One Hell of a Year

Well, it's the end of another year. I remember when New Year's came last year I spent the night doing nothing, and once again, I spend the night doing nothing. Funny how things come full circle like that. Well here's to another year of living and complaining!

Have a safe night, don't drink and drive.

RIP David Pollatsek

I learned just moments ago that a great man passed away recently and nobody knew about it. I can't let such an injustice stand, so I'm taking the time to tell people about this great man.

First off, I did not know David personally. However I am very familiar with the work that he and his companions have created in recent years.

David was one of the founders of Monster Games, a small independent video game developer located in Minnesota. In 1996, David and his friends formed the company and created games based on their racing passion. To be honest, their early games were underwhelming, but soon a once in a lifetime offer came that would put David and his friends on the map.

Smokin

On Christmas Eve, I was heading to bed when I heard some fireworks. That's nothing new, I hear them all the time, however this time they were louder than ever. I looked outside and the sky was being lit with an intense show of fireworks. Braving the cold, I stepped outside to the bow of the boat to take in the whole show.

The moon was shining brighter than I had ever seen. it was like a flood light illuminating the entire boat. I had taken a flashlight with me so I could see, but the moon was so bright it was unnecessary. I sat down at the front bench. and looked up at the sky full of flames. It seemed like everyone was firing their own fireworks at the same time, because no matter where you looked, fireworks were launching.

The president of this country has a place down river from here. I hate to say it, but he had by far the most disappointing fireworks of all. Just these little things that go up a little bit and make some small light. Better step it up El Presidente.

The most amazing thing however was all the smoke. When I went out, I thought that it was foggy at first, however all of the smoke from everybody's fireworks was filling the river with a blanket of smoke. The bridge about one kilometer away was covered with smoke, and all you could see was its silhouette.

Christmas Dinner

Continuing from our experiment with cooking a chicken in the BBQ, it was time to do the big bird. That's right, for Christmas we cooked a turkey in a BBQ, the first time we had ever done so.

This was much more challenging than the chicken. First off, the bird cannot touch the metal of the grills, so we had to soak some pieces of wood overnight, and place them underneath the roasting pan (they did burn to a crisp after about 3 hours). And about every ten minutes we had to check the temperature, as a BBQ is not sophisticated enough to keep a temperature like an oven. After around 4-5 hours, the bird was ready to eat.

Ingram Asked - End of the World Edition

Well, it's finally here, December 21st, and I here I am in the center of Mayan society, Guatemala. Two hours away from here, a huge party is raging in the tourist trap known as Tikal, and instead of joining in. I'm going to answer your questions instead.

Q: Will you ever post a video? 

A: Ha, ha, ha! Silly Shauna, I don't have the bandwidth to post videos. However, you may have these photos instead.

 The living room. 

The Final Hours

The end slowly comes...?

Riding on Fumes

Today we were out replenishing our supply of drinking water when we ran out of fuel. Seriously, we ran out and we had to tip the fuel can on its side to get the last few ml of gas left in the tank. As luck would have it, the nearest gas station was out of fuel, so we had to go to one a few minutes further. Somehow, we just made it before the tank ran completely out, and refilled to max.

Always make sure you have a good supply of fuel when going out. Who knows when things will go wrong?

Professor Michael's Fantabulous Feature on Famous Folks 1

I've complained before (that seems to be common theme lately) that people don't know enough about Canada, and the people who have helped shape it many different ways. Well, there is little worse than a person who is all talk, and no action. Therefore I've decided to put my money where my mouth is, and started this little side section. So without further ado, let's begin.

Part 1 - Ted Harrison

When I was in elementary school, I was introduced to works of Ted Harrison when we studied the Canadian north. Harrison is famous for his use of bold vibrant colours, while also using simple shapes and imagery to create something beautiful.

Harrison is not actually born in Canada, but was in fact born in Durnham County, England, on August 28, 1926. As a youngster, his teachers recognized his art talents, and encouraged him to enroll in Art College, and in 1943 he was accepted at Hartlepole College of Art. Following a brief stint in the military during World War II, Harrison graduated with a Design Diploma in 1950, and began travelling the world with his family.

Serious Business

It's started, the final countdown to Christmas. Beginning tonight, and going for each night till the big day is a fireworks show. Yes that's right, I have the pleasure of dealing with nightly firework displays, and warm weather. These also aren't those stupid firecrackers I complained about earlier, these are the real deal.

Damn Mosquitoes

If it's not one thing, it's something else. It seems like the roach population has dramatically reduced in the last few weeks, but now the mosquitoes are out like crazy. I'm no longer content with just slapping them, I now literally punch them out of the sky. Feels good, except for the blood they leave behind.

Splash

It's officially the dry season now, so there should be no more concerns about heavy down pours. We had gone on for days without any rain, so figured it would be ok to leave my bedroom window open. Well, it wasn't ok. At 6 a.m., I woke up to the feeling of water splashing in my face. I look down to the floor, and there's water everywhere!

...

I get a towel and washed up the floor, way too early to be dealing with this. Minutes later I crawl back in bed and go to sleep.

