no es el calor que es la humedad!

How do you survive in 90+ degree temperatures with 74+% humidity? Our answer is by taking it slow and getting things done as early as possible in the morning. While the heat and humidity aren’t a surprise, they didn’t seem as oppressive when we visited a couple of years ago. But then we weren’t dealing with getting green cards, getting the car serviced, sorting out faster Internet, Mexican phones, utilities, bank accounts and all of the other things that go with establishing a new home. Yesterday, the humidity level topped our previous days’ level. As we walked into old town, the temperature was only 84°F but the humidity was 85%. Not a comfortable walk, especially since the return home is uphill.

Following a hasty trip back to Nuevo Vallarta the first week, the rest of our immigration process has been relatively easy. We got our photos taken, complete mug shots but better than the visas in our passports, completed yet more documents and turned in our passports. Next we had to go to the Immigration office to get finger prints done and get passports back long enough to open a bank account. They had to be turned in again until we were officially legal. Our attorney has led us through the process and taken care of the correspondence and legwork, making it relatively easy. Bottom line – last Friday we received our green cards (they really are green, unlike the American ones) and got our passports back. Now we just have to visit the Customs office to extend the import permit on our car.

Where's my lunch?

It’s not all work and getting day-to-day things put in order. The days seem to disappear, yet at the end, I can never figure out what I’ve accomplished. Steve and I both have started getting some exercise by taking some walks to the beach and into town. Because of the heat and humidity, other than our exploratory walks on Sunday mornings and a few other times, I prefer to go to the gym and get my exercise in air conditioning. The gym is beautiful; fully equipped and has ceiling to floor windows facing the bay. The other afternoon, there was a large iguana, at least a 3 foot body with a tail even longer, who leisurely strolled by the windows to some plants. After eating a bit he went running back for cover. What other gym gives you such a view?

And only last week as we were having lunch on the balcony, we were entertained by a school of dolphins playing out in the bay. They were jumping up and having such a good time until some of the tourist boats noticed them and had to try and get closer.

Thursday is the maid’s day at the condo so we try to plan a day out on that day. Graciela’s service came as part of our rental agreement. Steve wasn’t sure about it but I finally convinced him that she is used to having the weekly income and most probably needs it for her family. She is such a lovely person and we’ve had some pretty funny “almost conversations” with her tiny bit of English and our very little Spanish. It took us 2 weeks to figure out what cleaning supplies she wanted. Our Thursday outings have been mostly walking but a couple of weeks ago we visited Punta de Mita, about an hour’s drive North, to have lunch at a great restaurant on the beach. We were just down the road from Sayulita where the Bachelor in Paradise series is being filmed, and we briefly thought about driving over to Sayulita but we aren’t interested in the TV program so we gave it a miss. 

View from lighthouse

Last week we took a walking tour of old town PV and learned a lot of the history of the town and surrounding area. Our guide also pointed out good taco street vendors but I’m waiting to take a food tour that will take us to several stands so I’ll know which ones are safe.

We’ve had a couple of incredible lunches at typical Mexican restaurants where the locals go. The food was fabulous and nothing like the “Tex Mex” that you get in the US. The beef in my tacos and burritos was so tender it melted in my mouth. Both came plain with no peppers or sauces but the meat was so good, I don’t need anything to go with them. We’ve also had some good fish but we need to be a bit more adventurous. . I’ve already learned the words “birria”, meaning goat or sheep or a combination and “menudo”, the word for a stew made with animal intestines. Both are consider delicacies but they are the ones I’m going to avoid. My adventurous food tastings have a limit!

Complete with Malt Vinegar

The people here are unbelievably friendly and helpful. The security guys are always so friendly and helpful and speak to us when we come in the gate. Our neighbors next door sent us a huge and unique bouquet to welcome us to the complex. I’ve never seen a bouquet that was over 6 feet tall! Our second week we bumped into an American woman at a local market and she invited us to join an expat group, Friday Foodies, that meets on Fridays at a different restaurant each week. We went to our first one a couple of weeks ago and met the nicest people!  Last week we went to a restaurant that served fish and chips. Who would have ever thought that we’d find fish and chips here in PV. Of course Steve and I had to try it - it wasn’t bad or as Steve said, I've had worse in the UK.

