November 2017 - La Colina Project

Journey to Polaris

November 28, 2017
by Beave

Still working towards getting our place ready to rent out. Making it fun. This blog may be a little ranty but it’s cathartic so forgive/ignore as necessary.

Our man wakes us as the light sets in proper about 8 am . He rides his donkey with no name noisily up the hill and delivers milk fresh from the cow. He insists it gives super powers. Few hours chilled and it is amazing stuff. He leaves with the donkey towing a lump of tree which is to be our new gate posts.

Our friend is a white witch healer in the town. She is a gentle and generous soul who only wears white and is seen with her two small rescued dogs that never leave her side. She takes local milk and cream and mixes it with honey from the hills and makes ice cream in jars. I was stabbed with a fork (not in a very healing, generous or gentle way I may add ) because I could not resist taking down the last jar she had.

My phone remains drowned. Our life saving methods including weeks in rice and anti-humidity crystals have failed to revive. I am not missing it at all. I have decided not to replace it for the foreseeable future. Lack of photos/camera is an issue I need to deal with (apologies).

I have progressively become more judgey as I see phones consume people’s lives. When stuck in airports I used to head to a bar and pass time chatting to random strangers. These days a screened device transfixes every single person in the bar. Saying hi or even making eye contact results in anger, suspicion or even fear. I’m not that scary.

It came home hard to me when I was in San Francisco. This city is extraordinary but you need to work 3 jobs for 7 days a week to make rent on a shared broom cupboard. I walked downtown in the middle of the day looking at my own phone following a map. I looked up and noticed that on the other side of the road there was a shantytown of homeless people. My side of the pavement was packed with suited people and tourists. All staring at screens as they walked. All of them. Literally all of them. On one side of the street I could not make eye contact with a single person if I had wanted to. On the other the homeless guys sat quietly and watched over at everyone marching past ghostly unaware. At first I thought people were distracting themselves, a way to ignore the homeless situation right there on display. After a while I realised that it didn’t matter what was around them . They were in a different place. Not here where I was. They were buying things for imaginary farms, or swiping left or right, or putting bunny ears on pictures of their kids they never see.

I recently spoke to a Doctor in Manchester who sees the results of children & young adults living through screens. I-pad attachments for prams and pushchairs are popular these days. She observes that there is a growing population that has lost the ability to emote. They have learned to express happy things with a smiley face and bad things with a thumbs down grumpy face emoji. It apparently extracts them from real emotions and the ability to recognise human feelings. It’s a worry.

Again my own hypocrisy in this matter is under review.

We do use Facebook to keep in touch with real-life friends and family spread far and wide and do find it a useful tool (if I avoid posts about how cute someone thinks their baby is or worse their cat.) We don’t approve at all of the Orwellian overtones of being constantly monitored and “influenced” by managed content but I avoid the like button and use a VPN so if the sneaky buggers want to find out were I am, what shoes I have just broken or how to make me vote for Trump then good luck with that mate .

Google is our friend. As a fact checker it helps and as a “how to do “ oracle of all knowledge its invaluable. Who knew how little I actually knew. Not me. Our website and our blog will be promoting us and so we are unashamed users of the great web of everything. If, however, you see me with my head in my phone when the sun is setting behind me and I’m surrounded by butterflies and birds and sexy people are trying to engage with me please please please give me slap. I see this happening all the time and it drives me nuts.

So we have come to understand the real addiction people have to their phones. We must make a plan to reluctantly service this addiction. We plan to promote our jungle experience as an opportunity to raise ones screen face upwards and engage but also recognise this will reduce our rental potential with those that can afford a few quid. We are told that American tourists here can do without water, food and a bed but not Wi-Fi. It’s an issue as the waiting list for new Wi-Fi connection in San Pancho is currently two years (not joking).

Because of this we have contacted the owner of the only house we can see from our land. Jayne’s Dad and I installed a rope up the treacherous hill behind us to give us better access to our water storage. If you make it up that far without falling too dramatically and squint with your head at a certain angle while hanging onto a tree there is a faint white spot that you may or may not be able to make out at the top of the furthest hill. That’s the place. Our first plan is to find a spot in town ( we have a number of target options) and bounce what internet we can to this white dot and redirect it to us so we can further distribute it around our hill. This is the result of Jayne’s Dad studying satellite imagery of the area and learning about such technical matters for weeks leading up to his visit. Not something we would be attempting on our own.

The alternative is to take our brand new temporary Mexican residence cards to Telcel (who have a tower near us that provides serviceable Wi-Fi at a price ) and get a decent data plan and share that. We are looking at both options for fun.

The recovery of the land is a constant amazement. We found a path ( I use the royal “we” as it appeared after the boys took their machetes out for the afternoon ). This wide perfect path crosses the land from North to South and connects one side to the other. It starts at the highest water Tinaco on the North side near the solar area and end up at our pool. On this path is another water Tinaco we discovered . This is great news as they are not cheap and are immensely useful. When plumbed in will feed the bricksh*t house shower. This is good news as we can set up glamping when we have power and connect water and buy tents and dig terracing and all the other things …..

Now I always had the impression that Canadians were a hardy lot who forged streams and skied mountains and laughed in the face of snow and ice. Well the two from Calgary that are here are letting the side down. I am swimming in the delightfully warm pool while these two shiver and moan about the slight cooling effect of getting in. It is currently minus 16 in Calgary by the way !? They are in cahoots and its not long before they have bought pipe and boxes are emptied and gas is diverted and holes are drilled and before too long there is steaming hot waterfall coming out of the taps. Hot water showers !! Softies. Jayne’s Dad is spoiling her rotten.