Christmas Lights

One of my favourite things in the Christmas season is all of the lights. I do love Christmas lights, especially the way they reflect off of the snow and ice. Down here, not too many people put up Christmas lights. Most folks simply can't afford them, and put up small plastic decorations. Don't get me wrong, Christmas is very important here, as much of the population is Catholic. However I do find it hard to get in the spirit of the season. After all, it looks no different from my arrival in July. No snow, no cold, no lights, no Christmas food stuff.

As that may be the case, we actually have bought some Christmas lights and have hung them around the boat. They're not perfect, but they do look nice. Nothing like a little colour.

Propane

There are lots of things here that are very different from back home. Some things are logical in their differences. I can understand something like apples being hard to find, but one thing very strange, is how propane is sold here.

Now back home, I remember when we had a propane BBQ, when the tank was empty, you just brought it to the store and had it refilled no problem. Over here, it's not so simple...

Oh my God!

Guards

One thing that place has a lot of, is guards. They come in all shapes and sizes, however I would have to say that the other guards at Tienda Reed take the cake. TR actually has a whole bunch of different ones, but these guys are by far the best and most intimidating.

 See them?

Tis the Season

Like in the north, people down here are fully in the Christmas spirit. However, down here there is a hidden ugliness which goes with the season that I learned of today.

For all of December, Hugo, the guardian of this marina sleeps in an exposed hut every night. The reason for this is that thieves are very active this time of year, looking for gifts to steal. Last night at around eleven thirty, I heard three quick bangs. This was Hugo, firing his shotgun into the air to scare away people who were coming too close to shore. Wow, what next? Pirates? Oh, wait, I already saw those...

Please leave your questions for Ingram Asked in the comments.

Ain`t What it Used to Be

I've come to terms with some of the things here, but there is one thing which I cannot abide by. It might be ok for the old folks, and the locals generally don't even notice, but I have.

Over time, the internet has been getting worse and worse. Where it was once bountiful, we're now finding bits and pieces. We used to have stable connections, now it flickers on and off. I believe that over the past few months, the telecoms have been changing how much bandwidth people get, and just being dicks in particular.

What can a guy do?

Venus

The next lesson in Art Academy was a sketch of the classical Venus de Milo statue. Here it is for your enjoyment.

Please post your questions about this trip soon. After December 21, the world will end, so you'll never have an answer!

Fireflies

We were in town getting some food, as we didn't want to cook anything. We went to some pizza place we never heard of before, but it had a good name, so why not? It's name, Pizzeria. That's it, so we headed on in.  I swear that the building was about the size of a bathroom. All it is was an oven (same as any kitchen oven you have), a fridge, and some chairs. Despite that, it was probably the best pizza I've had since coming here. Good crust, not overly greasy, but still lacking sauce.

After our order was finished, we returned to our boat, and headed for the yacht. At this time, the sun had already set and we had to make the short trip in darkness. The pizzeria is located on a minor stream located off the main river, and it's covered with thick foliage. As you can imagine, without even the stars and the moon, it became even darker. There is one part of the stream where lily pads block half of the navigable river, and the trees thin out. In this area, I saw some bright white lights, and I figured they must be boats on the other side.

Oh no, they aren't boats at all. What they were was a whole bunch of fireflies living in the lily pads. I've seen fireflies before, but never with this colour. These guys were a bright white light almost like an LED. I had no idea that they could glow like that.

Remember to post your questions for Ingram Asked.

Morales

Today we traveled to the city of Morales, a city about half an hour away, and said to be the roughly the size of Fort McMurray. I was told that there are lots of stores and things to buy which can't be bought here, so I was reservedly looking forward to going.

The trip to Morales is actually fairly nice. Lot's of rolling hills, but only one or two villages and no speed bumps, so getting there is fairly easy. Once in the city however, everything becomes a mess. They really need to hire a city planner, as roads go wherever, become narrow in an instant, and street signs are missing. I guess that's the third world after all, but still.

Anyways, to keep this brief, I'll just say that Morales is very disappointing. Yeah, it's big, however it's all the same stores constantly repeating. If you want to see creatively bankrupt people, go to Morales. Everything we got there, can be bought here for the same price, no difference at all.

I AM in Sweethaven!

I know this place is a little odd, but I've also found something even odder. Popeye actually does live here. He's very old, very strong, and has a deep raspy voice. I also don't see him very often, he only seems to appear when something very heavy needs to be moved. Popeye is actually very friendly too, as I was out on the deck he called me and waved. How nice.

Want to see a picture of him?

Ok!

A Better One!

Today we had tacos for supper, but we changed one thing about them. We made the taco up, then painted the tortilla with butter and threw it onto the frying pan. We wanted to use the BBQ, but the propane ran out, so stove it is.

Anyway, after a few minutes of cooking them, they were ready to eat. Let it be known that this is the superior taco. The tortilla had a nice crunch, but it wasn't overdone.

Perfection.

Remember to submit your questions for Ingram Asked.

Good Fireworks

Remember that time when I was complaining about fireworks and noise?

No?

You mean all I DO is complain, so it all blends together?

Ok, fair enough, I do complain a fair bit. Perhaps even too much. However tonight I am not going to complain about anything!

Guns

In about mid afternoon, I heard what sounded like machine gun fire coming from the jungle. It's not too surprising, at least not anymore because everyone in this country seems to be armed to the teeth. I thought Americans were bad when it comes to guns, but these guys take it to another level. Never in my life have I seen so many guns in such a short period of time. Imagine going to the grocery store and seeing guys with machine guns standing guard at the entrance. Well that's reality here. Virtually every store has one guy standing around with a machine gun or a shotgun. A very weird sight for a Canadian.

