yes i'm in Mexico and i haven't been mugged, kidnapped or stabbed yet, sorry to disappoint! It doesn't really seem like that sort of vibe here with miles of beaches and holiday makers from both north and south america.
Today i've spend most of the day reading textbooks and watching videos in preparation for the PADI Open Water Scuba Diver course which i start for real tomorrow. in the swimming pool!
But hopefully in a couple of days i'll be able to get out to some reefs and see lots of awesome underwater stuff. and again in the Cooks, Oz, Fiji etc.
The sea is so warm! It's another new one for me, the Caribbean, and although the air temperature isn't much higher than California, the pacific was FREEZING and this is very pleasant.
I'm frantically listening to my "Learn Spanish with Michel Thomas" audiobooks, but even if i can blurt out a phrase i have no idea what anyone is saying back to me, so i'm resorting to a lot of "lo siento, no hablo espanol, hable inglese?
I would like to come back and visit central america as a whole properly at some point, which could then involve one of those intensive immersive language school / home stay things. But the airport, hostel and scuba staff all speak english so it's no biggee, just some awkward shrugging in the supermarket.
The hostel costs 130 Pesos per night, which is about $10, or 7GBP. yay!
The flight down from Phoenix was delayed by a couple of hours due to some electrical fault, everyone was sitting on the plane when they announced there was a small issue and they were going to try turning it off and turning it back on again. LOL for cliched technical solutions. But that didn't work, so i guess the plane must be running Windows 95 or something. So we all had de-plane, walk across to the other side of the terminal, and get on a new plane that they found lying around in some hanger.
It was nice to arrive in a country where i wasn't interrogated coming through customs, the girl just gave me an amused grin comparing my passport photo (with shaved head) to current luxurient mane.
Something else funny in the airport customs, it's like a game show to see if you get your bag searched - (after the x-ray machine) you hit a buzzer and it will either light up green (ok you can pass) or red (you'll be emptying every item out of your luggage).
Maybe they SHOULD make it into a game show, "what's in YOUR luggage?" i'm sure some people carry ridiculous things around
So fun times in Tucson, shooting safari animals with a shotgun (in a video game in the bar), playing shuffleboard, and eating gigantic burgers
my fave new year related song:
Death Cab for Cutie - New Year (video on Youtube)
Some other fun links:
Spiral Island (Wikipedia)
Someone told me about this great man made floating island off the coast of Mexico - oh yes i forgot to mention - i'm going to Mexico on Thursday.
Thumbs Up! - this web only TV show follows two Korean hitchhikers as they travel across the USA without paying for anything. Lovely.
my fave new year related song:
Death Cab for Cutie - New Year (video on Youtube)
Some other fun links:
Spiral Island (Wikipedia)
Someone told me about this great man made floating island off the coast of Mexico - oh yes i forgot to mention - i'm going to Mexico on Thursday.
Thumbs Up! - this web only TV show follows two Korean hitchhikers as they travel across the USA without paying for anything. Lovely.
FYI i'm in Tucson, Arizona, staying with my old summer camp buddy Karl.
There are lots of cactuses!
There are lots of cactuses!
So on my way down the west coast i've met lots of cyclist on inspiring long distance journeys.
First up was Paul, who was at the end of a huge trip covering Europe and Canada on a four wheeled bike-car.
Then in Santa Cruz i shared some free eggs with Lukas, a Swiss guy who had crossed the USA from New York.
Over the next couple of weeks i met him a further four times as our journeys kept overlapping down the coast, each time we would discuss the condition of our stomachs after finding out the eggs were several weeks out of date...
Lukas has some great stories already, including:
The dogs...
"all cyclists talk about in Kentucky is the dogs. they just start suddenly right after the border. first one, then a bit further two, and then all of a sudden dogs everywhere. some are little and just make some noise yip yip you know, but some are big and scary you know.
So you have to get past them, some people pick up stones and throw them at the dogs, some people have airhorns. Sometimes you see a dog sleeping and you try to sneak past really quietly and then peddle as fast as you can"
The raccoons...
Camping out in northern California, the raccoons have no fear - open his paniers (they can open zippers) and eat his garlic mash potato and make a big mess... but they didn't even eat it so much.. all he has left as alternative is red wine and crackers
Also chewed some girls passport and she find it a few yards away...
The cat man...
A lot of cyclists follow the same route and stay at the same places, such as "The Cat Guy"
(The reccomended guides are http://www.adventurecycling.org/routes/)
"You give him twenty dollars and he gives you a baked potato with cream cheese...
..and he likes to drink brandy with you"
He has like 15 cats, and all these alarms so he knows when the cats come in, and they all line up to eat
Then you look at the end of this row of cats and there are two raccoons eating alongside - they just come in and eat all peacefully, and then go back out to the woods!
The spokes...
It seems that a touring bike is like a chain, one weak link and you'll be stuck on the top of a mountain pass in the rain making makeshift repairs.