The streams and rivers are all running slow and low. The result of this is algae is forming so we drive over green water these days. The seasons bring different gifts of nature. September is fireflies, October is hornets and wasps and November is ticks. We trekked up to the top of the hill and I ended up following a water pipe right through the jungle. I did not take a machete so I had both hands free and I needed them. At one point I was suspended above the ground by vines. An inelegant untangling later I descended through a lot of sharp pointy thorny stuff and ended up on the new pathway at the newly found water Tenaca. A gang of ticks must have had a right laugh following me and jumping on board. At the last count I found seven of them snacking on me. Good job there is no Lyme’s Disease in Mexico. Just well entertained, well fed ticks. I must be delicious . They don’t bother with anyone else.

San Pancho energy is building again. More new places to eat , shop, drink and spend tempt us daily. Many pinky brown tourists spending lots of money on rent. There are still the obligatory stunning sunsets . We have found a sexy bar that serves just about perfect Margaritas while we watch a lot of very thin bronzed and perfectly tattooed floppy haired local youths getting their surfboards wet and slack lining off palm trees.

No escaping the world really. I am in the back of our pick up truck just leaving our very favorite local ladies (who sell us the best cooked chickens) and a helmeted guy on a scooter shouts at me. Do you know “the Poyntons”? … Now much as I never like to admit knowing those crazy buggers I was wrong footed by surprise and confusion. Turns out this bloke from Cape Town knows us all from Afrikaburn and recognised me from there 2 years ago. I had thrown ice at him (we ran ice sales). He jumps in the truck and he gets the tour and lunch and heads back to his new job in PV. We now have our newest volunteer but worryingly more incentive for the Poyntons to turn up!

The past days have been swallowed by designing a battery safe house and solar panel racks. We have also spent ( invested) an age in Ferreterias, electrical and wood shops spending (investing) pesos. We are using Jayne’s Dad skills acquired by building scout camps and his own house . He is currently deployed wiring up our tree house for the arrival of magic sun power. We have gotten used to no power and having no lights and other such luxuries. Candles , head torches and early nights for us. When we test actual light bulbs on the generator it is like coming out of a cave. Seeing things all lit up. We had sort of forgotten the rather significant benefits of seeing things. Our floor needs a mop.

Much swearing and gnashing of teeth from me as both my batteries for my beloved Makita impact driver and drill fail. No charge and no charging. Trips to bloody useless Makita dealer and offers of extortionate priced inferior replacements later I finally clock the obvious. Feelings of both relief and stupidity as I remember we live in a 110v world here. We use the generator 240V outlet to power the 240V charger unit which charges them up as normal. Language and teeth noises improve.

Someone just told me it’s a month till Xmas. How did that happen ! We are not exposed to TV or media hype or advertising so it’s passed us by. By this stage in UK I would be in mild panic mode trying to organise all the things. Not happening here. Not a cracker to be had . I did buy a box of Mi-Julie dates which has made me slightly Xmassy and we picked up a litre of eggnog which we can traditionally ignore for a year or two and throw out when we get around to it. We spotted a sorry looking tinsel tree on a shack today by the side of the road and at the traffic lights someone was selling inflatable penguins alongside the usual lumps of suspicious looking sugar cane and stolen flowers so we are not completely removed from it all.

Surprise turn of events. Jayne’s Dad has become our first investor. We have a number of investment opportunities here (relax this is not a sales pitch) we are working on but he just might have the sexiest. He has just bought a Polaris. Now this Polaris is a 4 seater ATV which is top of the range and very highly sought after by those who know. Amazingly they are advertised for rent at over $250US a day in PV and are ideal for our land and our access road. We can rent our places here with a Polaris at a fair old whack. We need to modify the Bodega to get it through the doors but that should not be too much drama. This is good news. Should get delivery later this week. Want to rent a Polaris mate ?

La Colina Project

Guest Post: First Week in the Jungle

November 25, 2017
by Jayne

My Dad, Alan, has come to visit us in the jungle for three weeks. He’s been reading my blogs since I started blogging in 2012 and decided a couple of days ago to write one for La Colina Project. I hope you enjoy the new perspective of my Dad’s very first blog.

– Jayne

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I decided to come to Mexico to check out what Jayne and Beave are really doing here…as it sounded like quite an adventurous project, and indeed it is and then some.

I packed a picnic cooler with 20 kg of goodies for them including light bulbs, a soldering gun, a watt meter with a whole bunch of wires, plastic cards for direction signs, and a can of shingle nails to nail them up, and two quart jars of special fix-it lube for their truck to solve it’s transmission and differential problems (plus other tools, etc.). I was concerned all the way down on Westjet that somehow some security person seeing this on an xray machine may think this is suspicious. We left Calgary ok and on time, and landed early. The cooler was there… but I couldn’t find the carry on bag that I graciously let Westjet put underneath, as the plane was full and they asked for volunteers to put carry-ons under to free up overhead bin space. Turns out that a guy at the end of the belt in the airport was just taking off random bags including mine to save room on the belt, and it was hidden in with other luggage.

Customs then asked me where I was going, and then said push the red button. Turns out this button is a lottery to decide if your luggage will be searched by xray and hand, or give you a green light to walk out. Mine was green, so the cooler made it through without a hand search.

Then they asked me for the cart holding all my stuff before I got out to the main lobby, meaning dragging the other two cases as I struggled with the cooler… just around the corner, I thought there would be Jayne and Beave to assist… but not to be. Traffic from home had delayed them, and they showed up ten minutes later, all big smiles.

