New Year’s Eve – 2010 into 2011

Posted on January 9, 2011 by admin

View Trip To Guaymas in a larger map
Last weekend we traveled down to Abe’s house in Guaymas/San Carlos after work on Thursday. I have a new app for my phone that tracks our journey and gives statistics. I found it all very interesting. I turned it on when we hit the border, so it’s missing the first hour of travel from Tucson.

Total Distance: 408.69 km (253.9 mi)
Total Time: 4:19:33 (we stopped for gas and food)
Moving Time: 3:58:28
Average Speed: 94.47 km/h (58.7 mi/h)
Average Moving Speed: 102.83 km/h (63.9 mi/h)
Max Speed: 158.40 km/h (98.4 mi/h) (in the SUV even!)
Min Elevation: -32 m (-103 ft) (This was in Guaymas)
Max Elevation: 1356 m (4449 ft) (This was just South of Nogales)
Elevation Gain: 606 m (1989 ft)
Max Grade: 6 %
Min Grade: -11 %

Total travel time was about 5.5 hours. We can cut off about 30mins to an hour if we take one of the cars.

Yun’s parents had arrived earlier in the day with her Uncle, Aunt, and two cousins. We didn’t do much but relax, read, and eat. That made for an ideal weekend getaway.

Saturday was New Year’s Eve. The picture below is of our last sunset of 2010.

Tucson was pretty cold when we left on Thursday – the weather on the beach was warm and sunny. The water wasn’t even too bad, but we didn’t get in. Perfect weather for reading in the hammock and eating carne asada from the bbq.

We went to a really neat market on Saturday afternoon to buy the vegetables above along with all of the meat for the tacos. It was the first time I had been to this market and I was really surprised at how interesting and exotic it was. Surprisingly, I found a nice holster for my gun which I bought. Its surprising because guns are generally not allowed in Mexico.

Meat was pretty cheap and we bought an enormous amount for dinner. The butchers even cut a few giant bones for Tila and Scout at no charge. They were thrilled. A week later and they still chew them constantly.

We had a fun weekend and are hoping to get back within the next month. We may take the boat down next time and leave it there. I have added some other photos to the travel log.

Posted in family, Mexico, weekend getaways | 1 Comment

still working on the house…

Posted on January 8, 2011 by admin

We haven’t done much to the house over the last few months, due mostly to unreliable workers. Our former crew did pretty decent work, but it was really difficult to get them to come out and actually do the work. So over the last few months we’ve mostly just saved our money.

About three weeks ago, Matt and Dana introduced us to Tavo. They had met him through craigslist when they had listed an antenna they were giving away. Tavo showed up to claim it and mentioned he did various sort of renovation work. So they hired him to do some electrical. He was inexpensive and did a great job for them.

Ever since we met Tavo, we’ve employed him full-time. He has done an incredible job over the past three weeks. He moved a sewage line for the master toilet, moved a gas line that was under concrete, replaced the water line from 1/2″ to 3/4″ from the water main, installed three skylights, built a 150 square foot addition that will be a laundry room, finished some framing, and today completed the job of laying the black paper and 1″ foam along the entire exterior as we prepare for stucco being done. He is awesome. He calls me every day to update me on his progress and share his thoughts about the next day’s job.

He is also helpful at saving us money. For instance, the 1″ foam pictured above is 10 dollars for each 10 foot panel at Lowes and Home Depot. However, there is a stucco specialty store about 3/4 mile from our house that sells the same thing for 6 each. That itself saved us a few hundred dollars.

With his help, we are optimistic that the house will be done in the next four months.

Posted in casa, home restoration | Leave a comment

Peruvian lunch…

Posted on January 8, 2011 by admin

image

Yun and I were running errands today when we found a Peruvian restaurant near our house named Don Pedros. It has been quite some time since we’ve had this sort of food. We both loved our meals and intend to visit again.

I had the Loma Saltado and Yun had something that looked good, but I cannot recall the name of it now.

image

Posted in food | Leave a comment

New Year’s Eve sunset..

Posted on December 31, 2010 by admin

image

Posted in family, food, holidays, Mexico, mobile updates, travels | Leave a comment

White Mountains for Christmas

Posted on December 25, 2010 by admin

Yun and I head up to the White Mountains for Christmas last Thursday evening. We’ve had a lot of fun on this trip, mostly in part to having no particular schedule or plan. We’ve done pretty much nothing but sleep and eat since last Thursday. We rented a really nice cabin in the middle of the woods. It’s quite modern and well equipped.

