Tepic - Winter Wonderland

Tepic is the capital of Nayarit, the state in which we live, and is located about 1000 meters above sea level, with 500,000 residents. Our Spanish teacher Miguel, also known as our only Mexican friend, lives there with his family during the weekend. The teachers here are assigned to schools and live in a house with the other teachers, because the majority are from Tepic which houses the university. So on weekdays we hitch a ride to Punta Mita, where Miguel does special education with the non-profit PEACE. And last weekend we decided to explore this veritable Winter Wonderland.
Nayarit is an agricultural state, and we got a true taste of it with fields of sugar cane and endless orchards of avocadoes backed by rolling mountains and a roiling stomach. Tepic is not exactly a tourist destination, and we were fairly warned that there is 'nothing to do there'. We did not meet or see a single gringo on the entire trip. Sascha lugged the tent and blankets in his monster backpack, but once there, no one seemed to know where a good place to camp was, especiall that was accessible. So we stayed in a hotel close to the plaza and ventured out the first evening to find half the citizens in the city gathered there. We ate out and then wandered into the cathedral, where there just happened to be a wedding commencing with extremely poor timing, as the Christmas music and loudspeaker narrative poured in the open doors. And then the parade started, in all its commercialized glory, starring any animated film character you can think of. They had Peter Pan, Ciderella, the Flintsones, the Incredibles, the Backyardigans, Sesame Street, Batman, several Santa Clauses and countless more, each trailed by several dozen girls, aged 11-14 in appropriate costume. After the parade we went to a tiny cake shop where I bought a tiny cake from a stunningly gorgeous woman, and then went out to eat a second time.
Miguel scheduled a bus tour for us in the morning, and accompanied us with his wife and darling four-year old daughter, Paula. The tour traveled to four old colonial style haciendas, with trees hundreds of years old, and an orangeria (as Sascha would say), meaning a wonderful orchard full of cross-bred citrus trees. The whole property was chocked full of edible plants, which we all picked at all our leisure and enjoyed thoroughly. Another had been turned into a school, where they found indigenous artifacts and gold hidden in the walls. The last hacienda we visited was at some point used or owned by the Masonics, with symbols scratched into the stone. It was a textile factory from 1841 until 1985, making denim for the American market. The factory utilized child labor. The machines, both antique and newer, were all still there, along with spools of thread. The architecture of the building was fascinating, there were defense turrets in several locations where people with guns shot at marauders in the streets.
We went to a huge new shopping mall afterwards with Miguel y familia, much nicer than any mall I have been to in the U.S., and afterwards to a a huge park where we rode a tiny train. The park came equipped with a zoo, carnival rides, endless playsets and courts, and most unusual of all: an outdoor ice-skating rink. You may think the people of Mexico would not be highly skilled ice skaters, and you would be right, but there were a few with talent, and it was very amusing to watch.
Live music at a nearby bar concluded our evening with style, the mandatory nightly Mexican television, a special treat offered only by the hotel.
Miguel informed us that Mass was celebrated at the hour, and he would try to meet us at nine. Awakening at 8:50, I rushed over to sit in the cathedral for one hour before mass actually started, at which hour both Miguel and Sascha gamboled in. We somehow missed Miguel afterwards, and headed over to a nice restaurant for breakfast, and while Sascha finished I ravaged the town for some Christmas presents.
We caught the bus back to Bucerias where each of us had a conversation with an English-speaking Mexican. The man Sascha spoke to had immigrated to the U.S. as a baby and lived there thirty years, went to college, spent 9 years in the state penitentiary, and was finally deported to Mexico, a place he couldn't even remember. He is a vendor, coming on to the buses and selling snacks, and has no intention of going back to the U.S.
I bought a giant sparkler and called it a day.

There comes a point in every blog where the writer must admit to losing their camera. Today is my day. Just use your imagination.

