Wild and Crazy Days

Jan 29 – The wildlife experiences continue. I think that black scorpion I saw in the bathroom two days in a row is a lucky scorpion. Monday, we traveled south with friends Ryan, Clint, Christy and Dani, to a place called Ventanilla to check out the local ecotourism. This little beachfront community consists of black sand (which is metallic) and a large lagoon. For 35 pesos we jumped in a boat and our guide, Vicente, paddled us around the lagoon giving us snippets of history and facts about the mangroves and animals. We saw many crocodiles, turtles, tropical birds, and iguanas. At the close of our hour long tour, Vicente’s eyes practically popped out of his head and he vigorously paddled closer to the unfortunate demise of a pelican, snatched out of a low branch by a 4 meter long crocodile. With cracking and snapping, we watched that poor pelican go down the gullet of that giant croc in just a few minutes.

The next day, Roger and I woke up early to join Clint and Christy for a day of sport fishing with Captain Omar. Again, in the early morning I saw the black scorpion high on the bathroom wall. I just didn’t feel like trying to catch or kill it because it I thought it quite lovely. My first stroke of luck came while walking to the beach to meet at Omar’s boat. I found 200 pesos in the street. Then, as you can guess, during our morning of fishing, I caught a HUGE sailfish. It took every muscle in my body to anchor myself in the boat and then slowly reel him in. It was like fighting with the weight of a refrigerator. We had about 30 seconds to take a picture, then we let it go. Gratefully it dove back into the sea.

Roger was a wonderful photographer and cheerleader. Clint caught one too. We saw 3 humpback whales, many sea turtles, thousands of jellyfish, and had an all around enjoyable day. I really enjoyed being out on the water. It is extremely clear right now so Roger and I have tried to snorkel more often than usual.

Today while Roger ran and did yoga on the beach, I met two friends, Pedro and Diana, for an hour long swim. It was my longest swim this year. Our routine is to leave from a protected cove, go out into the open water, but swim along the shoreline away from breaking waves that can slam us into rocks covered with sea urchins. It’s all very safe, but today we did experience a lot of jellyfish stings. These are small critters difficult to avoid and their sting is like a quick hard mosquito bite that itches immediately. Between my tired muscles from catching the fish, and a long swim, I’m finally chilling out indoors.

Now here’s something interesting. We’ve been staying in this same apartment for 4 years, next door to a lovely little hotel owned by Dan, a guy from Canada. He lets us use the pool, borrow books, use the internet. We’ve been calling ourselves “extended family”. While visiting with his niece yesterday, I asked her “What’s Dan’s last name?” She told me it was Clemens. Immediately that triggered a question (and every Austin relative knows what I was thinking): “Is he related to Mark Twain?” I asked. “YES”, she said excitedly, “I am too!” My great grandmother, Karen Clemens (mother to my paternal grandfather) was related to Samuel Langhorne Clemens, and I grew up learning that Mark Twain is my 32nd cousin. My grandfather was born in Ontario Canada and this is where Dan’s family is from. Somewhere along the line, we’re related.

We booked our tickets for home. Less than 3 weeks to go. Tomorrow we meet our friend Tom Landis at the airport - he's coming down for some big savings on dental work and hopefully some big surf in between appointments. If you need work on multiple crowns, take Tom's tactic. Buy your ticket to Mexico, stay here for 2 weeks, spend less for the same work in the states, and get a vacation out of the deal.

Daily Happenings

Jan 25 – I am so pleased with the visitors to my hummingbird feeder! The local “colibris” feed daily as do the ants and bees. I never tire of watching the birds, the waves, the abundance of life here. Just walking down to the beach from our house, I pass by turkeys, roosters, chickens, ducks, horses, donkeys, dogs, goats,, and cats… you just never know if your neighbor is raising roosters for the cock fights or chickens to sell you eggs. Ah… but the flowers, my goodness. Picture the most brilliant magentas, purples and reds cascading over high walls. The other day, upon reaching the beach, I saw 4 dolphins dive through the crest of a wave. Then, they swam about 50 meters perpendicular to shore as I ran on the beach. It was the best escort I’ve ever had. The whales are showing up more often now too. I am constantly on watch for both dolphins and whales and will never tire of seeing them.

The wildlife in our casita is of another nature. We like having the gecko around to slurp up un-welcomed mosquitoes, but the cockroaches in the bathroom are speedy little devils I have yet to catch. I wonder how fast they can run. Roger’s first guess is 100 mph.


