There is magic in the wind and change in the air. The historic pueblo of Alamos, Sonora, like most Mexican silver towns, has descended to bust from boom more than once in its fitful existence. As long-suffering as a campesino, the community nevertheless has survived those roller coaster rides. Craggy hills clad in variable foliage […]
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Mazatlan has the virtues and vices of any tourist destination. But all the bad stuff – or good, depending on how you plan to spend the evening – is buffered by the decency and solidity of a working town. Unlike the hotel cities dreamed up by governments beholden to tourist dollars, Mazatlan, the second city […]
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When it’s winter up north, the skimboarding season is in full stride along the Pacific Coast beaches of Mexico. This is when the best talent goes head-to-head to determine ultimately who will make it to the world championship in Laguna Beach, California, where the sport was invented. It’s a sport that has not attained the […]
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Tomorrow’s champions are at work here, at Bahía de Navidad. In the hot afternoons along the wave-thumped beach of Melaque, lithe brown bodies dash along the alternately stirred and subdued sand and launch themselves at the sea. The steady winter sun descends in its unwavering plunge into a horizon washed faithfully by varying hues of […]
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It is more than Mexico’s constant sun and the bewitching landscape that entrance us. It is the people. October is revival month. We are at the tag end of six months in Canada the province of British Columbia to be precise — and joyfully are getting organized for the trip south to Mexico where the […]
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I tell my friends that the only thing I have had stolen by Mexicans was my unwavering fealty to Canada: I have even considered living full-time in Mexico. We are approaching the border crossing about half a mile off. There are no distinctive markings to the terrain to define it. There is no checkpoint. No […]
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Roads in Mexico should display this warning: Use at your own risk. This country has one of the most extensive highway systems anywhere, providing convenient and indispensable connections among villages, towns and cities. In a nation where a minority of people owns automobiles, almost everybody depends on buses to get around. These vary between long […]
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The tehuano endlessly blows where North America stops. The tehuano, the unforgiving forever wind of the Isthmus of Tehauntepec, ceaselessly scours a path through the wide gap where the continent of North America ends and Central America starts. We entered this maelstrom upon leaving Highway 200 and departing the State of Oaxaca on one of our journeys to […]
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When we return to Canada in the spring, we are cheerful, rested and tanned. We tell our friends that, yes, we had another glorious extended vacation in Mexico. After the exchange of a few pleasantries, some people are likely to blurt out: “Six months in Mexico! Whatever do you do every day? What do you […]
Continue ReadingMazatlan has the virtues and vices of any tourist destination. But all the bad stuff – or good, depending on how you plan to spend the evening – is buffered by the decency and solidity of a working town. Unlike the hotel cities dreamed up by governments beholden to tourist dollars, Mazatlan, the second city […]
Continue Reading