BACK IN LA PAZ!

Today is Wednesday, May 14, 2014.

         One  thing I really don't like about being down in Mexico is that all the good movies came out while we were down here and we cant find one that is not in Spanish and filmed with a cell phone in a movie theater by a random guy or girl with their phone so we can hear random laughing.  But we still managed to get a few good movies like Frozen, Turbo and Planes. Do you now about the boat with the little girl that got really sick during a passage to Hawaii? I'm asking because they were good friends of ours and there oldest girl they have is Samey's good friends. They would even bring their children to our boat and watch them so they could go shopping. Oh, I almost forgot to say sorry about not writing I was in the Sea of Cortez for a month and they don’t have WiFi so I couldn't write. The Sea is very beautiful but deserted. You can find things there called Chocolate Clams but they are not made of chocolate! They are brown. You find them on the bottom of the ocean when you see two holes. Max is good at getting them. One day he got 50! I got 6. They were delicious. Nancy on Antipodes made clam chowder (my favorite) and it was amazing. Max spearfished and got lobsters. Those were good too but I like shrimps better. I can't wait to go home to Seattle now. We will be there in 17 days! It is HOT here. We sweat all day long. 

Swinging on the beach in La Paz with Ben D. and Samey

Ice cream with Ben D. and Adam S.

Max's chocolate clams!

Copper Canyon.

First hotel---->La Fuerte. We left Mazatlan in the morning and were on a bus for 6 hours to Los Mochis. We were traveling with our friends on Sea Otter and Antipodes. When we got to Los Mochis we took another bus for two hours to La Fuerte.  Basically we were on buses for 8 hours. When we got there one of the three brothers who run the hotel met us with a van brought us to our rooms. I shared a room with Max while mom and dad shared a room with Sam. We had a view of the river. After we got settled we went to dinner at a really cool place. The next morning we got up and went to tour the fort. After we went to the fort we went back to the hotel. The next day we did the river tour which was basically a hike after a ride in a row boat.

Sam, me, Adam and Ben D.

We saw petroglyphs and one of them looked like an alien.

See the alien head?

They were from 2500 years ago. It was pretty cool. On the hike from our hotel we could see the river really well.

Second hotel---> Posada Barrancas (Copper Canyon). The next morning we took the CHEPE train from La Fuerte and got off at Posada Barrancas. We were again met by the owner of our hotel. It was a cool place called Cabanas Diaz. There were horses there and dogs everywhere. It was a one room place for us. It had a fireplace in it. We all ate together at one big table in their kitchen. We went to a place on the canyon where some people did zip-lines but I wasn't feeling well and neither was Max. My mom, Max, Sam and I rode on the gondola down to meet them at the bottom. It was cool.

me and Max

Adam, me, Easton and Ben D.

The next day we got to ride horses along the canyon. It was fun and funny. Adam's horse wouldn't listen so Shauna had to switch with him!

The next day we took a tour in van and went to a town called Creel. We took the train from Creel to Chihuahua that afternoon and got in really late.

Third hotel-à Chihuahua. Our hotel is so clean and right next to the Cathedral. We did a city tour on a trolley car to see Pancho Villa’s house and saw picture of him dead and the car he died in was there too. I got new shoes because there were shoe stores everywhere. We ate Subway sandwiches. The next day we went to see some caves which were hot and stinky and slippery. I got some cool stones – a onyx arrowhead, an amethyst, some pyrite and another piece of onyx at the store at the end. When we left Chihuahua we took a 12 hour bus ride overnight and it was cool. We all had TVs at the backs of the seats in front of us. I listened to music and found some cool new songs to download to my iPod. We arrived back in Mazatlan in the morning and we were all tired.

Mazatlan, Mexico

Yesterday my Grandma came to visit for a week. In Mazatlan, I have two friends: Adam and Ben. Adam is on a metal powerboat and Ben is on a sailboat. Ben and Adam both have pets. Ben has a dog named Chica. Adam has two cats, Oreo and Fiddlesticks. Mazatlan is really beautiful. It has flowers and trees everywhere. I miss Seattle a lot I wish I could be there.

This is our dock

Pool 

Slide at the pool

Grass

Marina

Main lobby of El Cid Marina Resort

We are in Barra De Navidad again

We are on are way back up to Puerto Vallarta then up to the Sea of Cortez for the spring. Appa and Sand Dollar are going to play Dungeons and Dragons, 4th edition. I chose to be a Shard Mind Invoker named Jim. Easton (from Sand Dollar) is a Dragon-Born Paliden. Kaley (from Sand Dollar) is a Nome Warlock , Nate (from Sand Dollar) is a Shifter Warlock, and Max might be a Human Ranger (at least I think he is). We will ask him when he gets back from Seattle on Sunday. I’m excited to play because it’s going to be a game where you fight monsters.

Far South

We are in Zihuataejo. The farthest south we are going to go on this trip. Me and my dad are going to calculate how many miles we have gone so far.

Where we started: Seattle

Where we are right now: Zihutanejo!

I was so happy when the Seahawks won. We watched it in a bar with tons of other people. When Easton and I go to shore we make sand structures like this one:

Easton and I made this world: water, fire, earth and air temples with a volcano in the middle. Sam made the one next to ours...

It took me and Easton a half hour to build. But it was fun to make. I am so excited to go to Seattle. If you think home schooling is better than school you are wrong. You have to do 3 hours a day, no weekends and no recesses L . But you do get to go to shore when you’re done. And you can snorkel, and jump off other boats' rigging. When we first got here, another boat named Patricia Belle called us over to jump off their big boat for fun. Kaley, Easton and I swam over and we had fun. They even had a rope swing but only Easton did it. Their boat is kind of like a pirate boat. My favorite thing these days to do is listen to music like Vida La Vida, Some Nights, and Party Rock Anthem. My God Dad Joe downloaded 953 songs onto my IPod for me. I really love and miss my God Parents Keri and Joe and my friends in Delaware.

More from Ben

We are in Barra De Navidad. We are in a marina that is in front of a huge, fancy resort. They have 2 cool slides at the pools. One is super slow and one is fast. We had fun there with our friends from Vales Valeo (Sonia and Anna), Antipodes (Adam) and Sand Dollar (Nate, Kaley and Easton). While we are here there is fishing tournament going on. We saw many sailfish and a big marlin being lifted out of fishing boats. We also got to go to a cool Buffet at the hotel and we got SUSHI!  J            We are more than halfway through the trip. I have been thinking a lot about Seattle lately and am already planning a lot of stuff to do there when I get there. My mom says we will be there around June 1.

The Best Month of My Life

Everyone I haven’t been writing lately. So here is a update from me. We’ve been in this bay for 1 month . The bay is called Banderas Bay. First we were in La Cruz and then we were in Paradise Village (Nuevo Vallarta) for Christmas and New Year’s. My Oma and Opa (German for Grandma and Grampa)came to visit. For Christmas, I got a 3DS and a really good boogie board. I also got Pokemon X and Y. We’ve been doing lots of fun things, like getting to let go some endangered sea turtles. Then doing a tour of Puerto Vallarta. Then we did 10 ziplines in the jungle and swam in a cold river afterwards. It was where they filmed “Predator”. After that we did a water park. At the water park you could swim with dolphins. We got to do the Royal Swim. We got to ride on their fins and also we got to do the foot push. Their skin felt like leather. It was really cool. I am going to write in my blog every week now. I am also writing a journal every day here on the boat. 

Two dolphins are giving me a foot push!!!