Adios Mexico, Hola Peru!

A whirlwind of travel for us over the past two and a half days. We left Puerto Escondido early in the morning on Saturday for another roller-coaster ride through the Sierras. Played a last soccer game in el Llano, ate one last Tlayuda on Calle de los Libres, one last lunch in 20 de Noviembre and one last bakery-quality churro. Then off the airport and our flight to Lima.

We got in late (or early, rather) to the welcome sight of Fredy and Eduardo, enjoyed a long ride to their home - Lima, according to Eduardo, takes about 2 hours to drive across (it's home to somewhere around 10 million people) - and then hit the sack. Not sure yet what our plans here will be, but we're sure they'll be fun.

Happy Thanksgiving

Just a short little post to wish everyone (belatedly) a Happy Thanksgiving. We had hoped to find ourselves a little turkey, but fell short. Seems like the only time you can reliably find it is around Day of the Dead. No big loss, though.

We spent the day like most down here - relaxing and reading on the beach, body-surfing a little. For dinner we put together some pizza to go with our standard bottle of Victoria. One with poblanos, queso, onions, dorado (mahi mahi) and an ancho chile sauce, and another with mole coloradito, quesillo, avocado, broccoli, and tasajo. Not bad, not bad. Still, we did miss two excellent dinners back home, one of which featured oreo turkeys. Erica misses oreos.

Just one more day at the beach, then a quick stop in Ciudad de Oaxaca before we're off to Lima. It'll be fun to go, but hard to leave...

Torneo de Surf

As part of the Fiestas de Noviembre here in Puerto, there was a surf tournament that stretched over three days this weekend. You have to get up early to see it, because the waves die down later in the day, but nobody seemed to mind. We had fun watching the surfers and the spectators, and listening to the announcer switch between English and Spanish. His favorite English phrases were "Sh**, brother" and "Shake it, but don't break it." Funny, with an announcer's cadence and a thick accent...

The waves weren't all that big, especially Saturday and Sunday, and some of the heats had really long stretches without much at all, so the better surfers seemed to switch tactics and ride smaller waves with more show-boating.

June and July are the best months, with waves reaching 20 ft., according to our downstairs neighbor - a tranplanted Australian surfer. Still, some were big enough to be intimidating.

Once the contest was done and we had enjoyed a snack of pescadillas (salted-fish tacos) we caught a collective-truck downtown to what was supposed to be some sort of dance, at least according to the events calendar we had found. No dancing unfortunately (maybe we'll find it tonight), but there was a vibrant soccer game between the Puerto Escondido Pumas and Barro something-or-other.

I think that the teams in Tule were better, but it was still entertaining, with a spectacular corner-kick-header goal just at the end of the second half to tie the game. One of the spectators on our side (Pumas, of course) was so excited that he ran out on the field to celebrate. (He had been drinking quite a bit, to be fair, and, as the game got a little out of control, also taught us - and all the kids within earshot - quite a lot of dirty words in Spanish.) Here he is congratulating one of the Pumas after the game. If only he knew what his daughter had just been listening to.

Just one more week in Mexico, then off to Peru. It goes by so quickly!

Motocross in Mexico

In honor of Mary's (my mom) birthday yesterday we went to take in our first motocross race. We had heard from various sources about the event, with varying start dates and times - Saturday morning, Sunday at 10:00, Sunday at 12:00. (Receiving completely accurate information about the start times of things has been tricky for us in Puerto.) We tried Saturday but there was just some set-up happening. Although disappointed we managed to walk around town a little, force down some amazing agua de jamaica (ha-my-kah, not the country, Jamaica), and pick up a few supplies at the grocery store.


We tried again Sunday at 10:00, but found out upon our arrival that the races didn't begin until 12:00. We clearly had some time to kill so we went to check out the two beaches out of the five local beaches that we hadn't seen - Playa Angelito and Playa Manzanillo. They too were gorgeous with some rocks separating the beaches, rocks that we obviously climbed on for a bit. These seemed more family beaches because you can actually swim in the water without fear of being pulled out to sea. Also there were lots of boats parked in the waters, waiting to take families and tourists out to see the sights - turtles, dolphins, even whales.


