican officials check the bus during the night at stops at random, darkened, unknown cities. Shortly after the sun rose, we rolled into Tulum, a coast town in the Yucutan peninsula in the state of Quintana Roo.
Tulum, Tulum. Now, I feel like a broken record here, but this town is flat-out amazing. Well, I guess the town itself is relatively benign, but the people (as per usual.....hell yeah, Mexican folk) and the beaches are incredible. The beach is comprised of soft sand. Now, when I say soft sand I don't just mean "yeah, yeah it's pretty soft." I mean crazy soft. Soft like bunny fur. Soft like ground up baby bottoms. Uh, that's a little disgusting but you get the picture. The sand is made from mostly limestone and is not only soft but refuses to get hot. Ever. It can be a million degrees outside and the sand is completely bearable in bare feet. The water is the color of the clearest turquoise stone you've ever seen. One can walk out into the water for a good 50-75 feet, as the slope of the sand is incredibly gradual until the coral reef is reached.
We had a general game plan for the area, thanks in large part to our wonderful friend Kate Ater and her copious notes on the region that she left for us before we all departed Oaxaca. Ok, so we wanted significant beach time (check), to see Chichen Itza (check), go to Coba (check), swim in a cenote (check), and avoid renting any more cars (negative....we broke down and rented another car that's done us just fine, thank you very much).
I can't remember the order in which we did everything, so I'll just rattle off what I do remember of the spots that we went to.
I'd also like to give a quick and enthusiastic thumbs-up to the hotel we established as our home base: Posada Luna del Sur. The owners, Marty and Sara, are a very nice Canadian couple who've run the hotel for about two and a half years. The place, especially in comparison to our bargain shopper spots so far, is excellent. It's air conditioned, clean, king-sized bed, and even a fridge. It's in the town of Tulum, which is not right on the beach. There are plenty of lodging spots on the beach but the beach stretch in Tulum doesn't have electrical infrastructure. That means that either the hotel must supply its own power to allow its patrons power 24/7 (which translates to incredibly expensive digs with moderate amenities) or it shuts power down completely for the majority of the day. On top of that, the showers are saltwater. Yeah, swimming in the beach and trying to shower the salt off with, uh, more saltwater. Negatory.
Coba - So this is a set of ruins just about 45 minutes away from our home spot in Tulum. Not the most expansive or visually striking of all the ruins but it has its own charm. The ruins have elements of other civilizations from Guatemala, making them unique in the Yucatan area. There is a beehive-shaped pyramid totally unlike any other we've seen. So, yeah. Cool ruins and a cool site. But that's not what made this a memorable trip. It was pouring rain (cats and dogs, yo!) and we sheltered ourselves under a small canopy trying to wait the rain out. After some time, we figured "screw it" and rented a couple bikes to cruise around the site. Yes, you can ride bicycles through the whole place. We threw on our rain gear and started cruising. It was SO fun. Splashing through puddles, we made our way from temple to temple, from the juego de pelota court (ancient Mayan 'ball game' court) to the huge pyramid at the end of the trek. This pyramid was a behemoth....the largest in the Yucatan, if I remember correctly. We climbed up the 17 bazillion stairs to the top and enjoyed a view that stretched for miles and miles. I have some pictures that I'll post later. The trek down was slightly perilous and fairly amusing, as I got to watch Leann scoot down on her butt, holding the rope attached down the middle of the stairs. The stairs themselves weren't perilous but the mind-fuck of looking down and imagining toppling down to your death was enough to make the majority of visitors take the descent very slowly. Great, great times.
Chichen Itza - The self-proclaimed "new 7th wonder of the world" is perhaps the most well-preserved archaeological site in the region. We had now visited multiple incredible archaeological sites and were a little skeptical about the presumed Disneyland-esque elements sure to be present at the area's most famous site. Sure enough, there were throngs of vendors selling everything from Hard Rock Cafe Chichen Itza t-shirts to carved wooden masks and small idols. However, the reputation of Chichen Itza is well earned. The site is incredibly well-preserved and the engravings on the walls were crystal clear. The ball court is 100% intact and carries an impressive echo (clapping carries for like 150 meters from one side to the other). Everything from the Warrior Temple to the Thousand Columns to the other temples there were in fantastic shape. And Chichen Itza is BIG. We have some more solid pictures to share, including pretty sharp ones of skull carvings (if I do say so myself) and even those of jaguar and eagle depictions.
