Ok so we are going on vacation in a few days! Decided to not worry about anything else....'cause really- there's always something going on in Mexico! The rainy season is getting over down there (well I think it is anyway) and we are gettin ready to go!! Of course as soon as I say- oh I can fit my stuff in a backpack...I start thinking about how long we're gonna be gone...hmmm I need shirts..shorts...well long pants cause Morelia is in the mountains....so a jacket..ha ha. Maybe a small suitcase???
Oh and ha ha I have no shoes except flip flops and workout tennis shoes. I thought I did, but when I took my hiking boots to NY...found out I don't fit in those either...and left them for my sister. I loved those red boots! But not as much as I love living on the beach where I only wear flip flops so my feet have gotten wider ha ha!! Ok tennis shoes it is!
Yeah I looked at the weather where we're going: let's see, dry...rain...hot...cold...humid....did I leave anything out? So I will of course over pack...but so what right? We're taking the truck and no dogs. Yes I feel bad about leaving them...but not gonna belabor the point- I want to enjoy the anticipation of the trip! So- we may only drive to Puerto Penasco the first day...it's about 7 hours I think, and yeah we could probly do about 5 more just to get us going.....so I'm not sure what will happen. But that's the fun of it...not knowing right? See- we have friends in Penasco....my zumba class, Deb & Rick....I really came to love them...Deb was my favorite person to sit and bullshit with....she knew everything about everybody and what was going on around town, and is so funny when she describes situations....and to me- I think everything is funny- I think life is funny, people are hilarious.....so we were good together. And my friend Pam - driving me to Phoenix the first time my daughters came to visit...again- we laughed the whole time. I haven't made a friend here like that yet....-well actually that's not entirely true. I do have a friend now, her name is Jan and I am so comfortable around her. I can totally be my irreverent self with her.
At the meditation group I go to, there's a few women I am really starting to like- but I don't know any of them very well yet; it's funny we talk about some really intimate stuff in the group, kinda like in AA where we share our thoughts & feelings....but we have a saying which I believe applies to my meditation group as well : "What you see here, what you hear here, when you leave here, let it stay here.....Hear Hear!" But I hope to get to know a couple of them better as well. Ok back to the trip!
Well I believe the first destination is Morelia, Michocan. It will take 4 or 5 days to get there....and we'll go thru Sonora, Sinaloa, Jalisco and Nayarit. Even if we don't stop in Penasco on day 1, we still won't make it all the way thru Sonora. But I bet we'll cross all of Sinaloa in one day. Last time all I remember of Sinaloa was fields and fields of agriculture. It's funny- from the states I always thought Sinaloa was this scary place full of drug runners/cartels. What I saw looked like central Calif ha ha. Ok well in the distance...far distance was a mountain range that had some name referring to it as a drug route...but us normal people would have no reason to be there. Really in the last 2 and a half years we have been in Mexico, we have seen nothing bad...nothing scary...just people living their lives....working...living, dreaming...lots of fiestas, lots of good food...
On this trip we will not have to look for motels that take dogs ha ha!! We won't have to hurry thru a meal to check on them, walk them....etc...and so I'm hoping to stop to take pictures....maybe walk in a tiny town....or on a busy street in a big city......We have some paperwork we decided we wanted in connection with our house down there, and we just tonite got the name of somebody down there who can help us out with that. Don't you love it when things work out? Everardo was online and then started chatting with somebody we know down there- who just went thru the same process! wow! So we said we'd see them in a couple of weeks. Yesterday Everardo found a microwave at a segunda to bring to the guy who caretakes our house....and we have a couple of little other things- a friend there who loves loves loves Skippy peanut butter...., a sccoer ball for a kid, and a hat that says Ensenada on it for my friend Chela. I hope so much that she and I see each other and are all hugs and smiles. I love her cooking, and taking a swim with her in the pool after gettng beat up by the waves at the beach.
This is the ocean- not a bay like we live in now. And I like where we are now, better. I like small waves, being able to wade out into the water and float around, for Sam & Hazel to be able to swim around us out there. Everardo is getting very serious about swimming for exercise out there, and no way he could do that in the ocean- it's just too hard, sometimes too choppy, sometimes just too dangerous, sometimes a bad undertow...I remember the days during the summer when we couldn't even go in, and had to be super careful walking along the beach from my house to Chela's, because the water- the waves crashed in sooo far that they hit the back of the beach- the wall of dirt that the houses sat on- a couple of times I had to run to escape.....yeah I got yelled at for that...But I do love that ocean down there! The water is so warm...we could swim any time day or nite. And the waves roll in, and then crash back into each other as one goes back out and another is coming in. At first that scared me, and I kept getting knocked around by them either coming or going. But I started to get the hang of it, and then it was fun to be right there when they came up against each other...I mean...it's all water, but the waves feel like entities, like arms of water crashing down- crashing into each other, fighting for the top spot. And to get pushed up in the water right when it's happening is so exciting, so forceful....you feel so.......alive! So part of the earth...more than as a person, more like a piece of nature. Sounds weird eh...guess you gotta be there. But- I also get tired out there much faster....like you're in the water less than half an hour and you're pooped out. Now of course, you go by a spot where the rocks protect you and there's room between the rocks and the beach, then you have little pools to float around in...there you can relax forever. Ok not forever...the tide changes and either there's zero water there....or it's crashing over those rocks and dragging you back into them...so you have to pay attention. It's not a place for drunks ha ha- good thing I'm not one!