Their blue and white van was just across the street in the parking lot, and Jayne had the parking ticket for exit in her hand as they helped me load my luggage in the back, and gave me the seat of honour in the front. We get to the exit of the parking lot, and the ticket has disappeared. After some discussion with the parking attendant by an overheated looking daughter, he says he will not lower the price of what appears enormous in Pesos, but is only about twenty times the parking rate. Jayne backs up the van, and the search is on for the ticket. After 5 minutes, the ticket magically appears by my luggage, but now the machine beeps and won’t let us out. Turns out too long was taken looking for the ticket, and an additional charge is due for more parking time. Frustrating.

The ride up to La Colina was an interesting one, through a big city, country towns, and finally some two lane paved road with just trees, and massive traffic on the road. We then arrived in San Francisco, which the locals call San Pancho, and decide to go in and eat before it gets dark. We then sat in a bar on the beach and saw the last of the sunset, and a main street lined with many restaurants and other small tourist trap shops. Jayne sorts me out with a Mexican SIM for my phone that costs one quarter of what Rogers roaming would cost me for my stay here, and top-ups of internet are cheaper too.

Jayne and her Dad reunited in San Pancho

The road to La Colina is from that point a real adventure in itself, and of course at night is just a tunnel of folliage and ragged barbed wire fencing with very rough dirt road with some larger stones, and four or five fords across various bits of creeks. There are a couple of random street lights in the middle of nowhere near the end of the power lines, just over half way, and several houses in the distance with the odd light. We arrive at the bottom of the property, and I am escorted into my new home for the next three weeks, which looks like an old Gypsy trailer from the outside, and a well worn, freshly painted RV on the inside with a double bed, and a table and benches that can eventually become a single bed once some cushions are fabricated. I am told the stairs to the yellow door have just been fabricated Rustico in my honour. Look like chain saw cut logs. The accommodation is quite comfy, and I am glad I brought my newly bought Red Lantern.

The whole of the land is on the side of a hill, with part of it then wrapping over top of a ridge. A small bit is sort of a clearing, which a couple of days later magically gets cleared using machetes to make a large open area where the solar panels on order will be located. There are trees everywhere, with small clearings around the buildings.

Since the whole place has been unused for 4 years, and subject to vandals removing anything of perceived value, and leaving large messes, and a jungle doing its best to reclaim what used to be nice buildings and walking paths through it… and even the area around the buildings, great amounts of brush clearing have happened by the three Mexicans hired from down the road who have accomplished an amazing amount in five weeks….along with a lot of work by Jayne and Beave.

Amazingly, not everything of value has been removed, and some of the infrastructure still remains hidden, like a giant puzzle. I have already been following mystery pipes and wires using a dowsing pipe, and will be doing more in subsequent days.

The Treehouse that Jayne and Beave are living in is majestically up on the side of a steep hill, with the swimming pool some 15 meters down and 50 meters away, near the edge of the property. The pool is in amazingly good shape, but needs some more troubleshooting to fix some piping before the pool pump will run and filter water. The water is amazingly clear, but cool.

The Treehouse is a single large room with the magnificent homemade bed with mosquito net screening like a sultan. They have given me similar netting in the Gypsy cottage, but the mozzies are not very vicious at the moment and only appear occasionally.

Jayne and Beave’s Parota Four Poster Bed

The main deficiency is that there are no permanent lights, and J&B have been living like the middle ages with candle light and flashlight head lamps, and tiny fairy lights left over from some past burning man festival. They brought some solar lights that do not work. They marvelled at the amount of light from the Coleman lantern.

We immediately started talking of putting in electric lighting… and I bring out my package of a dozen LED light bulbs I bought for 50 cents each at Rona, as they were subsidized by the Alberta Government last month to the tune of $3 per bulb. I am told that wiring is a priority while I am here, and we subsequently spend three hours of our Saturday afternoon at an Electrical parts supplier deciphering Mexican ways of wiring, and come up with enough bits to wire to almost Canadian standards, which is higher than the Mexicans… I marvel as I walk along the town streets and see many electrical cables and boxes that are totally installed to be practical but not up to our Canadian standards.

We now have a plan, and hopefully in a couple of days will have some permanent lights in the Treehouse, which will be for now powered by the generator, but later on by the solar panels.

We lucked out and the Electrical supplier had a 10 percent sale on everything for Revolution Day weekend, and also had some additional specials on some neat little hot water demand heaters at about $70 Canadian dollars each. Jayne is thrilled, cause she wants hot water showers. So in the end, three are purchased… two for La Colina, and one for me to take home to put in the garage, or at the Scout Camp. Once the required bits to pipe one in are in hand, the Treehouse may have hot water later this week.

Installing the hot water for The Treehouse

We discuss ways of attracting possible guests for the facilities here, and Bird watching, and Geocaching are mentioned. There are many birds here. In Canada I listen to CBC radio in the early morning. Here, it is a collage of many birds, and other creatures creating a dull hum in the night, with the occasional larger noise. There is a continuous shedding going on in the forest… with crashes of larger palm fronds, and other bits. I comment: I don’t want to be standing under one. I also think I hear small creatures wandering outside, but not sure. There are dogs on the next farm that are very loud from the Treehouse, along with the farmer yelling at his cows.

The geocaching discussion continues with thinking if our family created 81 caches in the area… one each of every possible difficulty and terrain, that some cachers would be attracted to find them all…. and perhaps stay here. Heather replies that we would have to cheat on terrain…but I don’t think so… there are many steep treacherous slopes here that could be rated 5 out of 5 with no question by any finder. In fact, J&B insisted that a rope be installed on the hill behind the Treehouse to the water tanks on top of the hill so one has something to hang onto while going up there.

