sayulita to cancun

aloha amigos!
thank you for your patience and continued interest, blah blah, etc...
this is why i didnt want to start a blog... so much to attempt to document; what to leave in, what to leave out. leaving some people hanging for weeks on end (jennis); overwhelming others with an overdose of info (andi). ill probably go off on a few tangents here, so maybe dont bother reading if you dont have a few minutes to spare... ;)
when viewing my pictures, keep in mind that im not a photographer, and my camera was the 3rd or 4th cheapest on the shelf :) irregardless (thats for you jacob), neither my deft maneuvering with the english language nor my unparalleled ability to take amateur photographs of the same mountain from 6 different angles in an attempt to capture 'essence' can fully depict the realities - both beautiful and hideous - of mexico. especially traveling thru mexico as a pinche gringo on the solo tip. . .

soooo, after leaving sayulita, i took a bus to puerto vallarta for $25 (all amounts in MXN unless otherwise noted, so... $2.15USD?). a half-hour ride brought me to the city center, where i booked a surprisingly nice hotel room for $420. they said it was a 2-night minimum, but i got chummy with the manager on duty, and he told reception to make an exception. yes!! cruised around pv on foot, took a coupla pics of the sunset, ate some pizza (id had enough mexican food for awhile). mexico seems to know 4 kinds of pizza: cheese, pepperoni, hawaiian, and - occasionally - a supreme-type pizza. for those of you familiar with antonios, i havent seen anything even closely resembling a mexicana pizza here (black bean, basmati rice, spicy chicken, cheddar cheese, sour cream). or an aztec chicken pizza. or any of the quesadilla or taco pizzas, etc... just sayin.

headed out to guadalajara in the morning. checked in with my couchsurfing hosts luis and melisa, who brought me out with their friends pedro, olga, and sesa (olga and sesa are having a baby in june; i think ive got them 78% convinced that shestin is a solidly ambiguous name for an unborn, gender-undeclared child. shestino or shestina if one wanted to be more gender-certain in this spanish-speaking arena). i tried mezcal for the first time, which is not unlike drinking smoke. checked out the city on my own the next day, took a few pics. its hilarious to me how many churches there are (reminds me of the RATM song 'vietnow' in which they ask, 'is all the world jails and churches?' the usa has all the jails, mexico has all the churches). seriously... the amount of time, money, and materials that go into building multiple homes in such close proximity for a god who is supposed to be omnipotent, omnipresent, and omniscient is ludicrous (that ones for you shawn b). is there really no better use of our time and talents than to be erecting these silly buildings for someone who doesnt even live here, and who would spend an eternity just trying to make an appearance in each home if s/he/it did? okay, back on track... saw too many gaudy churches (not just here - everywhere), but guadalajara is a beautiful city. also managed to get my pack repaired in a half hour for $50 pesos; and its sturdy - almost as good as new. pinche caballo.

on to ciudad de mexico, d.f. (distrito federal). met up with my couchsurfer friend carolina near viveros, and walked around the beautiful coyoacan area. had some delicious food and drink near viveros; i loooove garlic and its been so long since ive tasted it! muchas gracias caro for the connection! next day i checked in with erika, my couchsurf host here. she has a sweet place in the city near the zapata subway line. got to meet some of her cool friends ellie, aleksei, paula, umair; her bros ruben and jorge; her bf derek. woke up on cinco de mayo to a mexico city earthquake, the building swaying, erika coming into my room to tell me to come stand in the doorway; i stayed in bed. i went and checked out the pyramids at teotihuacan, the museum of anthropology, the bellas artes; tried to see the chapultepec castle, but got there too late, colon left-parenthesis. i somehow forgot that mexico city is one of the most heavily populated cities in the world...something like 18 million in the metropolitan area. i think all 18 million of them were on the subway that day. every station i went to i watched subway doors unable to close because people were literally jamming themselves into the cars. at first i thought, 'is it really necessary to be on THAT train? the next one is about 5 minutes away.' and i would wait for the next train, only to find that it was the same. or worse. and the next one. and the next one. unbelievable how so many people can be rushing in the same direction at once. it reminded me of nyc at rush hour, except that it was all day. everywhere i went. i kept wondering who was up on the streets, if everyone was down here. some really sweet art in some of these stations, tho. one of them has a planetarium-type feel to it with the zodiac painted on the ceiling and walls and lit by blacklight. i was an obstacle in the foot traffic for awhile, gazing up at the ceiling in child-like wonder. and steve stills of csny was right - when i saw the southern cross for the first time, i understood why i came this way...

from the d.f. i went to puebla to meet up with gabriel from camp and his friend maurilia. gabe and i cruised around puebla for a bit, saw some authentic poblano song and dance performances, a recreation of an aztec dance in the city center, rode on the crazy camiones that are like roller-coaster rides except way cheaper ($0.50 USD) and probably way more dangerous. went with maurilia (dos juntos) to the pyramids in cholula, another city of many churches, then went to meet up with gabe when he got out of work. had my first mexican 'crepe' which is nothing at all like a crepe, but delicious anyway. potatoes and chilis rolled in a thin dough and deep fried.