Lukas is pretty pissed off because he keeps breaking spokes - he complained to the manufacturer and they sent him a whole new set, and he got a bike shop in San Fran to rebuild the wheel...
...but less than 50 miles down the road SNAP.
He made it down to San Diego for Xmas, which turned out to be a rallying point for a whole load of cyclists en route down to central america.
San Diego hostel hosts a 500 mile 6 day xmas bike ride every year, for which Becky had come down from Seattle (not by bike though!)
Also at the hostel was Peter, a 69 year old Canadaian guy who is part way through an epic 18 month journey from the Yukon down to Argentina
www.yogipeter.com
So cue much discussion of bike parts, routes, and wildlife. Which was all actually very interesting!
Then there's all the people i've seen cycling locally carrying shopping, surfboards, and other bicycles!
And the huge range of bike styles, lots of recumbant bikes, and some multi-story bikes where people have welded two or three bikes together vertically.
For myself, i rented a bike once in Santa Barbara and it was hard work. hills, wind, broken gear shift, and the bike seemed to be made out of solid lead or something. In contrast, these touring bikes weigh so little you can pick them up with one finger.
Well, excluding the 60+lb of luggage, including lots of water, spare bike parts, stove and tent.
Still its a cheap way to see the world, (i've heard $10 a day quoted if camping and buying groceries), and you see eeeeeverything. So it's on the to-do list for the future!
First up was Paul, who was at the end of a huge trip covering Europe and Canada on a four wheeled bike-car.
Then in Santa Cruz i shared some free eggs with Lukas, a Swiss guy who had crossed the USA from New York.
Over the next couple of weeks i met him a further four times as our journeys kept overlapping down the coast, each time we would discuss the condition of our stomachs after finding out the eggs were several weeks out of date...
Lukas has some great stories already, including:
The dogs...
"all cyclists talk about in Kentucky is the dogs. they just start suddenly right after the border. first one, then a bit further two, and then all of a sudden dogs everywhere. some are little and just make some noise yip yip you know, but some are big and scary you know.
So you have to get past them, some people pick up stones and throw them at the dogs, some people have airhorns. Sometimes you see a dog sleeping and you try to sneak past really quietly and then peddle as fast as you can"
The raccoons...
Camping out in northern California, the raccoons have no fear - open his paniers (they can open zippers) and eat his garlic mash potato and make a big mess... but they didn't even eat it so much.. all he has left as alternative is red wine and crackers
Also chewed some girls passport and she find it a few yards away...
The cat man...
A lot of cyclists follow the same route and stay at the same places, such as "The Cat Guy"
(The reccomended guides are http://www.adventurecycling.org/routes/)
"You give him twenty dollars and he gives you a baked potato with cream cheese...
..and he likes to drink brandy with you"
He has like 15 cats, and all these alarms so he knows when the cats come in, and they all line up to eat
Then you look at the end of this row of cats and there are two raccoons eating alongside - they just come in and eat all peacefully, and then go back out to the woods!
The spokes...
It seems that a touring bike is like a chain, one weak link and you'll be stuck on the top of a mountain pass in the rain making makeshift repairs.
Lukas is pretty pissed off because he keeps breaking spokes - he complained to the manufacturer and they sent him a whole new set, and he got a bike shop in San Fran to rebuild the wheel...
...but less than 50 miles down the road SNAP.
He made it down to San Diego for Xmas, which turned out to be a rallying point for a whole load of cyclists en route down to central america.
San Diego hostel hosts a 500 mile 6 day xmas bike ride every year, for which Becky had come down from Seattle (not by bike though!)
Also at the hostel was Peter, a 69 year old Canadaian guy who is part way through an epic 18 month journey from the Yukon down to Argentina
www.yogipeter.com
So cue much discussion of bike parts, routes, and wildlife. Which was all actually very interesting!
Then there's all the people i've seen cycling locally carrying shopping, surfboards, and other bicycles!
And the huge range of bike styles, lots of recumbant bikes, and some multi-story bikes where people have welded two or three bikes together vertically.
For myself, i rented a bike once in Santa Barbara and it was hard work. hills, wind, broken gear shift, and the bike seemed to be made out of solid lead or something. In contrast, these touring bikes weigh so little you can pick them up with one finger.
Well, excluding the 60+lb of luggage, including lots of water, spare bike parts, stove and tent.
Still its a cheap way to see the world, (i've heard $10 a day quoted if camping and buying groceries), and you see eeeeeverything. So it's on the to-do list for the future!
So Christmas away from home turned out ok!
It was a beautiful sunny day, and after successfully speaking to merry family and friends,i sat in a park by the bay wearing shorts and reading a book.
But then it was time to deliver on my rash offer to cook a traditional xmas dinner. I hadn't realised the variety in xmas dinner menus are around the christmas celebrating world, but today it was turkey (14lb) with all the trimmings (but NO BRUSSEL SPROUTS!)
So thanks to my new friends from Switzerland, Italy, Canada and the US of A for eating it and making the day feel a bit more traditional!