Dos Ojos cenote - A cenote is an underground pool of natural water. The Dos Ojos cenote is comprised of two pools, connected underground by an underwater channel. Scuba divers can swim the connecting route but we just did the snorkel tour. Snorkeling around this cenote is like visiting another planet. Stalactites and stalagmites abound. Oh, and there are bats everywhere. Tons of bats. At first it just looks like some of the roof of the cave is a little squirmy until you realize that the movement are little fruit bats gathered in clusters. Cool, cool.
The weather has been a little overly rainy during our stint here. There was a tropical storm that swept through just prior to our visit (Tropical Storm Arlene or something like that) and the remnants were still slightly present while we were here. We tried to take advantage of the sunny stretches and immediately hit the beach. We'd intended to snorkel in a lagoon but were thwarted by a couple stormy days. C'est la vie.
Yesterday, our last full day in Mexico, we spent the whole day on the beach, soaking in sunshine that lasted about 99% of the day, and wallowing on the Tulum beaches like happy pigs in slop (I'm not calling you a pig, dear, just mentioning that we were incredibly happy and content). We ate and drank and swam and read and lived like a happy, vacationing couple instead of running around like determined chicken tourists with our heads cut off. We decided that we'd give one last shot at seeing some sea turtles in Akumal as they make their way up the beach to lay eggs.
Holy f'n crap. The turtles. We saw them! We saw TONS of them! We watched mama turtles come up the beach and dig huge holes with their massive flippers (these suckers are HUGE...must have been several hundred pounds a piece). It was amazing, like being in a nature documentary or something. The turtles and their eggs are protected by Mexican law and there were a few groups, perhaps volunteer, that watched over the egg-laying ritual and marked the spots on the beach where the turtles had decided to do their business. It was beautiful. We headed home about 11:00 or so after watching multiple turtles in various stages of their efforts all over the beach. We went to sleep contentedly, which leads me to.....
Today we leave Mexico. Noooooooo!!!!!!!! Well, I guess it's not all that bad, as our next stop is Costa Rica, where we plan to do some combination of beach, cloud forest, and volcanoes. However, Mexico has treated us so well that it's tough to leave. I freakin' love this country. We'll be back! We're hopping a bus to Cancun in a couple hours to prepare for our 6:00 pm flight to San Jose, Costa Rica where we arrive late, will crash at a budget hotel, and then plod on to the Pacific coast side of the country. A little excitement combined with a vague sense of loss at leaving Mexico. But the show must go on!
Check back with you all in a few days, hopefully with more cool adventures under our belt. This trip kicks ass.
When last I left you, fair reader, we were about to embark on our 11 hour overnighter from Palenque to Tulum. That really turned out to be a bitch of a bus ride. The bus we took wasn't quite as nice as the previous one. Being 6'3", I have the unfortunate problem of being about exactly one inch too tall to fit comfortably into most plane seats (can I get an 'amen', tall people?). This bus was no different. My knees were exactly one inch too long to fit well into the space between the seat and the seat in front of me. No matter how I contorted my body, I simply couldn't get comfortable. Leann slept like a baby. I felt like crying like a baby. Oh, well. I stayed up most of the night, watching folks periodically get on and off and witnessing a couple Mexican officials check the bus during the night at stops at random, darkened, unknown cities. Shortly after the sun rose, we rolled into Tulum, a coast town in the Yucutan peninsula in the state of Quintana Roo.
Tulum, Tulum. Now, I feel like a broken record here, but this town is flat-out amazing. Well, I guess the town itself is relatively benign, but the people (as per usual.....hell yeah, Mexican folk) and the beaches are incredible. The beach is comprised of soft sand. Now, when I say soft sand I don't just mean "yeah, yeah it's pretty soft." I mean crazy soft. Soft like bunny fur. Soft like ground up baby bottoms. Uh, that's a little disgusting but you get the picture. The sand is made from mostly limestone and is not only soft but refuses to get hot. Ever. It can be a million degrees outside and the sand is completely bearable in bare feet. The water is the color of the clearest turquoise stone you've ever seen. One can walk out into the water for a good 50-75 feet, as the slope of the sand is incredibly gradual until the coral reef is reached.