Paranoia

Do you anyone you would consider paranoid?

Annoying isn't it? Having someone who believes the sky is falling, and everyone else is too stupid to realize it.  Well right now, someone is sleeping upstairs because this person believes that someone is going to steal all their lumber.

Yes that's right, lumber thieves. Something that has no sale value unlike copper wire. There's a point where you realize some people can't be helped, and then you just throw in the towel. So no, I won't be an enabler, I'm going to go to bed, and not take part in any crazy schemes.

In other news, remember to get yours questions in for the Dec 21 issue of Ingram Asked.

BBQ Bird

A week or so ago, we bought a frozen chicken from the grocery store, and today we finally cooked it. Unlike in the north, you can't just put your bird in a bag and leave it til it's done. Down here, we also can't leave the oven on for hours, or else the place will get too hot. So what do we do?

First off we cook this bird on the BBQ. To make sure it doesn't dry out, we put a half full can of beer inside the bird, and turn on the burner the bird is NOT sitting on. It's important not to disturb it for about an hour and a half, so no peeking.

Here it is with some Thyme and a home made sauce.

Ingram Asked - Again

Due to popular demand, I will be bringing back the Ingram Asked feature. Post your questions, and I will answer them to the best of my ability. The deadline for questions will be December 20, and answers will come before the world ends on December 21. The sooner you submit your questions, the higher quality of an answer you'll get, so don't delay!

Ruins

Today was kind of a special day, my parents went on excursion to some ruins a little ways from here. Hm? I didn't go on this trip? Quite correct, while they went exploring, I remained on the boat and looked after the dogs. It turns out that there was actually a lot of hype for this event, as the ruins are trying to cash in on the 2012 doom craze. Let's decipher these photos together.

 Their xylophone skills won't save them from the end. (Though it will help lighten the mood!)

 Some kind of ancient tablet we'll never know the true meaning of. 

 One hell of a tree.

Pork Chops

Today my parents bought pork chops from Backpackers, a hotel/store/restaurant run exclusively by volunteers. These have to be the biggest chops I've ever seen, before being cooked, each one was about an inch thick. No matter, we cooked them and made some mashed potatoes, green beans, and some home style bread. It all looked fairly good, so I sat down and went at it. Not bad, I ate some of the pork, then a little later I found an unpleasant chunk of fat. I ate my potatoes, bread, and beans, then went to the kitchen, and gave my pork to the dogs. At least they liked it.

Sad Dog

A few days ago, we took the dogs into town for a walk. It wasn't really different from any other day, but we did take them to an area with more English speaking people than usual. As we passed through, an older woman commented about how Lola and Sonic were so pretty, nothing too unusual. We continued on our way and went walking around for about an hour before returning. When we arrived back, that same woman was there, and she came up to pet the basset hounds. She just loved Sonic and Lola, and gave them all the attention in the world.

Then it happened.

Pictures from Rio

Yesterday there was an amazing sunset. I failed to take a picture, but I did take some tonight.

Shooting Stars

Tonight was the Leonid meteor shower, did any of you check it out? I did and I was rewarded with a measly three meteors. The first was amazing. It really was a ball of fire crossing the sky, it was so big I first thought it was fireworks. How stupid is that? Fireworks don't move down, they move up! Still it was a rather amazing two seconds of falling space junk. The other two I saw were very unimpressive and were just small streaks of light against the sky. I guess that makes the first one more impressive?

Victory!

An updated from yesterday, about those pesky little bugs. Well I noticed that their numbers were going down, and I found out why. My little lizard friend has been eating them. Now he hasn't eaten them all yet, but  their numbers have dropped dramatically in the last few days. Thank you lizard friend, you have earned your stay here.

Infestation

I was getting ready to go to bed, when I saw something rather annoying. A small insect started flying around my face in obnoxious manner. I simply swatted it away, and went on my business. After taking some water I looked up and saw them. Hundreds of these tiny insects were all over the wall and fly around it. I stood there for a moment, then I just went down to my room and didn't come out until morning.

What a weird thing to happen. Who would expect to see something like that?

Oh wait...

My bad, I should have expected that because that's par for the course here. Idiot. Anywho, still I was not prepared for that, I wish I grabbed the camera, but maybe I will if they come out again tonight.

Fireworks

I was in the kitchen making dinner when it happened.

*BOOM BOOM BOOM RAT TAT TAT BOOM BOOM BOOM*

It wasn't even dark, and someone was setting off fireworks again. I swear that these people love their fireworks even more than the Americans do. And believe me, the stereotype about Americans and their fireworks are totally true. Never in my life had I seen so many signs for fireworks until I went to America.

Anyways, here there are fireworks all the time.

Birthday - BOOM!

Halloween - BOOM!

Independence Day - BOOM!

Festival of the Dead - BOOM!

What I would do for some peace and quiet...

Fat Pony

Here's a little thing I did last night. I thing he needs to eat a little less...

Swing and a Miss

I had a craving for a chocolate cupcake, but as I said before small things like that are hard to find here. Or so I thought. My parents found these little cupcakes called Pinguinos (Because only penguins live in snow), which are kind of like a Little Debbie cake. I should say I wish it was like a Little Debbie cake, because these are awful. Truly imitation can never beat the real thing.