I find it so interesting to be immersed in what many would consider rural, developing world conditions, mixed with affluence and amenities beyond the common US household. For instance, here are pictures of two houses in our neighborhood across the street from one another. One is a 2nd home for a nice couple from the states, has a pool, maid service, wi fi, excellent views of the ocean, and additional vacation rental units.

Across the street is the nice home of a local, who on Christams eve, butchered a cow on the sidewalk, let the blood RUN DOWN THE STREET, and hung the prized pieces of flesh on the clothesline to dry. Two very different displays of “wealth”. Then across the street from these homes is a tiny tin hovel, occupied by a family with at least 7 kids, multitudes of dogs, chickens and turkeys, all living in a shack with a dirt floor and no plumbing. I think it is too rude to take a picture, but I greet them every time I walk by. The children are all smiles.

My own version of wealth lately has been the unity and hope felt by everyone here celebrating the inauguration of our new president and his administration. We watched the events from Washington DC live on CNN at the hotel next door with Canadians, Mexicans, and US citizens from sea to shining sea. We stood, sang, cheered, and wept as a wave of relief, peace, and common spirit to pursue goodness for the whole planet washed over us. I’m glad I was here to share the event.

Today marks our 4th week in Puerto. There are some routines developing as we slip into life in the tropics. Exercise early in the morning before the heat, eat a hearty breakfast, lay low in the afternoons, then emerge for some early evening activity surrounding the sunset. Sandwiched in this daily schedule have been some killer cribbage games, eating incredible meals, doing some work and correspondence, reading books, field trips around the coast, and managing a pretty heavy social calendar. We’ve met some really fun friends here, and several just happen to be from Bend.

Life flies by in Puerto Escondido

Jan 11 – Hey today would be my dad’s 73rd birthday. Hard to believe it was 19 years ago this year that we lost him to cancer. We are remembering you today, Dad. It’s a day to go for a long run in the morning, watch some football in the afternoon, and eat ice cream at night. As I’m paying attention to dates, only 9 days until the inauguration of our new president! We will try to watch the event live on the television next door.

Jan 14 - Well… what is life like here in Puerto Escondido? On the surface, it looks tranquil and easy, but if you look closely, it is bustling with activity. Imagine staring at the palm tree next to you from your hammock, and upon closer inspection, notice its trunk covered with ants. That’s what it’s like here. True, everywhere you look you can find ants, but on a human scale, everyone is working and busy selling, moving, washing, cleaning or building something. A walk into town reveals a new paved street here, a torn up sidewalk there, a new restaurant, a closed business, one day the store has limes, the next day it doesn’t. The size of the waves, the slope of the sand on the beach, the wind, the clouds, the humidity, the clarity of the water…these things are never the same. However, we can count on hearing the roar of the surf, breezes in the morning, and stunning sunsets just after 6pm. We’re taking it all in.

We’re also enjoying the arrival of more friends we’ve met here over the years, which add walks along the beach, dinners, swims, dance classes or just visiting by the pool to our social calendar. Friends from Canada, CA, TX, NY, ID, and NC are all repeats like us. Although food is cheap and delicious here, we prefer shopping, cooking and eating at home over going to a restaurant, so we try to limit our dinner dates to about twice a week.

This morning as I checked the sunrise from the rooftop, 2 wonderful things happened. First, I saw a whale calf jump completely out of the water followed by the black rising back of its mother. Shortly after that, a beautiful orange streak backed oriole landed in the flowers in front of me. I take them as omens, each for a significant event that should happen today.

The first event is one we’ve been anticipating for over a week. We live in a 6 unit apartment building with 3 lower units and 3 upper units. We’re on the end of the lower units. As soon as Frank and Vanessa left, “the LOUD family” moved in two doors down. Two adults and two kids rapidly shouting in whiny voices, which alerted us that they were not speaking Spanish. When each syllable dropped off an octave, it was a dead give away – Italiano! Today is the day they move out! Our other neighbors speak French and are pretty mellow. They’ve been coming here from Quebec for the past 3 years as well and prefer a tranquilo atmosphere as well.

The next event is the best of all. I have gone 6 weeks now without a wireless connection on my computer and possibly today I will be able to connect from my room. I challenge any of you to see what kind of inner turmoil you can inflict by disconnecting yourself from the Internet for 6 weeks.