We had a general game plan for the area, thanks in large part to our wonderful friend Kate Ater and her copious notes on the region that she left for us before we all departed Oaxaca. Ok, so we wanted significant beach time (check), to see Chichen Itza (check), go to Coba (check), swim in a cenote (check), and avoid renting any more cars (negative....we broke down and rented another car that's done us just fine, thank you very much).
I can't remember the order in which we did everything, so I'll just rattle off what I do remember of the spots that we went to.
I'd also like to give a quick and enthusiastic thumbs-up to the hotel we established as our home base: Posada Luna del Sur. The owners, Marty and Sara, are a very nice Canadian couple who've run the hotel for about two and a half years. The place, especially in comparison to our bargain shopper spots so far, is excellent. It's air conditioned, clean, king-sized bed, and even a fridge. It's in the town of Tulum, which is not right on the beach. There are plenty of lodging spots on the beach but the beach stretch in Tulum doesn't have electrical infrastructure. That means that either the hotel must supply its own power to allow its patrons power 24/7 (which translates to incredibly expensive digs with moderate amenities) or it shuts power down completely for the majority of the day. On top of that, the showers are saltwater. Yeah, swimming in the beach and trying to shower the salt off with, uh, more saltwater. Negatory.
Coba - So this is a set of ruins just about 45 minutes away from our home spot in Tulum. Not the most expansive or visually striking of all the ruins but it has its own charm. The ruins have elements of other civilizations from Guatemala, making them unique in the Yucatan area. There is a beehive-shaped pyramid totally unlike any other we've seen. So, yeah. Cool ruins and a cool site. But that's not what made this a memorable trip. It was pouring rain (cats and dogs, yo!) and we sheltered ourselves under a small canopy trying to wait the rain out. After some time, we figured "screw it" and rented a couple bikes to cruise around the site. Yes, you can ride bicycles through the whole place. We threw on our rain gear and started cruising. It was SO fun. Splashing through puddles, we made our way from temple to temple, from the juego de pelota court (ancient Mayan 'ball game' court) to the huge pyramid at the end of the trek. This pyramid was a behemoth....the largest in the Yucatan, if I remember correctly. We climbed up the 17 bazillion stairs to the top and enjoyed a view that stretched for miles and miles. I have some pictures that I'll post later. The trek down was slightly perilous and fairly amusing, as I got to watch Leann scoot down on her butt, holding the rope attached down the middle of the stairs. The stairs themselves weren't perilous but the mind-fuck of looking down and imagining toppling down to your death was enough to make the majority of visitors take the descent very slowly. Great, great times.
Chichen Itza - The self-proclaimed "new 7th wonder of the world" is perhaps the most well-preserved archaeological site in the region. We had now visited multiple incredible archaeological sites and were a little skeptical about the presumed Disneyland-esque elements sure to be present at the area's most famous site. Sure enough, there were throngs of vendors selling everything from Hard Rock Cafe Chichen Itza t-shirts to carved wooden masks and small idols. However, the reputation of Chichen Itza is well earned. The site is incredibly well-preserved and the engravings on the walls were crystal clear. The ball court is 100% intact and carries an impressive echo (clapping carries for like 150 meters from one side to the other). Everything from the Warrior Temple to the Thousand Columns to the other temples there were in fantastic shape. And Chichen Itza is BIG. We have some more solid pictures to share, including pretty sharp ones of skull carvings (if I do say so myself) and even those of jaguar and eagle depictions.
Dos Ojos cenote - A cenote is an underground pool of natural water. The Dos Ojos cenote is comprised of two pools, connected underground by an underwater channel. Scuba divers can swim the connecting route but we just did the snorkel tour. Snorkeling around this cenote is like visiting another planet. Stalactites and stalagmites abound. Oh, and there are bats everywhere. Tons of bats. At first it just looks like some of the roof of the cave is a little squirmy until you realize that the movement are little fruit bats gathered in clusters. Cool, cool.
The weather has been a little overly rainy during our stint here. There was a tropical storm that swept through just prior to our visit (Tropical Storm Arlene or something like that) and the remnants were still slightly present while we were here. We tried to take advantage of the sunny stretches and immediately hit the beach. We'd intended to snorkel in a lagoon but were thwarted by a couple stormy days. C'est la vie.
