It’s Canada Day 2009 as I sit and write this, having just returned to Oaxaca from a 3-week visit to “the Old Country”.  As Calvin had done in March, I had to do in June – return to BC to renew my Canadian Driver’s License.  It was my first trip back since leaving Kamloops and Canada in September 2007 and I was determined to make the most of the time and money it took me to get there.

I truly enjoyed seeing family and friends in person rather than via webcam, visiting my old haunts, marvelling at the changes over the past two years.  It felt like a familiar place, but not really “home” anymore.

Oh Canada!  Your weather was disappointing!  I forgot how long the late spring days are in the North Country, but really, snow in June?  Many tank tops became increasingly crumpled in the bottom of my suitcase and I borrowed sweaters and jackets in four western provinces.

Oh Canada! You drown me in excesses, from the shower water washing down the drain to the years of accumulated stuff in every home.  While it was nostalgic to see some of our former “stuff” displayed in the homes of friends, I wonder what will they do with it all?

Oh Canada! Your bureaucracy is truly amazing, if variable.  No line-ups to pay the money and take the photo, but how long does CanadaPost need to deliver the treasured, semi-permanent, permit?  I’ve learned to love waiting in line in Mexico, carrying a book and a portfolio of all possible papers with me on any mission I intend to accomplish.

Oh Canada! The health care gods have continued to curse you, resulting in cursing at the front-line staff level.  Now I need a map and a guidebook to negotiate my former workplace, but I probably won’t be visiting again: too many new faces, too many grumpy old ones.

Oh Canada! Where twenty dollar bills fly out of pockets with alarming regularity and nary a blink.  If you knew how long I worked to earn the equivalent and how long I can make it last…would you believe me?  I saw no signs of economic shutdown – building, spending, hurrying around like there’s no tomorrow.

Oh Canada!  Where traffic stops at the thought of a pedestrian but not at the cost of fuel.

Oh Canada!  What’s in the news? Who’s in the headlines?  What will it cost?  Who gives a damn?

This isn’t a rant as such, just a lament that my home and native land has become so foreign to me and how we’ve chosen to live.  Life in Mexico isn’t perfect either, it’s just become our comfort zone.  But I’ll never give up my Canadian passport, I’m still proudly Canadian and will likely always pepper my English with “eh?”

Oh Canada!  Thank you for giving me a eye-opener of international proportions.  In the scheme of things, you’re a means to a different end.

Happy Canada Day to all Canadians, wherever you find yourself today.

Thinking back on Thursdays in my life, not counting the Thursday that I was born, I’d have to say this past Thursday was one of the better ones. In my previous life, I used to dread Thursdays like some people dread Mondays (see “This was MY Thursday” – January 2008 – for the backstory), anticipating a day-from-hell in the Histology Lab. But that was then and there – this is here and now. “Here” is our little piece of Paradise, Number 6 Tabachines Street in the Trailer Park Campestre, just south of the little town of Chiconcuac, sort of in the neighbourhood of Cuernavaca, Morelos. And “Now” is my between-jobs time when I get to do what I want, when I want, especially since Calvin’s not here at the moment.

How does a single gal live it up in Paradise? Here’s my day:

Naturally, Spike wants breakfast before the crack of dawn. I stall him until at least 6:30, but with the birds singing outside he’s hard to convince it’s not “daytime” already. I want to grab 40 more winks…

Not wanting to waste too much of my day, I get up and make a coffee-woffee…though my stash is running low, I HAVE TO use it up because the best before date is TODAY. But I sit and sip it while enjoying the rest of my breakfast, peanut butter and banana toast, and watch the rest of a very inspirational movie I’d started a few days before. I think our friend Rolene left it for us, and because it has the G-word in the title, Calvin doesn’t have any interest in it, but I find it quite thought provoking. So much so, I surf a little to find out more, until I hit a wall of ads that leaves me cold on the subject. Into the shower. I think about Rolene, the Walker from San Diego, walking to Santiago, and send her good vibes for her Grassroots Environmentalists’ Conference starting today in Oaxaca.  Wish I could’ve been there.

Sewing Room in the Shade - Paradise!

I assemble my equipment and move it out to the patio…ahhhh, an outdoor sewing room, how very delightful!

To relieve the 36C heat, a light breeze blows under the awning, flapping my design wall clothespinned to my laundry line. But all the blocks in my design-challenged quilt have been carefully pinned into place, so nothing goes astray. It’s only me, from time to time forgetting how Mary-Ellen wants me to pick up my blocks in sequence, that causes me to re-invent my own pattern, then take it apart to fix. But I’m not upset at all…how could I be? I’m in Paradise.

A small pick up truck stops in front of the bus and the man asks if I want to buy some Oaxaca cheese. Do I??? Do I!!! The Morelos version of “Oaxaca cheese” has left us disappointed, so of course I jump at the opportunity, but check his license plates and question whether this is FROM Oaxaca or is only “Oaxaca-style” cheese. Well, he’s from Puebla, he says there’s no cattle in Oaxaca, so how can they really make the cheese there anyway…he dumps what I suppose is water, and hope is actually bottled water over his hands, then unwinds a thick strand of cheese from a huge ball taken from a cooler in the truck box. “It’s only me, after all,” I tell him, “I can’t eat a whole kilo myself…” (before it goes bad like the local stuff did, I add to myself). It’s not really a bargain, but I’ve been longing for proper Oaxaca cheese, so it’s worth the 33 pesos. Mmmmmmm, my quesadilla lunch is just what I was after.

Karen Skypes me on her lunch break and I tell her about my fabulous day. Calvin’s been staying at her place, but hasn’t let her know if he’ll be there again tonight. We discuss and laugh about houseguests and house”pests” we have known…

I continue sewing through the afternoon, enjoying Spanish music meant to help entertain the gardeners working in the site next door. Earlier, I’d asked our friendly gardener  “Curly” to cut down a palm frond that was touching our roof, thinking it was the access point of the microscopic ants that had invaded our bus. I  watch Curly and the rest raking and mowing to the Latin beat, in preference to anything else in our eclectic music collection. By four p.m. I’m on such a roll, I record my telenovela “Atrevete a Soñar” and work toward a logical endpoint by about 4:30.  I’d promised Andrea to pick up a plant for her, and I remembered the vivero re-opened at 4 until 6.  I unwrap the Thing from its car cover and make the short trip into town, detouring by the vet’s to see if it’s OK to bring Spike by for his shots.  Dra. Paula isn’t there, but her assistant tells me she’ll be back in a half hour.  I return to the nursery and pick up the coveted 3-branched Cacaloxuchitl (plumeria to you and me) sapling, a bonsaied Adenium that reminds me less of a BC dogwood today than it did the first time I saw it, and the fragrant gardenia that Andrea has vowed to keep alive longer than the Oaxacan varieties she’s had poor luck with so far.  The friendly owner reminds me about sunlight and watering needs, and as she scatters ant killer on one of the pots before taking it to the car for me, she shares a client’s secret for getting rid of insect pests on foliage: Roma laundry detergent.  “Only that brand?” I ask. “Yes.”  Driving home, I smugly calculate the exchange for the beautiful plants I’ve bought: about $21 Canadian for all three.

