Blog - Page 7 of 10 - La Colina Project

A beautiful lotus growing in our pool

Currently more of a pond…

Jungle Journal

Spider Eyes and a Chicken Nunnery

June 22, 2018
by Beave

So I’ve been banging on about the rains coming for weeks and they finally arrive early and in style. Last night was the second night of rain. We have spent a very sedate day sweating and both recovering from my man flu. We mostly watched Netflix and waited for sleep to take us. No rush. The nightly chorus of tin whistle bugs is done and at midnight we drift off. At 1 am I am awake. The jungle is in instant shadow as the whole sky lights up in flashes. It’s chucking it down. Real tropical rain. The roof is holding up well and the ground is soaking it all in (for now) so there is little to worry about. Then the frogs kick off.

Considering how dry and water free it has been up to this point it is illogical in the extreme that all of a sudden a few hours of rain can create all the frogs. Where have they all suddenly come from?? I can’t count how many but the noise is deafening. Can’t hear the rain for them. I spend the next 4 hours in my man flu misery reading and listening. Amongst many others I identify a “base cello’ frog, a “scooter with a bad battery trying to start” frog and a particularly irritating “everything is hilarious and I’ve just huffed some helium” frog. The rains reduce by 5 am and my book is finished. The frogs care not and are still having a good old sing. I pass out.

The frog orgy has left without cleaning up. The evidence is everywhere. Frog and toad spawn had filled the previously dried up jungle pond. The sight of the swimming pool is shocking. There are about two dozen large frogs in there. I manage to rescue the few survivors and then start the body count. I fish them out of the pool and arrange them on a rock for curiosity purposes. It’s carnage.

I arrange the dead frogs on a rock beside the pool and return to the tree house. We are somewhat surprised by a high pitched scream. The local pool company has turned up for a visit and the girl who is examining the pool has just discovered my frog rock display. She is loudly unimpressed. Her colleague is highly entertained.

Curiously this whole frog rave lasted only two nights. They are still out there being irritatingly loud but this is an after party crowd. They now sound like clowns with bike horns and give it their all for about 20 minutes then shut up for an hour… then start again. It’s better than it was….

We now have lots of water. The well is filling up again (just in time), we have three out of five full tinacos, the pool level has improved, all the plants and herbs are thoroughly watered and the solar panels are washed. These are all good things.

Last week we wondered why our solar batteries were low. A brief examination of the panels showed that in just over a week the entire solar array had acquired a thick coating of twigs, leaves and muck from the shedding trees. How we had any power at all was a mystery. As our ladder was being used elsewhere an enthusiastic, brave and acrobatic friend who was visiting climbed up with broom and removed all the crap. Battery power renewed in no time. It was on our list of maintenance jobs to do this regularly but now there is no need. The rains have polished them to a sunbeam friendly gleam.

It’s time for planting stuff out. We have bougainvilleas to place on the fence line. Also a spontaneous planting of sunflower seeds has produced a dozen or so competing shoots that need a home. We have collected orchids in dormant state and tied them to trees. Theoretically these will suck up the moisture in the air and flower in a month or two.

I have had a nagging request for some time. Someone wants chickens. The opportunity presents itself when we get a call informing us that a local vet-student has chickens to rehouse. Our friends are bringing her and her family over to meet us on Friday… with chickens. I spend a day building a chicken nunnery tractor. A nunnery because it will NOT be housing any bloody roosters. Sorry girls. The purpose of the tractor element is to allow the chickens to eat all the scrub and insects underneath their home and then we move it along. In this way the jungle floor is fertilized and cleaned progressively and the chickens are safe, dry, fed and producing eggs. Chicken safety out here is something we need to understand better. Pretty much everything eats chickens. Eagles, snakes, jaguar, ocelots, us. They are famously delicious. Have to see how that turns out. The process of building all day in a ginger puddle has left me exhausted. I have been fooled by a few cooling showers and protective afternoon clouds and managed to get dehydrated.

I recover with pints of homemade Jamaica (pronounced “hamica”), AKA cold hibiscus tea, which is a red plant base that we boil up to make a concentrated syrup. Added to a heap of water and ice with lime juice it is as refreshing a thing as we have found. There is an endless jug of the stuff in the fridge.

My recovery is somewhat disturbed by the sound of the cat fighting with one big fat cicada type bug. It’s the ones that make all the racket at night fall. Now they are loud enough half a mile away but having one being chewed by a cat a few feet away is deafening. I drag myself up and grab a cloth. My first attempt at rescue only manages to scare it into a limping flight with its one remaining good wing as it attaches itself to the window screen. It’s bigger than I thought. A good handful. I make my move but it’s too quick and noisily collides with my face and disappears in silence. It’s nowhere to be seen. Mausetrappe and I look at each other in confusion. I feel a scratching sensation and am then startled out my wits by a massive noise in my ear! The little sod was hiding on the back of my neck!! I grab him and throw him hard onto the floor. The cat pounces and diverts the thing under the sink. He is silent again. Not for long. The cat gets him in her mouth. The sound is unbelievable. I grab him. My whole hand is vibrating wildly as it screams. On the balcony I shake the cloth in my hand and I see him shoot directly upwards into the trees. Gone. It’s raining and very dark. Around me there are slowly moving majestic lights. The fireflies are back!!

Mango season is upon us. I was put off mangos by spending a lot of time in Montreal. There was a phase of putting mangos on everything. It was trendy to have eggs and bacon with a lump of mango. Bugger that! I am , however, seduced by the laden local mango trees. Each mature tree produces up to 250 kg a season. We had to consider that when looking at land with a dozen mango trees. Thats literally tons of mangoes to deal with. The little ones taste better than the big ones.

Another welcome return is that of the toilet paper butterfly. This is unlikely to be the scientific name but they can best be described as a lump of toilet paper floating around in the wind. They are bright white and huge. The wings are far too big to be efficient so they kinda flop around randomly and somehow stay in the air. Inelegant but stunning to watch.

The chickens arrive. They are an ugly bunch. Dirty brown with bare arses. Tail feathers are optional we discover. The chicken nunnery is placed outside our balcony so we can keep them under review for the first few weeks. The ground is uneven so we create a rockery around the nunnery to discourage beasts from getting in. The chickens are installed and we decide to keep them locked in for a day or two so they learn this is where they live. Not necessary. Despite the door being left open all day the chickens don’t move from their luxurious perches in the shade. We learn that organic free-range chickens are mainly conceptual. Despite acres of lovely range to be free upon most chickens prefer to stay inside and view the outside from the inside. Despite being agoraphobic & antisocial our five chickens appear happy enough. I have decided to name our nunnery inmates. Sister Kwafi, Sister Pybus, Sister Bricklebank, Sister Allenby & Sister Bland. Any comparison with anyone with similar names is entirely deliberate. Eggs are in our future.

There have been a few nights now of heavy to very heavy rains. In retrospect many things have indicated rains were coming. The lime trees started to bear fruit again and we found a heap of bananas appearing the week before the rains came. We found a tomato growing wild next to the house, the last flower on the vanilla orchid appeared and was pollinated and the roof got fixed, all the very day before the rains came.

The ground is alive with bright glowing red beetles. We spend some hours at the waterfall pools and they are everywhere. Individually they are fascinating but they have a trick. They gang together and make balls of themselves. A bright red shape the size of a golf ball. I have no idea why. It doesn’t seem an efficient love in and there is no feeding frenzy going on. See how long they last. They are harmless and very, very pretty.

There is a phenomena that I was convinced was fake news. If you shine a torch or headlight at a certain angle into the jungle thousands of tiny glowing lights reflect back at you. Every one of these lights is a spider looking back at you. Well I had these lights shown to me a few times but refused to believe the spider story. This was until the tinaco above our tree house sprang a leak and I needed to change out a fitting immediately and the sun was setting. It’s not something you would chose to do without daylight but I had no choice. On the way up the hill my headlight caught a mass of reflections, which I ignored until the tinaco was fixed. On the way down the hill in the dark I decided to explore these tiny lights close up. Unbelievably its true. I got close enough to confirm that the closest dozen lights were indeed spider eyes reflecting back at me. They were only tiny spiders but they shone like diamonds. Spooky.

And with the rain comes the crabs. It’s a famously strange and wonderful sight here in Nayarit to see hundreds of thousands of large pink crabs heading a kilometer for the sea after hibernation all year. If you are in the way it’s described as biblical. There is no avoiding them! We have avoided them as we are just far enough away from the sea. Just. The run to the ocean is over now but the bodies of those that didn’t quite make it are everywhere.

The bugs have changed again this month. We had weeks of tiny little buggers that felt like grains of sand when you caught them trying to nibble on you. More recently there is a medium sized loudly buzzing night time arrival. It’s a good job we have the nets on the bed. You hear them first and then see them head butting the fabric screen loudly. It’s impossible to sleep with these antics so I have taken to punching them off the net. They cope with this tactic rather well. Despite getting a full knuckle punch in their face they come back at you! They have heavy armor that looks like a nutshell. It can take two or three well placed punches to put off a “nut bug”. The cat is far more efficient and crunches them loudly and leaves them in a pile for me.

The Summer Solstice is upon us. The longest day. Tomorrow in the UK Christmas cards start appearing in the shops. It is also the anniversary of the burning of an effigy on Baker Beach in San Francisco over 30 years ago from which the Burning Man event evolved. One of the founders of the event died recently and there is a worldwide acknowledgement of gratitude for the connections this event created. My life would certainly be very different if those guys hadn’t decided to burn something on a beach that day. So to mark the occasion we gather with friends both new and old and knock up a “palm man”. We collect mango margaritas and head to the beach. It was all rather beautiful.

The rains have held off now for a week. What appeared to be the rainy season coming early was actually the back end of Hurricane Bud. The first of the season. The real rainy season is due soon enough. We are preparing slowly.

There is no doubt that Mexico is now a great footballing nation. It only takes a single goal but timing is everything. We watch this goal live from our friend’s restaurant packed with locals. We also endure an hour of waiting for the Germans to equalise but incredibly it doesn’t happen !! Torture to ecstasy. The place goes nuts. Moscow will be out of tequila in the morning. We have the might of glorious South Korea next. Despite the dull as ditch water England performance against Tunisia Jayne’s footballing needs are satisfied. We are, however, asking ourselves if getting up at 6 am on Sunday to watch England v Panama is worth the effort… probably.

Jungle Journal

Ginger Puddles

June 5, 2018
by Beave

It’s all getting very different. The tropics have two seasons. Wet and dry. Right now it’s absolutely dry with the exception of the air, which holds a consistent 30-degree heat and manages well over 80% humidity most of the time. By the afternoon it is pretty much impossible to move. I am effectively a ginger puddle from 2pm. Every day.