Yesterday, our last full day in Mexico, we spent the whole day on the beach, soaking in sunshine that lasted about 99% of the day, and wallowing on the Tulum beaches like happy pigs in slop (I'm not calling you a pig, dear, just mentioning that we were incredibly happy and content). We ate and drank and swam and read and lived like a happy, vacationing couple instead of running around like determined chicken tourists with our heads cut off. We decided that we'd give one last shot at seeing some sea turtles in Akumal as they make their way up the beach to lay eggs.
Holy f'n crap. The turtles. We saw them! We saw TONS of them! We watched mama turtles come up the beach and dig huge holes with their massive flippers (these suckers are HUGE...must have been several hundred pounds a piece). It was amazing, like being in a nature documentary or something. The turtles and their eggs are protected by Mexican law and there were a few groups, perhaps volunteer, that watched over the egg-laying ritual and marked the spots on the beach where the turtles had decided to do their business. It was beautiful. We headed home about 11:00 or so after watching multiple turtles in various stages of their efforts all over the beach. We went to sleep contentedly, which leads me to.....
Today we leave Mexico. Noooooooo!!!!!!!! Well, I guess it's not all that bad, as our next stop is Costa Rica, where we plan to do some combination of beach, cloud forest, and volcanoes. However, Mexico has treated us so well that it's tough to leave. I freakin' love this country. We'll be back! We're hopping a bus to Cancun in a couple hours to prepare for our 6:00 pm flight to San Jose, Costa Rica where we arrive late, will crash at a budget hotel, and then plod on to the Pacific coast side of the country. A little excitement combined with a vague sense of loss at leaving Mexico. But the show must go on!
Check back with you all in a few days, hopefully with more cool adventures under our belt. This trip kicks ass.
Saturday, July 2, 2011
Mazunte (cont'd),, Puerto Escondido, and Palenque
Well, holy crap.
We owe a collective, huge debt to the friendly folk of Mexico for getting us out of yet another car-related mishap. When last I updated you all, we were stranded in a nice little beach town called Mazunte with a broken car that had leaked all its transmission oil out. (Now, as for how this happened.....I'm pleading the 5th). It took about a day and a half, but our nice-ish car was replaced by a sad sack of a beater called a Chevrolet Chevy. Not kidding. It is pretty much the equivalent of a modern day Ford Pinto, but it was running and we were stranded so we were in no spot to be both begging and choosing. Into the Chevy we piled and made our way an hour or so down the windy coastal highway to the surf town of Puerto Escondido. There we pretty much parked the car and left it and did all our traveling by way of foot and taxi. ´Twas a good call, as we'd find out soon enough.
Puerto Escondido is a bustling surf town, it would seem, during the winter months for some surf competitions and such. It was, however, relatively slow and light on tourists during our stay. Our first night there, we checked out the Zicatela locale, known for gnarly waves and hopping nightlife. We had some beers at an awesome little joint called The Spot (I mean, how can you not go into THE Spot?). What started as an innocent venture ended up awash in beer and tequila and conversation with a random Australian surfer we met. We merrily made our way back to our hotel (Hotel Mayflower, in case you're ever in the region....it's awesome and cheap, about $30 per night for a very nice room) and passed out.
Remember, fair readers, that every single time I mention 'our' adventures with drinking, I mean 'my' (Chris') adventures with drinking. I think that Leann has imbibed about two drinks the whole trip so far.
The next morning was decidedly rough and a nice trip for some coffee, breakfast, and serious beach time was in order. We'd already found a cool little restaurant called Danny's, so we grabbed some grub and coffee and then headed off to Carizalillo beach. This beach is one of the most amazing places I´ve ever been in my life. It's a little swath of beach surrounded by cliffs on both sides and is only about 200 yards long. Tiny little open-air restaurant slash bars dot the back end of the beach. The beach is only accessible via some 170-odd stairs heading down.....a nice haul back up, to be sure. After a nice stint at the beach, some good sun, and some cool waves we headed back to the main area of Puerto Escondido to grab some pizza (meh) and have an early night (yay!).
The next day was spent nearly entirely on the same Carizalillo beach. Nikolai and Adrian, our traveling partners, were equally impressed. We essentially rotated between grabbing sun on the beach, getting overheated, then cooling off in the cool and easy ocean. What an excellent day of vacation-style relaxation.