We have been for several meals in San Pancho, all very tasty, and J&B are greeted many times by servers they know, or other locals they have met. It is a very friendly atmosphere, and there is no sense of threat from the Mexicans…or the tourists, of which we meet many also.

A delicious cauldron of steak and cheese

Yesterday we parked in San Pancho with the truck, just recovered from the mechanics clutches. Across the street there was a black flashy ford, with a number of Americans, turns out from Houston Texas. They have this car from a friend, and the keys have been taken swimming… the electronics in the battery operated key now scrambled enough to not start the car, but only activate flashing lights, horn, etc. to which no one in the area are even looking at. The American girl asks for a boost. Jayne gets out Jumper cables, and hails down a car, so she does not have to move the truck and lose the parking spot, which is convenient on this busy Sunday evening. The car is boosted, but the Ford does not want to burst into life. The key corruption is stopping it starting. Monday is Revolution Day, a holiday… so good luck finding someone to sort out this car soon. I noticed it is still there on Monday.

Jayne says she feels safe here… apparently in these established tourist areas, there is not much gang activity, as the whole Mexican economy depends on the tourists.

The tragedy of the day is I have lost my camera, with all of my photos. Fortunately I do have some on Beave’s computer as I gave him a copy of most of them I have taken since I have been here. Hopefully it will show up, as I took some great photos at sundown on the beach last night.

I have been in discussion for some time with Jayne about the possibility of putting in some local internet dishes to move internet from San Pancho, via an intermediate house on a hill, to here. Good news is I can see the house in question from the hill behind the tree house. We await confirmation of the rest of the plan. So the saga continues, and it is an interesting exercise. I can see why things take a while to sort out here.

Jayne and I walked the road up the back side of property to the adjacent waterfalls. Another road with fords across creeks. The waterfalls are quite magnificent and totally undeveloped, with water coming across a width of about two meters. There are a couple of hoses there that feed water to several local farms, and now parts of La Colina has water from there also. Apparently this is the only local water source that is available year round. Like many jungle areas, there are two seasons in the year: rainy, and hot and dry. We are just nicely into the hot and dry, and thus the tourists are arriving.

Today is Revolution day, and we went into town and had waffles after watching a street parade with local children doing various gymnastics… diving through a fiery hoop onto a mattress, and climbing one each other making a human pyramid. There were a few horses at the end, and a band. We came back and decided it is too hot to install electrical plugs, so I am now writing this blog, trying to help Heather in Calgary sort out her phone, and eventually make a phone call that works to Linda who is with our granddaughter Rochelle and mom Kelly in Vancouver for a week. Generally the weather has been tolerable, but it is indeed getting a bit warm in the afternoons.

I have to watch what I touch. Beave is constantly getting bites, and bits. He has had three ticks or more land on him since I have been here and the card type tick remover I brought down from MEC has worked well. We haven’t tried the tweezers with the little hooks on the end yet. I just moved a couple of pipes outside without gloves and something on the second one created a deep burning sensation on my finger. The dirt just seems to collect under fingernails from nowhere.

Anyway, we are having a great time and I have been able to help with some projects… Two more weeks in the jungle to go.

Jungle Journal

Rustico ! is the new Janky

November 19, 2017
by Beave

Been out in the jungle now for 6 weeks. Seems like a huge amount more time has passed…. in a good way. No regrets and much achieved. Tourists are arriving into San Pancho and beach life there is in full swing. I need to preface this by declaring I am perfectly healthy and at no time has there been serious risk to my being . No need to worry Mum.

There is a lot to do and so we have to prioritise. No real routine has evolved but our current focus is getting the apartment above the Bodega and the area around it ready to rent out. We need an income. Our toilet block is now a delightful orange hue. Plumbing repairs to follow shortly. All the high value brass pipe has been nicked so we have a plan to replace it with low value plastic.

I have recently been spending a great deal of energy mending and replacing many screen windows. I’ve even built my first two from scratch. After a while swearing at the wood, pulling bugs out of the varnish , straightening bent nails, and hammering my multi-coloured thumb, time takes on a different dimension and allows you to think about the bigger things, manage your expectations, appreciate the brief moments of success and not be too attached to the result. It’s very much like supporting Newcastle United. Slightly less emotional perhaps.

The apartment is now bright blanco inside and out. As well as the first of the new beautiful screen windows there has been the addition of a solid staircase to get up there created by splitting a tree in half. It’s just the right side of janky. Rustico! is the design theme. We love it.

There has also been a further creation of a large impressive floating Mezzanine area with an even jankier (Rustico!) stair/ladder. We have decided not to make it feel too safe to get up to it and to leave off any safety railings or handrails. We are not aiming to make this space very child friendly or idiot proof. We are arranging for a jungle contract, which will exonerate us from lawsuits. It’s a jungle. Things happen. Be aware and take reasonable care and all will be well,.

Solar planning is also full on. We have realized that trees and sun make shade. The brick-shithouse area is ginger friendly. Only a few hours of baking sunshine a day. Protons bounce off treetops rather than hit the ground where we intend to make our sun energy magic happen. Change of plan. We have now cleared a huge swathe of jungle on the South face of the hill. What used to be a huge Palapa and deck area still stands on shaky bug eaten legs with no roof and a stolen deck clearly elsewhere. Our plan is to have our proton catchers in this sun trap and rebuild the deck. It’s a beautiful spot tucked away and boarded by the stream running from the falls. Should be water running for the next month we think.

Water is disappearing. The well has dropped a meter or two and the creek has all but dried up. We see some pools in the morning and nothing by the afternoon. So only 4 streams to cross to get to us now.