The light fades down at around 8.30pm as the sun hits the ocean. In the past couple of weeks full volume creatures accompany this event. These tiny bugs are the sound of the wet season rains coming to turn our dust into mud. The rain is due about 20 days after they start we are told. It kicks off as a kind of throat singing and morphs into the noise that a couple of dozen three year olds would make with a crate of tin whistles. It’s loud and tuneless. There is no other option but to stop and wonder how something so small can create such a bloody racket. The noise travels for miles and ends as abruptly as it begins when the dark sets in.

There has been a few recent Coatis sightings. They have been using their properly fingered hands to open sealed containers and scoff or re-distribute anything remotely edible they find in the outdoor kitchen. We have been tidying up after them for weeks now. These monkey/bear/raccoon type creatures are fearless and we now know why. The local dog packs chase them up to the very top of the tallest trees but they had a surprise when they cornered one last week. One particularly terrorized Coatis decided that enough was enough and deployed its claws. One dog ended up with a significant hole in its neck and poor old Tripod has had his face horrifically rearranged. How these scratty dogs heal so fast from what are no doubt serious injuries continues to impress. We won’t be cornering a nice cute Coatis anytime soon.

Jayne’s mother has not survived the journey from the UK well. Despite feeding her daily with the requisite flour and keeping her in the fridge there was not enough feedback to justify the effort. So we said goodbye and started another one. Sourdough bread is a process. New mother has faired better. The yeast in the air here has produced what has turned out to be a far more useful substance which has produced, with some effort, a pretty impressive and delicious loaf.

Lulled into a false sense of security we tried to reproduce the event. Despite hours sitting beside the outside oven and fantasizing about warm sourdough slices dripping in butter and marmite it was not to be. Our first attempt turned out to be a Frisbee shaped brick of solid dough. Even the dog wouldn’t touch it. Not to be put off we persevered. After further hours swatting bugs and staring through the oven door our second attempt appeared. It sort of defied description but a sourdough loaf it was not. It was more of an oversized hockey puck heavy weapon. It took a great deal of effort to throw it into the jungle. I’m sure it will be there for a very long time. Our bread making adventures are suspended. It’s not her mother’s fault apparently.

Ironically it was Mexican Mother’s Day (Thursday) and US/Canadian Mothers Day (Sunday) that very week. Our mother here remains well fed and refrigerated and ready for when the need for a marmite butty exceeds our reluctance to invest further hours staring at an oven. There is good bread in our future.

Big news. Our first pineapple crop is ready. Ok so it’s only one but it’s a start. Smells amazing.

My Spanish is coming along but way way too slowly. I understand most of what is said between Gringos and locals as this is a slower paced and more basic version of conversation. When two Mexicans add tequila and start an enthusiastic chat I’m lost in no time. This is a result of quite spectacular prevarication on my part. If there is any job that needs doing it takes priority over me spending time learning Spanish. Now this is very good for the ever ready composting loos, washing up and general house tidiness but vastly extends the time I can confidently and effectively converse with our growing number of Mexican friends. It’s so important. But here I am writing this blog about my need to learn Spanish rather than actually learning Spanish. Me bad.

Our good friends have bought a lovely house in the next town and we are helping them with getting the garden sorted out and overseeing some building work. I have always had great respect for my friends who are architects and structural engineers and always considered this an alternative path should I ever have the funds and motivation to re-train myself one day. What I have realized over the past weeks is that stress levels when building things for yourself is a different world that building things for someone else. What if something goes wrong? Are the boys doing everything right? What am I missing? It’s not my house! The responsibility! Thankfully all seems to be going very well and in a few days there will be a magnificent palapa on the roof to compliment all the new hand rails and neatly groomed garden. I will ask permission to publish some photos when it’s all done. Mightily relieved. We also get to nick their Wi-Fi whenever we go over so that has helped fuel our new habit of binge watching series on Netflix.

The Ceveceria (pub) has shut for the season. This is hard to take but our great friends who dedicate themselves to keep us all in pints deserve a break. It’s interesting to note the difference between a beer serving establishment and a pub. It’s all about community. The place we all get to know each other and meet up. The font of all knowledge and gossip. There is so much creatively, socially and economically that comes about from creating a space like this and drinking beer within it. That said we have to find an alternative social venue for the next few months. There are enough of us crazies around here that intend to sweat out the rainy season. We decide to have a pool party while we work it out.

So the pool finally becomes more than a sanctuary for one overheated ginger person. Many many friends arrive and after a very long and successful night it is clear that we need to continue to make the effort socially. It’s so worth it.

When a bunch of us get together there are recurring topics that arise. Real Estate is one of them. Our own experience in going through the performance and drama that is buying property in Mexico makes us think we know a little bit about it. In truth we know a lot less that we think we do. It’s an extraordinarily complex process and there are so many trips and hazards on the way that it takes a great deal of effort and good fortune to get through unscathed. We have been asked by a number of people to help them get through it all and the more we learn the more we need to. Finding out who owns the land (Ejido land or otherwise) and what you can officially do with it should you be able to buy it , and what permissions you need and if a great bleeding highway will be built right next to it are all pretty much a mission to find out.

There is a large Cuota Toll highway scheduled to be completed between Guadalajara and Puerto Vallarta over the next few years. We were told about this a year ago and it was a real consideration for us when we looked at buying our land here. By some good luck and slight of hand we acquired the GPS coordinates showing exactly where the road is planned to be. Many of the local estate agents don’t have that information.

The highway is scheduled to cut through the bird sanctuary and many miles of protected forest and jungle. It will skim past the entrance to our land about 200m away. The construction will require a 60m wide corridor being cut through unique and irreplaceable natural environment. It is a travesty ecologically but this is Mexico. Payments have allegedly been made. Money has allegedly been washed clean. Politicians have allegedly been bought.

In practice the road will be too expensive for most people to use. It costs at least a day’s wages to use the road, which saves between 2, and 3 hours driving compared to the alternative free road that exists now (the infamous route 200). There will be tourists and the wealthy, some buses and a few trucks using it but few others. This is the same with other Cuota (toll roads) in Mexico. We have used them and there is practically no other traffic on them. You can travel for many miles and not see another vehicle in either direction. Massive waste of money and resources.

The government has paid off the compulsory land purchases already so much of the money has already been spent. Lots of locals with new pick up trucks. The road is already built up to about 40 miles away. The construction crews are due to arrive with us in a year or so. It’s pretty much a done deal but there is a chance of stopping the route through the protected jungle. It’s not a big chance but it’s a chance.

The current government in Mexico is right wing and the last two elections have ended controversially. We are told that the first time they got into power they did not get the majority vote but declared themselves the winners and that was it. The last election the vote count was called off at midnight when they were slightly in the lead and all other votes were not officially counted. If they had been they would not be in power. The next election is next month. The opposition party is standing on an anti-corruption ticket and want to make Mexico “work for the many not the few.” If they get in they will have a much more sympathetic ear and could overturn decisions made where corruption is proved. Lets see what happens.

Leave No Trace : Leave Art . My mantra for the past few years. Entire civilizations have come and gone and left no other history except their art for us to judge them by. Art has arrived!! We have been blessed with the arrival of mural artists who have transformed our orange block and inspired me take brush in hand and practice. If you are inspired in any way to leave us some art in any form then please get in touch.

Our roof has been a worry for some time. It looks pretty and functional from the inside but the outside is buggered. It has had numerous trees and plants growing out of a thick layer of compost that the palm leaves that were installed 8 years ago have now turned into. When it rains there is a mad rush to cover vulnerable areas of stuff with plastic and deploy buckets to divert and capture the brown water that seeps through the compost. It’s not a good thing. We need a new roof.

Budget constraints and our reluctance to move out of our home for a week or two have lead to a compromise. We have a large 6M x 9M sheet of industrial plastic, a roll of wire and 40 huge palms leaves. In the hands of our man, his Dad, his son and his mate this is sufficient to create a waterproof roof in under 3 hours. I attempt to help but end up covered in ancient compost to the amusement of all. I helpfully pass around a few beers and brush away the fall out. We have a functional roof!!

Mexican man flu has descended. I again have a near fatal dose and am suffering in peaceful silence and equanimity. Jayne has a very mild dose of girl flu which is best cured by activity such as cooking and caring for me. This makes her very happy. I might yet survive.

It’s 3 am and I wake up in my ginger puddle of man flu. It’s raining hard. First time in over 6 months. I get up from my sick bed and wobble onto the balcony and get instantly very wet and cold. I return to my damp warm bed. The roof is holding up. I don’t have the energy to be buggering about with buckets and am very grateful. Mausetrappe makes a loud and dramatic entrance. She is entirely unimpressed with whatever this is. We remember that she is probably less than 10 months old so won’t remember rain and certainly not the heavy, cold, get you wet instantly stuff. She decides that my puddle is better place to be and settles in for the night.

Jungle Journal

La Cucaracha….

May 19, 2018
by Beave

It is becoming increasingly apparent that we need to know more about the birds and the folk who dedicate their lives and purses chasing around the world looking at them. It just happens to be World Migratory Bird day this past weekend and the San Pancho birder/twitcher community is having an event at a local bar, which we agree is worth the entrance fee to attend. The event is under attended which gives us the chance to properly meet the head of the local bird watching company and his family. He has been here forever and knows pretty much everything there is to know on the subject. He is probably the foremost expert on birds & their habitats in this region.

We learn a great deal. It turns out this whole area is unique and a very attractive prospect for the bird friendly. It’s a huge draw for many tourists. They are predominantly retired, in the higher budget bracket and from Canada and theUSA. The issues we need to look at will be to cater for older guests who may be used to room service and a touch more luxury than we currently offer. Transport over the rivers during rainy season will also be a challenge.

Another bonus for not having a large crowd at the event is that our odds of winning a prize in the raffle are greatly improved. We leave the event much wiser and with a free night in a Hotel in Sayulita and a free brunch for two (endless Mimosas included) at the Polo Club when it reopens for lunch in December.

One of our newly met friends is a girl from France who has been employed by the Polo Club this year to conduct environmental impact assessment and recommend actions. The Polo club has bought up over 250 hectares of land. That is a huge chunk of San Pancho. They have an immense and beautifully designed and executed club house, restaurants, beach club and stables. It’s vast and very very well funded. I have never seen a game of Polo up close and have never been dressed well enough to be let into the Polo Club so we arrange to visit early the next morning to take a bird watching tour there and check the place out. We are in a small group who are clearly used to these things by the size of their camera lenses and telescopic viewing contraptions. We are given the task of logging sightings for an International Survey taking place simultaneously on every continent. There are, unsurprisingly, many types and numerous quantities of tropical birds. We recognize all of them from our land. Our host has the skill to be able to identify the species and number of birds we are going to see from the song/calls. It’s an impressive skill.