Bellosas

The day started with a healthy dose of Catholicism on the plaza in Higuera Blanca. There is something about that international ancient tradition of seeking God that gives me comfort and companionship. Then to the highway, to hitch a ride to Punta Mita. Hitchhiking is generally pretty easy, we get picked up by workers, gringos, and even a single mom with a baby. Once we arrived in Punta Mita, our tourist pheremones set to work and they came at us like moths. We had an appointment for a boat tour with Rudy, a laid-back Austrian introduced to us by one of our community members. But that didn't stop a small swarm of tour guides quoting prices, adventures, guarantees, and mediocre English. We hemmed and hawed, and Rudy finally got the scent, swooped in, and hardly left our side for the next hour and a half, even joining us for the majority of our meal. Times are tough in the tourism field right now. We enjoyed a lovely meal at El Dorado, which our neighbor Rod helped found. They had delicious ice cream served in a fruit shell.
And then into the boat, about 25 feet long, with Rudy and his brother-in-law, a Mexican. The bay cradles Puerto Vallarta in the center, and we were located on the northern point, with the hazy sierra surrounding us. We traveled out toward the open ocean and saw a stopped boat, a good sign. We pulled up next to them and sure enough, they had spotted them. A family of whales! Mama, papa, y bebe. They come to the bay, as Rudy says, on honeymoon - to make babies. They also have babies, and we saw one later which was only a few days old, but already 1500 pounds, and as long as our boat. They are humpback whales. Rudy told us one of the largest dangers to whales still remaining is giant cruise ships which travel so fast that the whales can't get out of the way. Sascha's eyes glaze over daily while staring at the ocean hoping for a glimpse; apparently everyone in Litibu sees them all the time except us. But there we were, twenty feet away from them! And of course we were especially prepped for some great sea-life, having just watched Whale Rider AND Jaws.
Next step was a trip to the Marieta Islands, a Mexican National Park and bird sanctuary. And whatever they were doing, it was successful, because there were hundreds of birds in the air and hundreds more on every rock surface. The blue-footed booby has been introduced there, native to the Galapagos, and Rudy said the islands are home to 20,000 birds. Stepping foot on the island is prohibited, as well as fishing nearby, however swimming seems to be completely acceptable. We pulled up next to the island and fed the fish crackers, an entire school, each the size of a dinner plate, would aggressively attack the crackers. I did not want them to aggressively attack me. But I got in the water anyway. In case anyone reading this doesn't already know, I have an irrational fear of fish in all their forms. I had twenty bats flying around my head in an incredibly closed proximity in a dark room earlier this week, and one even pooped on my mouth and I had no problem with it. But swimming with fish is another story. We went through a hollowed out tunnel into a miniature cove with a lovely sandy beach. I wasn't quite brave enough to snorkel, in fact I avoided looking anywhere other than the sky the entire time, but no fish touched my skin.
The next step of our journey was to head to open ocean and throw in the lines. In case I didn't make it clear earlier, I really hate fish. I swam about while the men did the manly job. And they caught one, a ladyfish, and let it suffocate to death on deck, then took it's body and hacked it up right on board. We carried the carcass all the way home and Sascha boiled it up for supper, and spent an hour picking the bones out of it.

Bungle in the Jungle

I ventured into the jungle today, for the first time. Alone. It is completely different from the coast, where the two dozen overused flora are easily identifiable to me now. But the true difference is in the sounds. Up the hill, away from the ocean, the lull of the ocean falls back, and the calls of wild unknown animals are taken up. The screeching and chirping is so loud it seems like it must be an arrogant statement of existence. I did not partake, as it seemed preferable for the fewest number of them as possible to know I was there. It was on a well-beaten horse trail, and as it rained this morning, the trail actually consisted of about six inches of clay mud. Quickly the bottom two inches of my shoes also consisted of it. Although, strictly speaking, this is not a rainforest, as it doesn't rain regularly year-round, I had flashbacks to Mrs. Brown's second grade class, where we made a model rainforest in a refrigerator box. It was a feeling of exotic rapture to walk into that box. But my sense of adventure has a limit. Some grunts and the possibility of a wild boar nearby sent me back to the beach.
p.s. later, I saw four fish in about one minute, which also shortened my swim.

Las Plantas

The beautiful bougainvillea is a native plant of Spain, and is rampant here with its abundant blossoms of red, fuschia, pink, orange, white, and any mixture of these. I love to imagine a saucy Spaniard, set out to conquer a new world, discover gold, have adventures, exploit native peoples, with his little potted plant to remind him of his mother. The flashy flower is actually a bract of three colored leaves which gently cradle two small white flowers. The red ones are good for coughs, and I have been force-feeding bougainvillea tea to Sascha for his cold.
Also in the picture is the blue agave, which is famous in this region for its role as the key ingredient in tequila!
Every plant here is a new plant to me, to identify, to learn its uses and preferences, and of course to love! What makes this place more beautiful in the minds of people than any other place? Is it because the plants are different? Or greener? Or more flambouyant? My appreciation for beauty grows from comeraderie with land formation and plants and bodies of water. Here there are rocks, huge ones which the soil is perched on, small ones around which the plants are haphazardly stuck, and tiny ones, which the plants grow out of, also known as "dirt". And at the center of this rocky universe is El Mar, the mighty Pacific. It fills our senses incessantly, the salty air we breathe, the humid touch of our skin, the gentle, surprisingly deep, roar of the waves, never stopping, yet never constant enough to create a rhythm. I see the formation of waves when I close my eyes at night, and I feel the water pulling me into the crest. There is no anchor from the influence of the sea.