As the water levels drop there is a steady pilgrimage from San Pancho to the streams to collect rocks. River rocks are used everywhere for building and decorating and gardens. Pick up truck loads are removed. So before our best rocks end up cemented into someone’s bathroom we gather and take the Toyota down to the wide stream to test its suspension.

We park mid stream and load up the truck. These boys are small but immensely strong. Even granddad is picking up boulders half his size. The 15 year old is pushing stuff around twice his weight. There is a macho thing happening and I am getting sucked into it. We wait until the rear springs look stressed enough and return to our newly dug out parking area and start to make a rockery of stored stone.

We go back for another load. We want bigger boulders apparently. Granddad is throwing the largest lumps and so I chose a biggish one, which is testing my strength. I get to the tailgate and make the effort to load the thing onto the growing pile and suddenly see sky. The river is very slippy and I have lost my footing. I heave the boulderaway from me as best I can in mid air and land not entirely elegantly in the river. I sit there examining myself and avoiding fuss. Granddad points out a large rock close to my head that I avoided hitting. It’s far enough away and amongst a large number of similar things I avoided so no drama. My ribs are a touch bruised and my thumb (which successfully caught the boulder on the way down) has a very pretty blue nail. It turns darker as I watch. It might not make it. We collect a further couple of loads and then call our rock store complete.

We greet our iron maker who arrives to survey the house for our new doors. Designs are approved and he leaves to get creative. They will look brilliant and make our house secure and sexy.

We then welcome our solar guy & his wife to survey the new chosen location before it is cleared. We make the trek with a couple of friends who also arrive at the same time and bring us beer & Mezcal . This is by far the most people we have had our here in one day. It’s a nice change of pace. All is well until we head back and the hornets reappear. This time they ignore me as I pass them swinging a machete and hit our solar friends hard and fast. Not good. We get to the hosepipe and apply waterfall as quick as we can. Thankfully they are on their way to surf so their day can only improve. We drink beer and Mezcal with our remaining sting free friends and feel guilty.

The hornets have perished under a cloud of OKO. Our brave crew who cleared the land for the solar took spray cans of this specific noxious stuff which they know to be the best thing to discourage the buggers and distributed it onto every nest they could find. Not a job I would have wanted. I only got hit a few times but it was always sudden and unexpected and very painful. You don’t see them coming.

So we have exterminated the hornets. I also killed two large black torpedo shaped flying noise machines that were making sleep impossible. They sounded like helicopters, old broken noisy ones. I felt guilty afterwards, awaiting my Karma. Now I am no Jainist or vegan and my personal level of hypocrisy when it comes to respecting life and beasts is under constant review. I do try and respect life in all its forms and don’t make a habit of swatting flies or poisoning mice/rats. I save frogs and hopping things from the cat daily. I do, however, smack mosquitos to death regularly. My love affair with termites, scorpions and cutter ants is tenuous to say the least. I admit to ending a number of them. We are avoiding the very many recommended poisons designed to kill everything creepy or crawly. We are a source of food to many things and sorta kinda put up with it. Ticks are, however, killed on site. So far the rooster has survived the cull.

Snakes have appeared. Found a tiny baby one curled up under a block I moved which was cute but I kept my eyes out for its mum. Had a few other larger versions ignore me and cross my path quickly. We heard a loud distressed noise from under the house. it was dark but we traced the noise to a mouse that was looking directly at us and was clearly unhappy. I had my suspicions that this mouse was in trouble which was confirmed when we noticed that it is partly inside a snake. I hope that wasn’t Mortimer.

We are becoming very blasé about sharing our space with nature. I work beside the largest spiders and flick all sorts of bug and beasts from my face and hair regularly. I did, however, have my resolve tested when we arrived home a few days ago.

Still gulping air from the walk up the hill I noticed a trail of black ants on our stairs. Not cutter ants and not red ants so nothing to be worried about. I get to our recycle bin next to our door, which seems to be the ants’ destination and find a swarm of them over some unfortunate ex-beast that is all but consumed. Then my feet (which are in my last remaining unbroken sandals) get bitten. Many times. It hurts a lot. We get into the house quickly. I protect my aching feet with rubber welly -boots and head to the balcony to get a broom to counter attack. As I get to the screen door it appears to move. There are ants all over it. I open the door and shut it behind me very quickly. The decking is completely covered in ants. The screen windows are completely surrounded by ants. I check where they are coming from and the walls are covered in lines of ants. I attack. My broom eventually propels half of them over the side but more replace them. They are coming from everywhere at once. It’s biblical. I am now armed with a kill-everything poison spray bottle that we have avoided using except spraying the door-frames to repel scorpions. The ants thankfully don’t like it at all. With thrusts of broom and mists of gunk they start to retreat. A long few minutes later the deck is ant free. I return to the front door and return the remaining invaders to the jungle. I empty the last of the spray on the stairs. Tripe has vanished. Don’t blame him!

We have arranged a day off to meet up with a couple that are friends of our Chapala mechanic ( who we think is hiding from us or has died.) They are working in a dog rescue place not far away and are from New Zealand (we can forgive them that.) Good to see things here through fresh eyes. Also good to have a map of local surf breaks they have tried out. I must get my board wet soon. After the grand tour we end up in Sayalita indulging in one our favorite local delicacies. It’s a burrito without the tortilla, which is replaced with a sheet of fried cheese packed with whatever you like. Fresh octopus in a fried cheese casing is my idea of heavenly heart attack food. The kiwis are off to buy a van in Chapala and then travel Mexico. Sure we will meet up again.