New Plants Add to the Sewing Room

Back at the bus, I carefully arrange my new babies to take advantage of the last of the sunshine, then gather Spike into his harness and carrying case.  It’s been more than half an hour – a Mexican half hour at that – and Dra. Paula hasn’t returned from her errands.  Spike is restless in his confined space, so I let him out on the leash…he KNOWS where we are.  But Dra. Paula drives up in a few minutes, Spike is as good as gold having a shot in the hip, and we’re back in the car ten minutes and 100 pesos later.  Just in time to stop by the tiendita where Daly knows I love her icecream bars.  I tell her I don’t feel any guilt only buying one, my husband’s away today.  As I dash back to Spike waiting in the idling car, I wonder “Gee, did I sound too gleeful about that ?”

Sitting back, savouring my irish coffee and pecan-flavoured treat while Spike nibbles a little of the freshly-cut grass, I reflect on the good progress I’ve made on my long-delayed quilt, still hanging on the sheet I’m using as an improvised design wall.  Crunch the cat comes for a look at what food I might have for her, but I remind her that chocolate is for people.  I miss the garbage can as I toss away the empty stick, and she sniffs it with disdain – nothing of interest anyway.  When I get out the hose to water the lawn, she hightails it, thinking she’s in trouble again.  But I’m aiming at the grass, waving the water in time with the tunes, and I sneak a splash at Curly, now piling sand and gravel in the street to make a big pile of concrete.  They’re putting in a patio for the neighbours’ gazebo.

They work through the fading light and into a drizzly evening.  The third hour of telenovela finishes recording while I dismantle my sewing room.   I sit down to watch for the evening, eating supper in front of the tele like I would at home.  The Oaxaca cheese tastes good on the tostadas I make, and burn,  talking to Calvin on Skype.  Oops.

Karen Skypes me again from home, and between us we decide that popcorn is the thing – she to watch “Survivor”, me to finish “En Nombre del Amor“.  It’s good to be the grown-up.  Even fast forwarding through commercials, it takes me awhile to watch the day’s episodes, then it’s time for bed.  Spike has beat me to it, as he often does.  Cats have their own schedule and pretty much ignore what their people are doing.  It’s good to be the cat.

“Good night, daddy, wherever you are, ” I tell Spike, as I turn off the light.

This WAS the last Thursday in Paradise, because next Thursday, we hope to  pull out early enough to beat the traffic jam of 22 Quebec RVs due to leave the park.  I hope they’re not headed to Oaxaca like we are…

Though we arrived in Cuernavaca from the east this trip, and a little less stressed than our previous blind wanderings from the north, we found our paradise pretty much the way we had left it.  We had stayed at the Trailer Park Campestre outside of Chiconcuac, south of Cuernavaca, just before Christmas in 2007; now the trees are a little taller, the bamboo hedges a little fuller and our friendly camp mascots, Pepper the dog and Crunch the cat soon came out to greet us.  It was evident that continuing improvements were being made, and the increased camp fees were funding them.

Paradise Revisited

We got set up on a nice spot with fresh lava rock beside the paving block patio, with lovely green grass for Spike to graze.  Yes, it was paradise to see such greenery, not even in the rainy season yet.

Over the next couple of days, we got in touch with Cathy and Christine, our friends here who have Casa Chocolate B&B and arranged to come over for a visit.  The morning we came by, they had guests who were enjoying their comfortable beds until the last possible moment, so we lucked out and shared the decadent three-course breakfast with Cathy and Christine and their guests Lillian and Alejandra.  We enjoyed the food and conversation in the relaxed setting of their sunny terrace by the sparkling pool, then had a tour of the finished B&B.

Back at the bus, Calvin set out to discover the source of the overheating problem, and in getting the thermostats out of their hiding place in the bowels of the bus to check them, broke the thermostat housing.  When the cursing died down, he got busy online to try to track down a replacement housing.  One of the improvements in the park was the addition of wireless internet, but we found it intermittent and slow at best, non-existent at worst, necessitating a drive into nearby Chiconcuac to the internet cafe we had frequented previously.  Eventually we connected with Ted at Coach Maintenance and made arrangements for the parts to be shipped.

While we waited for the parts, we made exploratory excursions to several nearby suburbs of Cuernavaca: Temixco, Xochitepec, Tezoyuca and Emilano Zapata, getting our bearings and assessing the feasibility for settling into the community.  I had a job interview, which, while I knew was not realistic so soon, might leave a door open for something later in the summer or in the fall.  I tracked down several quilters, after Cathy and Christine put us onto a Yahoo Group for newcomers to the Cuernavaca area; we’ve now visited two of them and in addition to meeting two nice couples, have discovered other residential neighbourhoods and I got a bit of a quilt fix satisfied.  We took Spike to the nearest vet as a followup to a treatment we’d started before we left Oaxaca, then returned to her the following Monday with a wounded egret Calvin discovered in the park.  Through Paula, the vet, we met Lucy, a biologist who keeps birds as well, and is into greening the planet.  I visited her and saw her compost system, her greenhouse with symbiotic plants and even her “experiment” raising beetle grubs (in her kitchen!) for sale to sport fishermen.  Her chorus line of 6 dogs of all sizes greeted me at the gate – these are therapy dogs, so even the biggest is mild-tempered, and her noisy aviary included various parrots, a macaw, budgies and a mama-to-be cockatiel.  Not to mention her little monkey, who eats those beetle grubs like candy.
Lucy’s budding garden, recently planted, promises fresh organic tropical fruits well within the 100 KM the current diet rage advocates.  It’s a paradise I dream of having someday ourselves.  Well, except for the beetle grubs in the kitchen and the monkey who eats them…

We like the weather and greeness of Cuernavaca, its proximity to both Mexico City and Acapulco, and the norteamericano-style shopping available.  But the city lacks the colourful indigenous culture we realize we took for granted in Oaxaca.  In fact, Nancy, a quilter who moved here from Mexico City, says she can’t really describe the “personality” of Cuernavaca, always a resort town for visitors from the Capital.  It’s not really colonial, sort of cosmopolitan, but lacks the cultural depth developed over centuries of history.  Its citizens, while friendly and helpful, are largely DF transplants, or worse, weekend warriors who keep a house in the “City of Eternal Spring” to spend time in when the weather in DF is not as pleasant.  A realtor took us to look at a property in the neighbourhood “Burgos”: a gated community filled with large, extravagant weekend homes, likely each with a pool hidden behind the eight-foot high walls, but not a tortilleria, tienda or taco stand in sight.  That is not the Mexico we want to live in.

On Lucy’s encouragement, we drove outside the city to Miacatlán, then on to Coatlán del Río, in search of small-town Mexico with an agreeable climate.  They were a little bit too far from Cuernavaca to be seriously considered, but confirmed for us that these places do exist in the state of Morelos, “Land of Liberty and Work”.  We’ll just have to keep looking to find our paradise.

Those who know me know I’d have a route and a schedule to follow as we left Oaxaca and headed into Mexico’s interior.  When my planned Sunday departure was literally thrown to the wind – we flew a new kite with Andrea and her kids Tilman and Merle Saturday after work

Spike reluctantly says "adios" to Auntie Theresa

- it only followed that the route would also evolve.  So Monday morning, February 2 (Día de Candelaria),  we bid a hearty goodbye to Eucario at the Oaxaca Trailer Park, and following my usual walk to work, we struck out on the toll road toward Mexico City, intending to make Cuernavaca by nightfall.

