My daily routine in Xela
Day 341
Xela, Guatemala
I’ve been here for three weeks now studying and my days are pretty much the same. I wake up at 7.30am, eat breakfast and walk the 50 meters to the school around the corner. I get a cup of coffee and sit studying Spanish until 10am when there is more coffee and usually cake. Every stands around chatting for half an hour and then there is more studying until 1pm. Sometimes myself and the other students and teachers will go for a walk around town to look at something interesting, sometimes we’ll go for coffee. The school hasn’t had many people in it so far, at most 5 students, which at least means its reasonably quiet.
After school I come back to my host family for lunch and then maybe I have the rest of the day to while away. For several afternoons in the week we take excursions out to markets or churches in the local area which fills the rest of the day. Sometimes I have a siesta in the afternoon, or just sit and play my guitar for a few hours. I found a cool little cafe with wireless Internet so like to sit there when I need to get my information fix. I pulled my bike out of my van as soon as I arrived so try to cycle everywhere. Xela is kind of hilly and the roads can be pretty bad but its small enough with a bike.
At 6pm I have a salsa lesson and there are two possibilities, Salsa Rosa, which is small and funky, or Guajira which is bigger and with a nicer room. They both cost Q30 ($4) for a group lesson but no matter which you go its always a gamble as to whether you end up dancing with someone suitable or not. There is a nice Canadian girl, Ashley, who usually goes to one of them who is pretty good to dance with, but you might end up with someone completely off your level, or worse, no one at all. It seems Salsa is pretty popular with guys in Xela.
And so it should be, last Tuesday I turned up at Guajira to find 8 new, and very attractive, girls lined up for the class. Apparently they were trying to learn some new skills as they were the contestants in the ‘Miss Xela’ competition later today. I had a fun hour dancing with some hot (and rather tall) girls but sadly they didn’t return the next night. :p On some nights there is Salsa music in a few of the clubs which I have been to a few times. I’m feel like I’m finally getting to a decent level but I am still hampered by the lack of a good regular partner…
After my class I head back home for my evening meal and maybe an attempt at my homework, depending on whether I was given any. I’ve been messing around with Cubase 3sx for a while in an attempt to record some music, but the PreSonus 1394 interface I have works but produces far too much noise to make it worthwhile. I’m still looking for a solution but its not easy without a permanent Internet connection.
Xela is nice, although a little cold and it seems to be raining a lot of the time these days. I figure I will study for another week, maybe two, while trying to find some travel companions on the road South before heading east to El Salvador and some more time on the beach.
Another lazy weekend
Day 334
Xela, Guatemala
Well I seem to have gotten my site back to 100%, the RSS feeds were broken for a week and I couldn’t upload anything using Windows Live Writer either. Seems the problem was some blank lines in my various PHP files. I’ve been messing around trying to get a ‘digg this’ button on my various posts, obviously without much luck and breaking the damn thing in the process.
I finally bought a phone, a Nokia 1208 for Q125 so I can update my blog using Twitter. Sadly I am still stuck with the 140 character limit, I thought I could send larger texts and they would post to my blog. Maybe I could work on a plugin to solve this problem but my programming skills aren’t all that hot with PHP. Maybe I need to down load some books.
I’ve been playing my guitar quite a bit recently and finally dug out the FireWire audio interface I bought in the UK and last night spent several frustrating hours trying to get it to work. It finally seemed to start talking to Cubase and I think the problem is old drivers. I don’t have an Internet connection at home (well its intermittent when the family turns on the router, which has now disappeared….) so I had to wait until I hit a cafe today.
I was lucky I made it here at all. Yesterday we went on an excursion to some hot springs and the drive back was insane. I hate chicken buses!
Breakfast in the hot pool! 
Belize without a map
Belize City, Belize
I finally got my oil changed on my last day in Mexico. I rotated the tyres, changed the air and oil filter and had a confusing conversation about the fuel filter in Spanish. I didn’t care I didn’t understand any more, it was time for country number four on my world tour. After 4 months in Mexico it was time to leave. I had a final breakfast at a local cafe and dumped about 40 coins for my 52 peso bill before heading off the to the border. After seeing all the Belizean cars queuing for fuel I thought it best that I get in the line as well, just as well, I would later learn that gas is $11 a gallon over the border. Why do the Americans complain?!?
The guard at the border hit me for $10 to leave and had the gall to suggest other tourist pay him $25 for the amazing “service” of pointing out where the car import office was. I don’t think so. I sorted out my paperwork and headed over into the free trade zone between the borders. I got my $5 wheel spray and waved off the guys attempt to sell me insurance. I couldn’t just drive through though as one of the customs ‘helpers’ was keen to point out. He jumped in and we went back to get my wheels sprayed, at least that’s where we were going until I told him, to his amazement, that I had already done it. He also wanted to sell me insurance but I said I had no cash. We turned around and went back to the immigration place. Somehow I got away without giving him any money.