Our days here go by quickly. We rise early to exercise while there are still breezes and before the sun is too strong. We usually have a large breakfast, able to buy our fresh ingredients from the local tiendas in the neighborhood. We chat it up with Fabiola, our favorite maid, I do some work, we do chores, read, run errands, or get together with friends and before you know it, it’s time to watch the sunset and eat dinner. Of course, there are interruptions throughout the day, to watch the iguanas on the wall, or the orioles that come to the window next door and sing to their own reflection. I’ve put up a hummingbird feeder and it’s starting to get some action. All is well…
(Photos: 1. Caution, hole in the road 2. A friendly grazer by the river 3. Helping the fisherman bring in his net)

Puerto Escondido

On Dec 28, we arrived in time for sunset, and plan to be present for every sunset for the duration of our stay in this little beach town. There’s another story to tell that involves humility, anxiety, distress and great amounts of forgiveness that I will share with you now, hoping to save others from this sort of fiasco.

After our brief Mexico City stay, we showed up at the airport nice and early with our prepaid e-ticket itinerary in hand ready to drift over to Puerto Escondido after the madness of the city. I planned this trip so far in advance that, lo and behold, my memory and mixture of potential travel options the days following language school trumped the very basic duty of DOUBLE CHECKING FLIGHT ITINERARY DEPARTURE DATES. I was sure we were scheduled to leave on Sunday the 28th because that’s when our lodging rezzos began in Puerto.

Imagine my horror when I went to the ticket counter, presented our printed itinerary to the agent, then saw on the itinerary TUESDAY DEC 30! I had the departure date mixed up and our Sunday departure was scheduled for Tuesday. TWO MORE DAYS IN MEXICO CITY??? No way. After multiple lines and “speaking to supervisors”, we forked over the credit card and paid a pretty price to get ourselves to the beach. The flight to Puerto Escondido was full, but we could catch a flight to Huatulco, the nearest town to the south. A very quiet flight, a car ride, 2 low rent buses and 2 and half hours later we arrived in our winter home.

Thankfully, friends Frank and Vanessa from Bend were here to greet us with their sweet, handsome hijo – “Diegito”. This past week it has been very nice to be with familiar friends and to speak English. We’ve also enjoyed the company of a new friend we met playing cribbage in a café, and guess what? He’s from a town called Bend, OR. Dan, we look forward to continuing our games when we return to the Beaver State.

Vanessa and I enjoy our grocery trips – produce is fresh and food cheap. Cooking fulfills that creative need I’ve lacked over the past 3 weeks traveling. There are so many flavors to try here, yet fewer choices in brands and products. It’s amazing how many different dishes are made with tomatoes or chiles. Roger taught Frank to play cribbage and also looks forward to catching up with some football since he can find the games here in English thanks to our Canadian hotel owners who bring down satellite TV from up north.

Our winter friends are arriving from all points north and we’ve begun swimming with the group that meets at 7:30am MWF for our 30-40 minute ocean swim. It’s a good day when we don’t get stung by jellyfish. Okay, every day is a good day because we get to see so many fish, but I still have yet NOT to get stung during our morning swim. I’m kind of a wimp. They just plain FREAK me out. Gazillians of tiny things the size of your fingernail floating everywhere, and they probably get in my mouth too. ICK!

Unfortunately, our internet connection is a MYSTERY. With our Mac we’ve had trouble ever since we came to Mexico – which is new this year. I’ve spent hours trying to figure this out (bad airport card? Interference? The brand of the router? Antenna? Operating system?). Some people with Macs do fine, others are in the same boat as us. For now, I must go to a café to send and receive mail or update the blog and sit right next to the router (still fading in and out of a connection) or plug in with Ethernet. It’s a huge bummer. This “loss” of connection has taken a gigantic toll in my world and it’s been interesting to psychoanalyze myself and admit that my life is very intertwined with the Internet (Did you know you have to capitalize Internet? Like God). Seriously, I often have moments where I want to be at home because I want to be connected. THIS IS ADMISSION HERE – Hi, My name is Connie and I’m addicted to the Internet. Roger? Blissful (except in the Mexico City airport).

Tonight we went to the birthday party of the 7 year old son of the lovely woman that cleans the rooms in our little apartment building. We’ve been in touch with Fabiola ever since we started coming here 4 years ago (I don’t know if I should tell her I named one of my chickens after her or not). Being the only gringos at the party, we felt somewhat out of place, but pretty honored. It was very interesting to be invited into the home of a local. Very Spartan, but so generous. Tacos were served to all (5 each), a sort of milk/fruit/nut/water drink poured in plastic cups, and gifts, pastel (cake), and of course… the piñata.