The first leg of the toll road, though expensive (196 pesos for 42 km) was our proving ground, assuring Calvin that the bus was running smoothly after more than 10 months at rest.  Turbo boost good, jake brakes fine, breezing along in very light holiday traffic.  We returned to the free road at Nochixtlán and continued winding and climbing through the Oaxacan mountains toward Huajuapan.  But between the climbs in altitude and temperature during the day, our engine began to run increasingly warm.  Calvin compensated by diverting heat into the bus, but we eventually had to make a few roadside stops to allow the motor to cool down.  Always something.

We considered stopping for the night at Izucar de Matamoros, well short of our goal, but the bustling little pueblo did nothing for Calvin, who opted to press on.  Cuautla was only 60 km beyond, with a Sam’s Club and WalMart where we hoped to stop, shop and stay.

But I guess nobody told the Mexicans that WalMart is a favourite RV campground: after we had been in and spent more than we would have at an RV park, security asked us to leave.  They suggested we try the bus depot in nearby Oaxtepec.  I grumbled about missing out on the free parking, but at least the bus depot was easy to find, considering it was now after dark.  Of course, the bus depot was too busy to allow squatters, but the friendly security gal kindly showed us to a large lot next door where we could enquire about parking from the security there.

In truth, this was the IMSS facility I had noted in our Mexican campground guide, and had considered directing us to when it became apparent we would not be going all the way in to Cuernavaca before dark.  Yes, they would allow us to park there, for a fee…Again, I grumbled about missing out on free parking and 140 pesos to sit for 12 hours in a parking lot seemed a bit steep. But we settled in and I heated up our Día de Candelaria supper: Doña Lupita’s tamales de frijol and  salsa verde.  We were just starting to eat, taking photos

Happy Tamale Day!

to share with Kyle and Pilar, when the security guard showed up to take me to the office to pay our rent.

As we drove beyond the lit parking lot where the bus sat quite near the arched entranceway, I started to wonder what kind of place we were actually in.  We drove for several minutes through grassed parkway lined with buildings, and I noted a mini-super and a couple of pizza restaurants before we parked in a wooded area.  The man in the office was friendly and very thorough, explaining with a map what areas we were now entitled to visit as he wrapped a bracelet around my wrist.  I paid more attention on the return trip, so Calvin and I could come back and explore in the morning before hitting the road again.

The park was so large that we took the Thing, driving the route I’d gone the previous night then beyond, up the hill where the map said the Stadium was.  Stadium??  Yes.  This was the site of the 1968 Olympics, featuring more than 20 swimming pools, where the aquatic events were held.  The Mexican Government, specifically the Instituto Mexicano del Seguro Social (IMSS, who also provides the medical coverage that Calvin and I are enrolled in) took it over and has turned it into a vacation destination of sorts.

Oaxtepec Cabana

We saw many cabañas, that I could only imagine had been the “athletes’ village”, each with a little pool on its patio.  These are now rented out, as are rooms in several hotels on site.  The huge tent camping area I’d been to the night before – with a capacity for 4000 – rounded out the guest housing.  Several onsite restaurants, bars and of course the swiming pools, hot tubs, video arcades, football fields, Olympic sized track, and a new waterpark kept visitors active and entertained.  The full convention facilities now available attracted a different clientele, providing both hightech amenities and highclass accommodations in a prestigious and exotic site.  From the  Torre Parlementaria that crowned the hilltop, offering a commanding view to conventioners, a cable car would deliver you back to the geodesic-domed natural sulfur pool near the entrance.

We were impressed at every turn with the immaculate grounds and the number of employees busily sweeping, clipping and mowing.  The diversity of facilities for every taste, interest and price range was amazing.  Who would not enjoy a sojourn here, whether a family day at the waterpark, a boy scout campout with activities galore or a retreat that provided for both business and pleasure?  It turned out 140 pesos was not so bad to make this fortuitous discovery afterall.

Hard to believe it’s almost been a year since we set up house in the Oaxaca Trailer Park – last March.  We’ve discovered the OTP is perfectly located for walking almost anywhere we need to go – to work, to the Zócalo, shopping, restaurants, the vet, our local IMSS clinic, auto parts places, you name it, we’ve found it, somewhere in the neighbourhood.

In fact, we’ve become the resident experts as other RVers roll in and need a laundromat, an internet fix or a quick and cheap copy shop.  Calvin has enjoyed the interaction and has even put his tools and talents to use again fixing various problems caused by vehicles not faring so well over the mountainous roads that lead from any direction into Oaxaca.  But it’s snowbird season, and the ambiance in the park is changing.  With only two months left until we need to renew our FM3 visas, we thought we should take advantage of the opportunity to make a move…

We had skipped past several places in the interior of Mexico on our make-time trip to Bacalar before Christmas 2007.   We’d intended to look at Morelia and Pátzcuaro at least, and now, having experienced the almost-perfect Oaxaca weather, we’re searching for similar – yet greener – pastures in perhaps a smaller centre.  We’ve been quite happy here, but it’s like my colleague Theresa said, “Been there, done that, got the t-shirt”.

So tomorrow, Monday February 2, Mexico’s Día de la Candelaria, we’ll leave Oaxaca, heading first for Cuernavaca on our way west.

We know we’re not done with Oaxaca.  We’ve made many good friends here that we’ll want to see again, and we feel at home here on the streets of Colonia Reforma, our neighbourhood.  But there’s more of Mexico to explore – it’s now or never.  And if we decide to return we know we can easily renew our life and our lifestyle,  and I still have my Berlitz shirt…

Five months ago we arrived in Oaxaca, capital of the state of the same name.  We decided after a few weeks to stay awhile and take advantage of the opportunities presented here.  We had been given contact information by our friends and former residents Dawn and Noe, there is a Canadian Consulate here, as well as a Mexican Immigration office.  Much in the city satisfied the subjective criteria we’d been looking for in a new home town, so we began the tramite of converting our tourist visas to immigrant visas.

Through Dawn’s former neighbour Andrea, I was hired at the local Berlitz Language Centre as an English teacher.  My new employer facilitated the paperwork for my visa, as well as translating and certifying the necessary documents.

We're Oaxaquenos!

Once we had FM3 visas, I was able to apply to various Mexican government agencies like Social Services, and the Mexican equivalent of Revenue Canada.  Yep, paying taxes here now…  We are still jumping through hoops to get our Mexican Healthcare lined up and renewing our vehicle insurance with a local carrier, but all seems to be going well, just plodding along on Mexican time.

Our official address is the Oaxaca Trailer Park, and here we have stayed, through many passing travellers, watching the progress of the new building and becoming friends with the caretaker Eucario.  I often take him baked treats, when I have leftovers from  entertaining or class desserts.  Or if Calvin, now a proficient bus-husband, makes a big batch of say, frijoles, or chili, or more recently, sausage, he’ll pack up a meal to take over to Eucario.

Internet in the trees

We signed up for cable, and enjoy internet and 60+ TV channels from the street to a tree to our bus.  We even bought our first cellphone!

Spike has taken over the park and really enjoys the grass here which is lush, long and green with the summer rains.  He goes with me to the laundry area and stalks birds or munches grass while I hang out the clothes.

We’ve met many wonderful fellow travellers from near and far, as they pass through the park.  Calvin especially enjoys this contact with the outside world; I get my fix interacting with staff and students at Berlitz.