I was given 30 days and the same for my car. My papers all in order I drove my car to the border where it was vaguely inspected by the disinterested guard. He mostly wanted to know how much my bike was worth. $100 if I was lucky, I didn’t mention the laptops, camera gear and guitar. All of this business was conducted in English which was nice, its always nice to be understood. I was soon through and went to the office over the border to pick up some insurance. Since its $29B for a week and only $60B for a month I went for the longer time*. You never know. Sadly I learned that the disease of speed bumps has spread to Belize too but the roads weren’t too bad, the lack of signs sent me off down a dirt track that I learned would have soon brought me to my destination but taking no chances, and possessing no map, I turned back to seek out the highway turning I had missed.
A hour or so later I was in Orange Walk and with some local currency in my hand happy to be able to buy a drink. I am slightly ashamed to say I was glad to see the Queens face on a bank note. Kinda feels like coming home somehow. Now should I stay or should I go. Accommodation options in Orange Walk were limited, and most people only stopped to go on the river trip to the local ruins. I had just come from 3 major Mayan ruins so wasn’t that bothered about staying. Belize city was only an hour and a half away with more options, certainly for accommodation so I picked up some supplies and got back on the highway. I say highway… it was a paved road. Mostly without potholes.
Outside the SEA hostel I met the Canadian guy I had been chatting to the previous night but some strange force made me keep going to my other choice, the Seaside Guest House. It sounded so tranquil, serene and peaceful. What could go wrong?
The gate was opened by some aging American dude who obviously had had a few too many beers. He was followed by an older American woman who was shouting at him. I had them pegged as other guests and hoped they wouldn’t cause a problem. I stood in the common area trying to get some service for 10 minutes but there was no one about. It looked like a cool hostel though, lots of drums everywhere and a great library. I found some staff upstairs and it turned out the drunk couple were the owners. Seems like they had been at this all week.
I met up with the other guests, got checked in and a group of us headed over to find some Chinese food. We managed to pick up a local bum who I had asked directions from, which ended up costing me a bottle of coke to get rid of him. We were also on the street it says specifically in the guidebooks not to walk down during the night. 6 people shouldn’t cause a problem, right? Belize city is pretty grotty, the roads are in terrible shape, people hassle you for change everywhere and there is too much trash. Shame really, they have some nice architecture and the working people are friendly enough.
Back at the hostel we found there were another group of guests checking in so we all moved upstairs with a few beers in an attempt to be social. Mitch, the owner, brought us up a couple of drums and we started talking about buying a batch of local rum. His partner Diana had been drunk and embarrassing downstairs with the new guests and she soon came up to have a chat. She then started ranting about being mugged at gunpoint and how the Belizean Tourist Board were going to close them down if they had any more complains. It seems the tourists have been complaining about the hostel. We all wondered why. The other guys seemed to find it highly amusing that Diana seemed to take a shine to me, but at least she was being nice.
It started raining outside and we all felt sorry for poor Mitch who was out getting our booze. He came back and we started doing some serious drinking. Everything was fine, we had the guitars and bongos going.
I found out Vanessa had the Canon 40D and we chatted about photography. She said she was a photographer but I soon caught her out on that one by finding out she didn’t know how to set the white balance :p Faker!
Then everything seemed to go wrong. Diana was getting increasingly drunk and shouting about tourists ripping her off. Mitch managed to calm her down and send her back to bed but she was soon back up and not only shouting at poor Mitch but also now accusing everyone upstairs of not paying our bills. We had a tab open downstairs so thought this wasn’t a problem. I got my guitar out too and was trying to teach Mitch a song when she came over, grabbed the bucket of ice and threw it all over him. I didn’t get wet but I moved my guitar into the wall. I wasn’t impressed!
The rest of the evening consisted of everyone else talking to both of them trying to calm them down but mostly just trying to get rid of them. Mitch wanted to stay with us and chill, Diana wanted to kill him. She came up and kicked the locked door in, was screaming and shouting. We wound up retreating to one of the dorms and whispering behind the doors. Even that wasn’t enough and we got told off for that too. It was a very weird night.
Mitch and Diana. More drama than Mexican Soap.
* 1 day – $12.50B / 2 weeks – $46B
oil change/breakfast/getting rid of change/queue at gas station/border/$25 guard/spray/belize border/insurance-12-30-46-60/wrong road-no signs/orange walk-atm/belize city/heat sink paste/chinese directions/meet the canadian outside SEA/finding hostel/bad roads/drunk owners/hangin downstairs/check in.park up/invited to dinner/olly.jo.vanessa./ATM-shower/belgian couple.john-laurie/walk to chineese/pick up bum for directions/coke/peotry back to hostel/new arrivals downstairs/few beers/row/uncomfortable/go up stairs/rain on baloncy/dog shit/bongos-mitch.diana/diana talking to me/rows restart/mitch goes for rum/guitar/throwing ice/vanessa photographer/diana accusing us of not paying/getting weird/kicking door in/hiding in dorm room/3.3-am
The Three (drunken) Amigos!
Day 161
Los Mochis, Mexico
Even though it was Saturday I had to get up and move my van from outside Roberto’s office. I shouldn’t complain since he was kind enough to lock it up for me overnight but I hate to get up, especially since I had won the toss with Roland and snagged the bed. I should have sensed trouble when Roberto backed his car out to take me over there right into the front of a truck behind us. This wasn’t the only crash we would be facing this Saturday…..
