Wow, what a summer!
For most of you at this point, it’s only half done (weather wise, at least).
But for me, summer has come to an end (vacation wise) and it’s back to work. (Weather wise, it’s always summer in
Mexico!)
So I finished teaching classes in
Oaxaca on Friday June 16
th, flew to
Seattle on the 19
th, and got to spend some quality time with the fam in
Kent.
It was especially great hanging out with the nephews.
They’re growing like weeds and love playing with Uncle Ryan.
Alder and I flew out of Mexico together, but she went to a retreat at Breitenbush, OR for a few days. After that, she came up and I had a BBQ shindig in Kent so I could see most of my WA friends in one fail swoop and introduce them to Alder. A good time was had by all. The next day, Alder and I backbacked up to the Goldmyer Hot Springs (http://www.goldmyer.org/) near Snoqualimie pass. I can’t believe I’d never been there before. It is an incredible place and I highly recommend checking it out if you’re in the area. After soaking up as much goodness as we could, we returned to Kent for a day before loading up the Subi with my bike, desktop computer, spare car parts, tool kit, etc. and heading down to Portland for a few days.
My good friends Andrew and Sarah were kind enough to invite us to stay in their house they recently bought and moved into just a couple weeks before we rolled into town. I managed to see most of my OR friends at a wine tasting party at the new place the first night we were in town. The next night was the 4th and some friends, Alder and I went up to Mt. Tabor to watch the show. That Friday some friends and I headed out for a weekend of excellent mountain biking near La Pine, OR and Alder made her way down to be with her family in Eugene. We rode the Newberry Crater Rim trail (http://www.dirtworld.com/trails/trail.asp?id=712&trail_name=Newberry%20Crater%20Rim%20Trail%20Mountain%20Bike%20Trail) and it was epic. It was so nice to be camping right on a beautiful lake to jump in after riding. On the way back, we road a fun trail around Cultus Lake, took a dip in it, and got back to Portland on Sunday evening. So after seeing almost everybody I needed to, I headed down to Eugene on Monday to meet back up with Alder and spend some time with her family.
We stayed at their place out in the woods for a couple days while making preparations for our big road trip south as well as for the family’s booth they run every year at the Oregon Country Fair (http://www.oregoncountryfair.org/TheFair/fair.html). I managed to sneak away one morning and go for a mountain bike ride I had been wanting to do for a long time on the McKenzie river. The 20 miles I rode was fun, but left me wanting to ride the full 50. Later that day the fam and I packed up and headed out to the fair for another few days for a good old fashioned freak show. I saw even more friends there including James, a former Fulbrighter in Oaxaca, and had lots of fun with them as well as Alder’s family.
Then on July 17th, we loaded up the Subi one last time and headed south. After driving 8 hours, we spent our first night in Davis, CA with our good friend John, another former Fulbrighter who returned from Oaxaca the day before. The next day we camped at Joshua Tree National Park. We got there just after dark and it was at least 90°F. Needless to say we had the entire campground to ourselves. It is a beautiful place, but would be much more enjoyable any other time of year and we were ready to leave by 8am the next morning while it was still below 90°F.
The next day we drove thru Tuscan, AZ, then into probably the most violent electrical storm I’ve driven thru and camped at Patagonia Lake State Park. These last two days were the hottest and most dreadfully boring sections of road on the entire trip (besides the crazy storm). I was really hoping Mexico wouldn’t be more of the same. We got to the campground late and left early eager and a little anxious to cross the boarder at Nogales. Luckily we had a good Mexican camping guide book that spelled out the process in detail, but you never know what’s really gunna happen.
The boarder crossing couldn’t have gone any smoother. We got 2 random green lights (meaning no inspection, which would’ve slowed things down a lot because we were hauling a lot) and they even asked us to fill out an evaluation of their service. The first green light was at the actual boarder and the next was 21 km down the road at customs/immigration office. We actually could have just kept driving, but figured it’d be best to be legit in Mexico. After all the paperwork, we were out of there in less than half an hour. Of course it helped that we speak Spanish, but it wasn’t nearly as bad as I’ve heard it can be. So down the road we went to the beach at San Carlos just north of Las Guaymas.