Berlitz Bus party

We recently blended our two spheres when we hosted a Berlitz staff party in our yard and invited the neighbouring family from Germany.  Dinner was barely over when Nina started coaching Tilman in math in German; Brits John and Theresa stayed to the bitter end, bus dancing with Inmaculada and Adriana.

We’ve attended a variety of cultural events, something Oaxaca proudly provides in abundance.  THE place to go is the Guelaguetza Auditorium, an amphitheatre cut into a hillside that offers a commanding view of the city in addition to excellent acoustics and the most amazing fireworks directly overhead, so close that stains from fallen ash identify the spectators on their way home.  Many of these cultural experiences seem to drop into our laps, to our great surprise and delight.  We’ve written about a few of them to our families, and I am starting a new blog page about “Life in Oaxaca” where I’ll post them for all to peruse.

So, while we are no longer as mobile as we once were – this time by choice – we are open to the opportunities around us, and enjoying all Oaxaca has to offer.

We never really realized how much we missed the beach until we had left it. But the beach at Huatulco was literally and figuratively a long way from Xcalacoco and we found out you can never really go back. We treasured our days at the beach, but it was time to turn inland in search of more temperate climate. With spring approaching, it would only get hotter in the south of Mexico.

Oaxaca was planned to be the first stop on a route that would take us back into central, colonial Mexico. Though it’s only a few hundred kilometers on the map, experience told us it would be a long hard drive through the mountains, slow going because of traffic and the need to keep our engine cool. We’d heard the most direct route was also very sinuous, so chose to double back to Tehuantepec, then take the road more travelled to Oaxaca.

We set out early the Saturday before Palm Sunday so we would be safely to our destination before the start of the Semana Santa traffic. But the 38C+ heat proved to be too much, for us, for Spike and for our bus. We stopped many times along the side of the road, waiting for the temperature gauge to drop to a safe level, showering Spike with cool water to quench the heat. As a last resort, after crawling uphill in first gear, we unhooked the Thing and I drove separately for about 50 km.

By mid-afternoon, we decided we couldn’t continue to drive the steep inclines in the heat, so we parked on the side of the road at Totolapan, across from an all-night military checkpoint and their favourite diner.

At least he's on the right side of the road

It was a steady stream of soldiers, semis, buses and burros that night, so 6AM came early. A short 80 km drive brought us into Oaxaca, seesawing up the last 2000 ft, watching the sun rise over the hills we approached. We actually climbed up to 6600 feet, and dropped down into the Oaxaca valley, blanketed in agave cactus. Stands and shops selling mezcal made from the blue agave clustered along the highway from Matatan on, while the entrance into the city was lined with jacaranda trees cloaked in purple blossoms.

The Oaxaca Trailer Park had been rumoured not to exist anymore, but we found it where the guidebook led us. It was about half its former size, a newly-opened office building taking up one corner with another building going up beside it. We had been here eight years ago and had a few haunts in the city we wanted to check out. We also got some advice from our friends Dawn and Noe, who had lived here after we last visited and have now moved on. So we set about to rediscover Oaxaca, and have not been disappointed.

Through Dawn and Noe, we met Andrea and her family and Shoshana and Alejandro, who have been kind enough to show us around, and with whom we have shared several pleasant mealtimes. We renewed our acquaintance with Cafe de Olla, still an excellent restaurant near the Santo Domingo Church and museum. We dutifully discovered Itanoni, as recommended by Dawn and Noe, enjoying a typical Oaxaqueno brunch, and a dinner at La Biznaga was a frugal gourmet delight. We’ve been to Nueva Babel to hear Alejandro’s band play, and one morning went with Shoshana to nearby Santiaguito to see their property and meet some neighbours, Tom and Elaine. It’s as though we have inherited a circle of friends, through Dawn and Noe but in their absence.

We’ve also met a wide variety of travellers in the RV park. We’ve seen many Europeans, mostly from

If ours is a bus, theirs is a...?

Germany, with a variety of mobile living quarters, some Americans and a few more Canadians. At times we’ve had a regular United Nations here: France, Austria, US, western Canada, England, Italy, Switzerland, Germany, eastern Canada. English seems to be the universal language of travel, and even if someone’s Spanish is limited, we can usually share our experiences in English. Calvin enjoys meeting “new neighbours” as they pull in and we’ve become a fountain of tourist information regarding routes and potential campsites along the way.

Since Oaxaca is not on the regular tourist track (read:beach) it is often bypassed by northamericans on their way somewhere else. Oaxaca sits at the crossroads between east and west, north and south, so it is a stopping-off place, a spend-the-night-and-move-on place, not a destination in itself. This is a shortsighted misconception: Oaxaca and area offer endless possibilities.

The city sprawls along the Atoyac River and has crept up the hillsides ringing the valley.

Leanne takes a breather

To the southwest, at Monte Alban, three such valleys meet, their confluence crowned by Monte Alban’s commanding temples. We visited Monte Alban on Good Friday, which was also the Spring Equinox this year. Though I climbed to the top of the tallest pyramid, I can’t say I felt the mystic vibe of the ancients.

Each of the three valleys contains a number of small villages, whose residents have perfected a local craft: San Bartolo makes unique unglazed black pottery, Santa Maria Atzompa specializes in green-glazed pottery, you’ll go to Teotitlan to find woven wool rugs, and artisans in Xochimilco produce tinwork of all descriptions. The fanciful animals from Arrazola, carved from wood and brightly painted, defy description. All of these towns have their special market day, so you could easily spend a week or two visiting each town in turn. Or do as we did, and find them all under one huge roof at the Central market in Oaxaca.

View from Cerro Fortin

Before the summer rains, the hills are dry and dusty; low scrub and cactus, along with feathery pines, make up the majority of the visible vegetation. But the city itself is fertile and green, fed by the waters of the river, and the numerous dams located in the hills beyond. There are the ubiquitous laurel trees that indicate onsite water, palms and rubber trees, citrus and tropical fruit trees, bugambilla and plumeria and other flowering trees I don’t even know the names of. I can only imagine it becoming more lush and green with daily summer showers. Our spring days are warming up, but the evenings bring a slight breeze and cooler temperatures, so it is more comfortable to sleep.

We wake to the sound of birdsong in the park, then at 6:30, when the bells of a nearby church ring, Spike can finally have his breakfast. Tuesdays, there’s a street market set up just outside our park walls, so it’s handy to pick up fresh fruit and vegetables, even shoes, clothing, cosmetics and audio- and visual entertainment. We enjoy the outing as an excuse to eat pork tacos freshly made “on the street.”

There are many museums, art galleries and cultural events to enjoy in Oaxaca – we’ve only just begun to explore. Stay tuned for part 2.

PS this post was originally written in March

Once we discovered we were camped a stone’s throw from Mark’s resort, we planned to sit on the boulevard, cervezas in hand, to wait and watch their airport shuttle go by.  But I mis-remembered their arrival time, so instead, we pulled up in the Thing moments after they arrived in the lobby.  After the initial hugs and greetings, Calvin and I sat on the lobby’s comfy couch to wait while they went through registration.  By then, they had their welcome drinks in hand, so we toasted our reunion.  Within the first ten minutes Mark’s wife Lee had pulled out a digital brag book to show us photos of their new grandson, while Mark kept exclaiming, “I can’t believe you’re so brown”.  Lee’s sister Brenda was practicing her “hola” to anyone who walked by as her husband Todd roughhoused with Calvin. The spectacle had begun.