We are on a path through the foresty jungle and come across a gathering area where art has been installed. There are faces crafted onto huge rocks and stand alone sculptures. Smaller rocks in the shape of body forms and obscure natural creations which give the whole place a magical vibe. I study the art while the others study the birds. This is inspiring. They are all formed by shaping clay-stone around a wire-wood cage-frame . It’s simple but very effective. I would love to have this sort of art throughout our land. Would be great thing to do. Need to learn more about the process. Our French friend tells me she will put us onto the local artists. We “borrow” a few cuttings of yellow bamboo from beside the Polo field and head back enthused by the art and the potential to introduce our bird population to more people. If we can attract a younger, slightly more adventurous and less needy type of bird loving guest then that would be perfect.

Our needy pool has been given a good amount of attention. The pool has been considered a luxury bonus item for months so has been slightly neglected despite being constantly attention seeking. Things are changing fast. The humidity is now 80% plus and rising by the afternoon. The pool will soon become essential for ginger life. The only place to cool off. We bite a further bullet and pay the money to have the guy who has fixed pools for 8 years to come and banish the stubborn green that all the chlorine we can find will not shift. In 24 hours the pool is transformed. It looks like a real actual proper posh whistle clean pool! Already it’s getting well used. Even our delicate Calgary princess has approved the balmy warm water temperature and is now a regular feature bobbing about on some inflatable ice cream device.

We are visited by friends from town for lunch who generously bring us a box of crispy slices of bacon. It is well understood that bacon improves most things. In this case it’s task is to improve a bottle of tequila and limes that they have also brought for us. We have pre-lunch first courses of shots of tequila, followed by lime and then bacon to finish. We discovered in a very short time that bacon gets you drunk ! Who knew ??

Mausetrappe has been, as usual, very generous. Mice are a very regular gift and sometimes even whole ones. More recently there have been regular piles of cockroaches (cucurachas) left as morning offerings. They are harder to deal with as cockroaches have a bizzare play dead feature. They look pretty dead, upside down and motionless on their backs in a pile of fluff and other bugs until you try and pick them up. They then spring to life and try to escape. It’s a game. There have also been a few too many cockroach sightings for us around the kitchen sink. We dismantle the still slightly sticky kitchen worktop, clean everything and cover it with vinyl. We deploy anti-bug spray in all the places. Next morning I get to play the alive or dead? game with 18 (we counted) full size upside down blighters spread around the place. The cat had clearly lost interest in gathering them in a pile for me. Problem solved.

So we have officially become local media sluts. Our friends who dined with us recently have put us as lead feature in the world famous San Pancho Life newsletter. We can hardly walk down the street anymore. Fame is such a sweet burden.

We are now even more officially Mexican. The local hospital is free for Mexican residents as long as we are registered for Seguro Popular which is their equivalent free at point of service health system. It includes all medication & treatment and is impressive considering the alternative on the other side of the wall. The registration lasts till 2021 and involves the correct amount of pedantic messing about, creative administration and flirting with large ladies. We managed it. This is a main benefit of our temporary residency.

Our residence cards runs out in September when we reapply for a further 3 years which is pretty much guaranteed to go through smoothly. We then get the right to be full Mexican citizens. This has a number of financial benefits but also means we cannot own a vehicle that is registered outside of Mexico. So this might be a touch premature but if anyone would like a well loved 1989 Chevy Van delivered around September 2022 we can offer you a very good price.

It has been noted that a project is not a project till someone gets a tattoo. That has certainly been true of some that we have done. We weren’t expecting it here. We have had a Welshman in a hammock for a few days here and there. He sometimes finds his way home and loves it out here. He is, amongst many, a fan of our logo. Our local pub (Ceveceria) is a great meeting spot and we introduce him to the owner and his lovely assistant. She is an artist that has begun a mural on our orange block and has started hand poked tattooing recently. Our Welshman is very easily persuaded to meet up with her after a surf and get a hand poked tattoo of our logo on his leg. We are now a proper project apparently.

Strange times. The local tax authority has conducted large scale raids on Sayulita and San Pancho. They have entered businesses and shut them down with immediate effect. Lots of them. We drive down town to check it out. The local Hostel had its guests chucked out and shut down. A clothes shop, a hardware store and many cafes and restaurants have large stickers on their very locked up and closed front doors. Some of these places are of significant size and reputation. The sticker tells us that there has been some financial or administrative obligation that has not been met and the business is closed. These businesses are owned by well known locals, many of them Mexican, who have been here for many years and all strongly and loudly claim to have paid all their taxes. It’s not clear what the story is yet. It could be the authorities are doing an end of season shake down on businesses that they think should be paying more taxes. It’s certainly got people’s attention. There is a strong rumour that all these businesses use the same accountant and he has failed to submit proper accounts on time for all of them. Wouldn’t want to be that guy right now.

The exodus continues. More of our friends are heading North and elsewhere to avoid the impending humidity. We are the poor neighbours they are leaving behind and the focus of much welcome generosity. As folk clear out their houses for the great escape we get all the stuff they no longer need! Chairs, art , house fixings, and food.

We have had a number of friends invite us to dinner. This is a rare treat and we have certainly taken very grateful advantage. I’ve had more meat and decent wine in the last few weeks than I can remember.

I‘m a great fan of spreading out meat into small amounts that fit well into a taco. It uses less of the stuff and makes for great eats. There is, however, for me, no substitute for a hunk of meat that you chew on. It’s not a common thing here and usually offered at places that we don’t currently have the budget for. This is something my face has missed but my body has not. Digesting large amounts of meat is not something I’m great at anymore. Not going to stop trying when I get the chance. The wine here is a mixed bag price & quality wise. In my previous life I became a fussy arse when wine was concerned. I spent time in France in the vineyards and brought back special batches of extraordinary unique nectar for my horribly unappreciative mates to chug down. I saved all the best wines and refused to drink most of the “everyday” bottles. I got on my own nerves. Now with choice and budget limited I have modified my judgments accordingly. We have a self imposed 150 peso a bottle limit . I did have someone buy us a decent Pinot Noir in a local restaurant recently and it was splendid beyond description… it did take me back. I have not lost all my pretentions just yet.

The pub closes soon. Our dear mates are having a well earned break to pulling pints before heading up to Portland. What are we to do??!! Before panic sets in we must help these guys out and make sure they aren’t left with any stock. I am in training to help them as much as I can. Only two weeks of pints in San Pancho left… ok slight panic. Might have to look at opening our exclusive bar before the footy starts. Jayne is so excited.

Jungle Journal

Ayahuasca Custard

May 9, 2018
by Beave

Vanilla Orchids….. not the easiest thing to propagate. Having climbed the Copomo tree next to our balcony brandishing a the pool cleaning rod to make sure the host vine is heading upwards a certain way then downwards a certain way we wait. Months later we spot the first buds and then flowers. Each flower lasts but one day. During that time it relies on a particularly rare type of Mexican bee to happen across it and pollinate. No pressure. This is far from a certain event. To increase the odds of vanilla pods exponentially we have adopted the role of surrogate bees and have been sexing orchids. Up a ladder with a toothpick may not be obviously sexy but is apparently effective. We pollinate our first two flowers. There are buds for many more so we will be up a ladder with toothpicks doing all the sex for some time. In 6 months we may have vanilla pods . It’s a long and delicate process. How do we ever get enough of the stuff for ice cream ….or custard ….??

Took the time to get beyond the break and float on my back in the Pacific watching birds and sky and sun. It is remarkable and beautiful and humbling. The sea here is so powerful and yet today tranquil and supportive. If I keep air in my lungs I rest on top of the building waves with no effort. I close my eyes and consider taking a floating nap. Sure it wouldn’t last long but it’s entirely possible. Need to do more of this. Floating meditation is the way forward.

The moon is full, the bar is open, the food is cooking splendidly and our guests arrive. All goes in a very relaxed and enjoyable way. Good food, too much wine and a moonlit jungle with the now compulsory black light scorpion hunt. We are now recovering with a heap of over catered left overs, more beer than we started with, an amount of actual cash and enough wine to keep us out of trouble for the next week. There is the satisfaction of a very pleasant evening and the knowing we can cater at a high level for up to dozen people without much drama. We are told that there will be a write up on the night’s activities in the next edition of the San Pancho Life newsletter. This is certainly another potential thing to do to earn a crust when the season starts again.

Jungle wake ups are slow. There is a routine of moving towards the kettle and creating tea while showering that is now achievable with limited brain cell activity and only one eye open. A bucket of tea brings the synapses to life and my mind fills with the strangest of priorities. Do we have water flowing? Is there air in the tires? Any petrol in the tanks? Water, air and fuel. I’m becoming worryingly practical.

The sun is moving overhead and mornings are later and evening stretching out further and further. The solar panels catch sun very differently these past few weeks. Days are getting hotter and the humidity turns the air three times thicker every afternoon. Warm thick air to breathe for the next three or four months. Got to get that needy pool in good order. It saved us many times last year.

My buddies are building a temple on a lake in Netherlands. They want us to join them. It’s the first iteration of the Temple for Peace that we spent so many months evolving last year. Would love to be there to share the load and the laughs. I have foregone the delights of Kiwiburn and Afrikaburn this year and don’t see us making Nowhere, Nest or Burning Man either. I’m not too sad about that as this new adventure requires a different mind set. Over more than a dozen years I have devoted energy, love, time and cash to create the space for some magnificent art. We have chosen crazy places in many countries to build cities, temples, huge scale propane delivery systems, exhibition spaces, large theme camps and much more. With few exceptions these creations were burnt to the ground or dismantled within a week. I have learnt to let go. I’m very good at it, I’ve had a lot of practice. Our project here is different. I’m letting go of letting go… slowly.

Dogs for security. Everyone tells us we need dogs for security. It certainly focuses the mind at night when a pack of dogs starts barking at you. None of them will bite you and most are scared off by a good stare but it’s definitely a deterrent. Tripod is next to bloody useless. He is properly attention seeking and has well practiced “poor hungry me” eyes. The tart will flirt with anyone if he thinks there is food in it for him. We are sure he limps on alternating legs for effect. He turns up now and again and makes a good show barking excitedly at some confused armadillo that might have wandered by.

We have a fair chunk of land to protect so at the moment we are considering at least two (and probably more) large ugly dogs that look mean and sound horrible. They need to be self-reliant outdoor dogs that eat once a week and are protective of us and scare the be ‘Jesus out of anyone else. Tall order even for here. There are very many stray dogs here. A shameful amount. We have had a couple of slobbery candidates directed our way. We are looking for dogs that will thrive out here and do not need too much counseling. None has passed muster yet. The search continues…

The season change is now pretty dramatic. It’s hot. Flowers are bursting out everywhere but at the same time the leaves are falling from the trees. It’s like both Autumn & Spring have come at once. With the canopy thinning so dramatically we can see around us new places and all the birds and a lot further through the jungle. There is now a carpet of leaves drying to a crisp on the hot slippy dust. The palm oil coconuts rest amongst them like ball bearings. It’s a miracle we can stand up at the moment let alone walk around.

