Finishing touches

We went for our usual morning walk and proceeded on into the Thursday market.  I bought strawberries, fresh baked hot croissants, mandarinas, an oregano and cherry tomato plant as well as the pots to put them in.  I had to return to the nursery to get more soil.

The iguana thinks this is his display.

Hmm, tomatoes you say.

Martin and his crew also finished waxing and polishing the RV.

The park is steadily filling in with returning campers as well as newbies.  Other than a stray rooster running around the park that was all the excitement for the day.  We got take out from Teriyaki Time. 

Patio Flora and Fauna

We bought some pots from a local brick and pot making guy and some soil from the nursery and put our plants in the garden and pots.

Our old pal is back

Kirk has 3 iguanas to watch out for this year.  The old fellow from last year and 2 new smaller ones add to the decor of the patio.  Along with the usual geckos.  We will see how long our plants last, depends on how much the iguanas like them.

Let it snow

So I joined the 7:15 walking group (3 of us so far) and we head into town to a restaurant to have coffee or fresh orange juice and check out the menus for evening excursions.  It seems the caliber of chicken has gone up as well as a much cleaner landscape through town.   Took some photos along the way.

Let it Snow!  Mule thinks he can replace Rudolph!

We have been steadily working on the "needs to be done" list.  So we put diatomaceous earth in pie plates under the RV levellers, screwed down the 10 x 10 canopy, sprayed the bug poison round the tires, etc.   I also picked up some plants from the local nursery.

Diatomaceous earth

Patio plants

It was taco Tuesday so we enjoyed free Margaritas and 20 peso tacos.

Improvements

Well, has it been busy around the old hacienda!  

Nancy and Kirk went off to see the vet.  She recognized the young vet from when they were both volunteering at JEEP.  While he does not speak much English, he is very good at what he does.  He declined to express Kirk's glands, gave him an antibiotic shot in both back legs, and two different types of pills to take, and charged the grand sum of $200 Mxn or about $14 Cdn.  Kirk was still listless and subdued when they came home, a very un-Kirk-like state of affairs.  He perked up later in the evening, and managed to finish off his days rations before he went to bed.  He is improved this morning, still not his usual self, but on the road to recovery.  His appetite has returned, along with his usual good humour. 

Martin did show up yesterday with a crew, and washed and wiped down the Brave in just over an hour.  He says he'll be back to wax it on Monday; we shall see.  Our neighbour hooked up our coax to his setup, I adjusted the wiring setup in the front of El Valiente, and we now have TV! 

We picked up some pollo asado for an early supper, and had just finished when Eric the internet guy showed up with his tech, apprentice tech, and girlfriend/office administrator.  They bolted an antenna to one of our front deck poles in short order, then ran a cable under the Brave, into a bay, and into the interior via the bolt hole that formerly held the door chair in place (which we removed when we installed the new recliner).  

They unboxed and plugged in a new wireless N router, asked what we wanted for a password, set it up, and presto! our own 3Mb pipe, unlimited data internet!!  

2.37 Mbps running through a California VPN is good enough for me

I immediately had to try a Facetime session to my cousin, just to try it out.  Ta da!!  No more struggling with shitty Wi-fi.  We had an orgy of viewing last night, including catching up on some Game of Thrones from a memory stick, CBC news, then switched to Netflix to browse about.  Ah, roughing it!  Now if I could only figure out how to output the smart TV sound to the Bose Soundlink bluetooth speaker...

With the rig finally washed, today we completed our site setup.  First, I soaked down the CRV tow hitch with silicon spray (to stave off the effects of the inevitable seaside salt spray) before I put the cover over it.  

Then we set up our 10 X 10 canopy on the back deck, extended the Brave's awning, put the tire UV covers on, and attached the side and front sun/privacy screens.  Nancy then installed the black sun blockers on the windshield and front windows, on the windshield wipers, and put the tennis balls under the wiper arms to take the tension off of the wiper blades.  I still have to drill and screw down the canopy feet to the front deck to secure them, but we have to leave something for tomorrow.

Meanwhile, the weathers been good, and there were Dolphins jumping in the bay today.

Setting up shop

I apologize for our blog laxity, but we really haven’t done much of note since our arrival.  

The plot so far: Arriving later in the season meant that Martin, the wash and wax guy is up to his eyeballs in business, and hasn’t yet been able to clean our rig up after her long journey.  Our final setup can’t really be done until the wash process is complete.  Also, I have been considering having El Valiete’s cooked-out vinyl graphics removed and painted back on, but arriving later means the auto body guy is also neck deep in business, and unlike previous years where he was part of the welcoming committee, he has not yet been around.

The first thing we had to do, was lift the legs, store the slides, and move literally five inches east.  Have I mentioned that the prime real estate here in the park on the cliff overlooking the beach is a little tight?  

Nancy walked into town and did a big shop, then wisely took a taxi home with all of her goods.  Next, she did a massive clean of the motorhome, removing the detritus of 4,600 Km. of travel, and put out all of the rugs and furniture throws that are only in place during extended stays.  

Our friend made a trip to the storage bodega and brought us our table, chairs, water dispenser, and other miscellaneous shiite we have acquired.  