We left them with a walkie talkie and directions for how to get to our camp, then let them get settled in.  They showed up a few hours later and Calvin visited with them under our awning while I rudely stayed inside watching my telenovela.  But I was there to catch the action when Calvin lit up one of his big-ass bottle rockets as a welcome. Before they left, we made plans for a beach day the next day.

Saturday morning I did laundry in the great outdoors, birdwatching between wash and rinse cycles. In the afternoon, we wandered up the beach and squatted just outside the hotel property, we poor cousins bringing our own refreshments while the paying customers ordered theirs delivered beachside.  The guys decided to swim to a nearby island, where Mark climbed almost to the top but did not capture the flag because he went back to help Todd climb up.  Calvin returned wounded, throwing rocks into the water as he has done since childhood.  We girls sat on the beach and discussed what to do with the insurance money if they did not get back safely.

A little later, Mark and Lee joined Calvin and I on a short excursion into nearby La Crucecita.  Not really intending to eat, we couldn’t pass up the opportunity to try some fresh tamales, sold right on the street corner.  We parked our butts right there, and the señora was happy to oblige with styrofoam plates, napkins and plastic forks.  In fact, while we enjoyed her tamales, she left us with her belongings to run down the street to the market to pick up more forks.

All six of us went to town late Sunday for a little shopping, sightseeing and dinner.  On the way in, we visited the local bomberos so Todd could talk shop with some fellow firefighters.  We learned that their station is poorly funded by the government and relies heavily on equipment donated from firehalls in the US and Canada.  Brenda was taken by the four-day old Dalmatian pups, closely guarded by their mama when our bombero tourguide Jorge was not in sight.  Todd left several T-shirts from his local firehall for the guys, and will look into donating equipment to them on his return home.

We had a great authentic Mexican meal, complete with mariachis, at a restaurant on the zocalo.  Afterward, we were entertained with some traditional dancing at the bandstand in the middle of the square.

Monday we had a shopping day in both nearby towns, Santa Cruz de Huatulco and La Crucecita.  While shopping around the zocalo in Santa Cruz, I saw a woman with a haircut I liked, so I asked her where she got it done.  At an artesan market in Santa Cruz, Calvin bought a little wobble-head turtle, to mount on the dash of the Thing.  I immediately christened him “Bob”.  Brenda and Lee soon finished their tour of the shops at Santa Cruz, and we drove back to La Crucecita.  While the girls continued shopping in La Crucecita I went with the guys for a beer and lunch.  We met the girls later at another restaurant on the square, having a nacho snack.  Then we scouted out the estetica I’d heard about and I explained to Emma what I wanted.  As she started with the clippers, I told her not to be afraid to go short: “When you’re done, I want my hair to stand up.” She did a great job, for only 40 pesos, and earned herself a ten peso tip.  She’d had to put up with Lee and Brenda’s heckling as she worked.

On the drive back to the resort, we noticed Bob was missing from his perch on the dash.  We all suspected he’d been stolen, but started looking around.  Brenda speculated he had run away because he didn’t want to travel with us, and Lee eulogized what a good turtle he had been in his short life with us.  As we pulled up to the front door, we all got out and tore everything out of the Thing, until finally Todd came up with Bob, gave him CPR and some water. What a relief!  Now our little mascot is safely glued in place.

Later in the day, Mark and Todd radioed to ask if Calvin wanted to go sailing with them.  It seems none of the three guys knows that much about sailing, though Mark was dubbed El Capitan. I’m not privy to all the adventure, but I can report that all returned safely, a good time was had by all, and Mark was demoted to “jib”.

Tuesday was a beach day for the family. They had brought us mail from home, which included the last receipts and statements I needed to complete our income taxes.  So while I worked on that, Calvin did a tune up, rebuilt the carb and distributor and set the timing on the grey Thing parked a few spots down from ours.  Jorge was thrilled with how his car drove after that and promised Calvin a nice fish in exchange.  That night, the crew of drunken sailors turned up on our doorstep after dark, rousing us from bed, to tell some seafaring tales and drink a shot or two.

Mornings, we enjoyed birdwatching from our bedroom window.  Spike was particularly entertained by the birds and squirrels who came to nibble the opened coconut we set up on the awning post.  Several times he launched at the screen, trying to get at an unsuspecting bird, but always in vain.  My little hunter.

Wednesday we started out in the Thing, headed for the seven nearby beaches that are accessible by car.  But the navigator had planned a different roadtrip, and did not tell the driver to turn at the farthest beach exit.  We ended up at Puerto Angel, and found a lovely patch of beach catered by Roberto, who later served up a tasty seafood lunch.  We drove across the highway to nearby Pochutla and visited a Mexican small town.  Calvin and I thought our family would get a better appreciation for the real Mexico if they got away from the fabricated resort area of Huatulco and La Crucecita.  In Pochutla, tourists are rare and there’s no English spoken.  Shops don’t carry souvenirs and payment is in pesos.  But the people are friendly and genuine, and the town is real, not real prettied up. This was a different side of Mexico, apart from the excesses and extravagance of the all-inclusives.  I think our four visitors  realized and appreciated that, and enjoyed the excursion to “the other side”.

However, Thursday was a day of excesses, as they enjoyed another beach day.  When we joined them later that afternoon, there were no more barriers for the poor cousins, and we were right in the thick of the plush chaise lounges and served drinks.  Of course, Calvin and I had brought our own cooler, which was quickly depleted, and the party went on until we were the last ones on the beach.  Sorry, I did not bring back any souvenirs nor photos of this event; as Brenda said, “What happens in Mexico stays in Mexico.”  ‘Nuff said!

Before eight in the morning on Friday, three buses arrived, full of school kids armed with plastic garbage bags.  Within an hour, the entire camp, including beachfront, was stripped bare of litter in advance of Semana Santa, the leadup to Easter.
It’s a major Mexican holiday that begins Palm Sunday, and everyone heads to the beach.  We had experienced Semana Santa at the beach in Loreto ten years ago, and though we were up for the party, we wanted to be at our next destination, Oaxaca, before traffic picked up.  So Friday was spent preparing to leave – last laundry, cleaning and packing.  Mark came by in the afternoon and we drove into La Crucecita to order three pollos asados for our despedida supper.

Calvin was just returning from picking up the BBQ chicken when Mark, Lee, Brenda and Todd walked up the path from the beach.   We all enjoyed the chicken, frijoles charros, rice and tortillas, then the pastel frio I’d made for dessert.  Jorge returned from a beach day and stopped by for a chat and dessert.  The family helped Calvin put away some of our gear and then we said our goodbyes.  They would continue their luxury vacation for another week while we moved on with our adventure, through the mountains to the capital of Oaxaca.

After Merida we had about ten days to get to Huatulco on Mexico’s southwest coast, to meet Calvin’s brother Mark and family. Our first day was not a long trip, an easy drive to Campeche, the capital city of the state with the same name. But knowing we would soon be in the mountains of Chiapas, we started the day in a tire shop, having our front tires replaced. It gave us peace of mind to know we would not have to worry about a blowout in our aging tires on the narrow switchbacks ahead. Shortly after, on the dead flat Yucatan peninsula, Calvin was just commenting on the improved ride of the new tires when, to my astonishment, I saw a ridge of hills in the distance. Soon we were winding through these Campeche hills, and on arrival in the city of Campeche, noted that the city was built up into the hills, an absolute rarity in my experience. Already, I was captivated by Campeche.