The next morning we decided to roll out pretty early, as we had a long day of driving ahead of us. Our next destination was the town of Tuxtla in the state of Chiapas (probably most famously known by Americans as the home of the Zapatista revolutionaries). It was to be about a 9 or 10 hour drive and we hoped to get in while we still had light.
So off we went in our little POS car, full of hope and excitement for the day ahead. I was the first driver and noticed a little jingling noise coming from underneath said POS. First chance we got, I pulled over and checked it out. It was an array of wires dangling loose under the car. Uh, ok. We kind of stuffed the wires back in the car and headed out again. I drove for maybe 3 or 4 hours and we decided to grab food and switch drivers. After some decent roadside tacos, we were back underway. Another couple hours went by with little fanfare other than yet another undetermined noise. Driver switch part deux occurred just a couple hours later and the noise became more prominent. It sounded like maybe a CV joint issue, as it mostly happened around turns. We were now in no man's land, figuratively, as the only civilization around were extremely tiny mountain towns (pueblos) with only a hundred townspeople and few, if any, amenities other than food and drink.
The noise got worse. And worse. And worse. We finally pulled over to check the situation out and noticed smoke coming from inside one of the wheels. Not good at all. We were decidedly in the middle of BFE at this point and didn't really have any options. We waited for a while for the wheel to cool off, thinking maybe we had some sort of brake issue or something. Now, I'm no mechanic but I know pretty damn well that smoke eminating from tires is a very bad sign on sketchy mountain roads. What else could we do, though? We rolled on after the cool-down period.
Then things went to total shit. The noise turned into a shudder. The shudder turned into a total rear-end of the car shake. The rear-end of the car shake turned into us stopping the car in the middle of the road. We got out to inspect the damage. Lo and behold, the whole fucking wheel had come off. Not just the tire. Not the hubcap. Not a lugnut or two. THE ENTIRE WHEEL. We now had a 3 wheeled vehicle. Uh, yeah. We were still about 120 miles away from our end destination and about 50 miles from the nearest actual city. Moreover, our car was sitting dead in the middle of the northbound lane of a two lane highway in the middle of the mountains. Fubar.
We put on our shoes, gathered our stuff, and prepared for a walk to the nearest village. A car stopped to talk to us almost immediately after our breakdown and let us know that, no, they didn't have phone reception and, yes, there was a village about 10 km away (Rizza de Oro, or something similar.....middle of nowhere). Their car was too tiny to accomodate four people and their bags so we continued preparation for the trek. A big commercial truck also stopped on the side of the road. Luis, now our amigo and savior, came to take a look at the damage on the car. He concluded the same as us ---- fubar. He helped push the car off the road onto a kind of drainage ditch on the side so that it wouldn't get totaled by oncoming traffic and potentially even hurt or kill somebody. He then offered us a ride all the way to Tuxtla. Bewildered by our amazing luck, we graciously accepted and piled into his semi truck. Leann, Nik, and Adrian all fit in the back sleeper area of the cab and I sat shotgun next to Luis (who soon told me that he hadn't slept in two days.....uh oh). Before departure we were approached with an offer of help by another truck driver. Apparently Mexican truck drivers are all saints.
We rode with Luis all the way to Tuxtla to the outskirts of town, since huge trucks weren't allowed on the inner roads. He even helped us hail a taxi to get into town. The dude is just one awesome amigo. We gave him some cash, which he tried to refuse but eventually accepted after Nik pointed at a picture of his kids and said 'give it to them'. He gave us his address in Guadalajara and, in my opinion, we now have a bro for life.
We stayed in an unremarkable, kind of dirty, cheap hotel in Tuxtla after grabbing some grub late at night. The next day, which was yesterday, Nik and Adrian parted ways with Leann and I. They headed to the mountain town of San Cristobal while we mosied on to Palenque. After our six hour bus ride (the bus that we took was better than anything I've ever even seen in the USA.....first class all the way with mega leg room and a bunch of TVs) we landed in Palenque and found a room in an awesome little hotel with air conditioning for only about $20 a night. We've been exploring the town today and it's very cool. Tomorrow we head off for a tour of three different spots, including some amazing looking waterfalls and, of course, the famous Palenque ruins hidden in the jungle. I´ll make sure to post some pictures of this adventure when I can.
