Some cruisers follow the lifestyle of spending half the year (the non-hurricane half) cruising Mexico aboard their boats, and the other half of the year (the hurricane-season half) with their boats safely in wet or dry storage in Mexico and themselves elsewhere, engaged in other pursuits. It's a nice kind of life. Some of these…
After 13 years of owning The Fox and 12 years living aboard and cruising, it occurred to us that we could improve our tropical sailing experience by having a stainless steel arch installed on the stern, to support a couple of solar panels, a more stable cockpit shade cover, and whatever else we could dream…
February and March, 2015: the days were just PACKED. Our good friends G&J treated us like royalty. They had lived aboard in Mazatlan for over 10 years and had spent many of those years writing and distributing "Cap'n George's Cruiser's Guide to Mazatlan." They knew all the best places and very generously drove us around…
Readers of this here blog already know how much I enjoy exploring Precolumbian archaeological sites. Copalita, just outside of Huatulco in Mexico's state of Oaxaca, is one of my favorites.Way back in 2015 the cab ride took 10-15 minutes from the marina and the round trip cab fare was a mere US $11. The museum…
Our 13-hour-long day trip out of Palenque was only half over when we approached the Mayan Classic era ruins of Bonampak, located on a tributary of the Usumacinta River. In a history similar to Yaxchilan's, artifacts recovered from Bonampak indicate it was a nondescript agricultural settlement in about 100 CE, that amassed wealth from river…
Back in the 1980s, travel from Palenque to the two Classic Mayan sites of Yaxchilan and Bonampak was a multi-day trek along muddy roads through the jungle followed by hiring boatmen to paddle you and your gear along the Usumacinta River – the border between Mexico and Guatemala. These days it's a more-straightforward all-day trip…
Palenque is a major Mayan archaeological site located at the jungle's edge in southeastern Chiapas highlands. It rose from a small regional center in about 500 C.E. to a major Mayan city-state in the Late Classic Period, about 600 C.E. (when my own ancestors were living in mud huts and painting themselves blue). Of all…
San Cristobal de las Casas is a charming Chiapas city known for its international tourism, international cuisine, a variety of hotels and hostels for all budgets, and lots and lots of college kids and grad students visiting from the US, Canada, and Europe. With the largest, heaviest backpacks you will ever see. We visited San…
It had been about five years since we'd last had the chance to visit the Mayan ruins of Palenque, and this time our schedule in Tapachula was open enough that we were able to include visits to the nearby highly-regarded sites of Yaxchilan and Bonampak in our travel plans. We took one of Mexico's fancy…
GB and I spent some time in Marina Chiapas paying attention to The Fox, with general cleaning, replacing the fridge's thermostat, and repairing the toilet in the head. Toilet repairs should always be rewarded with a nice trip, so we planned to end 2014 and ring in 2015 with more tourism: a visit to Guatemala.…