We recognize the growing need for the pool to be ready to escape to. The sand filter pump has been working hard fairly often (subject to sun on panels.) It’s the only thing we have that makes even a dent in our “Nano-carbon” batteries which sit happily at 96 % or more all day no matter what else we throw at them. Good job as they cost their weight in truffle oil. We are well serviced for power thank the goodness’s. The pool however is stubbornly cloudy. It’s significantly less dusty and the filter is slowly working but the chlorine fish needs filling and probably some other costly process will be necessary. It’s currently a darkening shade of green. More attention required. It has been foretold by wise folk that lawns and pools need more upkeep than wives. I have a very needy pool that’s for sure.

We bite the bullet and head to PV to collect some cheap tyres for the Razor. They took a lot of finding but are less than half price of anything else we can find. They are 6 ply and many times better than the ones we have broken. The Razor has been on chocks for many days and this has made us a lot less lazy. We don’t drive across the land now but walk. It is a good thing to get more in touch with the land. We notice a lot more nature and wildlife. And jobs that need doing….

We have been invited to a XV Quinseañera party. Our man has insisted we join his family there. His son is the boyfriend of the birthday girl and he has a very important role to play. It’s a very well organized event with lots of traditional happenings involved. In Mexico the age of 15 is considered a very important time for young girls. Families save for years to show off and give her and everyone they know the party of her life. It’s a “coming of age thing”. It is not uncommon for pregnancy and marriage to follow soon after. We arrive at the town square on time. The stage is set for a band and the whole town square is packed with tables decorated in burgundy and gold.

We wait for the families to arrive from their long catholic church ceremony. No one shows so we hide in the pub for an hour. On returning we are spotted and join our man’s mum and a gaggle of kids and family. Still almost all the tables are empty. The panicked looking girl arrives dressed in burgundy and gold. She is shadowed by an equally stressed looking Mum. Slowly oh so slowly the entire town turns up. The band starts. I am surprised the racket that a dozen guys on stage can make. It’s a strange mix of wailing vocals , trumpet, tuba and at least two trombones (played as trumpets) with other bashing things behind them. This is either bloody awful or the best thing ever. I decide to decide later which one.

The girl is looking less stressed now and performs a well practiced dance with a dozen boys all dressed in identical burgundy shirts. Her brother leads her and our man’s son is right up there too. There is a table laden with gifts. There are presentations of dolls identical to the girl dressed exactly as she is. Bit spooky. Flowers are thrown and caught and every male member of the family gets a dance with her. The band are enthusiastically belting out what has become clear is bloody awful music. By 11 pm the place is packed and more tables are shipped in. The endless free beer takes effect and the dance floor starts to fill with some rather entertaining sights. There is a tendency for the lardy in Mexico. It is now published by the WHO that Mexico has officially the lardiest population in the world. This is demonstrated by the happenings on the dance floor. A properly entertaining mix. Some sprightly older folk at least 80 years old (probably older) swing dancing perfectly and looking good. A number of rather large boys practically suffocating slightly traumatized looking girls and sort of jumping together on the spot as the band blares out. Most transfixing is the huge ladies who have in their grip some tiny looking Mexican men who cling on for dear life as they lurch around not entirely in time with the music (if that is actually possible). The finale is the presentation of the girls first “official” high heel shoes. A traditional gift from the father. A sort of permission and expectation go now and be a woman. She looks a bit too young to me but what do I know.

The fatted cow is distributed. We knew the cow as it was one from a nearby ranch that our man slaughtered and spent all day cooking over a wood fire. Rather good stuff. It is served with what is now my new favorite Mexican delight – “frijoles puerco”. It is beans and cheese and chorizo all mashed together properly and deliciously. There is also a bottle of Agave type liquor which the family and many other random onlookers encourage me to drink a lot of. It is a poor man’s tequila but given a good go is still effective. It is effective enough for me to distribute cow juice and beans and chorizo and cheese onto my white shirt in a “look at me” obvious way. Embarrassing. It is confirmed by everyone on our table that we are the only “gringos” non-Mexicans in the entire square of many hundreds of people. It’s OK they tell us. “We are all Mexicans here .” Despite the spiny head and foody shirt that makes us feel rather good. By now we are ready to leave the noises from the band far away and make our way home. Its only 12.30 and we are the first to leave. The young kids and oldest folk are just getting started. The party goes on without us till sunrise.

We have met a number of people who have spent time out here over the years. The most recent is a girl who we heard about many times. She lives in town and had her first baby just about when we arrived so it has taken this long for her to surface. She arrives with us unexpectedly on her horse. We show her around as she shows us around. We go up to the Selva Vista apartment where she spent many years. She is relieved and emotional (in a good way) as she sees what we have created. Those tears are the best endorsement we have had so far by a long way. Before she leaves she shows us the many things she planted before she left 4 years ago. There is the lychee tree and the passion fruit and to our surprise a now mature Ayahuasca vine right beside our Morning Glory.

The important issue of the World Cup has arisen. Much as we would like to see England squeeze past the might of Tunisia and Panama I am more interested how Mexico will do against Germany, South Korea and Sweden. One of the restaurants in town is talking about remaining open just for the tournament and showing three matches a day. That is a huge relief. Wouldn’t want Jayne to go without her precious football.

Jungle Journal

Sprung

April 26, 2018
by Beave

It is without any doubt that spring has indeed sprung. It’s everywhere. And what a movement that was…

Within but a few days the Primavera (springtime) trees around us have exploded with sudden bright golden blossom. That scrawny old tree that had hidden behind everything else has burst front stage in a flamboyant flush of yellow. This display lasts for only a week or so. The Bougainvillea are alive and throwing colours everywhere. It’s an event .

It’s dry too. The ground is transforming into fine layers of dust. The pathways release clouds of the stuff which can be blinding when the sun reflects on it. Large thick roots are revealed as the earth evaporates around them. The rains are coming and we are now experiencing the grip of mild anxiety as we imagine all the landscape flushed of content and guess what might remain.

The humidity is also upon us. It’s been a quick transition between feeling the heat on the afternoon and the heat feeling you. Gets into every crevice. By 4 pm there is little option but surrender. If I’m outside I become a damp pink bloke with melting senses. Best to give up anything mentally or physically taxing. Which leaves little else to do but stay still and indulge in early day gins and naps. The fan has had it’s first good go of the year. Moving air is altogether more acceptable than the still warm heavy damp kind.

The sun has changed altitude and the mornings and evening have extended themselves later and later. There are days when the sun and squawking of mating parrots are ignored enough to sleep late. The sunsets complete their act around 8.30 pm so nights out are no longer ending at 9 pm. The town has emptied of most of the tourists. A steady but slow stream of beach seeking gringos still remain. The snowbirds (those who spend 6 month in Mexico/ 6 months in Pacific NW) are leaving for their long journeys home. Seattle and Vancouver are filling up again for Summer. We share a few last sunsets before they leave. The humidity moves in behind them.

Our mates from SF have bought a place in Los De Marcos 20 minutes away. We go with them to see it and end up at a jazz gig with newest friends. We agree to help mange the place and transform the garden and build a roof Palapa. That should keep us busier. We celebrate with dinner under the stars at our place. We engage in a late night Tequila fuelled scorpion hunt. We have a hand held UV dark light and we prove very quickly that when it hits a scorpion it glows like a light bulb. Have tried this before in Israel and South Africa but the Mexican scorpions are the brightest I’ve seen by far.

This did not help one of our guests. She had returned to stay with us for the second time because she loves it out here. Until that is, at 6 am, when she called us to an emergency. She had been hit twice on the foot by a scorpion that we find in her bed. We fly to hospital and wait there as she is observed for allergic reaction and bagged and given an anti-venom shot. It was her first time in hospital and a bit of a drama but we were soon out having breakfast of raspberries stolen from our white witch friend who happened to be passing by. Scorpions rarely are dangerous but they do give you a “poison trip” for a day or two that can be unpleasant. After she got over it all she went straight to town and had the astrological sign for Scorpio tattooed on her scorpion bite !

There are a very few things that I have avoided since being here but Micheladas is top of my list. I’m not universally known as a shy one and am all about trying new things but the very thought of a virgin Bloody Mary with beer in the same glass just seems instinctively wrong.

Our favorite sunset bar is closing down. Their lease is up and the owners are probably looking to sell their uniquely stunning spot for a hotel or something equally crude. Our Argentinian bar staff/friends who we have seen many times every week since we arrived are moving on. This is a sad turn of affairs and must be marked with a house Michelada. I’ve seen huge glasses of the red-stuff with salads of celery and cilantro spilling from their chili crusted rims pass my head very often. At no time has this tempted me in the slightest. However, in honour of Bar La Fresona and our brief love affair I order one. It arrives showy, resplendent and larger than necessary. The salt and chili flavours are soon overcome with an icy cool flood of tomato and the aftertaste of beer. It’s not entirely revolting. Over the next 20 minutes of sipping and battling a chili flaked celery in the eye three separate friends come over in high excitement to find out why I looked like I had been kicked in the face by a mule. No matter how much care and attention I took to get this this in me without drama it was not to be. For some reason I’m covered in bright red chili salt from hairline to chin. I am in bad need of a shower and a shave. Not my finest hour and I’m in no hurry to repeat it. Farewell la Fresona, going to miss you. Micheladas… not so much.

The season in terms of visitors has changed equally suddenly. We have had full occupancy these last few weeks and spent our days cleaning sheets and floors and greeting folk. I have done the tour of the land many many times. Same questions and similar answers every time. I have discussed this with bar and social hosts many times. How do you deal with being asked the same questions over and over again ? It’s not quite automatic for me but I can feel it getting a bit like that. Our story told in 20 minutes changes and evolves in the many tellings and as time passes. I have to keep an eye on keeping it authentic.

Right now we have no one on the land but us. It’s good. We have the odd enquiry and the very odd booking now and again. We have had a Welshman in a hammock for a few days and a couple of great friends bearing gifts of a new well pump, sheets, towels, car parts, jubilee clips, sewing machine oil and cheese. (Oh how I miss the joy of real proper, bites your tongue and makes you sweat cheese.)

The extra time we have now is a welcome distraction. We have had the space to start the process of planting. Much shifting of earth is required. We move pick up loads of real black earth from a river bed 1 km away to our piles of palms left over from the building. Earth on top and the placement of large river rocks and we have our “hugelkultur herb spiral”. It’s planted with all the seeds. Many herbs, chilies and marigold we smuggled in. Our well is still wet & the new well pump works okay after a repair or two so we may even have enough water for the plants and us.

