I don’t know how many times I’ve heard that there’s no climbing in the Yucatan. I’ve been quizzing some of the tour operators who sell “adventure vacation trips” into the jungle. They’ve all turned me down at the potential prospects of climbing. “But… but… what about the cenotes (sink holes)… what about rocks on the beach?” I say. Like an old man asking for change. “Just a dollar please sir. Just give me something to climb on.”"Nope, nada, sorry. There’s no climbing in the Yucatan” they reply. Not even a nickel of hope. I frown, put my head down and drag my heavy feet away. I knew better of course. Through google earth, I have researched many geographical features of this area and I’ve seen rocks, more than one even. Not having rocks to climb was a concern initially when we moved to Ouray, and now there is around 200 climbs close to our house. We finally put together the transportation logistics and made it to Tulum. I had seen images of rocks there and was determined we would find something. It was hot and mid-day and so we headed straight for the beach. And GLORY DAY, the beach was surrounded by rocks. Now I’d hate to tell I told you so, but to add the facts that there was rocks there, the rock was also very featured, slightly overhanging and of good quality. Not like the crap in Ouray where we need to beat on a climb for two days with a hammer to make a route climbable. We got on the rock, climbed, and it was a beautiful feeling. Except of course that it was in the sun, the rock was sharp on our moist and wet skin, humid and about ninety degrees. I climbed with grace and care, partially because I didn’t know how strong the rock was and partially because I didn’t know what kind of critters might crawl out of the pockets. The jungle is still a foriegn enviroment to me, and I’m not sure if I could handle a trantula climbing down my arm. Would I let go and fall? Would I watch it crawl across my arm towards my face and torso. Would I freeze and cry like a little girl? What would all the tourists around think? “Don’t be like that stupid gringo up on the rocks they would tell their children.”Climbing hadn’t felt so good in a long time. I guess part of that is because we haven’t been doing too much climbing. It sure looks like paradise in the photos though doesn’t it? Who cares what the tourists think.

Although being in Mexico is very similar in many ways to being in the US, there are oh so many things that are differente and we have oh so much to learn. Today was a good example. We started off the day by getting zane to school a few minutes late. (they start 15 min. earlier on Mondays to pay tribute to the flag…just found that out today). Anyway, when Jason went to drop Zane off the gate at the school was locked and the principal said, “Sorry Zane, your late we can’t open the door. Go home.” Needless to say Jason was just a little shocked at this reply. Eventually she let Zane in but Jason and Zane were scolded for not following the rules. Rules, which were of course given to us in Spanish, adding yet another thing on the list of things to do…find someone to translate the rules so we don’t break any more.Later in the day we came home to a card on our door from Cablemas, the cable company which will be providing us internet. We are currently borrowing “latinos” internet. Although using “latinos” internet cost us no money it’s not so convenient as we have to walk around the apt. with our laptops held high in the air until we get good signal, sometimes sitting on the ground in the middle of the bathroom to keep the signal. Making phone calls on Skype has been really fun. We shout, curse and repeat things until we get our message across. But back to Cablemas….so we called the number on the card and we were able to get the nice cable lady to come back to the house. There was some conversation and it seemed like Jason was communicating with here, but for some reason nothing was happening. In fact, she kept acting like she was going to leave. She didn’t seem to want to install the cable service and we were all just talking in circles. Now we have been waiting to get this hooked up for about a week, and we were NOT going to let this women leave.Anyway, this went on for about 20 min or so …she called her office…they talked to us….what we heard was …blah blah blah make the contracto….blah blah blah make the contracto blah blah blah make the contracto when I decided I would just sprint down to the property managers office and get our contract so she could proceed with the installation. Now let me just say…sprinting anywhere, any time of day is just a bad idea down here, but sprinting at 2:00 in the afternoon heat and humidity is plain dumb. Boy did I get some strange looks from the locals. Anyway, I arrived back at the house hot, sweaty and out of breath but with contract in hand Meanwhile, Jason had her cornered on the porch. I proudly offered my contract to her expecting all our issues would be solved, but STILL she wanted to leave. DAMN her!! Finally we got her to call Raquel our property manager on her cell phone. She has some words with Raquel, then handed her cell phone to us. Raquel then informed us that she was a sales women for the cable company, not an installer. This poor girl was just here to sell us cable, which we already had contract for!! Aahhhhh, she was there to “make the contracto!”