Lizard Returns

Remember a little while back when I showed you the pictures of that little lizard? Well, after I took the pictures  he ran off and I never saw him again. That is until I saw him a few days ago. Unlike before where he just scattered around without a cause, he has now found a nice home for himself. Since then, my good friend has found a nice home in the curtains across from me. Every evening, I see him come out and have nice time eating bugs. Better him than a spider.

Winter

I guess it is November after all, and as it will, winter has reared it's ugly head. Like you guys back home, it has become cold, wet, and miserable. Fair enough, it can't be above thirty degrees every day here, but even so, the sun has disappeared behind a thick layer of grey clouds. I can wake up with the sun shining through my window, yet in less than an hour, it's gone and we have a full day of rain. One nice thing however is the setting sun. With all the cloud cover, the sky gets a nice shade of violet, making me think of nice winter evening.

One other amusing sight is the local people, and how they deal with the weather. In this rather mild temperature, the folks here are dressing in layers. I can go out in shorts, and they have to bundle up in sweaters. A very different look from summer.

So it's come to this...

I just want to share this because I can. I know this has nothing to do with me, but I really like this thing, and you should too. Here we have an excellent picture drawn by the great, Soraya Saga showing her love of robots and Lupin III. Now, anyone who knows me knows that I have no love for MARVEL Comics, however, even I can appreciate a good work of art when I see it. So here it is; the best MARVEL character  mashed up with Lupin III. 

Koi

I'm a little embarrassed of this one, but here it is anyway.

I'm living in Sweethaven?

Wait, that can't be right, Sweethaven is a cartoon village from Popeye...

Seriously though, there is someone here who looks exactly like Bluto from Popeye. He has the hat, the build  the beard, everything. His boat however, is by far the most amazing thing about him. He drives his very tiny boat, which looks like a bathtub, with a motor attached to it. Really, it's amazingly surreal, I love it when that guy drives by. Really brightens the day right up. 

Is such a thing even possible?

Yes it is.

Honestly, it did start a little shaky, but as it got going, things began to shape up. A big problem, is that at sea level, dough does not rise very well. In fact I would say that it does not rise at all. Even after a full day, the dough moved very little, but we did have enough for two pizzas.

We also made two types of sauce, the first was a meaty tomato sauce, I frequently make this with spaghetti and pizza. In fact, I believe I have written about it before, so you should be familiar with it. The other was a homemade alfredo sauce, I like alfredo sauce, however I find that ours tastes too cheesy. A rare occasion where I prefer the jar.

So off we went, and placed our pizzas in the BBQ. After about ten minutes, the pizzas were ready, and we sliced them up. 

Crazy

I have never done this before, some might even say it's impossible. Nonetheless, I must attempt this. I am going to try to bake a pizza in he BBQ. Is such a thing even possible? Maybe so. I will let you know how it goes down tomorrow.

Passing

I found out today that someone I had known has recently passed away. I wouldn't say that I was particularly close to this person, but with his passing, something unique is gone from our world forever. It's people like him who change the way we think, and with one less, we are all a little poorer for it. 

RIP dear friend. 

Die!

A few minutes ago, I was sitting on the couch, surfing the net, when I saw something scurry, across the wall. Wonderful, another cockroach... I grabbed the nearest shoe, and gave chase on this horrible beast. It turned and twisted it's way around the furniture, hoping to lose me in the process. No such luck would be had today, as I was a man on a mission. 

BAM!

Clouds

One of my favorite things to draw are clods. The way they form into such large fluffy shapes and the way the light manipulates the colors. Is there a better thing to draw? Obviously the answer is no.  

What goes bump in the night

Last night we woke to a most mysterious event. At around 2a.m. Sonic was at the back doors, and he was going mad barking at something. I had no idea what if anything was there, perhaps something fled before we got to the door. I don't know what my dad was thinking, but he figured he should let the dog out so that he could do his business.

Big mistake.

Barley

As this fine month comes to a close, what could be better than a nice pastel drawing of a barley field. Nothing like fields of crops to make me think of fall, oh I also hear that it's Halloween, so I guess that's an acceptable view of the season as well.

I do love pastels, they are a perfect mix of paints and sketching.

All Good Things...

Must someday come to an end. No, I'm not cancelling the blog. What I am referring to is the free internet signal everyone was mooching off of. I guess the people across the river were tired of paying for everyone else, and yesterday morning they password protected their signal. We now have to pay for our internet, or have none at all. Well, it was acceptable while it lasted. 

BBQ

There is nothing quite like the taste of food that has been properly cooked over an open flame. I don't know what witchcraft it is, but somehow flame cooked food is simply superior. So if you have the chance (lol, not with your weather), get out the grill and get cooking. There is one little problem however...

These stupid grills are impossible to clean! What a way to ruin something nice... :(

Soap

I went to the store today to pick up some things, and I realized something. Soap is crazy expensive here. I don't  know why, it's only regular dish soap. Does it cure cancer? Is it made of gold? No, it is neither of those things. Simply one of those things they do to gouge people.