Some of the Friday Foodies gave us contacts for a Vet for the cats and since a few of them are heavily involved in a cat rescue project, we’ll be getting involved too. We also got a contact to assist us in getting local medical help (doctors, dentists, etc.).  We’ve been told there isn’t really such a thing as a GP so you have to go to a specialist for everything. Living in a new country means there’s so much to learn every day but with the help of the Friday Foodies, hopefully, there will still be adventures but fewer mistakes.

We are now in the rainy season and get thunder storms almost every evening. Most of these are torrential and are accompanied by spectacular lightening shows. While they vary in length we usually get a nice sunset around 9pm. This time of year is much less busy with tourists so it’s a good time for doing some sightseeing if you can bear the humidity.

I’ll post more adventures as I get to grips with metric measurements in cooking and get back to being able to think in Celsius, rather than Fahrenheit again. It’s been a few years. I’ve remembered the conversion for kilometers rather than miles for some reason and of course now I’m constantly converting pesos into dollars. In addition to learning Spanish, the biggy will be to “think” metric and pesos! Stay tuned for more of our challenges!

First Mexican Challenges!

We are safe and sound in Mexico however our move wasn’t without its horror stories! After an uneventful drive from San Antonio to Laredo, and filling in all of the paperwork for our possessions to be exported across the border, we checked into a hotel and let Sadie and Ali out of their carriers. Sadie (our female cat) was extremely nervous so she crawled under the bed where she stayed during the evening.  Later she kept us awake all night with her meowing and pacing and jumping on the bed. Since we couldn’t sleep, we started for the border and made our crossing at 6am.

The border crossing went smoothly – too smoothly we found out later. Four hours into Mexico, I was driving and running out of petrol. I saw a sign that showed a pump and 1 km so I got off on an access road. There hadn’t been any petrol stations right off the toll road. Mexico roads are notorious for their potholes plus they aren’t just any potholes – some of them are craters! They also have topas (speed bumps/sleeping policemen) quite often on busy roads. After carefully dodging all the potholes for about 1 km there was no petrol station but I came to water across the road. Steve told me to take it easy and slow so I went to the far left side because the water looked shallower there although it was muddy so it was impossible to tell. As I slowly progressed, all of a sudden the front of the car went down into a deep hole and we were stranded with water up to the bottom of the door. As we got out to inspect the damage, we were both thinking, here we are in the middle of nowhere in Mexico with no cell service and no one around. Steve waded to the front and following some checking he thought he could lift the passenger side of the car enough that I could get traction and reverse out.  I killed the engine several times, then finally we managed to reverse the car out. Steve was now soaked with muddy water as he checked under the car. Fortunately, he didn’t see any serious damage – just some scrapes. The picture isn’t our car but we neither one had our wits about us enough to take a photo. This is just to show you how much the car dropped off into a big hole!

Not our car - just to show the angle!

We carried on and got to Guadalajara around 7pm. It had already been 13 hours and we were tired of sitting in the car so we decided we’d stay somewhere there for the night. Nothing is on the toll roads so we got off at an exit for a road into the city. It turned out our chosen road was almost a carpark with bumper to bumper crazy Mexican drivers. We saw signs for hotels but driving round and round, we could never find them. After well over an hour we were frustrated, tired and also stuck in non-moving traffic that merged into a large intersection where several roads converged. There were no traffic lights so it was every man for himself. When Steve forced his way in, we discovered why traffic was backed up so far. The whole intersection was one gigantic pothole after another with hardly an inch between them. There were also two sets of railroad tracks running across the street we needed to take with the pavement badly eroded around them. We bumped our way through the potholes scraping the underneath of the car the whole way across. It was now 10pm, 16 grueling hours after starting out that morning, when we made it out of Guadalajara and checked into a hotel on the way towards Puerto Vallarta.

