hey, all! typing this on a keyboard with mostly spanish keys, so forgive me if i dont use capitals or punctuation correctly! at an internet cafe in downtown puerto vallarta, sunday afternoon. just finished lunch by the ocean and decided to check our emails and facebook and send you guys a hello before we go do some more exploring.
everything is going well. i am sure i will talk your ear off about it when we get home. actually not that hot here (upper 80s, lower 90s) but very humid, so you walk down the street for two minutes and you are sweaty, sweaty, sweaty. some big storms in the evenings or at night, lots of beautiful lightning over the ocean, but so far it has not stormed or rained during the morning or afternoon, though it looks like it could any minute and we forgot our umbrella at the condo... whoops! yesterday was beautifully sunny and very hot, today very overcast and not as hot, but still quite humid.
we really love our condo... it is a very scary (the road is like the pacific highway, right by the ocean with big cliffs and the drivers drive very very fast... pretty much no traffic rules here!) 10 minute bus ride from downtown, but that also means it is very quiet and very beautiful. view is amazing. the water at the beaches in town is almost brown from the runoff from the rivers and mountains, but the water at playa gemeles, where we are staying, is like carribbean water, very clear blue, so you can see down for many feet. very glad we decided to stay just outside of town. makes coming into town an adventure, and then you feel very relaxed when you go home in the evening.
i dont know what we would do without gearry being essentially fluent in spanish, though. i cant imagine being here just by myself, only speaking english and just a few basic spanish phrases. his spanish has helped us out a ton. he had a 10 minute coversation in only spanish with the cab driver on the way from the airport... good way to make friends. i just sat there stupidly, understanding about every 20th word. haha. the only other bad thing about it here is the many, many, many vendors trying to sell you things on the beach and the streets and getting you to come into their stores and restaurants. that is how it is in many foreign countries that cater to tourists, however, not just mexico. it is the low season, plus the economy is hurting badly from the medias horrible coverage of the drug wars and the swine flu, so people are desperate for money. you have to say no gracias, no gracias, continually. they are usually not pushy though. if you say no gracias, they leave you alone. some of the time. some are a bit aggressive, but again, it helps that gearry is pretty fluent. they are just hurting for money. it is nothing like the media portrays as far as violence and such though. no swine flu, no drug violence. police are everywhere, along with security, and everyone has been nice so far. if you want trouble, you can find it. but that is just like anywhere.
were going to go do some shopping and then have dinner at an awesome vegetarian restaurant and probably hang out at one of the beach bars this evening before head back south to the condo for the night. we spent the afternoon in town yesterday, but today will be our first evening in the city. tomorrow is our anniversary and we are going on a canopy tour in the a.m. in the mountains (zip lining and then swimming in one of the mountain rivers) and then going out for a nice oceanside dinner in the evening. we dont have any plans for tues., wed., thrs., or fri. weve been good about not making too many plans. our favorite thing to do here so far is just be lazy and lay on the beach and play in the waves!
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