After a shower and not much of a breakfast we then had to wait for the local plumbers to fit the kitchen. Roberto had recently separated from his wife and was now going through the painful process of not only living 400km from his 4 year old daughter but setting up a new bachelor pad for himself, the kitchen was just a shell and needed filing out. When the kitchen fitters had finally arrived and had gotten to work we went off on our mini-tour of Los Mochis. I’m not sure you would put it down as the cultural and architectural center of Mexico but it gets a steady stream of tourists all hoping on or off the train that heads up through the Copper Canyon, Mexico’s version of the Grand Canyon, and an arguably better version of the same. We went for a walk around the botanical gardens, which was a hot walk in the middle of the day. I’m not quite sure why Roberto though we were interested in plants but it was a nice enough place, and free, which is always a bonus. It just looked like a park to me though, if the fact that it had plants in it made it botanical so be it. Roland took up the challenge of jumping over one of the irrigation ditches which was good of him, but the photo would have been much better if he had fallen in, as I hoped :p
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We did pick up an interesting snippet of information though, we learned that there was a baseball game on later on and since Roland used to play baseball a lot, and I’d never been to a game, it would be nice to check out. Best of all the tickets were only $3. Always thinking in the correct way, Roberto took us to a Taco place which he knew sold tickets and proceeded to demolish a load of food while I sat nursing my soda. Telling the average Mexican you don’t eat meat usually garners the equivalent response to saying I had castrated myself, they are horrified, couldn’t understand it and feel sorry for you… My life, my choice…. There was problem with the kitchen and we had to go back. Trying to save a few pesos, Roberto had hired some Mexican Cowboys and they didn’t have the right tools to connect up the gas and water. At least he had worktops instead of nothing as he did before.
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We had a while to kill before the game and Roberto now confronted me, saying he was very worried about me. I hadn’t eaten since the night before and this was a cause for concern. I did remind him that I only eat vegetables and seafood and we had only been to places that only serve meat, besides I am perfectly capable of going several days without food and not feeling any ill effects but this didn’t assuage his concern and we set off in search of a ‘Subway’. I quickly reminded him I would rather eat fish tacos and happily he knew a good place that might still be open next to the 24 hour disco. Why it seems impossible to get seafood in the evening is still a mystery to be solved, as well as the 24 hour disco conundrum but at least I got something to eat. Roberto would be remiss to allow me to eat alone and joined in with gusto.
Before the game we quickly went to check our mail at his office and I rapidly uploaded all my missing blog posts that I had spent so much time on the beach writing. I still didn’t have enough time and was transmitting them from the car as we left. There is always another connection though, and 15+ posts at once would have to do :p
I have never been to a baseball game, the majority of my experience with the game is playing it on my Nintendo Wii, so at least I had some idea of what was going on, but then not much. I quickly gathered that the main objective was to drink at least one beer per inning.We took it in turns going off looking for ‘Senor Cervesa’ but with each trip up the steps to our seats I took my turn to be concerned as our host was panting like a car trapped dog, and the stadium was tiny…. For some reason we had chosen to sit right behind the local band and infrequently they would start belting out some random tune at breaks in the game. The guys played away but as no one was bothering to update the scoreboard no one knew who was winning. I soon lost interest and started reading my book, trying to ignore the annoying samples of music they would keep playing and the nearby band. The most interesting action came from the girls who would appear and start throwing promotional items into the crowd. Like plastic cups and key chains… To see the locals go after these was like watching refugees chase a UN food truck, I thought people would start fighting if they didn’t get something. I guess baseball isn’t my sport :p
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My First Baseball game, possibly my last…  |
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One of the teams won, I have no idea which, nor did most of the crowd, and we made for home. Roberto had managed to snag one of the big beer cups and was now on double portions of beer, I gave up after 4 beers and a trip to the disgusting cockroach infested toilets but my Amigos were both on double figures and were miles from home. I knew I shouldn’t have gotten in the car, I tried to persuade him to let me drive by admiring his car and asking how it handled but it was no good. It seems the idea of letting the person who has had the least to drink handle the driving is as alien as not getting completely wasted in the first place. Roberto assured me he wouldn’t go too fast, but the speed kept creeping up and thankfully the roads were quiet. He didn’t think it was a problem since he was a lawyer! Of course, you have the other drunken drivers to worry about too… ‘
By now our Mexican friend was hungry but he had a pescatarian guest to consider, luckily he knew a place that did potato tacos and we somehow managed to get there. I had 4, and probably would have had more if I had known they were only 2 pesos each! Bargain! Suitably full we went back to the apartment to get ready for an evening of drinking… it was close, we made it. Roland had set off searching for cigarettes despite my attempts to dissuade him and after smoking one agreed that is wasn’t a good idea, but there is no rolling tobacco in Mexico.
Roberto is a big Sopranos fan, as am I, and he put it on for Roland hoping to get him interested. Perhaps I should have gone to watch as well, then we might have stayed at home and lived, but it was not to be. They soon got bored and then insisted I get out my guitar, which I did. We had half an hour of painful shouting to various Beatles tunes before I had enough and succumbed to asking if we were going out. We got changed and set off to a good club Roberto knew of, after first checking we didn’t have any illegal drugs on us. A few more beers while hanging out kept the mood going and Roberto was in fine spirits as he cruised around looking for the club, telling us only the poor drink tequila in Mexico and his adventures in Amsterdam. Perhaps he should have been concentrating more on the road as he nearly killed us all by starting to turn left into the path of an oncoming car. Only my girl like screams of terror averted disaster and we pulling into the parking spot without a sound.