&pToday is the anniversary of 9/11. I wouldn’t have even noticed it except that I checked the date to mark this entry. Heck, both Lisa and I almost both forgot about our anniversary which is in a couple days. We don’t even have a plan yet of how to celebrate it. With the big move and all, we have been a bit consumed. Perhaps everyday for us might be like an anniversary for someone else! We’ve been going to the beach everyday and many days we go twice. Did I mention it was a beach in the Caribbean? Oh yes, and a lot of girls go topless too! Not only that, but they play great music and you can rent chairs or even beds on the beach. It’s pretty pimped out. It’s funny to see travel ads depicting “paradise” and realize they are showing where we live.I might call it paradise if there was great climbing, butg otherwise for now I”ls just something new.We are still getting settled in to life on the Playa (beach). It’s something like life anywhere else, sort of. We wake up, have and cafe latte, get Zane off to school. Then, we try to get some exercise which usually involves a walk down to and on the beach, sometimes accompanied by a swim in the ocean. The ocean is as warm as bath-water. We return to our apartment and work, get some lunch, then Zane comes home from school. In the evening we often return to the beach for a quick swim.I’ve been in the middle of a big work project that has been eating a lot of my time. We don’t have a car here so we walk everywhere. Everything is just a few blocks away anyway. However those few blocks have been adding up fast lately. We are moving a few blocks closer to the beach tomorrow to a nicer apartment; one with more light, a pool, it’s cuter, all sorts of better things. We’ll likely be in that apartment for the rest of our trip.Playa del Carmen is a nice town and a good mix of things for us. Our needs are beauty, fun, work, a school for Zane, opportunities for adventure, and a little culture.You can get around pretty well with just english and pointing, but at the same time there are lots of opportunities to practice spanish. Playa has most of the comforts of home (high speed internet, starbucks, wal-mart), enough culture that you don’t feel like you’ve never left the U.S., it’s reasonably clean – especially by Mexican standards, and is a good size (meaning you a can have a downtown experience or venture into the woods).

Moving out of our house was a little piece of hell as Lisa mentioned previously. Getting to Mexico was going all to smoothly until I was filling out the immigration forms on the plane to Cancun and noticed Zane’s passport was expired. Whoops!It all ended well, but buy a slight margin – as described in Lisa’s previous post. Once out of immigration, things were quite civil. There was no overwhelming barrage of taxi drivers to fight through. We got on a bus that took us to Playa del Carmen. From the bus station we took a taxi to the apartment we had arranged. After a few moments of getting settled in, we walked down to the walking plaza/street, got dinner, and then down to the beach. We turned the AC on to sleep and part of our “getting used to this” experience. Lisa brought Zane to school the next morning which involved a few tears as she left him in a class that was currently being taught solely in Spanish. I was feeling a bit displaced myself trying to get some work done at our apartment. I kept repeating to myself that I knew this was going to be difficult at first. I knew it was going to be hot. I knew we had signed up for a challenge. I was fighting with my computer. Lisa came home and told me what had happened at the school and the world seemed to be closing in on me. Just then a man appeared in the window. I opened to the door to find out he was here to install the internet. Already things were turning around! After about 15 minutes the world did not seem so far away.Life was already getting better. Please note that I’m not one who needs a cell phone or internet all the time. I wouldn’t want to be charged with such a crime. The move just happened to coincide with the middle of a big project I was working on. By the time it all happened, there was just no way to move either of them. I would just have to find a way to make it all work. If that meant living in a internet c afe, then that would be what would have to happen. The internet man arriving at the apartment was a way of it all coming together.

A few days ago I saw the cutest little lizard that I have ever seen…in my entire life. It was about 1.5 inches long and sitting on my screen door. When I spotted it I immediately dove for it. almost immediately I caught it went to show my mom. When I stuck it in her face she was surprised at what she saw. Then following that I put him in my sewing kit box. I kept it for a few minutes then set it free.

i have to admit, shopping is one of my favorite ways to explore a new country….and i don’t mean clothes or souviner shopping. i mean getting down and dirty with the local culture in the market. although there are three huge shopping centers close by that have everything in would want in one place, i prefer to walk to the small, difficult to find and sometimes a little smelly markets. to shop for dinner i need to find produce, dry goods and meat and all these are at different places….but i love it!! the goods are local and fresh and the folks working there are usually friendly and helpful. although i don’t speak spanish (yet) i can find what i need with pantomimes and the few words i do know. (i have to say, for some reason i have an innate ability to remember the words associated with food or cooking) sometimes they laugh at me, but that’s ok. i take zane with me and encourage him to communicate by telling him that if he wants something, he has to find out the cost. learning the locations and hours of all these different markets is challenging, but it helps me learn the language and is one of the reasons i’m here.