A day is spent collecting good growing dirt. I remove 4 years of anthill & bat poo that has filled our pool pump house with a carpet of it a few feet thick. Back breaking but we now have sacks of the stuff. We mix this with rotting palm wood and a full load from the river bed. We ninja raid a local stable and make off with a bag of horse shit. This all meets in a single pile under the shade of the solar panels. We are assisted by our hermit neighbor from even further up the hill. He has propagated Bougainvillea for many years. He told us that he spent months growing them locally and then cows ate them all in one day. So we collect the cuttings from a local snowbird on her way home to BC. We create the perfect grow bags from mixing all our offerings together. Good dirt and ant and bat and horse and palm. We dip the snipped ends into white power growth hormone and then each is planted, released and watered. Left to fend for themselves and get big and strong. We now have more than 100 future Bougainvillea of all colours under our solar panels protected from cows. They will one day make the most beautiful and dangerously thorny borders for the fence lines.

It occurs to us that we don’t currently have a single Irishman on our land… it’s been some time.

Our Polaris front tires blew out again for the umpteenth time and the fourth time in a week. It’s now our No.1 expense. We have a crap bald second hand tire on one side but that is so much better than the teabag that is the other. Can’t keep air in it no matter what we do. Even inner tube blew out. So we are saving our pennies to buy new tires and for now Pauly Razor is on chocks. Thank the stars we have a friend here who has been fiddling (in a good way) with Limonada Toyota for the past week. Brakes work and accelerator pedal is reattached and wheel bearing renewed.

Armadillos are noisy buggers. Must be mating season coz they are everywhere at the moment. Didn’t see one for months then all the big ones turn up digging loudly and proudly around the tree house at 2 am. Even spotted one in front of our balcony in daylight. Maybe walk of shame from night before.

We are well on our way to putting our house on the market in Darlington. When that goes through we will be funded for our next phase of creating. Until then it’s the farmer’s diet of tacos and tequila for us. We are living simply and saving costs and keeping busy. There are still small opportunities to make a few quid (pesos) here now and then and we are keeping ourselves up for it.

An unexpected opportunity has somehow appeared on our horizon. We meet new friends in town. They have been retired here for many years and split their time between an amazing house here and an equally stunning property near Seattle. They generously gift us herbs, flower cuttings, curtains and tequila. They and their visiting daughter end up at our place and we produce a makeshift feed at the open outside kitchen in the jungle. We use the oven to roast chicken and we overcook (burn) spuds & vegetables in the fire. Despite this they have waxed lyrical to their friends about us and now we have been invited to invite “them all” out here to a dinner. We have the great and good of San Pancho at our place for dinner in a few days!! They want to pay us for the privilege and take photos for the local news-rag to promote us. This could become a thing.

Jungle Journal

Grand Slam …

April 2, 2018April 2, 2018
by Beave

It’s a huge source of satisfaction that I am accompanied along the way by my friends and my son. The scrutiny of strangers is a fascinating process but the eyes of close friends can cause some performance anxiety. Seems we are passing the approval tests. Many more ahead mind…

Our full to burst compliment of folk are all enthusiastic to contribute & work but also have fun in their minds. Plans are afoot. There is much talk of whales who are passing by our shore daily at this time of year. There is the need to catch fish. Fish to take home and cook on an open fire all macho like. There is the need to explore the Pacific more. Coral is requested. We book us all on a day trip where a boat will take us to see whales , catch fish and drop us on an Island to snorkel over the coral. Success.

There is much excited whale spotting with some of these huge beasts getting very close. We catch a small tuna type fish (Ceviched later ) and tested out our ability to walk into the ocean in flippers without falling over and hold our breath long enough to follow the fish through the coral. Much sun , sea and sand and some sea sickness (or hidden hangovers) by the end of the day. It was a fairly dry event as the night before accidentally turned naughty. No one could face much beer after that.

There is a push now to get our bar built and the outdoor tables ready. We have invited many friends from the local community who have helped us out or just curious to visit us for a “soft opening” of La Colina Project on Tuesday this week. There is a lot of work to be done before then but there is great motivation and enthusiasm from everyone to make this a memorable event. I have all the faith it will be. Not entirely sure why yet. I’m not worried.

The leaps and limps to action are impressive. There is enough of us to make it fun and photographed. Monday night we apply the last coat of varnish to the tables bare foot in the dark with headlamps. My feet get a coating of marine varnish that lasts for many days. The other results are magical. We have a bar. A real one. The display of stunningly polished parota in the form of huge tables and a the bar top give a touch of class. Even the cow heads have lights in their eyes. A very cool addition. I am tasked with cleaning out a large cooler chest borrowed from behind a local restaurant of all its indescribable muck and grot. There is much of it that a hose pipe efficiently covers me in. We fill it with ice and beer. We have a number of jugs of local tequila, mezcal and rum. The blender has power, the lights are lit. I smell of muck and grot and have mottled brown feet but I’m ready as I’m gonna be.

The coming together of so many new friends and old who have helped us out over the past months is emotional. My strange smell & dappled feet are forgiven and a pretty fantastic afternoon and night evolved. Lots of tours of the property and gifts of booze and good company. At some point my knees again surcome to the effects of Mezcal and I am removed. Probably for the best .

The morning after is brutal. My mezcal knees have recovered but I still have a musty grot odor. There is a full truck of recycling. A large heap of cans, glass, cardboard and half drunk bottles of tequila. Despite valiant attempts to make a significant dent our free bar ends up with more booze than we started with. Result. It is a relief to shower and collapse and consider a job well done.

It is a different world out here now for a number of reasons. Our never ending list of things to do “right now” has reduced somewhat. The list exists but now has endless things to do “sometime soon”. Priorities are shifting. Our first chunks of big money items like solar and construction are spent and so we are now at the point of nurturing and repairing our battered bank account in order to look at phase two. Plans are made to tackle the white house and the Scorpion temple at some point in the future and saving to get a roof on our house that can cope better with the rainy season. We are concentrating now on selling my house in Darlington. When that is done we will have the means to make the next investments. Until then it’s austerity for us while making what we have give us an income. So a diet of tacos and Tecate awaits while we undertake a charm offensive with all the local letting agents.

We also have a lot of power. The solar panels are catching photons at an extraordinary rate and our sexy nano-carbon batteries are storing them all like champions. The past weeks have seen lights appear everywhere and sockets have emerged. Our pool pump has been removed and loved and returned to service with it’s own power line. The pump that pulls the water uphill to the top tinacos has also been wired in. This saves me dragging generators in and out of trucks and up and down hills three times a day. My poor old back is saved !

With power comes much digging. We have trenched 100s of meters of conduit under the stony jungle ground. There is a phenomenon here where a small trench just a few inches deep and a few feet long can create a pile of stones bigger than me. It makes no sense at all. The result is we have created a large number of rockeries next to freshly hidden wires. These now line pathways and make for what turns out to be accidental landscaping. Looks rather good.

Our first wave of paying guests proves to be a surprisingly lovely lot. A proper mix of ages and nationalities. It was worries to me that we would have over entitled people arrive here expecting too much and testing my fabled patience. As it turns out people really love it here and are happy to pay us and are on the whole considerably less irritating than expected. There have been some moments of extreme idiocy. It appears there is a section of the population that are more of a challenge. There are a lot more youngish people than I ever expected who are unable (actually unable) to follow basic directions or signs let alone follow a map. They either use Google-Maps to tell them where they are or they haven’t got a clue….no other option exists to them .. Scary but true…. I have , however, been able to deal with this perfectly thanks to my endless patience, understanding and empathetic disposition.

Our reviews so far have been outstanding. We are doing something right. It’s Easter weeks which are famously the busiest of the year and so we would expect to have some interest over this time. We are currently booked out til April. The test will come after that. See how long we can extend the season for visitors out here. We are contemplating retreats here for birdwatchers, fire fly spotters and/or photographers all with compulsory Yoga and Mezcal tastings (maybe).

Bird watching. Who knew ? We are a touch spoilt to be on “The Road of the Squashes”. People travel from far and wide and Canada to pay a bunch of dollars to walk down the road to our house. There are over 200 species of bird here. Right here. My oldest mate from UK (very old) came over to help with my electrics and give his girlfriend a break. He accidentally got hooked into the bird watching as they were outside his window all the time. Before he left they made a list of 36 new species of bird he has seen since he got here two weeks ago. A 13 year old girl arrived the day after from an Island off Vancouver and takes this as a challenge. She makes a list of over 70 new species she had seen in two days!! There has to be a market for a bird watching retreat for those who appreciate tropical birds. We are working on it ……

Sanitation is a thing. Buckets of unspeakable stuff are required to be added to the compost heap very often. There are a lot of productive bodies here now and the buckets are filling up quick. The buckets need emptying and the contents covered in a pile of compost as soon as they get full. It is a familiar process now and it’s become my job. I get it done usually first thing in the morning. It’s not the best way to start the day but not necessarily the worst. One of my previous jobs that I accidentally agreed to when drinking a bit to much at the wrong time was to be in charge of sanitation at an arts festival in Spain. I had the task of looking after the contents of about 1500 people in extreme heat conditions.

In order to delegate as much as possible I created and recruited a whole team of Shit Ninjas. These extraordinary humans took it upon themselves to educate everyone in the process of healthy sanitation and deal with the aftermath. Could do with a few of them here to help me out. My experience as the aptly named Shit Head has hardened me to dealing with such issues. I’ve seen things I can’t unsee. We thankfully have the services here of experienced carers and nurses who are even more conditioned to the grotty end of things so I’m now not the only one on bucket duty. So far it’s working out well and everyone’s experience of dry toilets is pretty positive. Saves a huge amount of water. The Parota sawdust smells the best.

My hair requires a shear I am reliably told. We have decided on a “no mirror on the wall” strategy and to adopt a rural-shabby-chique look and to only make suggestions on each others appearance when it’s clearly the right thing to do. This does remove any remaining vanity issues we may be harboring. Now is one of those moments. I have found that by wetting my hair and turning upside down and hacking off any misbehaving hairs that I can see in my shaving mirror it does change things a little. Not sure entirely positively… I catch my reflection in the rear view mirror of the truck. Not the worst haircut I ever had, however, I do know that my dear UK hair expert would be un-amused by such antics … she would not approve .

The arty gifts we are receiving here are just amazing and are fully appreciated. We have had deliveries of SD Cards packed with music of every sort. We have had unique art pieces made especially for us. Original paintings from guests, my wife pimped up & now as the bar figure head. There is even hand made mobile of paint pots on a saucepan lid shipped in from UK. It’s a great thing. We have a “leave no trace leave art “ philosophy and the time for art is upon us. It will be an exciting time as we see it evolve. A local mural artist work in the local Cervecaria (pub) . She has offered to paint a wall on the outside of the orange block. Should be a stunning addition.