And we had to drive home….
The ‘club’ was empty, just a few locals in cowboys hats standing around outside so we went next door to shoot some pool and drink more beer. I’m ok at pool but its just a game, not a competition of wills, but Roland and Roberto were pretty drunk so it was a simple matter to keep playing for me. I was bored though, and soon gave up and started reading my book. By now I had gotten to the 7th book in one of my favourite series and there was a whole new novel waiting to be read, much more interesting that beer and pool I have to say. After a few hours of this the club must be busy now? We paid our tab and went out to check, I saw inside before the bouncer quickly closed the door, it was still empty but now they wanted 100 pesos to get in! Oh well at least I would be able to get started on my new book since it was too loud to talk and I doubted we would be dancing… Some Saturday night this was!
We got back in the car and went looking for something, finally spotting some police cars outside a club and calculating that if the police were there it must be good… Well it wasn’t the best place in the world, but it was busy, people were dancing, occasionally a load of teenagers would get up and play some pretty appalling music which the crowd seemed to appreciate. I wasn’t being an old fart, the music was awful, but I was still bored. I thought it hilarious to see Roberto finish his beer and then stand waving his bottle around for 10 minutes trying to attract the attention of a waiter while the bar was only 3 meters away :p Eventually the DJ kicked in and Roland and I went off to dance. Roberto didn’t want to dance with us, apparently that’s a bit gay, but eventually he came over to sit nearby while I hoped and prayed to go home to bed…
getting van/crash/shower/kitchen wait/botanical gardens/jumping Roland/tacos/baseball tickets/kitchen install/fish tacos/office&uploads/baseball match/panting Roberto/too drunk to drive/10 beers/cockroach/potato tacos/cigarettes/sopranos/drug discussion/Beatles/drive/near crash/empty club/pool/not caring/reading my book/100 pesos empty club/police club/kids/terrible band/reading again/waving bottle when bar so close/dancing/Roberto not happy/interesting girl/drive home
Blog day
Day 159
Los Arbolitos Beach, BCS, Mexico
It seemed like I didn’t do much but I sat and tried to get up to date with my missing blog entries. I was on about 28 days and still had notes to fill out from before New Years Eve… How did I get so far behind? Laziness and laziness I guess. Writing my blog is just about the only thing I promised myself I would do everyday and it seemed it was slipping away. I justified it to Roland by saying that normally I would spend travelling time on buses reading but now when I’m bored I will just read my novel and everything else gets ignored… He probably just thinks I’m lazy :p I was surprised by how long it could take to write an entry though. When you factor in time to search for a few photos to flesh out the entry and hammering out the text, each entry can take 30 minutes or an hour. And the longer I left each entry meant I was sitting looking at the keyboard wondering what else happened that day that I didn’t make a note about. Months after I had travelled around New Zealand in 1994 I could recall pretty much every day, where I was and what I did, everything was fun and fresh but now all that remains of that trip are my photos and occasional journal entry. I didn’t want that to happen with this trip.
I got my missing entries down to about 10 days and was mostly satisfied. When I return to the UK I would have more work to do adding photographs to my previous entries to make them better but using the Windows Live Writer program has certainly made my life easier. I could write, add photos and save the drafts without an Internet connection and upload them when I found an access point. I also started working on splitting up my GPS tracks into each days, and I have to think about making the tracks more efficient. I dont need 200 points when I’m travelling down a straight highway, the start and the end will do, but that will require several hours of hacking to figure out and the day was too nice!
Roland borrowed my surfboard, despite the total lack of surf, and went to the beach and I got out my Guitar and spend most of the afternoon making my fingers hurt. Another job I had mentally set myself was to move any guitar tabs over to my phone so I had a ready supply of songs to play when required. I love playing the guitar but finding myself required to play and not being able to remember the songs is just embarrassing :p
That night we burned ‘Mr Woody’.
Surfs up!
Day 154
The beach!
Wednesday 13th February
God damn sun woke me too early, but I was on the beach and the waves were just crashing into the bay and god damn its good to be alive! The milk was still cold in the now semi working cooler, so after cereal and coffee I really didn’t have an excuse to not walk down to the water, with my surfboard and to try not to embarrass myself again. On went the board shorts and I tip toed into the water. At least the water has the decency to wash over your fear just before you get out deciding its too cold. I always get up to my crotch in the water with no problem, but getting my chest and beck wet just never wants to happen. The brilliant surf soon took care of my ‘neshness’* and I got down to the challenge of getting my hair wet. Wait for a nice breaking wave and hurl yourself into the white froth and my hippy hair was soon bedraggled all over my sun screen plastered face.
Before getting in I had done my ‘jump up on the board’ prepatory exercises, just as my instructor in Byron Bay told me how to surf all those years ago. But its hard, so damn hard! I had a much smaller board than the one I had last been on in Cornwall so that didn’t help, although I do think I’m thinner than I was on that trip…. Its time for an embarrassing photo…..