Today we went to the lake for a bit of a hike. It was beautiful and Scout and Tila had a great time chasing ducks in the water.

Posted in holidays, scout!, tila!, weekend getaways | Leave a comment

Yucatan 2010

Posted on November 29, 2010 by admin

We are sitting in the Houston Airport on our 8-hour layover on our way home, so I am taking this time to go through some of the photos I took over the last weekend.

The picture above is from Uxmal. It was a Mayan temple (Temple of the Magician) that was constructed 3000 years ago. It was an incredible sight. We rented a car after our first day in Merida so as to be able to avoid the tour buses. Also, with the rental we could go much later when most of the tours were already gone. When we arrived, we had the temple above to ourselves.

The rental car was absolute garbage. We paid $50/day for a Tsuru which felt as though it would break down at any moment. Only one headlight worked, the horn (a most necessary tool for driving in Mexico) was not functional, and there was no stereo. Even so, it was really nice to have our own car.

Before getting to Uxmal, we toured an old hacienda that was on the way. It was gargantuan. I love the architectural design, it was an inspiration for when we perhaps have our own one day. Property is extremely cheap in Yucatan.

Yesterday we went to another hacienda where we spent 4 hours touring the home, business, and grounds. We had the chance to meet an elderly man who has lived at the hacienda for nearly a century and had a fascinating history to share. Also at this hacienda was a cenote. We entered by a small stairway that went down into the earth where at the bottom there was a hole. Once through the hole, it opened up to an underground world of caverns and a small lake. We climbed down an additional set of stairs and spent an hour swimming in the luke-warm water. It was a lot of fun, despite the bats flying over our heads.

I have added more photos to the travel journal page linked above.

Posted in holidays, Mexico, travels | Leave a comment

Celestun!

Posted on November 26, 2010 by admin

We had a great day in Celestun today. We woke early for breakfast at the Hotel Hacienda de Merida to hop on a tour bus headed west to the sea. We saw some beautiful things and some pretty villages. We later got on a boat and toured the mangroves, saw nests of termites and were warned of crocodiles and boas. It was beautiful. We saw the flocks of pink flamingos (do they come in other colors?). We were told how they come to become pink – there is a worm they eat that turns them pink (they begin life white).

Later we headed to the beach. We had fish and shrimp for lunch and then took a walk on the beach. The beaches in Celestun are absolutely beautiful – a sort of mix between San Carlos and Cancun.

Posted in travels | 2 Comments

Cirque Sol du Soliel: Alegria

Posted on November 25, 2010 by admin

Yun and I had the opportunity to go to Cirque’s Alegria last night with her parents. It was surprisingly a lot of fun and very entertaining. It was amazing to see what the people in the show could do – I would think some of them have had their spinal column surgically removed in order to bend and move like they did. I would definitely recommend going to the show.

We are currently sitting at the Tucson Airport waiting for our plane to arrive and take us to Houston. It’s a bit late, but we have a four hour layover in Houston so I suspect we’ll be fine.

Posted in family, special events, strange things | Leave a comment

Thanksgiving weekend…

Posted on November 20, 2010 by admin

Yun and I found out last week that we would be able to get a couple days off surrounding Thanksgiving next weekend. As such, we spent many of our nights last week desperately trying to find a place to get away. It was no easy task, because 1] it’s a holiday weekend, and 2] it’s less than a week away.

We run into the same problem every time we try to plan a trip; which is, where do we want to go? We have a number of resources that we use that help find the best deals – travelzoo.com, farecompare.com, cheapotickets.com, etc.

However, after much deliberation (and much frustration) we ended up booking a trip to Merida in the Yucatan. Our friend’s Jeff and Beth have been there in the past and spoke highly of it. There seem to be a lot of fun things to do, so we’re excited.

Posted in travels | Leave a comment

San Carlos – October 2010

Posted on November 2, 2010 by admin


Yun and I took a trip to San Carlos / Guaymas a few weeks back with her parents and Aunt from Morelia. We left Thursday night after work and arrived late around midnight. It was surprising how hot it still is and how warm the water is as well.

This is the perfect time of year. There beach is empty, the sand is perfect and clean, and the water was just right. We spent a lot of time on the beach relaxing and reading. We also had a chance to do some snorkeling and saw the usual underwater things. Its always fun and exciting.

We had a great time Saturday night in San Carlos at Bonifacio’s. Despite our commitment to our diet, we were still able to eat some incredible meals.

This was a relaxing trip and I look forward to going back as soon as possible. I have added more photos to the Travel Gallery from this trip.

Posted in family, Mexico, weekend getaways | Leave a comment