Now that we’re here in Puerto, we will continue our Spanish studies, but not so intensely. We’re scheduled for 2 days a week instead of 5. Even with our challenged Internet connection, I’ll try to keep up with the blog. So when your own Internet addiction kicks in and you want to know where to go while you surf, look us up. Please send us a note, we miss our friends and family.
rognconz@gmail.com

Mexico City

Dec 28 - Mexico City. I’ll make this one short as we really are only here to layover before our flight to Puerto Escondido. We are staying in the Central Historico and it is PACKED with people. Of the 23 million people that live here, half of them must have been at the zocolo on Saturday night. Every major brand name store or food chain is in the heart of Mexico City and everyone here is shopping. Something is for sale in every inch of this district.

We managed to tour the National Palace with its amazing murals painted on the interior walls by Diego Rivera, and visit the wing where President Benito Juarez lived and died. Both sites were incredibly interesting. The palace visit was worth the hassle of being in the crowds, but we can both honestly say we hope we NEVER have to come back to Mexico City. Even though most of our navigating around has been painless, we feel safe, and the sites are spectacular, the city just isn’t our style. Our little oasis in Puerto Escondido can’t arrive soon enough.

Christmas In Guanajuato

Dec 24 - Noche Buena began with our last day of language classes in Guanajuato. After school, we were presented with a diploma and an extensive evaluation to complete. Roger was hoping for valedictorian, but somehow got overlooked. To sum up our experience at Academia Falcon, I give it an A, Roger gives it a B* (*it’s difficult to learn a language when you are being taught in a language you don’t understand). We both feel like we gained some headway, have lots of tools to continue our studies, and that our 3 weeks there were well spent.

After school, we toured an old hacienda built in the 1600’s of one of the old mine owners with our new friend Gary, another Falcon student. Then we wandered into town to catch any festivities and have a bite to eat. We knew that our family celebration wouldn’t begin until 9 or 10pm, with a midnight meal, so some chile rellenos and tacos tied us over for the evening.

Throughout the town, we saw all kinds on nativity scenes called “nacimientos” set up in front of businesses, homes, companies… even the sewage treatment plant had a large nacimiento. These have been fun to observe because they are HUGE and full of, not only your typical barnyard animals, shepards, angels and wise men, but ANY kind of small figurine or toy worthy of observing the birth of the baby Jesus.

Roger sacked out for the evening and I went into the kitchen to visit and observe the evening preparations of Jesus and Fatima. The menu: turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, bread, and lots of dessert. I guess tamales and atole are served in less affluent families. It was still hard to wrap my brain around the notion of eating dinner after midnight, but when the turkey went into the oven at 8:30 p.m. I decided to make a beer run to contribute to the pre-dinner festivities. My selection: Noche Buena, a seasonal dark available only in December.

About 9:30 p.m. extended family members arrived and we all crowded into the living room to visit and imbibe. A little mini bar was set up, snacks provided and we were enfolded into the conversation and treated like honored guests. Also joining us were Elaine, another student and housemate from Wisconsin, and her son Jesse who surprised her by “stopping by” for Christmas on his way from Mississippi to Argentina – on his motorcycle.

At the stroke of midnight, the Mexican traditions of Noche Buena began. Everyone stood up and exchanged hugs and said, “Felicidades”. Then the baby Jesus doll(s) were brought out and wrapped in decorative bandanas and we lined up 2 by 2 and swung them while we sang a cradle song and passed them up and down our little aisle. Next, everyone kissed the little Jesus dolls before laying them among the scene in the nacimiento. On to the table for dinner.

Toasts were made (I was asked to give one, where I thanked everyone for including us and told them how this would be a lifetime memory) then we enjoyed an excellent meal. Following dinner, we moved to the living room for some karaoke! I sang “Yesterday” in English, and Roger did “California Dreamin”. All song selections were in both English and Spanish and brought up from a program on a laptop with this crackly sound system. The microphone was passed around and by the end of the night, Roger was arm in arm with the hermonos belting out songs in Spanish he’s never heard before in his life.

The gift exchange was short and simple. It looked like family members drew names because each person had only one gift – even the kids. Men received a nice shirt and women received a bottle of perfume. Elaine and I both received a ceramic dish, one I will enjoy using for salsa.

We stayed up for more singing and conversation and finally hit the pillow around 4am – about the time I remember waking up to open presents on Christmas morning when I was a kid. We could only sleep in until 9:30, so got up and hiked around the Panoramica road around the city for a few hours before wandering in to el centro again. Most people pretty much just relax at home on this day.

Christmas in Mexico was certainly something I’ve wanted to experience, especially with a local family. Roger and I are pleased to have lucked out with such gracious hosts, however, we truly missed being with our family back home and participating in those traditions we have come to love. When we get home, I think I’m going to pick a snowy day, put on Christmas Music, bake, make a nice meal, watch “It’s a Wonderful Life” then read all the Christmas cards that we missed reading while we were here.