Morning came all too quickly as we started the final leg of our journey early, arriving at the condo midday. It took several phone calls to track down the person with the keys so we could get in and when we did, my jaw dropped when I saw the condo -- it is so unbelievably gorgeous. The photos we were sent just don’t do it justice. It’s much more stunning and the view looking straight out from our balcony is dazzling blue water with old town Puerto Vallarta to our right. Our few possessions (we thought it was few until we had to move the boxes!) arrived early the next morning (Thursday) and one of the security guards and his friends helped us move everything in.

That afternoon, Steve emailed our Mexican attorney to let him know we were here and told him about our crossing. He asked about our visa document that we needed for our residency but we weren’t told to get the appropriate document. We had the visas and the Temporary Import sticker on the windscreen of the car so we were just waved on through. When we met with him the following morning he said that our missing document is a critical step in getting our temporary residency. The only way we could do that is to drive back to Nuevo Laredo and go to the Immigration office - no other choice.  Since we were already in the attorney’s office, we started filling out more required forms to apply for our temporary residency. 

 

I only got in the wrong lane once!

Sunday morning, we left at 5am for the 17 – 18 hour drive back to Nuevo Laredo, arriving at 10pm. As the Immigration office is open 24 hours, 10.30 on Sunday night is the perfect time to go. We completed yet more forms and quickly received the appropriate document with no questions and no problems. We didn’t even have to exit Mexico into the US and come back in, which was a big relief!

After sleeping in Nuevo Laredo for 5 hours, we started the 18 hour trip back, arriving totally exhausted at midnight Monday night. This time we made the whole 1,800 mile return trip in 42 hours without the car being caught in potholes and we are learning quickly how to drive like the Mexicans. Monday, I made a U-turn from the right hand lane with cars coming at me from both directions and Steve was overtaking slower trucks and cars on curves and hills when driving through the mountains.

To add to our trauma, Sadie has been in attack mode, mainly towards Ali, so we’ve had to separate them and keep them in different bedrooms for a week. Wednesday morning, a week after arriving, was the first time we’ve were able to let them out into the same room.

After being here for a week, we went back to the attorney and completed yet more paperwork and had photos taken. Our forms are now with the Mexican authorities and we are waiting for the notice to meet with them and get our finger prints done. We are also hoping that we can now get everything unpacked and in place and have a less stressful time.

This adventurous start hasn’t stopped us from having a drink on our balcony every evening and enjoying the sunsets! Stay tuned for more of our Mexican adventures as we get settled.

First night in condo

It gets better!

It keeps getting better and better!!

Our Moving Story

Just one week to go!

Final Count Down to our Mexico Move!! The past 2-3 months have been extremely crazy. Steve was finishing up his contracts and I was doing prep work followed by working onsite at three week-long conferences - Dallas, Tampa and Houston (two of which were back to back). All three took place within six weeks. Back for just a week, I’ve been focused on conference wrap ups. I’m also focusing on writing specs for a software company to program a registration system for one of our clients.

In addition to our crazy work schedule, we’ve had to get our visas, plus compile a mountain of other required documents, get them US notarized, bank guaranteed and get the Apostille for Spanish documents (the equivalent of Spanish notarized). Meanwhile reactions from people when we tell them our plans range from “you are so lucky, wish I could do that” (do they really wish that?) to “you have to be crazy out of your head because it’s so dangerous in Mexico”. How can these people think that Mexico is any more dangerous than any cities in the US that are now experiencing all sorts of shootings, riots and other violence? At least it’s not legal in Mexico to walk around carrying guns.

Sadie -- didn't we do this just a year ago?

We now virtually have almost no furniture or clothes and we are down to one box of books, the only remaining books being Spanish language books. Getting rid of possessions has been quite a liberating experience. Even though I’ve moved across the Atlantic a couple of times, I still had far too many possessions. For Mexico, we have to list all items no matter how small that we are taking across the border. Since we are moving into a furnished condo, our possessions have been slimmed down to include only a few warm weather clothes (the rest went to either Good Will or Dress for Success), music CD’s because, being “old people”,  we still like physical CD’s and can’t fully operate in the cloud and office furniture and files. We are keeping dishes and pots and pans and of course Steve’s bread machine and pizza stone. Having to list absolutely every item you own and box it up with labels is a real wake up call. You realize just how much “stuff” you actually own – yet never need or use. Preparing for the move has also been an exceptionally virtuous experience because you can’t import anything purchased within the last six months so no last minute shopping! I’ve had to think twice or even harder before buying anything but Steve is always reminding me.