We are preparing for a VIP. Jayne’s Dad is arriving from Calgary for a 3-week visit. The apartment is far from habitable yet so this involves a lot of very hasty upgrades to the “Gypsy Caravan” or shed as I call it. Holes are mended, locks fitted, paint is applied, waterfall is plumbed in, beds are made. The whole of it is cleaned for the first time in many years. It looks pretty good considering. Finishing touch is the obligatory janky (Rustico!) staircase up to the door. I was told the Queen thinks the world smells of paint because everywhere she goes has just been redecorated. I wonder if he will notice.

Our schedule has been interrupted as we have taken some days off to attend a four-day “Architectural Bamboo “ course. We have a heap of bamboo and an endless supply locally, which we want to use. We have a lot of experience building various temporary structures with bamboo around the world. We want to learn more so have negotiated a significant cheeky discount and off to Sayulita we go.

We now understand that bamboo is not good in the wet, or the sun. We also know that bugs love it and that it can’t touch the ground, ever, or it will rot. We know that it is strong on the outside but weak on the inside and needs a lot of pretreatment before we can use it at all. It is not the flexible friend we thought it was. We also know that failing to build a geodesic dome for two days with lengths of bamboo and string is a terrible idea. Being hit in the head by spring-loaded bamboo is also a terrible idea. Thankfully I have a thick skull and little there to damage so I survived. We have met some very good people and are looking forward to working and playing with them again.

We arrive home late and the van gets stuck up the hill before reaching the house. Our 4×4 is back with Jesus. It’s dark and the back wheels are spinning on the rocks that used to be evenly spread as traction but the rains have now made into sporadic piles of rubble. I get out to survey the situation and encourage another run at it. The wheels spin until there is slow forward motion and then sudden momentum as they catch. The van lurches upward and the tyres fling rocks at great speed towards me. I hear them pass very fast and very close to my head. I won’t be doing that again.

Great news! We are informed of the opening of a pub in San Pancho. The first of its kind. It serves home produced beers on tap. Tap beers are something I miss as its pretty much all bottles here. We arrive with some enthusiasm and are greeted by great people behind a large Parota bar very excited about their first day of business after many months of planning. The craft beers they offer are all IPAs. Now I am not adverse to a hop or two but the trend to make beer taste like perfume, toothpaste, shoe polish and feet is not for me. I am assured that for IPA these beers are great examples but I am clearly not an IPA drinker. Beers that I grew up with from Theakstons have spoilt me maybe. Where are the Leo Sayer ( all day-er ) brews that taste like smooth delicious beer and don’t make you stupid after a neckful of them ? Guinness oh Guinness how I miss you.

It is possible that our mechanic in Chapala is still alive and an outside possibility that the Rug-Rod vehicle we bought a few months ago may be in a state of drivability within a foreseeable amount of time maybe soonish. This is potentially possibly good news. A trip to Chapala is in our future, we suspect, sometime, perhaps.

Jungle Journal

White is the new Orange

November 4, 2017
by Beave

So the effect of no 4×4 truck is to persuade Django (our lovely 2×4 van) to take us further than it wants to go. We compromise and park her at our mans ranch which is a little more than half way home. From there we walk.

The plan is to buy only easy to carry things and arrive home before dark. We are not good at this and arrive at the ranch , in the dark with , amongst many other things , a queen size mattress and 80 litres of paint .

Puerta Vallarta ( PV) is in a separate time zone to us. Or should be. Mexico decided that this was inconvenient as large amounts of hungover Gringos did not factor this in and missed their flights. This was solved in a flurry of official stamps and signatures . San Pancho and Sayalita were declared on the same time zone at Puerta Vallarta by the Mexican government. 30 mins up the road the other way the time changes as per traditional International “guidelines” and geography.

We forgot about the clocks changing and arrived home an hour late in the dark. No excuse for the shopping.

We decide to blag a lift with all our stuff the next day and set off home in the dark being fully aware of snakes . There has been sightings of two large snakes on the road between the ranch and our house. It’s OK as we have protective open toe sandals and the light of our one good iPhone. Snakes are our number one thought for nearly a whole minute. As we leave the light and follow the path fire flies are lighting our way. Not just the odd one or two but thousands of them. By the time we reach the creek+ that borders our land there are swirls and waves of them. It’s dizzying and overwhelming. We sit down and try and take it all in. This is one of the most stunning sights I have ever witnessed.

Did not know how many kids were in San Pancho till today. Halloween brings them all on the streets to impress with their dressing up efforts and fill themselves with sugar. Hundreds of sugar crazed spider-bat-witch-frog-zombies. The town itself is almost fully alive now. Renovations in final stages and new old places opening daily. So much more choice to spend your peso. The tourists are coming.

Day of The Dead is a family affair in San Pancho. The locals spend a few days in the graveyard partying with their departed. If grandad loved cards then there is a poker game. If granny was a dancer then there is dancing. There is a somber candle lit procession of girls all immaculately made up as the iconic Katrina character . It’s a spiritual affair. Almost but not entirely unlike the opening scene of a certain bond movie. We have missed our good friends 50th Birthday in Manchester which was Dia De Los Muertos themed. Photos look epic. Skype failed us or she would have had a Mariachi Band play happy birthday from the beach. It’s the thought that counts right ?

Jobs at home are appearing fast. After moving our house tenaco to the other side ( of the hill ) we use the water from the creek+ to fill it & hose down the shower block and bodega. The effect of this is to reveal what will be a rather funky jungle apartment …. Eventually. Previously an aged artist chap who lives even further out somewhere painted on the entire apartment exterior. It is a 360 degree mural depicting night and day in the jungle with plants and trees and butterflies and birds. Now I am all about the art but this never quite made the good list for me. It took a lot of work I can see that but does look like a stage set of the Jungle Book made for a junior school production. The water had removed sections of bird and plant. Time for a change.