Steady on girls, his friends reckon he’s gay… :p |
And the before… I have lost weight!! |
I messed around in the surf for a while longer but then I needed a drink, or a shower, or anything to get me out of the water. Life is so brutal for my readers, I’m able to go surfing but I’m just a bit too lazy :p I intended to have a productive (by my standards :p)day and got my guitar out and proved to Roland that, without doubt, I was a rubbish guitar player! :p I don’t play enough and I was starting to think I shouldn’t be distracting myself with literature when I could be singing/playing, learning Spanish, moving myself around a bit or chasing girls :p Oh and eating! Ah the 5 great truths of travel. No time to spend enjoying yourself, there is work to be done! I coaxed a couple of songs out of it eventually, which Roland reluctantly said were ‘not bad’ and then it was time to annoy everyone else on the beach properly.
My friend and I often say to each other, upon hearing the twang of nylon or steel on a fretboard “There’s always some twat with a guitar!” to which the standard reply is ‘Yeah, and usually its YOU!” and we laugh, but we retrieved the Frisbee from the car and attempted to act like Alpha Males. This was far worse than some random noise pollution which could be blocked with ear plugs or an ipod, we were throwing a deadly weapon! At least I could do my mis-throws into the car park, Roland would try his trick shots and nearly decapitate a gringo playing some dumb bag throwing game! We were joined by a third player in the form of a crazy dog who loved our toy. His owner came to tell us he wouldn’t bite, us or the Frisbee, and the dog would be safe, ba-tsssshhhhh! The owner, and the dog for that matter, was fascinated by hooplike Frisbee. He looked about 80 though and declined my offer of a game by telling me he had just broken 5 ribs. Nasty. He loved the thing though, I wonder where they’ve been hiding him…
I even got Eduardo, our camp neighbour, to give me a go on his skim board! (I was crap)
The day progressed with another surfing attempt for a while, but again my heart wasn’t in it and watching the other people have more luck was no fun, but I’ll be back at it, just wish it wasn’t quite so cold! We went over to the other side of the bay to watch the sunset and drink a beer. I asked our neighbour to watch our van and set off. Roland said something about rock scrambling and I guess I should be putting him off but he’s a big boy now. You could see the whales off the bay, loads of them and then we saw some breaching, leaping up towards the blue and red heavens before crashing back with the pull of gravity. Why do they do that? Probably the same reason I look at gulls flying past and breathe to myself ‘I wish I could do that…’. I will have to go paragliding again soon!
* Neshness: Stokie# word meaning ‘unable to take the chill of water cos he’s a big girls blouse’.
# Stokie: Someone from Stoke on Trent, my home town.
surfing/guitar/watching tents/surfing/sunset/whales/todos/no tacos/drive back/fire/halo moon
Time for the beach
Day 153
South of Todos Santos, BCS, Mexico
It was time to say ‘Auf Wiedersehen’ to Mike and find some surf. Sheena was gone and she had left me with a German! But Roland was turning out to be more fun than Sheena and certainly less stressful. Stress is one thing I don’t need The plan was to head down to Todo Santos on the Pacific coast and find somewhere for me to surf and Roland to recuperate from his near fatal fall the day before. We read something about a surf camp where you could camp and they also had a BYOB-swim up bar! Sounds good.
Well it would be if it wasn’t nearly impossible to find. We went through Todo Santos and the beach we wanted was only 10km to the south but the surf camp was hidden somewhere. We saw nothing that looked likely as we drove and eventually stopped by a small shop but the guy sitting in the shrine next to it was either so wasted or crazy that we couldn’t get any sense out of him. Roland speaks Spanish fluently and had no idea what the guy was going on about. Luckily we picked up nearby gringo and in exchange for a lift he showed us where the surf camp was, on the main road and a few miles from the beach. It seemed pretty good but we wanted somewhere by the water and they didn’t have any palapa’s* left so camping under the sun would be hot!
* Thatched shelters
At least we got directions to the beach and turned off at the 64km marker to follow the sandy road down to the surf. There was quite a break and plenty of people surfing, boogie boarding and chilling out at the local bar. There were plenty of tents set up too and after a few enquiries discovered we could camp there for free! We set up near where we had parked the minivan next to a bunch of hippies. They were sitting around playing their guitar and I made a friend by loaning Chile the use of my guitar tuner. Nothing worse than an out of tune guitar….
After a paddle in the water I made the decision to try out the $25 Walmart boogie board I had carried all the way from Florida and never used. The water was, um fresh, and although there were lots of people in the water with wetsuits on there were also quite a few without so it couldn’t be that bad. The surf was strong and I was soon wet enough not to care. It only took 2 goes on my boogie board to run back to get my surf board and I was soon wiping out as though my week surfing in Cornwall was just a dream. I didn’t last long. Tomorrow though…
Roland wasn’t going surfing, he was still hobbling around from his fall on Monday but not too bad. There were no facilities on the beach, although I guess you’d have to buy a beer to use the bar’s toilet, I sneaked over to use the shower on the outside, trying to avoid the staff as I washed off the salt. Its not a bad life, we cracked open a couple of beers and waited for the sunset. Roland had chatted to the nearby hippies and they were planning a fire later on, we agreed to bring wood and beer!