We parked the bus along the malecon and went to reconnoiter possible campsites in the Thing. In the end, we parked for the night in the parking lot of the tourist information building, after the dayshift had left. But there was no hookup, so we depended on the fresh ocean breeze to break the heat. It was really hot and humid at the coast, so we gave Spike the first of several showers to cool him down. He never complains because he knows how good it feels.

Just before dusk, we walked around the old town, bounded by remnants of the stone fortress that had protected Campeche from pirates in the late 1600s. Each of the seven bastions houses a museum, so we explored the first and oldest one, the Museum of the City. We had the place to ourselves and took photos of the city skyline, the view from the turrets, and my favourite (look in the flickr photos) of Calvin addressing his peons, with the little trough pointing down at them so he could “pee on” them.

Old Campeche, within the fortress walls, retains the landmarks of a Spanish colonial city, with the typical zocalo. Along the cobblestoned streets are city-block-sized buildings, subdivided into shops and homes, each distinguished by their chunk of colour, ranging from pastels to more vivid tones.

The malecon was quiet all day, but came alive at night with strollers, skateboarders and couples parked on benches. During the night, a storm blew in and continued the next day, so we revised our beach destination of Isla Aguada and headed south toward Palenque. This completed our Yucatan loop, since we had stayed in Palenque in December on our way to Bacalar. However, the weather was still rainy, it was still early in the day, so we carried on to Misol-Ha, a waterfall just south of Palenque.

We’d made a short pit-stop in Palenque, where I walked through the rain to find a bank machine while Calvin changed a fuel filter on the bus. We got rained on more getting parked and settled in the lot at Misol-Ha, so we just decided to go see the falls as is, thinking we were already wet and it wouldn’t matter if we got wetter in the rain. Again, we had the place to ourselves, no doubt due to the poor weather, and the falls were swollen with rain and runoff, so quite impressive. We followed a trail behind the falls, which was near the bottom of their 30 meter drop. Torrents of water came crashing down inches in front of us, the wind whipping the water into our faces. It was as if someone had thrown a bucket of water on us, we couldn’t see or talk for the sheer volume of water coming at us. Fun, funny, cool, cold, wet and wild…and for me, a little scary. But we were laughing as we came out, and ran into a couple from Winnipeg, dressed in rain gear. They looked at us like we were crazy people.

Soaked to the bone, we changed into long pants and sweatshirts for the first time in months, and Calvin made us some of Doña Mari’s hot chocolate while I put our soaked clothing in the spin-dryer then hung it up to finish drying. We were heading into the mountains of Chiapas – the altitude was already 1000 feet – and the temperatures at night would drop as we gained altitude.

Soon after we left Misol-Ha the next morning, getting deeper into Chiapas, we passed a sign informing us we were in Zapatista territory. Further along the way, we saw more signs and murals of Zapatista activity, but to be fair, we also saw the usual Mexican campaign posters. The going was slow through the mountains, but the roads, though winding and steep, were in great shape. We eventually reached pine tree altitude, where Ponderosa pines predominated the formerly-tropical jungle. People in the towns we passed were wearing sweaters and jackets in the chill air, and more and more, we saw colourful traditional garments worn. Near Ocosingo we stopped at the La Cañada market, newly built and nicely laid out, that offered a wide variety of products made locally. Not only were there the richly hand-embroidered blouses and flavoured tequilas we bought, but products made from honey, cocoa, coffee and macadamia nuts all grown in the area as well as jewellery and carvings made from amber and jade found in Chiapas. We spent an enjoyable time chatting with the vendors, learning about the area’s resources and were proud to support “the sustainable improvement of indigenous communities of Chiapas” with our purchases. Indeed, we saw lots of new construction and efforts to spruce up houses and yards.

Our altimeter got a workout as it registered the ups and downs through the mountains – up to 8400 feet at times, then dropping into valley towns – but the bus did us proud and though feeling the altitude, could still pull 4th gear when we needed it, and the jake brakes held well on the downhills. We cruised into San Cristobal de las Casas about 2:30 that afternoon.

We had emailed our friends Graham and Luisa in advance of our arrival, and they stopped by our campground on one of their trips to town. We followed them out to their ranch in the hills above San Cristobal, where we had a tour of the grounds, herded their sheep then had a simple and delicious lunch of beef tacos. Luisa sent me home with the leftovers, in exchange for the muffins I’d given them earlier. Yes, it was cool enough in San Cristobal to bake in the bus – we appreciated having the extra heat of the oven.

Another day we explored San Cristobal, looking for the alternate RV park Graham had mentioned. We got lost, but in trying to get our bearings, discovered we were at the Museum of Mayan Medicine we had visited and enjoyed eight years before. We stopped in, not to tour it again, but to see if they had any traditional remedy for my bochornos. The men at the ticket counter and in the farmacia did not know what that was, but when I explained my hot-flash symptoms, the pharmacist sold me some drops and the ticket agent had me write it all out in Spanish and English so they could update their bilingual ailments and remedies sign.

Making our way back to the zocalo, we walked through the handicraft market spread out over the steps and grounds of the city’s main church. Indigenous women, in the traditional dress that indicates the area they were from, sat among their wares, quietly embroidering while tourists looked over the finished products for sale. We approached Andrea, a petite woman with a pretty smile, who politely and proudly informed us about the Marco doll we bought from her. I had asked if it were bad luck to have such a doll in the house, a miniature of Commander Marco of the Zapatistas. She patiently explained that he was the hero of the indigenous people, fighting for their rights as equals, encouraging women to vote and children to become educated. She pointed out that the market itself was a protest of the government-sponsored craft cooperative housed in the back of the church, because of the unfair profit margin exploiting the women’s handiwork. I was impressed with this well-spoken young lady, and happy to support her and her family in this small way. And we couldn’t help but notice how the entire inside of the church was gilded while right outside, poor barefoot Indian women sold their creative efforts for pennies.

The Tourist Strip in San Cristobal is a far cry from the 5th Avenue of Playa del Carmen, an indication of the kind of tourist that makes their way to the cultural rather than capital-based areas of Mexico. But one young enterprising fellow we met was Armando, who sat with his bathroom scale on one of San Cristobal’s side streets. For a peso (about 10 cents CDN), Calvin stepped up to get weighed. Armando offered to hold Calvin’s sunglasses, but did not lighten my load when I stepped on the scale. As I got off, I noticed the scale zeroed at 40 kg, but I do believe I was weighed accurately. Instead of Calvin’s sunglasses and watch, which Armando clearly coveted, we tipped him an extra peso, and took a picture of him for posterity.

As we made preparations to leave San Cristobal we were charmed by a little cutie who had been running amok in the campground in the last few days, entertaining himself and his little brother while their parents tended to daily chores. One morning Calvin found him on top of his family’s minivan, tying his feet to the luggage rack. Finn was curious about Spike, but quite shy, declining my offer to take Spike for a walk with a dimple-filled smile. We invited this friendly German family over to see the bus, then Finn proudly showed us his home-on-wheels. He was quite concerned that we had forgotten to take the Thing with us as the bus pulled away, until he saw we were only moving over to the sewer dump. Then he cheerily waved goodbye once we had hooked up, calling out “Adios” in a perfect Spanish accent.