Thankful

There is someone who I recently started following on Twitter who has started writing about things that make her thankful. With such an uplifting piece, I figured that perhaps I should get a piece of the action. So what am I thankful for after all this time here? 

Hm...

Perhaps...

No...

Ah! This could be it...

???

I don't even...  I'll leave this here. Do you know what these are?

Cookie for whoever can correctly identify this thing. 

More Cake?

Is such a thing even possible? Yes it is.

Today, my parents as they often do, stopped at the bakery and picked up another cake. This time it was a chocolate cake, and boy is it good. I even has a fancy ring of chocolate going around the edge.

Windmill

Like the title says. Not the best,  but I like it. 

Dinner

Tonight we were once again running low on food. Since nobody wanted to run out, and get stuff, it fell on me to come up with an idea and make something. What's in the fridge? Spiced meat, brown sugar, vinegar, ketchup, potatoes... This could work. I know, meatloaf and mashed potatoes with my homemade BBQ sauce. 

A few hours later... 

Small Friend

Here is a regular lizard I see from time to time.

Hiatus

I will be taking a temporary hiatus from he blog for technical reasons. My keyboard is non responsive, so it makes typing very hard. I will post pics when I have them, so check back for that.

13 hours...

This is a record of the 13 wasted hours I spent today. Prepare to be very disappointed.

04:15 *Bang Bang* "What?" "Time to go!" "Already?"

04:33 *Bang Bang* "Are you ready?" "Almost..."

04:44 In the truck, driving towards the border town of El Ceibo. This is going to be very fun.

05: 14 "Oh crap, the road is gone!" Literally, there is a chunk of road missing and you need to avoid it by driving through a ditch.

05: 41 The sun is starting to rise. I love the look of the sky when the light blues starting peeking over the treeline.

06:54 Stopped at a checkpoint outside of San Luis, the guy isn't checking for weapons or drugs, but highly dangerous fruits and vegetables. Luckily we have neither.

Slow, but happening progress

As you may already know, the reason we've been in Guatemala so long is that we are having renovations done on the boat. Labor is cheap and materials are plentiful, so why not have it done? Eh, the workers aren't very fast?! Well, I suppose there must be some trade offs for such low prices... Never the less, we currently have the Flybridge undergoing extensive renovations, and I would estimate that we're about half-way through the procedure.

Currently we are having a wall added to rear section of the bridge so that it's no longer exposed to the elements. After that, we should have some new stairs put in, so that the dogs can go up top. Three months and they've never been there yet.

 A few days ago...

Colour!

One of the cliches about the tropics is that there are beautiful colours everywhere you look. This is true in some areas like the coast of Belize, but in this area, the colours are really similar to what Canada looks like in the summer. One thing in this country that does have colour all the time however, are fruits. It seems no matter where you go, fruits just liven up the atmosphere, and they are beautiful.

Being such good sources of colour, fruits are rather fun to paint, the fruits here really use the colour wheel in all it's glory.

 Tasty

Oh no! Privateers!

I went to town today and tried to fix my internet router, a few days ago it stopped working, and I figured that  perhaps using the internet connection at a different place could do something. Turns out I thought incorrectly. Going to town did nothing, and it looks like I now have a busted router.

One thing I did notice however, was that there was a lot less people there than usual. Usually, the place is packed with barflies throughout the day, but today there was maybe only 15 other people there. That may sound like a lot, but it's not, this place usually has every seat taken. For perhaps the first time ever, I could enjoy the restaurant in peace, without having all the childish antics of the other patrons. I spent a few hours there using their awesome internet, and enjoying the breeze. Ultimately defeated however, I packed up my things and returned to Anarchy.

No more than half an hour after I returned I heard a horn go off. Huh? I look up and I see two large Jolly Roger's passing by the front of the boat. Oh no! Privateers! I go to the front deck to see what's going on, and there are a bunch of people dressed like pirates with swords dancing on the boat. I wish I had my camera with me, because it was so odd. I can't wait for the next pirate raid. Hopefully it'll soon!

Tuna Steak

Let it be known to all, I hate Tuna Steak. Who wants a half cooked steak with tiny bones lying around everywhere? If I want tuna, I'll have it from a can thank you very much. And if I want bones, no, I never want bones. Seriously, outside of sellers being to cheap to de-bone their product, what reason is there for having bones present? To make it easy to murder your enemies? To give people something to chew on? Come on, just get rid of the bones and maybe I'll be interested. Ugh, the thought of fish bones just make me lose my appetite  My Grandpa was the same way, as soon as he found a bone in his fillet, he was done, no matter how good the dish may have been. Well I'm done too.

Sketching is also Hard

Like painting sketching is also very hard. In fact, I think sketching is harder than working with paint, who would have thought? Here is what I've done so far. I'm a little embarrassed, but I know I'll get better later on.

Good Eats

Today was my birthday, so we had to have something special that we don't have every other day. Being in Rio Dulce, we don't have all that much period, so having something special has to be something not too complicated. It's not like lobster we have every other week for a couple of bucks. So after thinking about it, I decided I wanted hamburgers, but with the twist of having homemade BBQ sauce and my moms corn fritters.

For those of you who haven't had my moms corn fritters, imagine something like an apple fritter from Tim Hortons, but smaller and no glaze on the outside. Replace the apple with corn, and you've basically got the same thing. Yet describing it alone isn't good enough, you really have to have one right out of the pot to appreciate it.