Another Shitty Day in Paradise
Monica isn’t really two-faced…
* Thatched shelters
drive south/surf camp/weirdo/yank lift/camping/free/hippies/tacos/fire
Happy Birthday to me and 150 days away…
Day 150
La Paz, Mexico
Today was a day for doing pretty much… Nothing! I played my guitar for a bit, wrote my blog, took a few photos in the garden and wondered where Sheena had gone.
Later another couchsurfer turned up, Roland from Germany and we persuaded him to come out for a drink with us in town. It didn’t take much :p Of course, it being ladies night, Sheena decided the plan for the evening. She wanted to go and see a drag show, I was too baffled to argue with her. After the events in San Diego I started to wonder if she had a gay man addiction, the kind of problem that requires sympathy and understanding :p Happily the show hadn’t started yet so we went into town for a beer, Sheena only pouted somewhat ay the $2 cover but we would be wandering for ever looking for somewhere else. You got free jelly at the door though, awesome ! But no tequila in it 
Still Awesome, Jelly!
Back at the gay bar they wanted $5 each to get in so that idea was quickly rejected. I was relieved, its one thing watching semi authentic transvestites but I didn’t fancy watching a short, fat, moustached ‘woman’ taking her clothes off, or even worse singing!
bday
lazy hammock/roland/bars/gay club/tacos
Travel scrabble??
Day 127 Tucson AZ
I spent most of the day installing Ubuntu on my laptop which worked without a problem but getting it to connect to the Internet wasn’t happening. The wireless drivers for this Aspire 5520 don’t work natively and I couldn’t get the madwifi drivers to work or ndiswrapper. No sound either but I got the graphics to work ok, it looks good in 1280×800. I ended up downloading the 64-bit version of Ubuntu and switching to that, not that it made any difference. I was semi scared of messing with the hard drives since I have XP set up nicely now and didn’t want to screw it but it was ok. The laptop comes with a 10gb partition for recovering the system but I had not compunction wiping that for Linux. I should be able to connect through my other laptop to the Internet if I can figure out how to fix the wireless problem. A laptop that can’t connect to the net is neither use nor ornament.
Lashel was out to Uni for a while but when she came back she volunteered to try to show me some of Tucson’s more wacky sights, specifically some kind of crazy welded truck out in the suburbs somewhere but we couldn’t find it. When I found out Tucson has a Govindas restaurant I was so there! I love those places and we sat on the floor cushions filing our faces with yummy curry and salads chatting about Lashel’s forthcoming trip to India. I’m guessing she’s going to be having a great time! I decided I should probably leave the next day and hence we wouldn’t be drinking, well, only coffee. The three of us went out to Coffee X Change with a scrabble board for a game. I haven’t played it since I was a kid but Grace didn’t kick my ass too much, at least I didn’t come last! :p I protested weakly back at the house and got my guitar out to see if I could remember any songs. The girls were a gracious audience but my voice was a mess, all gravely and uneven. At least I wasn’t so horribly embarrassed and coerced like I was at the ski resort. They forced me to play until 3am, so much for an early night eh? :p
What is the Spanish for ‘Happy New Year’ again?!?
Day 111 Monday
Chuidad Juarez
New years Eve was a quiet day for me, once again I phoned the insurance places which were closed and the family took us all out to lunch, to a Steak house…. Maybe I should repeat I don’t eat meat a little louder, although I thought we were going for Tacos… I slobbed around until the evening watching Mexican Soaps with Grandma (and switching to Seinfeld when she went to the bathroom) and not getting much done. People started arriving so I went for a shower and changed my clothes to something less ‘backpackery’ and when I came down there were 2 Mexican guys in white shirts serving drinks to everyone. Posh!! They didn’t give the maid a night off though which was something of a shame… New Years Eve was just like Christmas really, drinking, snacks, some songs on the piano, someone brought a guitar and no one could find the right channel at midnight to do the countdown. I was handed 12 grapes which I was apparently supposed to eat as the clock counted down the seconds but I was probably the only person who finished them completely, but then Im a tourist. I then set off attempting to wish everyone else a happy new year but should probably have sat in one spot and let them come to me because everyone set off around the house trying to hug everyone as quickly as possible. More smoking and drinking commenced but I grabbed Raphi’s ipod and watched Superbad with Dani which would have been a much better option the day before. Quite hilarious! Mc Lovin!!!!! :p
Mexican Christmas
Day 104 : Juarez Mexico
It was Christmas Eve, my favourite time of the year…. Not. Its not that I hate Christmas but I think that its been perverted by capitalism. I’m not a Christian but I’m expected to celebrate it non the less. Sure there should be a time in the year for families to come together and give out gifts but why should it be the day that Jesus was supposedly born for non-Christians. Atheists should swap out Halloween and Christmas, give out gifts at he end of October to each other and dress up as zombies in December. Seems like much more fun. After completing so many miles the previous day we only had a short hop ahead of us into El Paso. The sun was shining as it always does and we followed the signs for the highway. Just on the intersection there was a guy with a cowboy hat, a guitar case and a big smile holding out his thumb. Getting Daniella’s opinion first we pulled over to pick up the hiker…..