Our drive that day to Chiapa de Corzo was only about 70 km on the map but took longer than the expected hour because of the highs and lows through the mountains. This route was the most scenic, from 8500 feet down to 2500 feet, and so convoluted that the kitchen furniture soon lost its footing and slid around the floor, giving Spike a start. At the lower altitude, we were back in the tropics, but the vegetation was desert rather than jungle. And it was hot, man.

Friendly cabbies gave us a city map and suggested it would be safe enough to leave our bus parked at the side of the road near the 24 hour Pemex gas station. We showered Spike and left him to guard the bus while we scouted out a possible campsite. We found the zocalo, crowned with a beautiful brick fountain, a clean, airy market, and the boat launches for the tours of the Sumidero Canyon. But no campground, so we moved the bus to a shady spot along the main road for the night.

We decided to tour the Sumidero Canyon early the next morning, but it wasn’t until a full load showed up that we left. Along our three-hour tour were wonderful vistas of steep canyon walls, up to 1000 meters high, and the Grijalva River was calm and peaceful as we whizzed along. At the far end, we saw the dam that controls waterflow through the canyon, and stopped for a short break at a restaurant in the town that was built along the new lake’s shore. I got to fly on the way home – a shorter trip because we did not stop to see the sights of interest again.

We took the Thing to nearby Tuxtla Gutierrez, the capital of Chiapas, to scout out the campground there, but found it was too small for our bus to enter or park. Further along the highway was the little town of Berriozábal, where we got out to explore on foot. In the market there, we bought a sisu, an unfamiliar vegetable that looked like a corncob with coarse brown hair. The vendor was peeling the hair off them to sell, and assured us they tasted wonderful when sliced and fried with some tomato and onion in a little oil. We decided it must be an acquired taste.

Returning to Chiapa de Corzo, we drove some backstreets in this hilly town and encountered a parade of sorts: some clowns, people carrying flower arrangements and piñatas, musicians and children. That reminded Calvin that he wanted to find out where to get the fireworks we’d heard through the nights here, so we asked at a store near where the bus was parked. The fellow told us to go to a house a few blocks away, and when we arrived, there was a party going on in the street. Clowns, people with flower arrangements, musicians and lots of kids. After a few inquiries, Freddy and his wife Margarita climbed into the back of the Thing and directed us to another house. For 75 pesos, we got a dozen huge bottle rockets, and Calvin was so ecstatic, he had to set one off as soon as night fell. Spike was not impressed. The party? It was to celebrate San Gregorio, as we later saw the partygoers parading to the church carrying an image of San Gregorio along with the flowers and piñatas.

Tuxtla no longer being an option, we moved further down the road to Ocozocoautla and set up at the orphanage where we had flown and donated our kite eight years before. There had been some nice changes at Hogar Infantil in the meantime, including four new cement pads with full hookup. I was excited about the possibility of doing laundry until we realized there was no water available, their pila had not been filled in the dry season. So we relaxed and looked at maps to plan our route after Huatulco, then took a drive to town to reconnoiter and find Internet. We were quite disappointed not to find any internet access, and a few people actually directed us out of town to find any. This turned out to be a wild goose chase, because after about 10 km without seeing a town of any size, then taking a side road to a waterfall we never reached, we turned back and raced the fading daylight back to camp. Ocozocoautla’s internet cafes and El Aguacero waterfall will remain mysteries.

With two days until Mark’s arrival in Huatulco, we opted to move on to Tehuantepec, and leave the last big drive through mountains for the morning. The drive to Tehuantepec was mostly downhill, though slow and winding, allowing me the opportunity to examine the mango trees we passed. The fruit looked ripe and ready, dangling on its stems out of reach, like a carrot on a stick. I looked forward to parking under the mango trees at Santa Teresa, as we had seen mangoes since Chiapa de Corzo.

When passing through the narrowest part of Mexico, where the wind blows fiercely from Atlantic to Pacific, we noticed a wind farm had been built near La Ventosa. A little further along, by the junction with the highway that crosses the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, we saw evidence of the wind’s activity: all the garbage in the world had collected on the fences and trees along the road.

Soon after, we were set up under the mango trees, but I was disappointed that the fruit was not ripe here. I took Spike out for a walk around the grounds and saw the campground owner’s little son coming over for a visit, with a bag of 6 ripe mangoes for me. So I was happy again, parked under the mango trees, enjoying a diet Coke and a doradita. We reconnoitered in town, finding lots of internet here, and the vegetation and weather definitely more tropical. Later, we watched a caravan roll into the park, the same group that had been in Merida. We recognized our friends who had catsat for Spike, so had a nice catch-up visit with the Ritchie family while the no-see’ums chewed us to bits. That evening, the caravaners enjoyed a catered meal; we went to bed early to the sounds of their live marimba music.

Our wakeup call was not so pleasant: the RV genset next door roused us into action and we were on the road just after 6AM. But the cooler early morning air was just what we needed: past Salina Cruz we saw the Pacific Ocean, but soon left the coast again, turning inland, winding and climbing through the mountains. We remembered driving this stretch eight years ago, in the dark, over potholes and past wandering donkeys. Now the road is repaved and in good shape, with a few nice views of the ocean, but mostly of dry hills and valleys.

To our surprise and good fortune, our RV park in Huatulco was only 600 meters from the resort that Mark and family are staying in. We reconnoitered the nearby town, La Crucecita, stocked up on beer, and prepared to greet the family when they arrived later that afternoon.

Donna and Rob arrived in Playa del Carmen on Wednesday, with our replacement bearings, and we had been negotiating how to connect with them. Since we love Merida and it is a big city with lots to do, we thought we would host them for a weekend, if only they would make a five hour bus trip…Our emails and instant messages to them consistently repeated the invitiation, and then Thursday, I suddenly had a brainwave: Why didn’t I get on the bus in Merida and go get the parts? After all, they were doing us a favour by bringing them, and we shouldn’t expect to put them out.

Meantime, Donna told us that she had sat next to a fellow on the plane and in casually chatting about her vacation in Playa, he suddenly pointed at her and exclaimed, “You’re the bearing people!” He turned out to be Dave, of Dave and Annamarie, other friends of ours from home who also have a bus. We had let Dave know about our continuing transmission problem, knowing he would empathize, but not expecting he could help out. When we knew the two couples had connected, coincidentally, we figured a road trip was in order. But what to do with Spike?

My first rash thought that he could come with us was soon nixed by Calvin. So we needed a catsitter. But Carolyn had gone to Bacalar; we didn’t really know anyone else in Merida. We had met a young couple from Victoria BC who were tenting, and we had told them about the nice campground near Progreso we had found. On a hunch, we made a quick trip that Thursday to Chelem to try to find Colin and Alanna, thinking that they might enjoy a pre-paid weekend in our RV park in exchange for looking after our cat. We missed them there, but some fellow campers had seen them at a hostel in Merida, so back we came to town and tracked them down at the Nomads Hostel. They had decided to move on, so we had to resort to at least Plan C: our friendly Canadian family who were in the latest RV caravan in our park. Of course, they were happy to do it, so we quickly gave Allan and Morgan a tour of the bus, left food, dishes and contact info on the kitchen counter, packed our tent, sleep pads and a few clothes into the Thing, and with the usual instructions to Spike about “don’t barf on the carpie or the ‘puter”, we headed off into the night.

