International quest for the good life

Peru to Pichilemu

2009-03-11T09:11:00.000-07:00

I'm in Santiago, Chile at the moment and I've got a place in the coastal town of Pichilemu for $150 a month. My ticket from Tijuana to Lima was around 500 bucks and I found a hostel for two for 18 bucks a night. I think there were places across the highway from Miraflores (coastal part of Lima, Peru where I was staying) for $5 a night. It's a ten dollar cab ride from the Lima airport to the hostels in Miraflores or Barranco (where I think the rooms are cheaper). Food in this area is good and cheap if you eat where the locals eat. We were getting three course meals (really good fish soup, dank avocado salad, and various meat/fish plates) for $3 at a place across the street, and there was an alley with four or five restaurants, all of which had great local plates and free berry juice (chicha or something). Eating at the more touristy places is more expensive, like $5-$8, and not as tasty (think crappy deli sandwiches and confusingly bad pasta). I really can't remember a time when I decided to pay more for better food and actually got better food. It's natural to miss fettuccine alfredo, but beware...

Didn't take too many photos of Lima because besides the excitement of being in a new place it was a pretty dirty city, like most I've been too, where the most exciting thing to do was try not to get ripped off by business owners and reefer dealers. At least there is some reefer in Peru; in Chile it's on the list of hard drugs and is therefore virtually non existent. I will double my search efforts when I return to Pichilemu a lonely man (my travelling cohort leaves me tonight for Mexico city where she will be attending Le Cordon Bleu for career building activities). For me the draw of Peru is the barren wastelands of the rest of the coast, which seems to be one continuous rainless desert through which the Panamerican Highway runs north to Ecuador and south to Tacna, the last stop before Arica, Chile. Once the southern hemisphere winter gets going, I think that the surf will be absolutely insane from Southern Chile to Northern Peru, so it is my plan to buy a used tent from a guy I know here in Santiago and just trek up the coast eating beans and rice and churros, showering twice a month and reading the library that makes up half of the weight of my backpack.

If I'm not making a great case for seeing the beautiful nations of Peru and Chile, let me remind those potential visitors that the bus ride from Lima to Santiago, a scant 50 hours or so, takes one on a scenic tour of the driest and most lifeless place on Earth. If you're curious about the validity of this claim, just look it up. They're testing Mars landers out there. It's funny to say to yourself, "You know, this might be what it's like on Mars," and then to look up the Atacama on Wikipedia and find out that science says you're basically correct. It's also funny when you book your 11pm bus ticket and they tell you you'll be arriving at 6am. But you thought that it took like 20+ hours... aw, shit.

In Santiago (I mean Chile, as far as I've found), people sustain themselves on Empanadas and Italianos (foot and a half long hot dogs with guacamole, salsa, and mayo). Unless you're training for a marathon or surfing 5 hours a day, it's a good idea to figure out an alternative. Knowing that the surf would be really good in Pichilemu, we traveled there (four hours on a bus leaking fuel) and ended up haggling for a good room rate. The key phrase down here is "Puede bajar me?," meaning "can't you go a little lower?." I learned this phrase from my first cabbie in Lima, and using it alone I have gotten the best bargains of my life (from $400 a month to $150 and so on). Lying about previous offers is also essential to proper cabana rental fee extortion. I've found that the key to sustainable living abroad is a working stove and oven, good local produce from the stand, and access to a big grocery store where the locals shop. Having a companion who likes to cook and is good at it is nice as well, but as long as you can boil water and bake stuff you're set.

Fruit and Pancakes, Volcanoes,

2009-01-25T20:24:00.000-08:00

The good food is the fresh food. The fruit is fresh in fruity places. Volcanoes are a regular part of the landscape from Guatemala on down.

quick summary

2008-10-09T19:14:00.000-07:00

Here's Kenny cutting my hair, Chris peeing, me crossing into Guatemala, and Arlette crossing into El Salvador.

New Journey

2008-10-09T07:57:00.000-07:00

This morning finds me in the town of Managua, Nicaragua, where buses converge and auto-hotels abound. Pochomil, on the coast, is 1.5 hours away, and I´m hoping to get to surf today. Don´t really know anything about anywhere I go these days, so all I plan on is finding another little pocket of circumstances to experience.
This started as another surf trip, this time directly to Barra de la Cruz in southern Oaxaca, Mexico. After driving all day from LA to and from San Diego to grab Victor´s epoxy board, I missed the 1am flight that Kenny and his friend Chris were on out of LAX. Relaxed with my mom until 2am and then packed under the influence of a few wondrous substances while mom snored for a refreshing 3 hours in her room. Candace explained the housing crisis and I think a lot finally stuck while she drove me to the airport for my 6:45 flight to Huatulco, Mexico.
On the plane I met a guy named Ross from Oceanside who was getting a ride to Barra from his Cousin who ended up being a dude I met last time I was at Barra. Ross ended up being a super styilish surfer who could play a mean blues harp.