We'll be hitting the road in another bus tomorrow night after the long day of adventuring and we'll be going all the way to Tulum, a small beach town in the Yucatan just south of Cancun. It's an 11 hour bus ride and it's an overnighter so we'll see how that turns out.
That's about it for now. We will not be renting any cars any time soon. Oh, and if you ever get the chance, avoid renting from EuropCar at all costs. Unless, that is, you feel like riding around on three wheels.
Also just thought I'd throw a quick shout out or two to both of our families (love all you guys!), the Bataan Park Guts Brothers (five hole Trammel for me), and the folks at Rotojunkiefix.com. Keep on keepin' on!
Also added pictures from Monte Alban and Hierva el Agua to the Flickr feed at http://www.flickr.com/photos/chrisandleann/ Check 'em out!
We owe a collective, huge debt to the friendly folk of Mexico for getting us out of yet another car-related mishap. When last I updated you all, we were stranded in a nice little beach town called Mazunte with a broken car that had leaked all its transmission oil out. (Now, as for how this happened.....I'm pleading the 5th). It took about a day and a half, but our nice-ish car was replaced by a sad sack of a beater called a Chevrolet Chevy. Not kidding. It is pretty much the equivalent of a modern day Ford Pinto, but it was running and we were stranded so we were in no spot to be both begging and choosing. Into the Chevy we piled and made our way an hour or so down the windy coastal highway to the surf town of Puerto Escondido. There we pretty much parked the car and left it and did all our traveling by way of foot and taxi. ´Twas a good call, as we'd find out soon enough.
Puerto Escondido is a bustling surf town, it would seem, during the winter months for some surf competitions and such. It was, however, relatively slow and light on tourists during our stay. Our first night there, we checked out the Zicatela locale, known for gnarly waves and hopping nightlife. We had some beers at an awesome little joint called The Spot (I mean, how can you not go into THE Spot?). What started as an innocent venture ended up awash in beer and tequila and conversation with a random Australian surfer we met. We merrily made our way back to our hotel (Hotel Mayflower, in case you're ever in the region....it's awesome and cheap, about $30 per night for a very nice room) and passed out.
Remember, fair readers, that every single time I mention 'our' adventures with drinking, I mean 'my' (Chris') adventures with drinking. I think that Leann has imbibed about two drinks the whole trip so far.
The next morning was decidedly rough and a nice trip for some coffee, breakfast, and serious beach time was in order. We'd already found a cool little restaurant called Danny's, so we grabbed some grub and coffee and then headed off to Carizalillo beach. This beach is one of the most amazing places I´ve ever been in my life. It's a little swath of beach surrounded by cliffs on both sides and is only about 200 yards long. Tiny little open-air restaurant slash bars dot the back end of the beach. The beach is only accessible via some 170-odd stairs heading down.....a nice haul back up, to be sure. After a nice stint at the beach, some good sun, and some cool waves we headed back to the main area of Puerto Escondido to grab some pizza (meh) and have an early night (yay!).
The next day was spent nearly entirely on the same Carizalillo beach. Nikolai and Adrian, our traveling partners, were equally impressed. We essentially rotated between grabbing sun on the beach, getting overheated, then cooling off in the cool and easy ocean. What an excellent day of vacation-style relaxation.
The wonderful, amazing, hidden beach of Carizalillo, one of Puerto Escondido's finest treasures.
The next morning we decided to roll out pretty early, as we had a long day of driving ahead of us. Our next destination was the town of Tuxtla in the state of Chiapas (probably most famously known by Americans as the home of the Zapatista revolutionaries). It was to be about a 9 or 10 hour drive and we hoped to get in while we still had light.
So off we went in our little POS car, full of hope and excitement for the day ahead. I was the first driver and noticed a little jingling noise coming from underneath said POS. First chance we got, I pulled over and checked it out. It was an array of wires dangling loose under the car. Uh, ok. We kind of stuffed the wires back in the car and headed out again. I drove for maybe 3 or 4 hours and we decided to grab food and switch drivers. After some decent roadside tacos, we were back underway. Another couple hours went by with little fanfare other than yet another undetermined noise. Driver switch part deux occurred just a couple hours later and the noise became more prominent. It sounded like maybe a CV joint issue, as it mostly happened around turns. We were now in no man's land, figuratively, as the only civilization around were extremely tiny mountain towns (pueblos) with only a hundred townspeople and few, if any, amenities other than food and drink.