Under Mother Moon’s bright full light we drove east toward Cancun. The toll road to from Merida to Cancun is very flat, pretty straight and almost empty. We flew along this Mexican autobahn as fast as the pesos flew out of my pocket: it’s your time or your money. Four hours later, we arrived at Xcalacoco, and quietly set up our tent. We enjoyed a quick midnight rinse in our beach baño, then caught some sleep.

Bob was surprised and pleased to see us, then he surprised us with the news that had we arrived a week later, Xcalacoco would be no more. The big hotels and condo complexes had finally squeezed Juan and Luzi out, giving them just a week to find other accommodations. This made our return to Xcalacoco that much more special, and the sand and shell-framed photos we had given our beach friends that much more significant.

We connected with Donna first by internet, then came by their resort on the south side of Playa to pick them up for the day. Since Donna and Rob had not been to the Riviera Maya, we started with the Tourist Strip in Playa del Carmen, yes, yet again for us! But we detoured to Casamara and introduced them to Sandra while we made arrangements to stay there that night. We had a filling and inexpensive lunch just off the Strip, then we hit the beach, our beach, which they had already read about on our blog but wanted to see for themselves. We relaxed in the sun, drank cervezas under the palapa, ate mangoes in the ocean and walked in the soft white sand. It wasn’t the best day for beaching, but it was to be our last at Xcalacoco – I felt a sense of closure having returned, and left behind the shells I had collected there before.

After we dropped Donna and Rob off at their resort, we checked into the studio at Casamara. Immediately we felt at home in this cozy little apartment. I hung up the awaiting hammock and lounged in it to watch my telenovela. As it ended, Sandra arrived with Dave and Annamarie in tow and I continued to swing comfortably as we all chatted awhile. Eventually, Dave and Annamarie took us to Billy the Kid Taqueria, the taco restaurant Donna had tried to find for us earlier in the day. We had a great late dinner there, then had our first nighttime stroll of the Strip on the way back to Casamara.   Despite being so close to the busy  Strip, we found our studio a quiet haven in the middle of Tourist Mecca.

Relaxing in our studio that evening, we tuned in to cable TV and found our old familiar programs. In the morning we enjoyed a long hot shower – we had not had such luxuries in awhile so savoured the decadence of it all.  As we left, we asked Sandra for her input on places of interest to visit in the Playa area. She recommended the cenotes at Kantunchi, a short drive south of Playa. With hugs of gratitude and friendship, we said hasta luego to Sandra, knowing our paths will cross again.

We picked up our tour group of Donna, Rob and their friends Bets and Layton at their resort and headed out to the highway, stacked three-deep in the Thing. They had all worn their swimsuits and brought snorkel gear, and looked forward to trying it out in the cenotes. Kantunchi is an eco-park across from the very resort that Bets and Layton stayed at last year, but as Bets said,”They didn’t even tell us about it”, so it is not in the resort tour packages. We had our choice of a guided tour that included multiple caves and cenotes that you could swim, snorkel or kayak, or a self-guided tour of four cenotes. We decided we’d have more freedom with our own tour, so map in hand, we hiked into the forest along well-marked paths.

The Yucatan peninsula is made of porous limestone, and much like a sponge, the holes on the surface are often connected below to other holes. It is this land formation that can make scubadiving in a cenote treacherous, when underwater currents carry unsupervised and unknowing swimmers away. As a non-swimmer, I am particularly nervous about this, so while the others snorkeled to their hearts’ content, I stayed on terra firma with the camera.

The water-babies in the crowd gingerly approached the stone steps into the first cenote, awaiting that crotch-level chill that makes you wonder if it’s worth going in all the way. But the heat of the day convinced them it was cooler in than out; the chill soon seemed refreshing, making the walk to the next stop less oppressive in the humid jungle. There were fish to look at in the clear, slightly-saline water, which ranged from 4 to 21+ feet deep. Most of the cenotes had cave-like entrances, and obviously had channels or tunnels leading to other caves, but one spot had a typical open-air water surface, very pretty with lush jungle vegetation surrounding it.

At the last cenote, all but Calvin and Donna had had their fill of swimming and snorkelling, so headed back along the path to the cervezas that waited at the park entrance. Donna, just learning to snorkel, was anxious about swimming through the small submerged spaces until Calvin went ahead and showed her where they ended up, often in a larger cavern. While they explored below, I tracked their voices from above, as there were several natural skylights into their swimming hole. Donna was so proud of herself for swimming out of her comfort zone and enjoyed this part of the tour immensely.

The six of us piled back into the Thing for the trip back to the resort. We were tired and hungry and in need of freshening up. But Calvin and I declined an offer of lunch at the resort, and went to see if we could connect with Dave and Annamarie in town.

They were not at their apartment, but the tenant we met there said they had gone to the nearby WalMart. As we drove there hoping to find them, we tried to reason what they would be looking for if they were just moving into their apartment, so figured on looking for them in the linens or toilet paper aisle. We split up but Calvin found them first, choosing a mattress pad. I think he said Annamarie’s reaction on seeing him was “Oh good, somebody with a car”, meaning they could buy more than they could carry themselves. We laughed about that, all of us feeling relieved we had found each other without benefit of a telephone. We detoured to the food section, loaded the Thing with their supplies and drove back to the apartment. While the tenants continued to move out, we set up on the poolside table and and proceeded with a “grab and grunt” of handstuffed chicken tacos washed down with cerveza. We were all famished and manners were not an issue here: we were definitely among friends. Dave’s Swiss army knife was all that stood between the pollo asado and the tortillas.

It was almost dark when we said our goodbyes and hit the road back to Merida. Travelling at night on the autopista is safe enough and much cooler than in the day. Merida 305 km…I started a chorus of “99 bottles of beer on the wall” substituting the kilometers, and when Calvin suggested I sing slower to make each verse last a kilometer, I switched to Spanish, and Damn if it didn’t come out in just the right time!

So passed the four hour return trip, one of those giddy punchy evenings where silly things like stealing roadsigns can happen. Well, we did stop to look at the stars, out in the middle of nowhere, where the sky was clear and not light-polluted. I was surprised to hear voices, but the sound from the loudspeakers at an event in a distant town travelled across the flat terrain easily.

Spike was well and happy to see us and we had a nice note from the family who had looked after him.

The sound test for the Flag Day ceremony roused us early Sunday, and while I watched the spectacle, Calvin put the bus back together. Really. It was that easy. Or at least, he made it seem easy. Judging by the lack of swearing heard, I knew it went well.

We spent time packing up and preparing to leave, and I spent way too much time in the sun waiting to get just the right shot of our bus and Thing parked below the huge Mexican flag, now proudly flying from the huge flagpole at the shopping mall next to us. Have a look at our map in the sidebar to the right and see if it isn’t a good photo (Click on the arrow above the map to enlarge it and see the list of places).

So, we’re on the road again, thanks to our Home Team (Tom, Guy, Zach and Melissa), the Away Team (Donna and Rob) and the Road Crew (Allan, Charlene, Morgan, Elise, Mason, Sandra, Bets, Layton, Dave and Annamarie). It was a group effort that made a potential disaster a wonderful experience.