The other day I was chatting with my daughter on facebook and she said she wants to sit on my rock in Playa Ventura! She has seen pictures, and we talked about it, and I've written about it, she said she feels like she's been there. She'll see it some day! With me, or maybe with her dad; I think he's been talking about taking his wife down there for a vacation. I don't care who she goes with (yeah ok I wish it's me ha ha), as long as she goes. She's like me- she wants to explore all of Mexico. There's just so much to see and hear and taste and experience, so many customs..same and different all in one...dialects, climates...so much! I'm looking forward to going back to that qiosko (spelling) (the town square) in Morelia and taking more photos now that I have a nicer camera. I think though when I finish this post I should go back and look at the pictures I took last time so I can make a "photo plan" for this trip. We sat and drank coffee, but maybe can walk more this time...up little side streets. I am excited to see Pablo my brother in law- my cunado...and Nieves my cunada. I think it's almost the same time of year. Will we go back to the tiny town where his mother is buried...visit her? I would love to poke around there a little more. I like to go to a place a second time....there's so much we miss the first time and so much that comes in our head and then flows right back out ha ha- well for me anyway- I get on overdrive trying to take everything in, and sometimes the beauty, sometimes the message or the lesson is in the smallest of things.
So it will be a trip of old and new. (well if you can call second time "old" so new, kinda new...& old). And we have not decided out route after Michoacan. West to Zihuatejo or south to Oaxaca? And if we choose one on the way...do we choose the other on the way back? It's gonna start in just a few days...not a couple of weeks like I thought. I'm gonna bring my laptop....but ha ha will I get to use it to write here? I don't know...so maybe I'll be able to write as things happen, as I visit, experience....breathe laugh sigh....and maybe I'll only be able to take notes and start writing in a few weeks when we get back...so see you when I see you! Nos vemos!
Oh and ha ha I have no shoes except flip flops and workout tennis shoes. I thought I did, but when I took my hiking boots to NY...found out I don't fit in those either...and left them for my sister. I loved those red boots! But not as much as I love living on the beach where I only wear flip flops so my feet have gotten wider ha ha!! Ok tennis shoes it is!
Yeah I looked at the weather where we're going: let's see, dry...rain...hot...cold...humid....did I leave anything out? So I will of course over pack...but so what right? We're taking the truck and no dogs. Yes I feel bad about leaving them...but not gonna belabor the point- I want to enjoy the anticipation of the trip! So- we may only drive to Puerto Penasco the first day...it's about 7 hours I think, and yeah we could probly do about 5 more just to get us going.....so I'm not sure what will happen. But that's the fun of it...not knowing right? See- we have friends in Penasco....my zumba class, Deb & Rick....I really came to love them...Deb was my favorite person to sit and bullshit with....she knew everything about everybody and what was going on around town, and is so funny when she describes situations....and to me- I think everything is funny- I think life is funny, people are hilarious.....so we were good together. And my friend Pam - driving me to Phoenix the first time my daughters came to visit...again- we laughed the whole time. I haven't made a friend here like that yet....-well actually that's not entirely true. I do have a friend now, her name is Jan and I am so comfortable around her. I can totally be my irreverent self with her.
At the meditation group I go to, there's a few women I am really starting to like- but I don't know any of them very well yet; it's funny we talk about some really intimate stuff in the group, kinda like in AA where we share our thoughts & feelings....but we have a saying which I believe applies to my meditation group as well : "What you see here, what you hear here, when you leave here, let it stay here.....Hear Hear!" But I hope to get to know a couple of them better as well. Ok back to the trip!