90:Junction:7 letters done, 7 to go…
I looked out of the hotel window and could have sworn I was back in the UK. It had been raining and the sun was no where to be seen It was cold and miserable. Bleh. No time to sit around moaning and no chance to jump on a plane to warmer climes, I had a stupid route to complete and by god I was going to do it. Passing by the rollercoasters in Six Flags again we drove for quite a while on the Interstate before turning south towards Junction a couple of hundred miles away. We stopped for some greasy breakfast in a pretty seedy truck stop café and I hoped this wasn’t going to be a feature in the trip now Daniella was along for the ride for a while but she was as unimpressed as I was. At least I finally found out what ‘biscuits’ are, kind of like a scone. You see them advertised everywhere so its nice to know.
83:Monroe, La:Cold Campin’
No frozen toes when I woke up today but could I get an early start? Nope. After a quick breakfast I hit the showers and was further delayed by the discovery of a frog under the shower outlet that needed to be photographed. I thought it was plastic until it opened its eyes. My camera then steamed up as soon as it got in the washblock but I used my reserved Pentax (which I can just run under the hot tap) to spend a happy half hour chasing another more exciteable green frog around as it jumped from wall to wall and futiley wait for my Canon lens to clear. I did consider liberating them to a more natural setting but then I figured the place was full of bugs and would be warm all year round so left them to it.
80:Louisiana:Living it up in the Big Easy
I guess the slight advantage of it being so cold while camping is that it certainly encourages me to get my ass out of bed. It was 6 degrees, so not too bad, and I was wearing plenty of clothes which certainly took the edge off it. I was starting to hum a bit since my last shower wasn’t since Tuesday and there wasn’t a shower in the Parkway campground but I was planning on making a hostel in New Orleans tonight. I cooked up some oatmeal and finished up my left-overs from the night before and carried on South West through the Parkway. I was looking for somewhere to grab a cup of coffee on the way but I would be waiting a long time for it. We were in the midst of a high pressure system so the sky was clear and the heater in my car soon got the chill out of my feet. Best to make the most of it since there was rain forecast for the weekend.
75:Ocean Park:Getting eaten…
No big surprise that I slept through my alarm at 8am and woke up bleary eyed and confused around 10.30am. So much for my resolution to do another long day on Sunday… At least I was alive, on the way in the night before I passed a huge correctional facility, but it seems there were no break out and murders happening this week. I resolved to have a day sorting out my car and looking for one of my lost memory sticks. I made breakfast and then found I wouldn’t have been going anywhere fast in any case, once again my battery was nearly dead. I discovered I had left my side lights on, which shouldn’t have made any difference since I couldn’t see them in the night but it seemed that was the cause of the problem. After a shower I set about removing pretty much everything from the minivan and taking a few photos for the blog. I wanted to show how you could make a bed in the back with a $20 piece of wood. No sign of the missing memory card though I took out the rear seat (which weighed a ton) and then put the right hand seat behind the left one. It fit ok, but I wouldn’t have much room to sleep in the back…
If I could turn it around it would have no gap on the side and more room for me, but the stupid designers didn’t forsee this option. A handle on the side was in the way, so out came the screwdriver and now the metal bar was digging in the plastic wall of the van. Better but still no fit. I switched to the knife and chopped a square of plastic out. Even better, but still not quite. I removed the plastic runners from the floor of the Minivan, sat on the seat pulling the handle and with the use of a piece of firewood as leverage got it to lock into place. Success! I can always move it back around if I need to give someone a lift. I moved the front seat forward so it would lock back and gained a nice spot between to hold my now unused backpack and other superfluous stuff. I could now fit my twin mattress in the back and sleep on the floor which meant I could also hang out there if it was raining and even change. I had gained 50% more room in the back.
I spend the rest of the day putting some black tint in the rear window and clearing out other junk and stuff I wasn’t using. I resolved to sleep in the back that night and since it looked like rain that wasn’t a bad idea. I worked on my blog, watched some episodes of South Park I had downloaded, played my guitar and swatted mosquitos, and when the moon poked through the trees I got my camera out and took a few pictures, the best one of which is this one:
72:Hendersonville:No turkey for me!
For my first thanksgiving in America I didn’t find it particulary exciting I must say. Would help if I had some family nearby I guess. First I went back to the estate agents to surf, then I went shopping at good ol Wal-Mart, lamenting the poor bastards that had to work that day. Then I went to the Red Roof Inn and got myself a room, a shower and a shave. It was about time I think. I kept working on my damn GPS plots but kept changing my mind as to how I wanted to work on them but I was learning more about how to sort them out once and for all. The majority of the afternoon was spent vegetating in front of first, The Princess Diaries and then one of my favourites, the incomparable Incredibles. I love that movie! It wasn’t all just hedonistic pleasure as I had a good bash on my guitar too… Oh that was pretty good too!