Our neighbours have been here since the start of the month, and have had Carlos perform the annual knocking back of their vegetation.  

We’ve talked to Antonio and are in line to get our’s done as well.

The hummingbird feeder is up, and well-attended.  I will state right now that the accompanying shots are less than optimal, but illustrate our current setup.

We’ve used our fresh water tank for non-potable water in our Mexican travels, so last night we bleached our water system, and this morning, flushed everything out, and are now onto the Park’s potable water system.  We will continue to have a 5 gallon supply of agua pura for guests. 

The promised Park wifi improvements have been completed, however the wifi can still, at times, be dismal.  As an example, will trying to do a simple banking transaction, I had to log in three times, over 20 minutes, because the connection was both very slow, and intermittent.  Our neighbours pay for a Las Colonia tower based internet access.  I asked Antonio about it, he said Eric is doing an installation here today, I’ll send him over when he’s done.  Eric says $2200MXN for the antenna and installation, and $300/month for service with NO DATA CAP!  I asked him how soon he could do the installation, he said tomorrow.  We’ll soon see whether he meant Saturday (today) or mañana (not today, sometime in the future).  If this works as it should, it means we have FaceTime, Netflix, and all the other niceties which have, in the past, eluded us.

Anyone who knows Kirk knows that there' something wrong with this picture.  Kirk, never, and I mean never, rests until every morsel in his dish is done.  On inspection, he has what we think is an impacted gland, So Nancy and he are off to see the vet, while I wait, just in case either Martin or Eric show up today.

Other than the above, we have been resting up from our travels, catching up with friends we haven’t seen since the spring, and enjoying the heat and a beverage or two.

Melaque to La Peñita

We averaged just under 45 Km/hr for the day's drive.  The first 50 -70 Km were decent pavement, but working through the mountains, the road was constantly turning tightly, with big elevation changes, and overhanging vegetation.  As we proceeded north up the coast, as the country opened up, the roads steadily improved, and straightened, raising hope.  Then we turned north and inland, and the "construction" began.  Unusually for Mexico, there were almost no flagman.  There would be the odd short section of completed, wonderful highway, then you would turn a corner to find a bridge with one side not yet decked, yet accessible, or a choice between two routes, neither of which appeared probable, or even legal north of the border, with no signage or flagmen to guide your guess.  The sections of old highway joining the construction areas had received no maintenance in some time, with overgrown vegetation and broken pavement, giving you the zombie apocalypse sensation.  We were very high coming over the mountains south of PV, likely 5,000 - 6,000 feet, up in the pine forest, which had a grass understory, quite lovely really.  The road twisted and turned tightly as we descended to sea level in short order.  We came to the ocean south of PV, to the utter worst pavement and tope hell we've yet experienced in Mexico.  After the zillionth hotel tope, I snapped, and started honking the horn every time I went over a tope.  If the hotels wanted slow traffic for their convenience, I reasoned, it should be slow, noisy traffic.  Perhaps if everyone did this, the hotels would not install so many topes.  Nancy broke before the hotels did, however, and my grand scheme was scotched.  Next was the laterals of PV; because El Valiente has dual rear wheels, we are considered heavy traffic, and must chug along the rough, cobblestone, collectivo ridden laterals, rather than moving with normal traffic, lest we risk the wrath (or mordida) of the Transitos.  Another 50 minutes once we were clear of Bucerias, and we were home in La Peñita.  We went to the Pemex in La Colonia, unhooked the CRV, filled El Valiente to the brim to minimize gas tank condensation during her four month snooze, and very happily, lumbered into the RV Park.

Well, it was a long day. The highway from Melaque towards Puerto Vallarta started out as a very mountainous region.  It was winding with lots of vegetation very much like the highway between La Peñita and Puerto Vallarta.

An early start

Costalegre

Quite a few large rivers 

Construction along the way

There were intermittent pieces of construction.  Some with nobody around to tell you where to drive.  Luckily Cam made all the right choices and traffic was next to nothing.

Pine forests closer to Puerto Vallarta

We descended down to sea level and an 11 km hell highway into PV.  It was an appalling piece of highway (and we're from Manitoba).   Narrow, pitted/potholed, topes every 100 feet due to the high end hotels every 100 feet, with overhanging vines and heavy traffic.  It was gruelling.  I had been concerned about PV central traffic but when we finally got into PV and on the Librimento it wasn't a big deal not even when we had to go on the laterals.  Don't get the wrong idea though.  The highways we travelled in Mexico were 90% great.  Just that one little piece by PV was nasty and Mexico is working hard to build super highways everyday.  

Puerto Vallarta in the distance 

The cruise ship port

Say, isn't that the Ruby Princess

We are glad to see our friends again and they had a great supper waiting for us.  We are all safe and sound and happy to be off the road for awhile.  Marteen was here too and hopefully the Brave and CRV will get the bath they so badly need and deserve.

El Valiente, Cam y Kirk in our site.

288 Km.

4,626 Km. since Clandeboye

Día de Revolución

We didn't see the parade but a group of riders went by on the beach behind our trailers.

Palapa behind our RVs

We went out for a final dinner at the hotel restaurant.

Time to leave Melaque.