Painting is Hard

I recently took and interest in painting, it's a good way to pass the time, and it's a fine skill to boot. Since I'm only learning, I didn't want to buy an actual canvas and paints, so instead I downloaded some software, and started taking the lessons. I'm just at the very start of my journey, but I want to share what I've done so far.

Showdown!

So, tonight brought about the first debate for the presidential election in the United States, and while I'm not an American, it will effect all of us so I decided to listen in.

For the last few months, Republican Mitt Romney seemed to be taking a severe beating from President Obama, but I was surprised by Romney's performance tonight. I should first disclose that I listened to the debate, but I didn't have a video feed to watch their body language and what-not.

In my view, Romney had complete control of the entire debate. He was confident and cool, even when he didn't really make sense. Really, everyone seemed to think that Romney was going to be a second John Kerry, but today he had charisma and dignity. Today was make it or break it for Romney, and I feel confident in saying that he did indeed make it.

I don't know what happened to Obama, but today he just was not there. Perhaps being emperor for four years dulled his combat skills, but who knows? I used to think that this race was already decided, but perhaps Romney gave himself the jump start he needed...

Why?

A month or so ago, we had pizza from the Catamaran hotel and restaurant. You may remember that I hated it, and felt that those people should be ashamed of themselves for selling something so terrible. Now you can all remind yourselves about how bad it was. Note how up above, I mentioned that the pizza at Rio Bravo was good, but I didn't really remember it since we were so tired when we had it. Here we are in October, and we return to Vista Rio.

Still Alive!

A few days ago, there was massive power outage that effected the entire region. I woke up early in the morning to the unpleasant smell of diesel fuel, and I knew right away we were on generator. This lasted the entire day, but at least I got to have A/C and made some significant progress into Xenoblade. Going out, it was the strangest thing ever, power outages aren't new, but this one completely killed the region. It's weird seeing these guys who basically spend all their time working, just sitting around doing nothing. From dawn till dusk, these guys are doing their jobs, but on that day, all they could do was sit around and fish.

With that, we had a nasty internet outage that lasted even longer. I don't understand why this happened, but after the power outage was over, we still had no internet. When it came back the next day, it was really bad, and virtually impossible to do anything with it. No matter now, I'm back and soon we'll be going full steam ahead!

Holandesa

Today while in town, we stopped at the bakery, Holandesa. Holandesa is kind of like the Time Hortons of Central America, but the big thing is that they sell all kinds of baked goods like cakes, donuts, and anything else. If it's made from dough, it's either bought from Holendesa, or it's from Bimbo. What I would do for a slice of D'Italiano bread...

First thing we got was a six pack of tiny donuts. These donuts are covered with icing sugar, and have orange jelly inside. The donut is average, but the jelly helps give it a refreshing feeling.

G-g-ghosts!!

Going out for a stroll in the morning sun, I came across some unearthly apparitions.Terrified of the impending consequences, I used my trusty Camera Obscura, to exorcise these foul beasts, and return peace to the land.  Do you dare take a look at them? You may never be the same again if you do. You have been warned.

Noooo!

Today we were cleaning some containers on the back of the boat, and I was dreading this chore. The cleaning isn't the bad part, but I knew that such an area would be home to a vast menagerie of roaches and other undesirables. We started by removing some old ropes, nothing seemed to be out of the ordinary. That's good. Then came some tarps, and it started...

A whole bunch of roaches were living here, I think there must have been half a dozen there. And one is really strange. It had a typical body of a roach, but it's head was shaped almost like an ants head. Strange isn't it? It seemed more aggressive than the others, but my dad flattened it before it could go nuts. Either all the roaches were trapped in a garbage bad, or were squashed, never had so many been killed in a single day. But it got worse, much worse.

I later stopped cleaning, and left to go make supper. My parents continued cleaning out the containers on the back of the boat. A few minutes later I heard my mom yell stop, and I came up to see what was going on. My mom told me to grab the wasp spray, and right then I knew what was going on. A massive spider had appeared, one even larger than the other one I talked about before. My dad took the can of wasp spray, and just smothered this bastard with the stuff. A few seconds later he curled up and died. One less enemy to worry about.

Fruits and Veggies

After about a week or so, we begin to run out of all the produce, we consume a lot here, and the stuff will go bad rather quickly. So once again, we trekked into town, and got a few bags full of produce, and returned to the boat. Remember earlier how I was ranting about chicken being expensive? Well it is, but produce on the other hand, is very affordable.

How much do you think the below cost? (There was a little more not shown in the pic.)

100!

That's right people, it has finally come and it will be gone like a transcendent dream. The post of all posts, post number 1-0-0. Yes sirree Bob, it has been one hundred great original posts from me since May. You're saying that I should do something for such a splendid anniversary? Huh, well, I didn't exactly plan on doing something special...

Perhaps a summary of my favourite moments on the trip?

Puppy Photo Shoot! Yay!

Lola was in a good mood today, and she just loved posing for the camera. Let's see if she has what it takes to be a star.

 Why hello there Lola!

 Nice day isn't it?