Photos aren’t something you automatically think about on a daily basis but moving lots of photographs is expensive and they take up precious room. A couple of months ago, I went through our boxes of photos and sorted them for scanning and Steve and I went through the ones that I’d kept. We decided that all photos apart from originals of our parents and photos of when we were young, we’d have scanned and then we’ll just have the digital images, or rather, they will be in the cloud. We’ll have access to them whenever we like. Scans were received while I was away and they have been backed up so the originals of the children have been sent to each of them to decide what they want to do with them.

Our welcome to Mexico

Our move a week from today means we’re prepared to execute precision timing – (more or less) Mexican precision timing. Since its Mexico and we can’t find absolute rules, the timing could slip quite a bit and we’ll just have to go with the flow. The US side should be fairly straight forward. A truck containing our few remaining possessions and detailed lists will be loaded on the 28^th. On the morning of the 29^th Steve will drive it to Laredo, TX (a border crossing) where all contents, along with relative lists, will be moved into a truck owned by an International Border Crossing Company. They will maneuver the customs check and crossing for us. I will follow in our car with the cats which will be a fun experience (not) because they both hate the car. This will just be the beginning for them and for us too because we’ll have two more long days in the car. 

At the crack of dawn on the 30th we’ll head for the border crossing. We have a page long list of things that can’t be imported in the truck but can be taken in for personal consumption so I have a feeling the car is going to be crammed full! Once the truck passes inspection, it will be sealed by Customs and driven down to Puerto Vallarta. 

Our welcome to Puerto Vallarta

Our preparations have truly been an extraordinary experience. Since our condo is completely furnished, as are most rentals in Mexico; we knew we’d have to get rid of nearly all furniture as well as other miscellaneous items. Selling our possessions has been a “Craig’s List” experience. Extra beds, dressers, sofas, dining table and chairs, pretty much everything has been sold and I have to say, I’ve had no emotional ties to seeing any of it moved out. Does that make me a “cold-hearted” person? Perhaps! But I also know that I’m going to have all the comforts of home when I arrive so I don’t really need to keep much at all. 

Some ex-pats decide to ship almost all of their possessions because they want/need the security and comfort of familiar things around them. Since neither of us feels that need, the only things we are being consciously aware of keeping the same are cat accessories such as blankets, scratching posts and their “tree”. YES - we are crazy cat people!

Locally grown produce

We’ll need to purchase some smaller items not included in the condo rental such as throw rugs, bath mats and various other items that we probably can’t even think of now. Finding these will be a good introduction as it will get us out and exploring Puerto Vallarta. Although, since the condo is furnished, it means there's no urgency in “getting the house put together” after moving in. We will also have to find places to shop for food. I’m already familiar with the mega Mercados so one of my first searches will be a fresh produce market.

Center of PV

And I want to explore the area surrounding our condo as quickly as possible. We’ve been told the beach is just a 5-minute walk and it will be a 15-minute walk into the center of Puerto Vallarta so there will be lots to explore. I think one challenge will be avoiding all of the touristy shops and bars. 

Further afield trips are already planned to San Miguel de Allende, a wonderful artsy and historic larger village. I also want to go back to Guadalajara, a favorite of mine but Steve hasn't been yet. Our first month will be filled with official things such as obtaining resident visas, bank accounts and post office boxes – all have to be taken care of pretty quickly. 

Since we have taken the condo sight unseen and we haven't been back to Puerto Vallarta for a year - it's going to be an adventure. Here's a link to see our new home:

https://plus.google.com/photos/102840684536112573599/albums/6140906472570844193?authkey=COj6nPnn5JvrEA

We are hoping reality matches the photos. 

Nothing is simple, easy or familiar while transitioning to a home abroad but exploring as much as possible every day is top of my list. I’ll be posting updates to our “moving story” as we progress through this adventure. And hopefully, we'll be like the photo below.