Last day in Puerto part 2 starring Charles Norris and Steven Segal

2008-04-27T09:35:00.001-07:00

This time I think it`s for real, but I`m done stressing about where and when. For now it`s back to the beautiful wave that took my world class wave virginity, this time by bus and boat. Might stay a whole week there, as it looks like a pretty hearty swell is coming on Thursday and lasting into the weekend. It`s a funny thing, waiting around for swell to arrive so that you can go score the wave just outside of town. On the one hand, I`ve been able to surf a pretty manageable Zicatela with a couple really, really good sunset sessions that saw flawless peaks breaking over complete glass. On the other hand, it`s hard not to feel like my limited time to see this amazing part of the world is passing by while I`m sitting on a thumb chair. I`ve learned a lot, regardless, and hopefully we get some really good face time next week. I`ve got a feeling that the waves we are about to get will be worth all the simmering we`ve been doing in this pressure cooker. It is really goddamn hot right now.

With a new guitar in hand, thanks to Raoul the German hulk`s incredible string of bad luck which included a mugging, a deep laceration, and a cataclysmic episode involving the hostel`s high velocity ceiling fan and my first guitar, I am off to re-discover paradise with a new crew of international wanderers. I`ve got travel chess, a new book from Robbie the Irishman entitled Love in the Time of Cholera, and a journal that is half empty. The green is cheap, and the thrills are cheaper; sails up!

This hurt my brain.

2008-04-24T14:49:00.000-07:00

a wee left

2008-04-24T14:45:00.000-07:00

This was a five second barrell, but I liked these shots the most. You believe me, right?

2008-04-24T14:34:00.000-07:00

still no tubo, but closer!

2008-04-24T14:07:00.001-07:00

2008-04-24T14:07:00.000-07:00

2008-04-22T16:15:00.000-07:00

Last day in Puerto

2008-04-22T15:33:00.000-07:00

My bus leaves in an hour and a half, and I´ve tied up all of the loose ends that my mind can muster. I missed the Aussies when they left this morning, and I´ll say goodbye to Eric when I jump into a taxi in front of our beloved Hotel Villa Mexicana. I´m more than ready to hit the road again, but I´m gonna miss a lot about this slow little tourist paradise. I don´t imagine that I´ll ever eat as cheaply and as well as I have for the last month, and I don´t think that getting surfboards repaired will ever be so fast and painless. Fifteen bucks for a cracked rail on an epoxy skin board! Sorry about that one Victor, I think that I´ll just end up buying this board off of you.

I´m really gonna miss the brothers Fernando and Emencio who watch over the hotel. I got so wasted last night that I don´t remember pounding on the gate to wake up Fernando to let me in, and I owe it all that fun loving Mexican´s generosity with his primo mezcal. I´m also going to miss the burrito place with the best juice to hit this digestive tract. On some days I´d order pineapple, banana, and strawberry, on other days I´d get something like apple, pineapple, and lime, all blended with ice and orange juice. I´m going to start a mobile juice bar when I get back stateside and use the cash to fund a coinciding tour of the coast

Managed to get down to Barra de la Cruz, which is an amazing place, and though the surf we got wasn´t perfect the potential of the place smacks you in the face. Took some pretty hairy drops there, one of which taxed me for a couple of my own hairs which I later found in the crack in the board caused by a violent encounter with my shin. I swear I felt the big barnacled rock brush my ass a couple times, and even a couple surly locals hooted for me as I paddled for do or die rides. Some other guys just shook their heads at what they saw as complete recklesness, and after thinking about it for a bit I decided that with the hospital so far away and my life so fresh, maybe the glory is not worth the risk. Of course we left Barra on Saturday the 19th, the day after we arrived, and three days later I heard from a local bigwig that Sunday was really good and devoid of people. Documented travel lesson #1 : let the herd go its own way if you´ve got greener pastures in your sights. Oh well, at least we got to play chess at Cafe Babylon and spend travel funds on beer.

The real jewel down here is the sleepy fishing/mexican vacationer town of (insert name here). Jaime, the expat Puerto veteran who looks over the sweet house that sheltered Brandon, Jeff, Colin and myself, told us about the place and we went there not knowing what we would find. The good lord really took his time on this one; absolutely beautiful, reasonably priced, and the wave is perfect. Went there twice, with the first trip bestowing upon me the best ride of my life on a perfectly shaped ten foot wave that was like a big steep neverending ramp. The second trip gave us a different look at the place, with the swell coming in from a bit more to the west creating perfect aquatic cylinders for those able to wrangle them. I certainly tried. That time was with Colin, John, and Natalie, and we lived like royalty in a concrete cabaña atop our ever attentive host Carlos´ own home.

Oh shit I hope I don´t miss my bus. I´m off to barrel riding school with the travel chess set that I bought at a toy store for 25 pesos. It´s got backgammon and checkers too, so I´m sure I´ll have a pretty easy time making friends.

Al sur antes de la viaja al norte. Necesito mas español

2008-04-18T10:02:00.000-07:00

Travels north have been delayed in favor of heading to Barra de la Cruz, the famous right pointbreak lusted over by regular footers around the world. In an hour our international crew boards a luxurious taxi that will take us right to the gate of the little fishing village overlooking the wave. A bit of haggling by Eric the Spanish king of tranquilo brought the price of the one way drive down to 200 pesos each, which is a chunk of cash down here but not much when still living off of paychecks delivering western wages. I´ll spend two to four days there, most likely saying goodbye to Michael and Joel the Australian players as they head for the airport and their respective destinations, and then its back to Puerto to regroup and head north to Pascuales. If something else happens...

Hope this whole blog thing doesn´t slowly drain my soul through my eyes and fingers.