My son Jake has a long held dream. He has always wanted to visit the town of Tequila and this is his chance. For the first time we agree to leave the land in the hands of others for the night and venture the 4 hours to explore the world of 100% agave. We pass many fields of blue agave of various ages. It takes 8 to 12 years before they can be harvested by a Jimador, roasted, juiced and then made into Tequila. We arrive and Jake is to say the very least excited. Haven’t seen him this excited since “X-box Christmas” 2002.

We start with a basic white tequila. You can taste the agave. Strong pepper after-taste. Delicious. Then we get into an old aged golden coloured version that tastes almost like an old rum. We then take the Jose Cuervo factory tasting tour.

My dear son is in his element. The tour climax is a sit down tasting of 4 of their best. “Always start with the best as by the time you finish your taste buds will be in shock” we are told. The group has about 20 people and we are surprised to see that more than half of them leave the tasting after just a sip or two. This leaves a few dozen untouched full glasses of premium tequila. Well it seemed rude to leave them there ….. the remains of the day from this point are hazy. We are fully conversant in the production of tequila and have developed a great appreciation of this magic stuff.

In the interests of further education there was considerably more sampling . “On average we are told that 4 glasses of average tequila will put the average person to sleep in an hour.” We, however, avoided sleep for some time and managed to raise the averages somewhat before eventually calling it and try to find the hotel. We woke early and limped to the van for the long, quiet and reflective drive back.

March 17^th started early watching Ireland beat England at Twickenham to Grand Slam the 6 nations Rugby on Saint Patrick’s Day. There are two proper Irish folk left here to gloat. That is some start to the day for them. The pubs in Dublin must be pure madness and no further excuses are needed here for a touch of daytime celebrating. Despite being wounded by Tequila they all make a good effort to keep their reputation alive.

This past month has passed quickly. My son and most of his mates have bounced back to Dublin. He went through New York post-Paddy’s Day which was an entirely different adventure. Pictures of him with Guinness smugly in hand prove he got home somehow. I miss the bugger already. My daughter is next. One day soon the stars will align and she will be here.

It’s my Birthday. San Pancho is the home to, amongst others, Gilles Ste-Croix who is the co-founder of Cirque du Soleil. His gift to the community here is to offer his considerable resources to train local children in circus skills. He has founded and supports Circo de los Niños http://circodelosninosdesanpancho.mx/ They have a show once a year. It’s tonight and we have tickets. I arrive carrying the considerable load of my first decent steak in 6 months and far too much of freshly made birthday cake and a steeping in Mezcal. I am in a packed venue to watch what Cirque du Soleil can do with 150 Mexican school kids. It’s truly astonishing.

I am stunned enough to require a reasonable number of pints in the Cerveceria before giving in to my age and heading back to the jungle. Those kids were inspirational.

My son’s girlfriend is going home and she needs a photograph of her surfing to show him to wind him up. Reasonable request even though she has never surfed before. We load the van and head to La Lancha beach where the surf is reliable. We take Jayne’s inflatable paddle board and all my surfboards and prepare for the photoshoot. With very little instruction she catches her second ever wave all the way to the beach. By some miracle we have it captured on a phone camera and her visit here is complete . She leaves for Dublin very happy with the photo to prove it all happened.

The day has started well. The guests are moving out. All of them. All on time and apparently delighted… Which is a good.

Another few buckets of the real stuff to compost. The well pump appears to be bust and we just ran out of propane for tea making/ hot water, we don’t have enough Queen size sheets, need to sand and varnish the new Parota tables in the outside kitchen, need to find 3 more pallets for the third composting area next to our house, we also need to work out how to mend or replace the tree house roof before the rains…. Here we go again. Today is exactly 6 months since we landed here. We are already very busy making a plan for the next 6 months.

There may not be a bunny or chocolate egg within 100 miles but Happy Easter.

Jungle Journal

Six Months in the Jungle

March 25, 2018March 27, 2018
by Jayne

Living in a treehouse, clearing and cleaning jungle out of living spaces, the swimming pool and everywhere else, close calls with trees and bees, gaining a Maustrappe and losing weight… A lot has happened in just six months.

It’s been just over six months since Beave and I applied to become Mexican residents and moved to Mexico. It’s been just under six months since we took possession of “La Colina”, and started living in 3.5 hectares (8 acres) of jungle just outside San Pancho, Nayarit.

We’ve laughed, we’ve cried, and we’ve worked very, very hard.

Jayne and Beave being the gate to La Colina in Sept 2017

Cleaning out the sky casita in November 2017

Checking out the well when we first arrived

Back when it was just a Brick Sh*t House

Now a three bedroom open air glamping jungle retreat

Our intention of building a place using sustainable methods and materials, permaculture principles, full of art, which will be self-funded by hosting guests and creating value on the land is becoming a reality much quicker than I had thought possible. Back in the summer, as we packed up our lives in England and prepared for the unknown, I’m not sure where I thought we’d be now, but it wasn’t with five cabañas and casitas rented out and living fully off-grid with solar power and hot water showers from our well!

We moved to La Colina at the end of rainy season. The palapa roof on our house has three major leaks. We learnt to put buckets in the right places. We had no power. Just a few headlamps and solar lights we’d brought from the UK. We bought brighter lights, and a generator to charge them. At first we used a small cooler with ice to keep a few things cold, and soon upgraded to a chest freezer with the bottom filled with ice, it was clear that a more permanent (and much quieter – that generator is LOUD) solution was needed.

We were introduced to Frank, who is a retired firefighter from the USA and now installs solar systems in Mexico, where he lives with his wife and twin children. Frank designed us a solar system and we took the (very expensive) leap in October. We ordered 12 solar panels and a space age set of batteries, inverters and controllers from Outback.

Then we waited.

We’d been told that the hurricanes in the Caribbean and the associated “disaster dollars” had bought up all the off grid solar systems in stock.

So we waited.

My dad came to visit for three weeks and helped us wire up our house ready for the arrival of the fabled solar power.

Christmas came. Christmas went.

And still we waited.

We bought a single solar panel and hooked it up to this Amarine-made 24V Submersible 4″ Deep Well Water DC Pump we bought online. Best $125 we’ve spent. That pump pumps water up a massive hill to fill 2500 litre tanks without missing a beat. When it’s sunny, it’s pumping. Now we just need to see if our well goes dry before it starts raining again…

Wiring up the solar panel to the well pump

That time when we made water flow uphill!

And still we waited.

Our friend Alex came to visit and started building our composting toilets, Beave and my sister continued the good work. We had learnt from seeing raw sewage flowing into the ocean in Sayulita and having to lug all our water up the hill to our house, that using water to flush poo down the drain is not the way we want to live. Inspired by The Humanure Handbook: A Guide to Composting Human Manure, we built ourselves five wooden boxes with toilet seats on them, into which we place buckets with a bit of sawdust in the bottom.

We don’t use precious water to flush – we use sawdust to create compost instead!

These are what we, and everyone who visits La Colina, use to make our deposits. After each use more sawdust is added to cover the business and keep the smell away. When the bucket is full it is emptied into our compost bin, and the cycle begins again. In a couple of years we will have beautiful compost for our gardens, and no sewage will have polluted the local rivers or oceans. The cycle of life, looking after our planet.

And still we waited.

Since the day we moved to La Colina, our neighbour Rogelio has worked with us. We would not be where we are today without him.

He and his son (also called Rogelio, but lovingly referred to by his family as “Burro” (Donkey)) help us with pretty much all aspects of our land. In particular Rogelio Sr is a genius with a chainsaw. He made our gates, stairs, and so much more with just a chainsaw. We feel privileged to call him our friend, and to help provide his family with a living. It’s what La Colina is all about, providing abundance for us, our friends, and our community.

My sister arrived for a visit, followed shortly by my parents and then my brother and his family. At one point in January we had nine people visiting at once!

And still we waited…

One of the reasons we wanted to live here is so that we can welcome our friends and family to visit us. Having so many visitors is both a great pleasure and a jugging act. It was wonderful to spend time with my family, who I don’t see often. The number of visitors we have means that we need to have online forms to collect information about when people want to visit and what skills they want to share, and to keep a calendar of who is here when, and where they are going to stay.

It is also a balance between being very social and having time at home to ourselves. I find that if I spend too many days and evenings out working hard then socialising I run out of energy and get grumpy (poor Beave takes the brunt of that). I am learning to make sure I get some evenings at home, spending quality time with Beave and looking after myself. Sometimes this means leaving our guests to their own devices for a time, which is not always easy. I’m working on learning how to get the balance right and not upset anyone in the process.

Mid way through February we swapped my family for Beave’s. Over the space of a few days my family left and Beave’s son arrived with his girlfriend and two more friends. We installed them in our newly built palapa roof cabañas and put them to work.

Location of the La Colina Grand Opening Party

We’d been in touch with our solar designer throughout this time, and now, four months after we’d ordered the system, there were finally rumours of our equipment being in Mexico.

After overcoming some issues with the frame for our panels not being quite level, the panels were installed.

We met some wonderful new friends who offered to come help us. We put them to work laying hundreds of meters of cabling and conduit from the batteries to our treehouse, the bodega and the cabañas. This is backbreaking work, and we can’t thank them all enough for their help. Even Nicky, one of our first ever paying guests, helped lay the cabling!

It was the 22nd of February, 2018 when we finally switched the solar power on. We had silent light in the treehouse. We bought a fridge the next day.

After such a long wait it was great to finally have on demand power. There was also however a feeling of loss. The days of living by the rise and fall of the sun, of candlelit evenings, of a simpler life were gone. It was an important lesson to us both that living without modern day essentials is not only possible, but very enjoyable.

Recently we’ve wired in power to the Sky Casita (thanks to our good friend Kevin), the Las Palmitas Cabañas and the Jungle Cabin. I felt the most proud of myself I have in a long time when I switched on the power to what is essentially a three bedroom house, that I had wired myself, and it all worked. I am very grateful to my father for teaching me electrics and so much more in life.

One of my favourite aspects of living in the jungle is achieving tangible successes. Picking a chili off a plant I’ve grown from seed, watching a tank fill with water on top of a hill, plugging a light into a socket I’ve wired and having it work – these give true feelings of achievement. I can’t help but feel that the lack of physical, tangible achievements in so many office jobs is part of the reason so many of the people I care about are feeling disenfranchised and disillusioned. Getting your hands dirty, learning new skills, and enjoying the fruits of your labour are fundamental parts of being human.

I invite you all to visit La Colina and experience the joy playing in the dirt can bring.