We were psyched to be back in Mexico and even more so heading to the beach. Driving south of the boarder is a lot more heads up and consequently much less boring. The roads are not as well maintained or signed so drivers can’t just switch on cruise control and zone out (like we did during the CA and AZ portion of our trip). The best thing about driving in Mexico is that speed limits are not enforced. The worst thing is the poorly signed and highly irregular speed bumps in the middle of the highway where drivers are expected to slow down. Sometimes they have yellow and black stripes painted on them and/or a sign before or at least next to them, but not always. After catapulting over a few hard enough to rattle our teeth loose, spotting them became a fulltime two person job.
San Carlos was at the beach, but it was a bit disappointing. The “campground” our guidebook mentioned turned out to be much more of an RV park and there were only high priced hotels as an alternative. So we pitched our tent in a corner away form the RVs and went swimming in the pool. The beach was a bit rocky, but that didn’t slow me down too much. We packed up the next morning and headed south to Mazatlán. This might have been the longest day on the road. Although it was an exhausting day, the scenery changed dramatically from the last couple days. The dusty brown shrub scattered desert landscape changed to a vividly green springtime scene. I don’t exactly remember where this happened, but at one point I asked Alder if we were still in Mexico. We definitely still were, but the rainy season had started while we were away and most of it is now a much greener Mexico than when we left.
We arrived in Mazatlán in the late afternoon, exhausted and a little apprehensive as to what our campground was going to look like after our last experience in San Carlos. It was a few miles north of the main resort area and much quieter. I had worn board shorts that day and had planned on jumping in the ocean as soon as we arrived and that’s exactly what I did. The water was perfect and it was tough to get me out. We pitched our tent under the shade of some big bamboo and several coconut palms about 150 feet from a beautiful semiprivate beach. This was to be probably our best camping on the trip. The following morning we went boogie boarding after breakfast, packed up and headed south to Sayulita, a small beach town just north of Puerta Vallarta.
The farther south we got the more lush the vegetation became, which has to be due to an increase in precipitation. I’m guessing that because when we got to our destination that afternoon, it started to rain. We checked out the campground on the beach and it looked perfect except for the rain part. So we decided to stay in a hotel that night, luckily. Then it started pouring down sideways and it felt like a full on hurricane. The town has a lot of foreign influence and caters to tourists wanting the “off the beaten path,” small beach town experience while still being conveniently close to a huge resort destination. Besides that, it’s an interesting place although we liked Mazatlán better.
The next morning we drove thru Puerta Vallarta on our way south. It’s much larger and more established than Mazatlán for sure. We’re not into huge resort destinations or anything, but still felt compelled to check them out. Our next destination was nowhere near any big cities and we were excited about it. We had our second longest day on the road and rolled into the small beach town of Playa Azul just after dark. This town caters to a very Mexican tourist crowd which was a refreshing change. The campground that we were planning to stay at had flooded the night before and the guy that worked there recommended that we talk to one of the palapa restaurants on the beach to see if they’d let us pitch a tent there. We ended up meeting a super nice owner of one that had actually spent some time in OR and he welcomed us with open arms. He told us we could pitch the tent anywhere we wanted and let me park the car in a safe spot between the restaurant and his house. He had his 7 year old son take us to his sister’s taco restaurant downtown a few blocks away and we had some tasty tacos before taking a dip in the ocean, pitching the tent, and crashin out on the beach.
Our next stop would be Acapulco. Getting there was much less eventful than leaving this largest of all Pacific coastal cities. We had planned to stay at a hotel right downtown, but on getting to the bustling and unsightly heart of this city, we decided to check out a couple campgrounds on the outskirts of town. The first time leaving downtown we kept getting funneled back into it and finally managed to find our way out amidst horrendous traffic and totally unmarked one way streets up the side of cliffs steeper than San Francisco. Driving and navigating big cities in foreign countries can be quite challenging. I can’t imagine what it’d be like not speaking the language! We finally found a pleasant campground on a nice beach that we figured would be a lot more relaxing than downtown. We went swimming first thing, and then it started to lightly sprinkle. We tried to wait out the rain, but after a couple hours ended up getting really hungry and decided we needed to go get some dinner. By the time we got back to the campground, it had stopped raining so we pitched the tent and crawled in for the night.