A Huge Storm

Last night as I was getting ready to go to bed, a heavy downpour arrived and covered the region in a thick fog. Being that the only ventilation in my room is created by a ceiling hatch, I stopped what I was doing and closed the hatch before an unmanageable amount of rain could pour inside. As I turned around after closing the hatch, I spotted something brown and shiny scurrying around the stairs. God damn it! Another roach is spreading it's filth.

I quickly dashed up into the living room and grabbed the bottle of water/soap that we use to stun roaches. As I raced back downstairs, the roach was still scurrying around, so I took the bottle and sprayed it. It seemed to effect it a little bit, but the roach then started running around like mad. As this was happening, all of the lights suddenly went out, and I was afraid that my prey would escape into the darkness. Fortunately, it was only a power surge and the lights were restored about ten seconds later, though it seemed like an eternity for me, and likely the roach as well.

Independence Day

Tomorrow is one of the most celebrated days in all of Guatemala, Independence Day. Yes on September 15, 1821 Guatemala threw off the colonial shackles from Spain, and declared itself a sovereign nation. It hasn't been a completely flawless 191 years, but it could be worse. However there is one thing that has disappointed me about this holiday, and it's a rather odd thing to mention.

Not that Independence Day!

Tacos and Sun

Once again, we had our homemade tacos and homemade sour cream. As I kind of promised in a non-committal way, here's a low quality picture of my taco. The only thing I have on it is the beef/rice/jalapeno mix, sour cream, cheese, and lettuce.

Tacos

Tonight for supper we had beef tacos. Rather than making them from ground beef like we usually do, today we used the same kind of roast beef as I wrote about last week with the wine. Once again we put it in a slow cooker with rice and allowed it to cook all day. After a few hours, we added some fajita spice and jalapeno peppers to the meat, and allowed the meat to absorb the awesome flavors. All together, I would say that the meat probably cooked for almost if not ten hours.

Now one thing I love to have on my taco is sour cream. I think it's the perfect dressing to temper the spiciness of the meat. However, like many things here, sour cream can be difficult to acquire. Yet despite seeming out of luck, it turns out that making sour cream is actually extremely easy. All it is is heavy cream, lime juice, and vinegar; items which are all easily found in town.With that, we made our own sour cream, and it was actually pretty good. Not as thick as store bough, the flavor was relatively the same. Altogether, the meal was pretty good, perhaps there will be picks when we have more tomorrow?

Robalo

For the past two days, we've been having a huge fillet of robalo fish (also known as snook) for supper. The robalo fish is native to the waters from the south eastern US, all the way down to Brazil, so it's eaten fairly commonly. We were told that robalo was one the best tasting fish there is, so we naturally bought some. After sitting in our freezer for a few weeks, we finally took it up and cooked it up yesterday.

What a cute little guy! 

What came afterwards, was chunks of white fish meat which were battered and fried on the stove. The taste was rather... disappointing. It really didn't taste like anything at all, it was just generic white fish. In fact, I would say that a "mystery fish stick" has more flavour than this thing. It's really sad actually.

Small Post

Not much happened today, and I'm fairly tired, so I'll just post a couple pictures of a boat I saw today. Maybe I'll throw in a puppy pic or two...

 Ah, the majestic sailboat. Is there any greater mode of transport?

Want Some?

One of the easiest things to make in this great heat, are hamburgers. They don't take long to make, you don't need to use the oven, and they taste good (I love them). So yesterday, we went to the general store to buy some ground beef to make burgers. We arrived at the store, and began looking through the meat freezer for some ground beef. We found some ground pork, but no beef, so I was prepared to leave in disappointment. However, the owner of the store came by, and showed us some beef cubes, we have a meat grinder, so this could work.

Courtesy

I want to talk about something I may have gone on about before. I'm not sure if I did, perhaps I didn't, but I'm going to do it anyway. I want to talk about the courtesy that the rich Guatemalans show all the other people, and how they need to be taken down a peg.

First off, I should talk about how the land is distributed in this country, specifically in this region. Relatively speaking, there are three types of people who own any significant land down here. Those people are either foreigners, criminals, or politicians (some might say that the latter two are the same group). You see, the people who own the land next to us, are druglords. The next three properties are owned by the druglords and their associates, and the fourth property is owned by the president of Guatemala. Strange isn't it?

It's Back

I can't remember the last time like this, but after about two weeks of dry conditions, it stormed once again this night. It's odd, apparently September is supposed to be the wettest month of the year, yet it's been by far the driest so far. Tonight though, everything changed again. As evening arrived, instead of the normal picturesque sunset, heavy dark clouds covered the landscape. An hour or so after that, sheet lightning filled the sky, and soon regular bolt lightning joined in. When the thunder rang out, surprisingly Sonic ran for cover. Now, usually Molson is scared of loud cracking sounds, but this time Sonic ran for the bottom of the boat. In fact, he only came out of hiding as I typed this up.

Great Taste

Tonight I had a simple meal that was much greater than the disappointing jambalaya of before. This meal was homemade, so it has nothing to do with any of the restaurants here, it was merely a product of my mother. The meal itself was a simple plate of roast beef and rice, but is was so delicious I can't even believe it.

You see, the beef was prepared in a slow cooker all day, with white wine as the only thing added to it. I don't like the taste of alcohol, so I don't really drink wine, but with all the alcohol being burned off through out the day, it gave the beef and intensely rich flavour. That's not even to talk about tenderness. The meat just came apart like cotton candy. Sometimes the simplest things in life are truly the best.