We drive too far and spend far too long buying exactly the right shade and hue of paint . We chose a subtle semi-matt terracotta bloom for our entire exterior and get a ton of boring white for the inside. It’s an early morning start to avoid the sun and I take to the bodega armed with brush and intension.

Jayne would like to help but has been stung many times in many places by flying hornet terrorists. She is not in a good way with crawlingly itchy inflammed wounds and being pretty effectively poisoned. We have anti-scorpion bite strength anti-hystamines and Mezcal. If she makes it through the day she has agreed to see a doctor.

Some more rustic locals use scorpion bites as medicine. When the flu is setting in they deliberately get themselves stung to liven the immune system. Hornet stings are good for arthritis we are informed. Jayne is unconvinced but large areas of her neck and arms do appear arthritis free.

There is now a substantial chunk of semi-matt terracotta bloom on the shower block . A lesser chuck on the bodega apartment. I rehydrate by sitting in the creek+ and review the situation. The shower block looks orange. The bodega apartment has a wall with very distinctive birds and plants covered in a non-opaque orange wash. I decide to cover all depictions of beasts and plants with a white undercoat before deploying the orange… semi-matt terracotta bloom . After too much sun and not enough cold beer I have it all covered. I sit in the reviewing position and accept a delivery of just the right amount of cold beer from my poisoned invalid who is slightly conscious. . We both look at the very orange shower block and the now beautifully clean white Bodega apartment. White it is then…… We now have a disturbingly large supply of orange paint.

+We have had a river that became a stream but it is now certainly a creek. Soon it will be a creek bed.

There is a growing dark patch of what looks like fungus on the trunk of the tree outside the bodega. I am warned away from it so have to go and look. The patch on ill advised close inspection is hundreds of caterpillars that excrete noxious stuff and must be avoided. You can’t tell till you are too close.

“Mackino” is coming . It has been foretold since we arrived but now it is coming. The wise ones have declaerd the rainy season over and our road needs to be fixed. Our van wants to come home. It’s a real beast of a Mackino. It tears up tonnes of earth and shifts rocks from road and river bed and arrives out side our place. It rips us a new road right in front of our eyes. It then drives onto the land making a driveway as it goes. A very large area of brush and sharp things are removed and a brand new area of our land appears. Somehow it has danced around the new lime tree that is uncovered. We now have lime, avocado , papaya, lychee, mango and passion fruit trees all waiting for us to water them enough to fruit . No pressure. Mackino is to return and forge us a roadway & parking for van and truck next to our house. We love Mackino !

The new road is really awful, quite terrible in fact . For us , however, it is a delight. All those lovely janky rocks are in different places and it has taken a good minute off our transit time to town. Better than this is the fact the Django can get to our house. For the first time ! I no longer have to carry too much stuff from the ranch in the dark ( yes that has become a regular thing ).

Truck lives. It has taken a while. Jesus the mechanic performed his miracle despite much faffing about and we now have two vehicles out here. There is more to be fixed and we have arranged a constant supply of parts from USA through a new friend who flys there and back regularly to his restaurant in Colorado with extra luggage space. He’s our new best friend probably. Over time we can get a whole Toyota shipped down in 50 Ib lumps.

Coco-nuts are not what they seem. Coco de Agua is how they call the Bounty Bar ones we all know and have an opinion on. What was new to me was the popularity of Coco Nuts. We have an endless supply out here. They are small and tough and after much work reveal a thin layer of soft orange flesh that tastes unsurprisingly like coconut but with an added exotic flavour I can not yet best describe. Kids love em.

Now there have been some incidents that have been sent to test our resolve. One of which I am still bemused by. Our kitchen space with beautifully fitted new sink just needed a coat of polyurethane to seal the wood surfaces. All kicheny things were temporarily balanced on chairs and tables and a new varnish coat was applied . Now we realise that a humid tree house is not the best environment to dry anything. We really do understand that to be true.. however. It’s been over a week now of sharing our space with kitchen stuff. The surfaces in our kitchen are distinctly sticky. Just sticky enough to glue anything we leave on them in place. We have decide to find it amusing rather than stickily frustrating. We are convinced that if we give the stated 4 hour drying time another week or two all will be well. We will have a worktop with the history of the past few weeks glued to it and we will one day get our chairs and table back.

Good news today is that we will not run out of water. Quite a major thing. There was an issue. The old guy who owned the land above us where the waterfalls are died last year. The current caretaker decided last week to fence off the waterfalls, remove everyones water lines and refuse to provide water or access to the falls unless she is paid. She is the wife of another older guy who died due to a fall at the waterfalls recently. It’s all very strange and a bit of a worry. The waterfalls are gorgeous , a local attraction and are right next to us. They also provide year around water to all of us around here which is especially important during very dry months. Much land in Mexico is actually owned by the Ejido tribe which keeps the land in trust for the people of Mexico. One of the many reasons you need so much legal advice when you buy land here. Lots of folk think they own land here. Thankfully this is such a case. The Ejido tribe have ruled the waterfalls belong to the people and can’t be owned or commercialised. Relief.