The noise got worse. And worse. And worse. We finally pulled over to check the situation out and noticed smoke coming from inside one of the wheels. Not good at all. We were decidedly in the middle of BFE at this point and didn't really have any options. We waited for a while for the wheel to cool off, thinking maybe we had some sort of brake issue or something. Now, I'm no mechanic but I know pretty damn well that smoke eminating from tires is a very bad sign on sketchy mountain roads. What else could we do, though? We rolled on after the cool-down period.
Then things went to total shit. The noise turned into a shudder. The shudder turned into a total rear-end of the car shake. The rear-end of the car shake turned into us stopping the car in the middle of the road. We got out to inspect the damage. Lo and behold, the whole fucking wheel had come off. Not just the tire. Not the hubcap. Not a lugnut or two. THE ENTIRE WHEEL. We now had a 3 wheeled vehicle. Uh, yeah. We were still about 120 miles away from our end destination and about 50 miles from the nearest actual city. Moreover, our car was sitting dead in the middle of the northbound lane of a two lane highway in the middle of the mountains. Fubar.
We put on our shoes, gathered our stuff, and prepared for a walk to the nearest village. A car stopped to talk to us almost immediately after our breakdown and let us know that, no, they didn't have phone reception and, yes, there was a village about 10 km away (Rizza de Oro, or something similar.....middle of nowhere). Their car was too tiny to accomodate four people and their bags so we continued preparation for the trek. A big commercial truck also stopped on the side of the road. Luis, now our amigo and savior, came to take a look at the damage on the car. He concluded the same as us ---- fubar. He helped push the car off the road onto a kind of drainage ditch on the side so that it wouldn't get totaled by oncoming traffic and potentially even hurt or kill somebody. He then offered us a ride all the way to Tuxtla. Bewildered by our amazing luck, we graciously accepted and piled into his semi truck. Leann, Nik, and Adrian all fit in the back sleeper area of the cab and I sat shotgun next to Luis (who soon told me that he hadn't slept in two days.....uh oh). Before departure we were approached with an offer of help by another truck driver. Apparently Mexican truck drivers are all saints.
We rode with Luis all the way to Tuxtla to the outskirts of town, since huge trucks weren't allowed on the inner roads. He even helped us hail a taxi to get into town. The dude is just one awesome amigo. We gave him some cash, which he tried to refuse but eventually accepted after Nik pointed at a picture of his kids and said 'give it to them'. He gave us his address in Guadalajara and, in my opinion, we now have a bro for life.
We stayed in an unremarkable, kind of dirty, cheap hotel in Tuxtla after grabbing some grub late at night. The next day, which was yesterday, Nik and Adrian parted ways with Leann and I. They headed to the mountain town of San Cristobal while we mosied on to Palenque. After our six hour bus ride (the bus that we took was better than anything I've ever even seen in the USA.....first class all the way with mega leg room and a bunch of TVs) we landed in Palenque and found a room in an awesome little hotel with air conditioning for only about $20 a night. We've been exploring the town today and it's very cool. Tomorrow we head off for a tour of three different spots, including some amazing looking waterfalls and, of course, the famous Palenque ruins hidden in the jungle. I´ll make sure to post some pictures of this adventure when I can.
We'll be hitting the road in another bus tomorrow night after the long day of adventuring and we'll be going all the way to Tulum, a small beach town in the Yucatan just south of Cancun. It's an 11 hour bus ride and it's an overnighter so we'll see how that turns out.
That's about it for now. We will not be renting any cars any time soon. Oh, and if you ever get the chance, avoid renting from EuropCar at all costs. Unless, that is, you feel like riding around on three wheels.
Also just thought I'd throw a quick shout out or two to both of our families (love all you guys!), the Bataan Park Guts Brothers (five hole Trammel for me), and the folks at Rotojunkiefix.com. Keep on keepin' on!
Also added pictures from Monte Alban and Hierva el Agua to the Flickr feed at http://www.flickr.com/photos/chrisandleann/ Check 'em out!
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