hey all,
we arrived late yesterday feeling weary, hot, sticky and cranky after only having slept a few hours the night before. getting moved out of the house proved to be a HUGE chore and kept us both running morning to night. jason is also in the middle of a big work project, so we have been working working working.
we were amazed at how smoothly the trip here went though. the first hurdle of getting our large and heavy bags checked went well. we only had to pay $50 for two overweight bags…and we were able to bring 3 computers and 2 monitors as carry on luggage! i think this is the first trip we have had where there were no late or cancelled flights or lost luggage. kudos to american airlines!! as we boarded or final flight, we were feeling pretty confident that there wouldn’t be any hang ups until jason began filling out the immigration form and realized that zane’s passport had expired!! holy shit! holy shit holy shit! i wish he hadn’t told me until the end of the flight. scenarios of being sent back to ouray ran through both our heads. we decided we would just try and get through immigration anyway. i think i could hear jasons heart pounding as we watched the woman scan zane’s passport…(holy shit!, holy shit! holy shit!) what? it’s expired you say? she asks if i have his birth certificate…i thought i did, but couldn’t f ind it. rummaging madly through my bag all my papers spilled out onto the floor. amidst the pile i found his social security card. i remembered throwing that in at the last moment. THANK GOD! she accepted that and let us pass. we were really lucky. i have no idea what we would have done if she hadn’t let us through. before the trip i hadn’t even look at zane’s expiration date as we got all our passports at the same time. apparently, childrens passports expire earlier. NOW, i know this. we will need to sort this out as we want to go to Cuba and perhaps Belize, but at least we’re here.
our apartment is simple, but nice. this isn’t the place we were going to stay originally, but we needed internet for work so were here for a month or so. this will give us some time to find more what were looking for.
zane has been really nervous about starting school and i can’t say i blame him. last night as i layed in bed with him…both of us teary eyed and feeling a bit homesick, i tried to assure him that this will be a good experience. i’m sure our lack of sleep had something to do with our emotional state. we set up a few of thing things he brought from his room and tried to make it feel like home. as a parent, you just want to do what’s best for your kids…i sure hope i’m doing that.
this morning i walked zane down to the school. so many things are different…like bars on the windows and a locked gate. of course everyone is speaking spanish. zane wears a uniform, which jason pointed out may not be a bad thing as sometimes zane likes to wear very unique clothing and things here are pretty darn conservative. it may help him fit in. i know initially this move is going to be hard on zane. half the day is taught in spanish and all but one of the kids in his class are bi-lingual. he will be challenged in many ways. but i believe that this will be an experience that will enrich all of our lives, especially zane’s. as i walked him up to the class room i could feel his anxiety. i held off my tears until he was out of sight. i pray he has a good first day.

So I finally purchased the tickets, so we must really be going!! Where, you ask? To Playa Del Carmen, a beautiful beach town in the Mayan Riviera in the Yukatan. Jason, Zane and I will spend the next 9 months there. Zane will attend a private Waldorf bilingual school, which I think is pretty cool. Jason and I should be able to continue work as usual. Seems like paradise with one exception…no rock climbing. We have had many friends and family members question our decision to move to a place with out climbing. Actually it concerns us as well. Our hope is to check out the climbing areas in Mexico and possibly Cuba as well as making trips back to the US. What kind of shallow narrow minded people would we be if we put those kinds of limits on our life? It’s time for us to expand our horizons and possibly purchase a drill! There will be many new things to check out in Playa, like kite surfing, scuba diving and snorkeling, exploring the jungle and Cenotes and just exploring the new world around us. I feel I need to explain our decision to move there, especially after we had initially talked about several other places, such as South America and Zion. To make this work we need several things to happen…we need a great school for Zane that’s within our budget, we need to be able to work and stay in communication with clients, we need to be able to afford to live, we need to be able to return to the US easily and we to be able to get around. Also, one of our long time goals has been to learn Spanish. Playa seems to meet all these needs, when the other places we were looking at did not. Yes, it’a bit of a leap of faith to move to a place that you have never even visited, but we wanted to shake things up a bit. Living on the ocean has always been a dream of mine, and Zane loves the ocean. This will, indeed, be and adventure…and we are ready!!

So, while I in no way claim to be a writer, I thought it would be interesting to share our experiences here with folks back home. So please try and overlook my gross grammatical errors and poor writing skills.

-Lisa Nelson