Unfortunately, we had to drive thru the city again the next morning to continue our trip south. It was a bit easier the second time, but just when we thought we were past the worst part, we got pulled over by two cops on an unmarked motorcycle. They said that they were going to keep my license and I would have to go downtown the following morning (because they claimed the entire police department to be on vacation until then) to pay the $200 fine. All of this because my car was packed too full to be able to adequately use my rearview mirror. Luckily for me, I had fully expected to get pulled over in Mexico for something and was surprised it hadn’t happened yet. A good friend from Mexico City gave us some good advice before leaving the States. He told us to never appear in a rush, always have a cell phone in hand and mention calling a lawyer/embassy every once and a while. Well we took that a step further. After I was out talking with the cops for a while, Alder got out of the car acting like she was talking to a lawyer and asked me to ask them for their full names and badge numbers. I did and they quickly handed me back my documents letting us go with just a warning that time. HA! HA!
Our original plan was to drive from Acapulco to Cuernavaca, just south of Mexico City, and stay with a friend there before heading to Oaxaca. But we decided we needed more beach time and took the longer route back thru our favorite little beach town, San Agustinillo just south of Puerto Escondido. It was pretty exciting to finally get somewhere that we recognized. We showed up just in time for some of the best boogie boarding on the Pacific, an incredible sunset and dinner on the beach at Mexico Lindo. We didn’t camp that night because San Agustinillo isn’t even in our camping guidebook (nor is it in our detailed Mexican road atlas!) and we knew about some tried and true hotels right on the beach. There turned out to be some places to pitch a tent there, but it was a good thing that we didn’t because a big storm rolled in that night and we would’ve surely gotten washed out to sea.
The next morning we started the day boogie boarding, had breakfast, rode some more waves, then reluctantly packed up and made our way home. It was time to finally unpack and get back to real life. Alder had to prepare for a conference she was presenting at in a week and I had to start doing some serious preparation for the methodology classes (of which one is in Spanish!) I was about to start teaching at the university. The thought of this fantastic vacation coming to an end was a little sad, although we were excited to get back to Oaxaca. We rolled into town over all the familiar speed bumps, knew right where to slow down, and then where to… stop.
So now we’re back safe and sound in Oaxaca gearing up for a productive fall(?). It doesn’t feel like autumn in the least, but academically for me it is. Alder is already finished with her doctoral coursework, so days, weeks and months are rather irrelevant to her as she plugs away with her fieldwork and dissertation. My 32 hours of teaching per week begins on Monday August 6th and I need to finish this entry so I can continue with my preparations.
The political situation here continues to be especially tense as the local elections are happening tomorrow, August 5th. For a casual observer, that means an increase in large protest marches, heated political rallies, banners, signs, etc. The good news is that unlike last year at this time, there are no busses being burnt, no roadblocks, much less graffiti and most importantly there are not thousands of federal riot police (soldiers) occupying the city and the airspace above. What’s really happening is that the unpopular and overtly corrupt governor that has remained in office, despite all of the efforts of the opposition to peacefully remove him, is abusing his power once again to get all the candidates/henchmen from his party elected. There are isolated instances of violence, but the vast majority of the noise is not. For all the latest in detail, check out http://www.counterpunch.org/peller08042007.html
All right I gotta get back to work digesting theory of methodology of second language education in English and convert it into bite size morsels to teach in Spanish. It was great to see all of you that I was able to see this summer. Check out some new pics at http://good-times.webshots.com/slideshow/560148535jcpaCY For those of you who are thinking about escaping Christmas in the NW this year, my winter break is from December 22nd to January 8th. Come on down and I’ll take you to my favorite beach.
¡Hasta entonces!
Seasons Greetings from Oaxaca!
Whenever I'm not teaching, preparing to teach, grading, studying, or writing, I try to go mountain biking as much as possible. We go at least once on a weekend morning and sometimes go on a night ride with powerful helmet-mounted lights. Most of my cycling buddies are Gringos, but there are a couple of locals who like to ride as long as we do. We’ve managed to map out an impressive network of trails and are constantly exploring new routes. About a couple of months ago, five of us got lost in the forest and had to overnight it. We managed to get a little sleep thanks to our campfire. Unfortunately, I managed to brake the frame of my trail bike a couple of weeks ago; but fortunately it has a lifetime warranty. The tricky part is making the whole warranty process happen from Oaxaca. To make a long story short, a friend of a friend will hopefully be bringing me my new frame in February.