These have been some of the most fascinating months of my life. It is amazing how rewarding building, making things work, welcoming guests, living in nature, and settling down in a beautiful jungle paradise (full of biting creatures and falling branches though it may be) has turned out to be. I am so fortunate to have Beave as my partner in this endeavour, we make an excellent team.

It is difficult at times to be away from family and friends, and to balance “work” with “me time” while living and working in the same place. It’s a constant act of juggling relationships, friendships, responsibilities and relaxation. But really, we all have that same juggling act no matter where we live, or what business we are in.

At least with this home, and this way of making a living, we can invite others on the journey with us. Our guests, our family, our friends, our community, our volunteers and our staff are all so important to us, and they all benefit along with us.

Come play in the jungle with us! *photo: John Curley*

Jungle Journal

All the young dudes…

March 12, 2018
by Beave

There are moments here. Many moments and it’s a great thing this blog gets to capture them. Things changing fast and will never be the same again.

The first time we saw the humpback whales leaping out of the the water in front of the beach bar we had to check ourselves. Did that actually happen? The splash from these immense beasts is spectacular. Tails surfacing and slipping back under with a slow wave. They entertained us under the sunset for two nights and then moved on.

Nights recently have not been conducive to sleep. We thought that Maustrappe had developed a bad eating habit as she woke us up crunching on her food loudly at 2 am. I decided to encourage her to shut up by shining a torch right at her head. The possum that actually got flashed in the eyes was startled and unimpressed. At about twice the size of the cat it crashed about loudly and frantically trying to get out of presumably the cat hole in the back door where it got in. It ended up in a cupboard stubbornly refusing all persuasion to move. I very cleverly created a barrier of chairs around the cupboard creating a maze that led to the cat hole. I arm myself with a bathroom plunger and give the brute a prod or two to get it started. Not playing the game at all the plunger is attacked with what turns out to be a rather sharp and large set of possum teeth. No wonder it eats so loudly. It then deftly leapt over my useless barrier and hid in the far corner near the balcony door. Jayne woke briefly to mutter some encouragement. A swing of plunger and loud swearing does the trick and the possum closely followed by a curious cat runs onto the balcony. Seeing an approaching cat and a naked ginger man with a chewed plunger is too much and he leaps over the balcony into the night. I check out the ground below for broken possum and there is none. That is one traumatised but tough little bugger.

My son Jake arrives with his girlfriend and mate… but not before his house mate who we have known for many years. He contacted us and asked to be secreted on our land for a few days before Jake arrived so he could be a surprise addition. Happily we accept and put him to work. The next day we all arrive at the airport to meet them. A ragged bunch arrive with sorry tales of a long and adventure filled journey through NY and Cancun and Havana and Mexico City to here. It’s a minor miracle they made it. There is a dash to the Gentleman’s room to release unspeakable things. Jake’s girlfriend is already at the bar. It’s going to be a long month…. We get to the van and take a predetermined route out of the airport and decide to pick up a hitchhiker. Jake’s house mate jumps in the van to be greeted with much jet lagged excitement.

The final chapter in our solar panel saga plays out. We spend all our money leveling the solar frame with much hardware. I spend a very hot & sunny day bolting & sweating up a ladder with an ex-fire fighter from California. Good news is that according to his experience the fire risk on our land is negligible. A humidity of 4-5% can be a worry but ours rarely drops below 30% so we have one significant thing less to worry about. He is also a ginger man. What are we doing in this sun!!?? Some days are spent pulling endless black and aluminium power cables through hundreds of meters of orange conduit through thick jungle. We get help from our new airBnB guests and an entire family from Oregon. Couldn’t have done it without them. Our batteries arrive. They are the most expensive things we have in our lives by quite a margin. They are introduced to their new house and settle in quickly. The computer, robot, control panel, centre of operations looks like a unit from Star Trek. With a flick and a twist and a few final expletives it fires up and in the distance, in a treehouse far far away, a light goes on. It’s taken 5 months. We have power.

With power comes much responsibility. The first and most important of which is to apparently get Jayne a fridge. This is quickly decided upon. We all head to Las Varas in the van on a fridge hunt. Turns out the news that we are getting paid by our soon to arrive friends to stay in the Selva Vista (yet-to-be-finished) apartment has sent us a touch giddy. We return home with a packed van. Fridge, oven and new sexy Chainsaw. Life is complete.

We are woken by our concrete man who has arrived to collect his tools and clothes and all other bits that were evicted from the battery house when the batteries moved in. He arrives with a bucket of yaka fruit and a huge container of homemade Mezcal. Good trade!

Much business and the cabañas are starting to look pretty excellent. Our good friend in town suggested to us that hanging beds might be a thing. This idea ignited by tequila took hold. It gives us the very best excuse to use up all of our bamboo. Our man sets about designing bamboo hanging beds both single and queen size and a double size hanging sofa/bed for the apartment. We use miles of rope to lash the things together and suspend them. Our bamboo pile is seriously reduced. We are delighted to have finally found a use for the stuff!

We make a trip to buy new mattresses for all our new beds. Limonada the pick up truck is deployed. On the way home we are overtaken by a scooter frantically trying to attract our attention. One of our large mattresses is missing. Much hand signaling suggests it’s not that far away. I jump out of the truck and walk a half a km back up the busy highway to retrieve it. Thankfully its not destroyed and has bounced onto the side railing. I hoist it on my back and head back to the truck dodging the traffic. I get to 20 yards behind Limonada and she moves off and disappears in the distance. Jayne somehow missed the brightly coloured queen size thing moving dangerously towards her swearing loudly and took off to make a U turn and try and rescue me. She eventually finds me on the side of the road covered in muck and sweat sitting on a slightly road damaged mattress.

There is a swing dance festival in town and no room at the inns so our little Jungle cabin has been booked out for days. We have had 4 crops of guests through. It’s not much money but it’s a start and everyone loves being out here so our reviews are great. The boys have taken over one of our new cabañas and Jake and his girlfriend are installed in another. We prepare for our friend from Darlington coming over. She arrives and is installed in her own private cabaña.

The central outdoor kitchen area is looking rather well. We have introduced a palapa shade roof, sink, worktop and an oven. It even has its own working power socket!! We will plumb the solar into lighting and more sockets soon.

The bathroom shower block has been transformed. Our resident bats have been encouraged to move to more suitable accommodation which allows the place to have a coat of paint and remain clean. Continuous falling bat guano is a challenge.

As a final touch we have created a stairway and a platform up to the roof which gives a raised area to eat, sunbathe or relax under the jungle/stars. There is a bannister around this area as it’s small enough for drunks not to be trusted. It’s looking beautiful. We have just listed all the cabañas separately on airBnB and also the whole area as an open-plan 3 bedroom retreat. We have a serious amount of bookings and enquiries already!!!

It’s changed…..

From this………..

To this ……..

We make an early start and head North to get supplies. The time zone change catches us and we arrive very early. We are making great time as a result until we get stuck on the road on the way back due to some accident again. Common theme we know. It’s an hour on the same bit of road and nothing is coming the other way. We hear a helicopter. We are close to a local town and we divert in for some lunch. We hear that a bus has hit a taxi and it’s not a good result. When we return to the road we pass what is left of a car but there is not much left. 30 feet down into the jungle is the bottom of a bus, wheels up. A large full transit bus to Guadalajara packed with families. There are fatalities and many serious injuries. We hear later that the taxi driver who is well known in San Pancho was at the end of a few days of a drink and drugs binge. Another humbling day.

The Six Nations Rugby is happening and I’m suddenly not the only one that cares. It is possible now we have some power to get my laptop functional enough to run a VPN and fool the internet gods that I’m sitting in a bar in UK somewhere and allow me to watch it like every other license paying UK citizen. My Irish mates are also willing to get up at 7 am to drink Mezcal and watch the match. Ireland v Wales …. don’t want to talk about it. They do….. constantly.

More good friends from Darlington are due in a few days and there is a mad rush of wood cutting, window making, chair hanging, safe installation, bloody floor cleaning and sink plumbing to get it ready for them. We create a staircase onto the roof of the orange block which makes for an outside raised lounging area. Fairy lights installed and the place is perfect with a good few hours to spare. How this place has changed….

From this ……….

To this …………..

We do another airport collect run and meet the others on the beach before arriving home. It’s a full moon and the jungle is lit up. No need for torches. A well lubricated crowd all witness our first Selva Vista apartment guests check in. They love it.

That’s a full house for us.

NINE guests !!

Here we go.

La Colina Project

Who Flung Dung? By Linda (Jayne’s mum)

February 20, 2018
by Alan Davidson

Jayne’s Mum, Dad, Brother and Sister all came to visit La Colina in January. Here’s a guest post from Jayne’s mum Linda.

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After driving 4595 km from Calgary, we arrived at La Colina late one January afternoon, Alan and I were hoping to surprise Jayne and Beave as we were one day early. Instead, they surprised us by not being there! We set up camp.

Following closely on our heels, were Sam and Taryn, the motorcycling duo from Australia. We had hosted them in Calgary as couchsurfers last July. (rideto-theend.com)

Our daughter, Heather, and a Romanian from Switzerland, Andrei, were already here. Then Philip, Kelly and SnakeJaguar flew in three days later, so now we were nine camper/volunteer workers enjoying a reunion with each other and Jayne and Beave in the jungle.

Lots to do and we all sweated the days away woodworking, plumbing, sewing, painting/varnishing, cleaning buildings, fixing the truck and generator, and preparing for, and erecting, solar panels. The busy days were often followed tasting Mexican fare in the little town of San Pancho, or neighbouring town of Sayulita.

Mr. Fixit Philip working on Truck Brakes and Generator

Heather’s boyfriend Julian and Kelly’s sister and family joined Beave and Jayne and the whole Davidson clan for an evening out in San Pancho.

No sign of scorpions, snakes or other scary jungle creatures (except for Beave in his baggy work pants!), but there are beautiful colourful butterflies and birds in abundance at La Colina.

One of the Mexican workers caught an armadillo one night and his son brought it to show us, carrying it by its tail!

After a few days of cold, outdoor showers (which Beave assured were good for us!) Alan hooked the shower into the Bodega’s tankless hot water system and we all became instantly squeaky clean. Philip, Kelly, SJ, Alan and I, set off for town in the Razor ATV. Part way along the dirt road, we came face to face with a cow which couldn’t make up it’s mind which side of the track to allow us to pass. Finally, it chose to turn sideways, completely blocking our path! Continuing on, Philip drove through a fresh cow patty – a gift left by the obstructing cow, no doubt! The newly cleaned Razor, Kelly, and I, got completely splattered in dung. We were not amused!