Now the most magic sought after wood around here is Parota. Our house is pretty much made of it. It resists all that nature throws at it , brushes off termites and mould and rot. When something is made of Parota it lasts and costs. During the storm a huge old Parota fell in the river closest to town. A local company bought it immediately from the ranchers who owned the land and set about it with chain saws. All the offcuts mysteriously disappear every night. A few mysterious offcuts have appeared in my house this morning with the full family crew. I help carry massively heavy lumps of Parota up all the steps avoiding our new seedling plantation usefully located on them. Add a chainsaw , a hammer and a handful of industrial nails and we have a new four poster Parota bed to house our new mattress. Let it dry out for a month or two and we will stain it to match the house. We promised that we would not compromise on a decent bed. We have achieved no compromise at very little cost. Not one item from Home Depot ++ either. Great result .

++ We have boycotted Home Depot and Walmart in PV who both offer overpriced everything in exchange for “a gringo friendly environment.” We have found them not only expensive but fairly useless and so our mission to support local business is not only a much more human, practical and friendly experience but saves us a load of cash too.

It’s full moon and 3 am and the jungle is lit with a moony glow and my laptop. Insects are singing more softly tonight. Maustrappe is on my shoulder purring like a well fuelled generator. Moonlight picks out the climbing vanilla next to the balcony and a patch of dormant orchids . It’s a peaceful place. I am relaxed and motivated . Good job. I’ve six windows to build today.

La Colina Project

Making a Jungle a Home

November 1, 2017November 1, 2017
by Jayne

What is it that makes a place home?

We arrived in Mexico nearly two months ago.

To me, it feels like we have been here much longer, and Mexico feels like home.

I love waking up snuggled between Beave and Maustrappe the cat, listening to the morning orchestra of birdsong, woodpeckers, neighbour’s rooster, and the local cowherd with his distinctive shouts. When I open my eyes I am greeted by a million shades of green through the haze of the mosquito net over our bed. Our house now has all that we need (other than power, but that’s coming).

Our biggest challenge in the house is refrigeration. To that end we bought a small chest freezer, which we plug in when we run the generator (about every 2 or 3 days) and we bring bags of ice back from town. It works like a big cooler box, and keeps our milk, cheese and other essentials cool. I’m looking forward to having a fridge once the solar system is installed.

Every day we make progress. It’s a very rewarding way to live, knowing that poco a poco (little by little) we are building a sanctuary, for ourselves, for the wildlife and vegetation of the forest, and for the people who visit.

I cried the day we had to cut some trees down to make way for the sun. We feel very strongly that our place is to protect this slice of nature which we have the honour of shepherding, and to fell those strong, graceful beings was heartbreaking. Don’t get me wrong, it is part of looking after the forest, and had to be done. Losing those trees makes space for the rest of the jungle to thrive, and we will be using the wood on the land, but still it hurt.

Click here to see a video of the end of one of our trees

I feel everything very strongly here in the jungle. I think it is because we feel the impacts of every action so clearly and visibly. In corporate life I often felt like much of what we were doing had little to no impact, it is hugely motivational to see the results of one’s actions – seeing the pool water clear after adding chlorine, green shoots resulting from planting seeds, and people greeting you by name because you took the time to introduce yourself the last time you crossed paths.

Nursery on the steps – the start of our permaculture gardens.

The other night we were walking home and when we reached the streams, there were hundreds or maybe thousands of fireflies all around us. It was one of the most magical moments of my life. Walking down the stream, being led home by blinking fairies all around us, I felt like I would burst with happiness. The reason we were walking at night? Because our truck, which we depend on to get down the 1km dirt road, started making terrible grinding noises, an it is now with a mechanic being fixed. The truck upset me much more than it should have. A combination of annoyance that we have just spent a lot of money buying a 4×4 and having it fully overhauled, and fear that the cost of repair is going to blow our very precarious budget.

I need to learn to feel freely and completely, but not let the emotion overtake me or bring down those around me.

Beave and I spend so much time together that our moods have a much greater affect. If one of us is happy, sad or angry, the other can’t help but feel the consequences. It makes being upset even worse, because you know that it is not just yourself who is suffering from it. However joyful moments are fully enjoyed. There are two sides to every coin, and we spend a lot more time being happy than sad.

I am grateful every day that Beave and I are so well suited, for otherwise this crazy undertaking would not be possible.

In the past two months I have learnt a lot about our new country.

1. The people are incredible. Both Mexicans and those who have chosen Mexico to be their home are welcoming, kind, friendly, cheerful and generous.

Our neighbour Rogelio greeted us the first time we drove past his ranch with a big smile, and he has been the one person who has most helped us. We are incredibly fortunate to have him as our friend and neighbour. (I’ll write a whole post about him soon.)

We’ve met many people in town, and now any time we walk down the main road we run into friends. We have found favourite hardware stores and restaurants, and are greeted with huge smiles as soon as we walk in. In Las Varas, a town about 40 minutes North of us, our friend Jesus, who owns a couple of delicious taco restaurants, will drop everything the second he sees us, and take us to the best place to buy whatever it is we need, be it a new water tank, or a 20kg bag of oranges to put our new orange squeezer to good use.

2. Things happen in their own time and space here. Patience is a requirement. Lines and queues are a way of life, and it is normal to spend over an hour buying paint, or applying for a tax code, or getting a chequebook. The thing is, it’s okay, because time moves more slowly here, and everything gets done eventually.

3. While the cost of living is significantly less than in the UK, things still cost money. (Shock of the century, I know!) I’ve been writing down everything we spend, so that we can predict our expenses and figure out how much income we need to break even. Our savings have been going down very quickly, but that is what we knew would happen with all the investments we have been making in the buildings, solar power, vehicles and the cost of the land itself. We do however need to ensure that we’re finding opportunities to secure an income. So much to think about!

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I have no doubt that buying La Colina was the right thing for us to do, and despite the few moments of upset, I am full of anticipation for what the next two months and beyond will bring.

It is wonderful being home.