Well I believe the first destination is Morelia, Michocan. It will take 4 or 5 days to get there....and we'll go thru Sonora, Sinaloa, Jalisco and Nayarit. Even if we don't stop in Penasco on day 1, we still won't make it all the way thru Sonora. But I bet we'll cross all of Sinaloa in one day. Last time all I remember of Sinaloa was fields and fields of agriculture. It's funny- from the states I always thought Sinaloa was this scary place full of drug runners/cartels. What I saw looked like central Calif ha ha. Ok well in the distance...far distance was a mountain range that had some name referring to it as a drug route...but us normal people would have no reason to be there. Really in the last 2 and a half years we have been in Mexico, we have seen nothing bad...nothing scary...just people living their lives....working...living, dreaming...lots of fiestas, lots of good food...
On this trip we will not have to look for motels that take dogs ha ha!! We won't have to hurry thru a meal to check on them, walk them....etc...and so I'm hoping to stop to take pictures....maybe walk in a tiny town....or on a busy street in a big city......We have some paperwork we decided we wanted in connection with our house down there, and we just tonite got the name of somebody down there who can help us out with that. Don't you love it when things work out? Everardo was online and then started chatting with somebody we know down there- who just went thru the same process! wow! So we said we'd see them in a couple of weeks. Yesterday Everardo found a microwave at a segunda to bring to the guy who caretakes our house....and we have a couple of little other things- a friend there who loves loves loves Skippy peanut butter...., a sccoer ball for a kid, and a hat that says Ensenada on it for my friend Chela. I hope so much that she and I see each other and are all hugs and smiles. I love her cooking, and taking a swim with her in the pool after gettng beat up by the waves at the beach.
This is the ocean- not a bay like we live in now. And I like where we are now, better. I like small waves, being able to wade out into the water and float around, for Sam & Hazel to be able to swim around us out there. Everardo is getting very serious about swimming for exercise out there, and no way he could do that in the ocean- it's just too hard, sometimes too choppy, sometimes just too dangerous, sometimes a bad undertow...I remember the days during the summer when we couldn't even go in, and had to be super careful walking along the beach from my house to Chela's, because the water- the waves crashed in sooo far that they hit the back of the beach- the wall of dirt that the houses sat on- a couple of times I had to run to escape.....yeah I got yelled at for that...But I do love that ocean down there! The water is so warm...we could swim any time day or nite. And the waves roll in, and then crash back into each other as one goes back out and another is coming in. At first that scared me, and I kept getting knocked around by them either coming or going. But I started to get the hang of it, and then it was fun to be right there when they came up against each other...I mean...it's all water, but the waves feel like entities, like arms of water crashing down- crashing into each other, fighting for the top spot. And to get pushed up in the water right when it's happening is so exciting, so forceful....you feel so.......alive! So part of the earth...more than as a person, more like a piece of nature. Sounds weird eh...guess you gotta be there. But- I also get tired out there much faster....like you're in the water less than half an hour and you're pooped out. Now of course, you go by a spot where the rocks protect you and there's room between the rocks and the beach, then you have little pools to float around in...there you can relax forever. Ok not forever...the tide changes and either there's zero water there....or it's crashing over those rocks and dragging you back into them...so you have to pay attention. It's not a place for drunks ha ha- good thing I'm not one!
The other day I was chatting with my daughter on facebook and she said she wants to sit on my rock in Playa Ventura! She has seen pictures, and we talked about it, and I've written about it, she said she feels like she's been there. She'll see it some day! With me, or maybe with her dad; I think he's been talking about taking his wife down there for a vacation. I don't care who she goes with (yeah ok I wish it's me ha ha), as long as she goes. She's like me- she wants to explore all of Mexico. There's just so much to see and hear and taste and experience, so many customs..same and different all in one...dialects, climates...so much! I'm looking forward to going back to that qiosko (spelling) (the town square) in Morelia and taking more photos now that I have a nicer camera. I think though when I finish this post I should go back and look at the pictures I took last time so I can make a "photo plan" for this trip. We sat and drank coffee, but maybe can walk more this time...up little side streets. I am excited to see Pablo my brother in law- my cunado...and Nieves my cunada. I think it's almost the same time of year. Will we go back to the tiny town where his mother is buried...visit her? I would love to poke around there a little more. I like to go to a place a second time....there's so much we miss the first time and so much that comes in our head and then flows right back out ha ha- well for me anyway- I get on overdrive trying to take everything in, and sometimes the beauty, sometimes the message or the lesson is in the smallest of things.
So it will be a trip of old and new. (well if you can call second time "old" so new, kinda new...& old). And we have not decided out route after Michoacan. West to Zihuatejo or south to Oaxaca? And if we choose one on the way...do we choose the other on the way back? It's gonna start in just a few days...not a couple of weeks like I thought. I'm gonna bring my laptop....but ha ha will I get to use it to write here? I don't know...so maybe I'll be able to write as things happen, as I visit, experience....breathe laugh sigh....and maybe I'll only be able to take notes and start writing in a few weeks when we get back...so see you when I see you! Nos vemos!