Jungle Journal

UK Surf & Stings

February 9, 2018
by Beave

It’s been five months since we first arrived from Manchester airport and only four months since we bought the land and started this project. All things converge and conspire to humble, surprise and delight us in equal measure pretty much every day. We have had, as expected, a hectic January with many comings and some goings. February is bidding fair to be equally mental.

Jayne’s parents arrived middle of January to join her sister and they have all been dutifully deployed ever since. They drove all the way down from Calgary pulling a tent trailer packed with all the stuff Jayne left at their house before she left on her motorbike 4 years ago. Our house now has posh cups and plates. All the notably jankier bits and pieces have been replaced with things from Jayne’s time in her flat in London. Proper upgrade.

For the past few weeks there has been much cleaning and fixing and creating delivered with great enthusiasm and skill. They head on the long road home again next week in time for us to have a couple of precious essential days of space to ourselves to restore our aching sanity and make plans for our next influx.

We get a sudden instant booking for the jungle cabin. She arrives the very next day. We kick out the current tenant (Jayne’s sister). Much busyness cleaning and making good all the things. Gas is plumbed and sheets are laundered and floors are swept. Cushions are sewn and counter tops are lined and lights are hung. We await the arrival of the girl from Bristol. She doesn’t show up. Much confusion until we check and discover the booking is for next month. Not the best start at hosting… Anyway the place is in good shape for our next lot of visitors arriving the next day.

We acquire a number of outdoor tables and chairs from town. They are much needed but are bright red and coca-cola branded . We de-brand them & deploy cans of Copper and a CP3-0 gold spray paint . Works rather acceptably. They are much used.

Jayne’s brother, who she shared her motorbike adventure with, arrives with his girlfriend and insanely cute one-year-old daughter SnakeJaguar. I will leave the story of how she got such a kick arse cool name to Jayne. I’m sure she will get the time and energy to blog soon.

There is a strange legacy that is manifest on our land from an experiment to introduce citrus fruit to this area. In the 70’s the Mexican president who had great affection for San Pancho (and his mistress who lived there) made a deal with a large Japanese company to introduce orange , lime and lemon trees to the area. At the time the local crops were predominantly Mango and Palm Oil. The Japanese built a series of warehouses that still exist (now community centers) and started growing citrus trees. What happened in those warehouses is not fully explained but things got a little mixed up. The result is that we have trees here that bear strange fruit. Oranges that taste and look lemony. Lemons that look like limes. Limes that give lemon juice. There are advantages. A slice of orangey-lemon-lime in a gin and tonic works a treat.

As the Swiss family Davidson contingent here expands further we are also joined by an Aussie couple on the same motorbike journey Jayne took with her brother. Alaska to Argentina via La Colina. Both are engineers. He is a civil engineer and she is clearly an uncivil one. Poor sods park their bikes and are dropped right in the thick of it.

Our solar frame needs concreting in at exactly the right angle of the dangle for the maximum photon catching efficiency. The ground on which it sits is at a different angle in all directions. The frame itself has legs at 3.6M to 2.6M all of which need to be dropped into accurately placed holes of different sizes and secured permanently at an angle of 17 degrees to the sun. All this and leave enough room underneath to hang hammocks in the shade. They agree to take this on and create sums, drawings, formula and numbers, string lines and marks. We bring in our concrete guy who now has the whole plan translated for him. Chances are this might just maybe work out OK. Perhaps.

Our Romanian friend arrives in the night. He lives in Switzerland. We have known him for many years from the Nowhere Festival in Spain. He brings me Slivovitz in a plastic water bottle smuggled from Eastern Europe. This stuff is an extraordinarily efficient plum brandy that has been known to considerably shorten many of my favorite days (in a good way). I’m saving most of it for when there is a smaller more appropriate audience. He delivers Swiss Chocolate to an excited Jayne and pitches his tent. We spend some good days balancing work and sunsets. He and our Aussie bikers are inspired to dig up a mountain of rocks behind the cabin and create an outdoor en-suite toilet area that we designed but hadn’t quite got around to building yet. Looks fab and will make staying there a whole heap easier.

Our concrete guy is still finishing the concrete floor of which we are now unable to speak about without making a bad face. It’s taken a huge amount of time and money and stomach lining to get it this far. It’s level and brownish but we are over it. So very over it. Our man spends 3 days cleaning the thing and sealing it to make the best of what we have. Stairs are reinstalled and we move on.

Concrete man’s wife is very grateful that we have taken her man on. She has a number of his ten or eleven children (he is not sure how many he has) and so any income is greatly appreciated. News is that she has been making cookies and edible Mexican delights for us for days. She arrives with some of the kids and delivers boxes of cream, strawberry, pineapple & chocolate treats. She and the kids stay a few days on the land happily sleeping on the shelves in the battery house (cell). We count 15 people living on our land tonight.

Excitement. We find out that one of my favorite photographers ever has arrived in San Pancho. We have met a few times briefly at Burning Man so I make contact and agree that he and his girlfriend visit us here. He is retired now and looking around for further adventure. We spend a great day inspiring each other and I have a spot of hero worship as he brings out the camera and starts capturing what we see everyday with his unique eye. This blog includes many of his photos. If it’s a good one it’s almost certainly one of his. Going to see a great deal of each other in the future. Good news.

I spoke to my Dad on the phone. Good to talk to him. Afterwards I make a sudden and important decision to take a flight home. The week in the UK was stunning for a number of reasons. The first was the January cold that came as a considerable shock to my now soft and timid constitution. My furriest and warmest of bikinis are no match for January in the UK. My clothes that we put aside to cope with such an eventuality are packed in a hurry and I soon discover they are 50% mould. I do not smell the best.

I am collected from airport in Manchester and after an essential top up of Guinness for breakfast I’m deposited with an especially naughty friend who I have arranged to cut my hair. I have been cutting it myself and I think I’ve done a great job. She does not agree. I am told that I stink and must immediately have a bath and only then will she mend my head. My first bath of the year. Absolute bliss.

I have a few jet lagged happy days in Darlington. I visit my house, which is rented out, to prepare for new tenants and collect essentially important things we did not have space for first time around. These things end up being lots of art, some shoes and a hat. I notice that my love and attachment to my old home in Darlington has faded. It holds all the memories and still a load of our stuff but now is just a house.

Really good catching up with so many proper friends in such a short time. I visit my brother, my nieces and my folks and go to my first ever funeral. I stay with my daughter and more proper friends before heading home. I have two new mould free shirts that were hurriedly bought for me while I was in the pub as the mouldy look apparently just wasn’t cutting it. My poor mother has spent many hours removing every last spore from all my remaining things. I have managed to squeeze in a further two baths and my suitcases are full to burst with my full luggage allowance of art, shoes, a hat, Yorkshire Gold Tea, Marmite, Strong Cheese and HP sauce. I’m sorted.

It is somewhat interesting to note that I do not feel that I have been home for a visit. I feel that I left home on a visit. After only 4 months here that is a surprise.

Home again and straight back to it. I am immediately in a Materiales buying lengths of steel to strengthen the solar frame. I arrive back to see Jayne’s brother carrying a lump of metal across a field onto our land. I have gatecrashed a project to raise the water pump solar panel up high on a gate post. One of the bigger jobs on our list. The old solar frames in the neighbouring land have been taken down, dragged away and recycled into something that will work. Task achieved and tested. We have a functioning water pump and we now don’t fall over the solar panel propped up against a rock.

Jayne’s brother and clan are leaving for a few days down the coast. Back for one day later this week. While I was away the truck broke again and he thankfully fixed it. We now have a hand brake and the gearshift sort of works. Result. The truck is now officially called “Limonada”. When life gives you a lemon ….

Couple of friends arrive from Calgary for a week in the jungle cabin. They are also engineers. They also are dropped right in it as they arrive. The solar panels were concreted in nearly correctly. The nearly bit is costing us a heap of cash in additional leveling bits to fit the panels. The solar panels are now in the battery house (cell) where our concrete guy is no longer. They require a perfectly flat space to land on. Our frame has one leg two inches too high and that is not good enough. Our new engineers and I set about cross bracing what is there and repainting it to look as sexy as we can. We also repurpose some 25 feet lengths of water pipe we found in the jungle and plan to trench through the rocky ground to create conduits linking the frame with the battery house (cell). Solar panels will be launched in just a few days time.

The casitas are coming along really well. The BrickS*House is plumbed in with a shower and sink on it’s way. That whole area is going to be stunning. The casitas are rustico but rather pretty. Their shaggy drying out roof fringes overhang the palm bark walls and large mosquito screen windows. The views are beautiful. A new walkway through the jungle from the BrickS*House area to the front gate has been cut. We will build composting areas here next week. We have met some new friends from Oregon who have just moved down here who get what we do and are keen to help. Not sure they will love us so much after digging rocks out of a composting hole for some hours. There is a phenomenon here that whenever you dig a hole 2 feet deep you get 10 feet of rocks out of it. Magic.

Had a surf this morning in Sayulita with Jayne’s brother. So good for my mind and soul and perfectly timed. I’ve been living at such a pace that taking the time waiting for waves and feeling the ocean again was a real gift. We both caught a few good rides. I arrive home irritatingly self satisfied. That did not last long.

We decide to suit up and burn some cow poo and go collect honey from the hives. We go back to the source of the bees to collect more hive parts, pollen traps and other beekeeping useful things. I am, this time, all in white and armed with cow poo smoke and a real head cage. I approach the hives confidently even after being warned by our man that the bees were feeling “brave” today. Brave indeed they were. Each of the very many tiny black grip-dots on my whitish gloves had a bee on in in full attack mode. I am stung a dozen times on each hand in no time at all. It hurts. I bugger off.

I make it back to the pool and remove my head cage and soak my swelling hands in the water. I take a breath and watch Jayne and her sister both suited up in pro-bee suits walking past me and both covered in bees. The bees are not getting through the suits and decide I am a much easier target and attack. I am instantly surrounded and stung countless times. They are in my hair and my head is getting very sore. I move for the smoke but this just pisses them off and they go for me again. I make it up the hill in a smokey cloud of poo and bees and into the house quickly. Inside I find sanctuary behind the mesh doors. I remove the remaining bees from sleeves and hair. I take an anti-histamine, reach for the Mezcal and declare no further interest in honey. They can keep it.

My son Jake arrives from Dublin with his mighty girlfriend and a grand mate very soon and we are preparing as best we can for that. The diary is getting packed. Our modest little cabin has a number of Airbnb bookings now, and we have a fairly continuous stream of visitors booked through to April. We will be adding three casitas and the apartment onto our Airbnb portfolio very very soon so that will make for extra fun and games juggling friends and paying and non paying guests. This is what we have created so there is no moaning about it that anyone wants to listen to. It’s a touch overwhelming but it will be good moving into the guts of a tourist season to see how we fair. We have a lot to learn .