What am I pointing at? Crabs!!


We grabbed a quick bite to eat in town and then headed back to the motocross races. What a spectacular event! We were there in time to see the warm up for the intermediate, veterans, and expert groups - some of those guys can really get some air! Rory says he sort of figured out the race track after watching this practice, but I never got a sense of the hairpin turns, loops, and hills/jumps. There was a momentary pause in the action as the Sexi Chicas Corona and other dignitaries made their way to the commentator's mound of dirt by the track to call the official start of the event. The first race is what made it all worth it for me! With the help of adults, maybe fathers, a group of fully decked-out 6 year olds made their way onto the course. Their little bikes were ridiculous compared to the larger ones we had just seen. All the parts of the course that older racers jumped over and caught crazy air remained hills for the kids, their bikes never leaving the dirt. One kid even swerved off the designated course onto a different part of the track. No injuries, so I was free to laugh about it all.



Next up were the more experienced racers. They were from all over Mexico and even a few from Guatemala. It was neat to watch them do the jumps and jockey for position. And did I mention that the Pacific Ocean was the backdrop for all of this?

New Rides, New Supplies, New Views

As we have gotten adjusted to life in Puerto Escondido we have noticed some key differences between the coast and the city. The first is transportation. The streets are still filled with colectivos and buses (urbanos) that pass by with great regularity. The newest form of transport are the truck/mini buses. Little did we know that a standard truck could be turned into a ride that seats at least a dozen. The trick is adding benches to the back and constructing a covered-wagon-esque roof over it. There are no seat belts so we recommend holding on to the metal supports to make the highway traveling, speed bump maneuvering a little less precarious. All for 4 pesos each (30 cents).


Another big difference here is also the manner by which you can obtain fruits and vegetables. Our neighborhood is frequented by mostly men driving trucks or other cars, blaring announcements of their wares. We hear lots of announcements during the day. On Monday, before our big market trip, I was able to scurry downstairs fast enough to get some mandarin oranges, white onions, and small yellow apples from the back of a nice gentleman's truck. We have since noticed announcements for Tortilleria Gaby (he comes by ALL the time with an especially catchy song), more oranges and onions, tomatoes, peanuts, chayote, among other things. Sure makes shopping easier when the produce comes to you!

The vistas we get to take in are also quite different here. Here are some photos to give a better sense of the scenes. The first two are from our roof, the final one is a little beach called Carrizalillo where we are going return to today to try out surfing....

Puerto Escondido

Hello from the sunny, beach town of Puerto Escondido. This is a very different feeling town - lots of English, lots of surfers, and the Pacific Ocean a short walk from our apartment. We have been getting settled the last couple of days, getting to know what is around us and in town, trying to get acquainted with the different tourist culture here. Our apartment is not quite everything we had hoped with the dozens of roosters crowing at dawn and non-functioning internet. We have already figured out some solutions to these small issues. Rory bought some ear plugs yesterday and we are planning on making use of the many internet cafes and restaurants the line the beach.

Now on the the good stuff. We have a stunning view of the ocean from the roof of our apartment. The roof is covered with a palapa, a dried palm frond roof, and has two hammocks. The sunsets are gorgeous from this vantage point. I am hoping to take a picture of the sunset each day.


In the last days we have traveled into town to the market to get food, enjoyed some reading, walking and running along the beach, read in the hammocks, enjoyed beers in beachfront bars. If we didn't do much in Oaxaca it appears that we will be doing even less here. We hope to do some surfing and exploring of other nearby beaches, national parks and lagoons. The big surf competition is November 19 - 21.

The Beach!

It was a windy, bumpy ride, but we made it to Puerto Escondido no problem. The ocean is beautiful and very close by. Our neighborhood also seems nice, although also apparently filled with roosters.

Our internet seems to be pretty slow and intermittent, so there might not be a lot of posting/skyping, but who knows...

Off to the market.....