The Promised

Here it was after failure to acquire the promised sustenance, we once again had our chance to claim victory. Wanting no mistakes this time, my parents left much earlier than normal time to get this promised stuff. This stuff of course was the jambalaya from Vista Rio that my dad wanted to buy a little over a week ago. Pressured my public demand, Vista Rio made another batch of jambalaya, and my dad would not allow himself to miss it once again. He left a little bit before 3, and returned a little while later with five orders of the stuff.

My verdict.

Garbage

I don't have much to say today because this was another day where nothing really happened. Because of that, I'll talk about the dreaded trash removal process.

First off, our one and only trash bag is kept in a trash compactor located in the kitchen. One mystery of the compactor is that no matter how hard it's cleaned, there is always a small dirty pool of water building up at the bottom every time we change bags. The bags aren't ripping, so maybe the excessive heat causes this?

A New Year

The summer is over, vacations around the land come to an end as people get ready to head back to school. My vacation to is at an end, I've packed my things into my suitcase and am prepared to head back to school for some more knowledge. All though my time down here in the Rio was brief, it feels almost like an entire lifetime. Yes, by this time tomorrow, I should be in Calgary, ready to resume my normal life.

But they won't drown...

Yesterday I was getting ready to go to bed, and went to my bathroom. I hate using the bathroom on this boat, there is no ventilation, so it's hot like an oven. You can walk in perfectly normal, but when you come out you'll be drenched in sweat. When I say drenched, I mean covered in the stuff where your clothes end up soaked. It's that unbelievably hot.

They can fly?!

It was just a normal night like any other. The sun was down for hours, and a storm was raging as usual. As per tradition, the power eventually failed, and we scrambled to turn on the generators so that we could have some lights. In about a minute we had power restored, but the internet was down, so I tried to paint something. After painting on my art program, I looked up and saw something about the size of an eraser fluttering around the lamp on the other side of the room.

I wasn't sure what it was, perhaps it was a moth, we do have a lot of those around here. Well, we have a lot of every type of creepy crawly around here. Moths, butterflies, spiders, lizards, frogs, birds, etc... If it exists, we have it here in one form or another. What I didn't realize at this time, was that the flying thing was none other than...

Pictures of Guatemala - 2

I feel too lazy to write anything today, so instead, have these pictures.

What will they think of next?

A lot of people here don't have money to spend on nice things, and generally you can see that just by going to the store. One of those luxuries are sweets, we don't have very many available to us, and those that we have are usually not that good in the first place. The one thing we do have that I would consider acceptable, are Oreos.

Yes good old fashioned Christie brand Oreos, the cookie everyone hates, but the filling everyone loves. I admit, I like them, they're far from my favourite cookie, but they'll do nicely. Personally, I would love nothing more than to buy a tube of cookie dough and bake some good chocolate chip cookies, but you can't do that here.

Homemade

Today the Vista Rio was advertising a New Orleans styled jambalaya as their special of the day. Now these guys are from Louisiana, so it's got to be pretty authentic, so what could go wrong? Dad loves jambalaya, so he completely abandoned all the food he bought in Guatemala City, and took me on the boat to Vista Rio. We are currently in the process of buying a new boat to travel around town in, so we went to the marina owner and borrowed one of his. After a long ordeal of starting the boat, we finally got it going, and set off for some jambalaya.

Mystery Fruit - Revealed!

So with the past two days giving you ample time to guess what the mystery fruit was, I had one person saying that it looked like an eggplant. Well, no this isn't an eggplant, but something much more local than that. something so normal, it seems peculiar to name call it something no one here has ever seen before. The fact is, this is an extremely common fruit, what is uncommon, at least in these parts, is the size that beast grew to. 

Journey to the South - Map 3

Upon leaving America, we headed into the great unknown of Mexico. While we originally planned to go through Mexico quickly, we were advised by an expert on Mexico to take at least five days, or else we would be charged by the Mexican authorities a fee for travelling though Mexico, and not as tourists. Heeding his advice, we went through Mexico slowly as you can tell from the blog. This is perhaps the safest route of going through Mexico, so if you ever find yourself there, remember this map. Route taken is shown in purple.

Flotilla

There was an unusual occurrence here today, something I've never seen before in my life anywhere. Apparently this thing happens quite frequently, but it's the first time I've seen it, so I was kind of freaked out by it.

What I saw, was a series of islands floating down the river. I know that sounds crazy, but it's exactly what they were, huge chunks of land that broke off, but are light enough to float on the water. All the life forms on the land naturally stays alive as it moves down river, so it's very dangerous to go on it. Besides the fact that your boat will get stuck, all the native snakes and spiders aren't gonna be very happy to see you.

Mystery Fruit 2

My parents returned from their trip late this evening, and they brought back a variety of things from Guatemala City. They stormed Wal-Mart when it opened this morning (we have no big stores here), and bought $1000 worth of goods. At least we won't have to go to the store for a while...

One of the things they brought back was a giant fruit, one like I had never seen before. I have had this fruit before, but never one this big. I was truly amazed and even a little repulsed by the sight of this large bulging fruit. But enough of that, can you guys guess what this is?

This thing goes to above my knees when standing on it's end. 

If you think you know what it is, post your answer in the comments!