after puebla, i had to decide between veracruz (north and beaches) and oaxaca city (south and pyramids) as a kinda halfway point on my way east to palenque. i chose oaxaca, and checked out the pyramids at monte alban. met 3 swiss girls (ingrid, lucile, celine) with whom i shared a conversation (in english, yes!) for about 20 minutes before i explored monte. cruised around the city the next day, ran into the swiss misses again, and we talked for a bit longer. a bum got aggressive and angry when they didnt want to trade his sandwich bag of junk and a phone charger for their cigarettes, so he snatched their lighter from the table and ran away. i thought it woulda been a fair trade - i never know when i might need a phone charger, some rubber bands, soda can tabs, pen caps, or even a flyer for a local night club. and if theres one thing i learned from japeth the goat in hoodwinked, its that i should be prepared. this lesson must be shared...

i continued on to palenque to meet up with federico and work on an organic farm there. found out that he wouldnt be there til friday (i arrived early wednesday morning), so i thought to myself, 'self, why not take a trip up to ciudad del carmen for some beach time?' great idea self. took a bus up to cdc, but arrived around sunset (slighly underestimated the amount of time it would take to travel 80 miles; bus left palenque at 11, got to cdc at 530?). found a brand-new-looking hotel with rooms for only $350 ($30US), so i checked in so i could drop my pack and take a look around the city. on the surface, everything was new and shiny. upon closer inspection, there was not only a healthy mold colony growing under both of the mattresses in the room (there is a fondness in this country for using massive concrete slabs as bed frames; sturdy, but you can never rearrange your furniture), but there were more mosquitos than a room-sized rainforest might have. i spent no less than an hour and a half trying to kill them all (mosquitos are the only living thing i can say i truly hate, and i definitely cant sleep peacefully in the same room as them) and failed. at about 9pm i gave up, took a quick shower (they jumped in with me, the pervs), cranked up the AC in the hopes that the cold would slow them down enough so i could murder them, and went out to find some dinner. two hours later, back at the room, the mosquitos didnt seem to be affected by the cold. i killed a few thousand more, then opted for stringing up my mosquito net from the light bulb (had to unscrew it a bit first) above the bed. made certain all the moldy parts of the bed were tucked away out of sight (just as the hotel staff did before i checked in, im sure), then laid down and watched nacho libre en espanol. ahhh, jack black. even tho i cant understand the words that are coming out of your mouth you make me laugh with your crazy antics. jack always reminds me of my friend sean berthiaume (as does chris parnell for some reason); except sean is much funnier. in fact, for those of you who dont know sean, if you ever need a laugh or a smile, just hop onto his facebook page at
www.facebook.com/home.php#!/seanymcsean
youre guaranteed to find something that will make you chuckle. also, try to find the revolusean tattoos in his photos; something like 11 or more people with variations of seans face tattooed on their bodies. amazing! if you want one, he will pay for it. just sayin... oh seany mcsean. anyway, checked out of there as soon as i woke up on thursday (after flipping up the mattresses to expose the dirty truth, in the hopes that maybe they would address it. doubt it) and realized my predicament: i now had a pack to carry around, so i couldnt really relax at the beach, and i had to be in palenque the next day, so it wouldnt make sense to check into a hostel or hotel. so i went back to palenque. there were probably other solutions that made more sense. palenque was good to me tho. the posada nacha'n ka'an hotel is right in the town center, rooms for $75 ($6.50US) with free breakfast and free internet. whaaat! yes please. went to check out the pyramids, which were obviously astounding. bought some 'linen' pants for $100 pesos ($8.60US) from a roadside vendor on my walk back. i wanted to get some dark-colored linen pants to swap out for my heavy and bulky jeans so id have some farm-working pants. i fortunately didnt get rid of my jeans, because the new 'linen' pants split completely down the seams the first time i put them on. lesson learned. got in touch with federico and found out that i had to take a colectivo to meet him in zapata, because we were going to be working in campeche, not palenque, so i bought a $25 peso ticket to zapata and rode like a sardine all the way there.

in zapata i met up with fed, waited for another wwoofer, marion from france to arrive, hopped in the truck, and it wouldnt start. after an hour or so of trying, we decided to stay in zapata for the eve, and had a mechanic come repair some cables in the morning.

on to campeche in the dodge ram pickup. it was loaded down with bags of meal, dolomite, and phosphorus for making compost (along with soil, mulch, compost aged 2 years, molasses, manure, and water - a recipe he had learned in brasil), so it took about 4 hours to get to campeche, with the gratuitous stops at every state boder to be questioned by police. as it turns out, it wasnt an organic farm after all, but coast tropical - a branch of coast citrus (www.coasttropical.com) - an enormous mango plantation, and one of the largest exporters of mango to the us. spent a few days shoveling shit (literally), eating mangos for 3 or more meals a day (literally ;) and hanging around campeche.

after campeche we were to return to palenque to work on another farm in the community, but i opted to head to cancun instead, since it was much closer than palenque and therefore quicker and cheaper to get to, and since i had a commitment to another farm in quintana roo in 3 days anyway. arrived in cancun after midnite, checked into an eco-hotel (www.reycaribe.com) that was effing sweet despite the fact that the rates at the front desk were a bit higher than the quoted rates online. beautiful place, also with free breakfast and internet.
ill be hanging around in cancun for a coupla days, checking out chichen itza, wading in the water (since sayulita reminded me that my shoulder isnt quite ready for swimming yet), maybe ferrying over to isla mujeres if its cheap. ill try to get a scuba session in at cozumel. i was thinking of going and doing some organic farm work up in solferino, but ive changed my mind. ill let you know how it goes and stuff...

-- a good traveler has no fixed plans, and is not intent on arriving
lao tzu