My R&R was interrupted by Miriam ringing to see if I wanted to come and sit in the freezing yard in front of the fire. We were supposed to be off having an adventure the next day but she was getting grief from the people she was staying with and I thought best not to push it. I went over and we sat alternately freezing and then coughing up smoke once I got the fire going. I met Patricks brother Mike as well who is a sculptor and makes really cool latex masks, I saw some of his work in their shed/studio. He was working on a dragon mask, just the kind of thing you would see in the Dungeons and Dragons Dragonlance novels. I want one. It was too cold to sit out, too smokey to sit near the fire so we went for a rather pointless drive and then said our goodbyes as it would be time for me to get a move on the next day. I needed to plan my route out. It was time to have another meaningless adventure. I guess that’s what they call life eh?
62:Florida:All girls are freaking crazy! :p
Miles traveled : 4,000.
We woke to the sound of the thundering traffic. Miriam froze most of the night, myself not so much. She’s been in Florida too long and away from her native Seattle. We stumbled down to the car to make breakfast and coffee. We planned on going for a swim and then whatever but Miriam had a minor shock when she phoned her friend so we could sing happy birthday to him and found she had somehow lost a day. Was probably a good job she found out as it might not have come up in conversation :p I pulled out my guitar for a quick strum and the guy that had come and sat on the bench near our site saw his chance and moved over to make conversation. Seems he knew a few chords himself but it made his fingers hurt. It was enough to get him onto our bench though so we couldn’t ignore him. Miriam told me off for saying he was a hillybilly but if you sound and look like one the cap fits. I did a few Beatles tunes from the book and he asked if we were a traveling band :p Bless! Its not a bad idea though. He asked Miriam if she sang and it’s the first time I’ve heard her shut up. If he only knew about my little Opera singing jellyfish’s talents!
61:Ocala Forest Park FL: Bonnie and Clyde…?
Ah, clean sheets, warm shower… right there. The luxury! This was in fact my first paid for accommodation since Toronto nearly 2 months before. Everything else has been couchsurfing, camping or sleeping in my minivan. They even had a TV! :p We eventually tore ourselves away from the decadence and went off for breakfast. This meant finding a nice place by the sea which was easy enough and then performing the ritual called ‘eggies in the basket’ at which I am now becoming quite proficient. Still not a master though but all the practice I was getting was honing my skill quite nicely. We sat under a gazebo near the sea watching the fishermen and drinking English morning breakfast in the early afternoon. Still hot and sunny. We packed up, the dishes could wait (for 2 days it transpired!) and set off north. Up the I-95 was a big state park called Ocala which seemed as good a destination as any. First we had to rob a hotel….
Tampa Fl: Windy Night
I had a nice nights camping the previous night in Little Manatee River Park, was my first state park and for $16 I couldn’t complain. I had water and power right next to the camping ground, I sat, lit a fire and played my guitar. I tried to forget about my sunglasses :p
I was just south of Tampa/St Peterburg and it was coming up on the weekend. I got back in the saddle and headed North, back into the burbs and civilization. Or what passes for it in
Pirate Harbour : Extreme Paranoia…
Back at the Holiday Inn I did the usual move of stealing not only their wifi but getting a zip-lock full of ice for my cooler. I have to stay hydrated and cool!! :p Its so nice to sit by the pool checking your email and enjoying the sun. Next time I’m going for a swim too J Instead I went back to where I saw the sunset and lay there crunching my abs, checking out the babes and watching the pod of dolphins frolicking 30 meters off the shore. I couldn’t get them to come any closer when I jumped in for a swim but my waterproof camera’s battery was dead anyway L I was heading North to the Tampa area now but no one on Couchsurfing seemed to really be interesting, and I didn’t want to sleep in Wal-mart again if I could help it. I looked on the map and saw a place called ‘
Naples : Go west my boy!
We had planned on doing a Victorian Secret fashion shoot at the
Everglades National Park: Hanging out, hassling the animals
Rocky didn’t come back but the crows and other vulture type creatures did, picking their way through the garbage that Miriam had unhelpfully knocked out of the car on her way to the bathroom. I love her dearly but she can be so ditzy sometimes. She promised me eggies in the basket and said she would be making six but despite my attempts to pretend to be asleep had to drag myself up as she struggled with the stove. Listening to her burn to death from an exploding pressurized stove wasn’t really going to be worth the small pleasure of a lie-in. The instructions are written on the side so its not that hard, but then the sheet music for the Mozart Aria she sings so well is freely available and I can’t do that can I?
Everglades National Park: Alligators, Crododiles *and* sharks! Jump in the water is lovely!
The next morning Miriam was gone! I heard her messing around with the stuff on the table and asked what the hell she was doing!?! But it was the bloody crows attacking our belongings and then cawing very loudly so as to stop me from getting back asleep. It was rather cold in the morning, but I now learned that the firepit was full of wood from the previous campers and my mashmallow addiction could have been fulfilled after all! Blast! We had eggies in the basket for breakfast which is always fun and a skill I have yet to master, but would be better with a non-stick pan Im sure. I bought a single petrol fuel stove which seems to work quite well and I shall have to make some extra soda can stoves too in the near future. This was really my first camping trip too as I only bought the tent on Thursday and had thus far been sleeping in the minivan on the platform. Perhaps I should lose the rear set of seats to make more room or perhaps store them on the roof. Time will tell. …