Sunday, July 24, 2005

Pto Vallarta trip

Last weekend we went to Pto. Vallarta while Taylor was in town. It was a lot of fun to have him here. Pto. Vallarta is a great little town. There is a lot to see and do. The beaches there are ok too.
We spent a few days there.

It was a lot of fun.
We only have 3 weeks left here in Mexico we are hoping to take another trip soon.
There are a couple of other pueblos that we still want to see.

There's only a few small problems. One is that I have classes and the other is that I'm waiting for a part for my motor since the engine fell on the ground.

I hope to have it back and running this week.

We'll see.

sunglass shot




This is a shot that I took off of Cristi's sunglasses at the beach. It turned out kinda cool
The beaches in Pto Vallarta were really cool. I really liked the beaches there. They are great.
There seems like there is a lot to see and do in Pto. Vallarta. We didn't get to do all the things we wanted
but, it was a lot of fun.
I highly recommend checking it out.

Cristi on the beach



Here's a shot I took of Cristi on the beach in Pto. Vallarta.

Fish




These are some angel fish where we went snorkeling.

It was great. Our guide kept throwing bread on top of us while we were diving

So, the fish would attack us.

It was a good time to be had by all.

Brinlee boating it up


This is Brinlee life jacket and all on the boat out to the Arcos.
The girl can do no wrong. She's just too cute.

The pig tails help.

Monday, July 18, 2005

Los Arcos Pto. Vallarta

This is an arch in p.v. where we went Snorkeling.
Once you get outside of the town the jungle and the ocean combination make for a beautiful site. It is really beautiful. Not far from here is where the Predator was filmed.

Taylor's modeling shots


Here's tay in P.V. he's down for the week for a visit. We went to Pto. Vallarta this weekend and did some beaches and snorkeling. We stayed at an all inclusive resort and Taylor took advantage of the all you can drink Pina Coladas.

Sunday, July 10, 2005

Mellow Yellow's last ride?


Well after having all the work done on the engine I took Mellow Yellow out for a test run. She died on me and I had to enlist the help of Ean and Mike to get some pushing help. Then I found out the starter was bad so that had to be replaced and after I was driving it around checking out how it was running I hit a speed bump and heard a loud thump. Then the motor accelerated and I tried to down shift and the shifter stuck. What was going on? I thought I had lost the clutch. I finally got the engine to stop and hopped out to see what had happened.

I looked down at the rear of the car and the engine was partially sitting on the ground. Not good. Some cops drove by and laughed and said that's not good in spanish. So, long story short the mechanics who but the engine back in didn't bolt it down. And I had to get a tow truck to haul it home. So, we will shortly see if they honor their 6 month gaurantee. I'll keep you posted. i just hope that it's not Mellow Yellow's last ride.

Thursday, July 07, 2005

Foundation for a Better Life


This is a picture of my billboard from the foundation for a better life. I meant to post this picture a long time ago but kept forgeting or couldn't find it. For those who don't know what this is all about you can go to the foundations website

http://www.forbetterlife.org

I donated bone marrow a couple of years ago and the foundation heard about it and added me to their campaign. The idea is to promote values and positive ideals. For me it's been a real honor. I get to share the honor with famous people who have done some really wonderful things. I honestly don't feel like donating bone marrow to a stranger was a big deal it pales in comparision to what some of the people in the campaign have done. But, it is a big honor. Go check out the website it explains the stories behind the billboards.

You may have seen some while out driving around your town. I used to see myself 45 feet wide almost everyday when I was Living in Salt Lake. It's also been fun to have friends call and tell me that they saw me on a billboard while they were somewhere traveling around.

But check out the website it's really inspirational what a lot of these people have done.

templo del sol


This is me in front of the templo del sol. the largest of the temples at the site.

Brinlee


This is our roommate's daughter in her child transporter. She was sleeping for a while and she got a free ride up to the top of the pyramid. I could have used one on the way down after my sandal broke.

Broken Sandal at the Pyramids


I busted my trusty sandals climbing the pyramids in Mexico. I've had those sandals for over 3 years. It was kind of sad to have them break. Maybe I can fix them. Because of the broken sandal I had to walk really slow back to the entrance and we missed the bus.

Jugos Canada


Can I recommend a great little juice place in Mexico City? This place had the best Juice and blended drinks. We stopped there on our way from palacio bellas artes to the zocalo. We all got different kinds of juices which were all really good. They have the best fruit down here. We go to a local market every week to buy fresh fruit. Anyways, Cristi wanted to take a picture of me at the juice place and the owner said, "If you are going to take a picture you should take a good one. Come back here and squeeze some oranges for me". So that's what I am doing.

Cristi at the Mexico City Market


This is the entrance of one of Mexico City's markets. This one is quite big. Your can find anything your heart desires at these markets. They have bootleg DVD's to socks. You can walk through the market and buy some of the stuff you need and pick up a little something to eat as well. This market is right by the Zocalo which is in the historic district of town.

Palacio Nacional


This is another Diego Rivera work. It's got a lot going on in it. When you look at it you can see so much history and so many stories.

Diego RIvera


This is a really great fresco by Diego Rivera he was married to Frida Kahol. A very interesting guy. He is regarded as one of the great Mexican artist. I really like his work. Every painting tells a story. This was inside the Palacio de los bellas artes. We also went to the palacio nacional where he has some frescos that depict a lot of Mexican history as well as a great deal of political works.
He is well known because he focused a lot on the Aztecs and the indegenous populations. He really shifted the focus from the rich to the blue collar man. Indigenous people are the focus of a lot of his works as well as political themes.

skulls from the templo mayor




This is a pic of a wall of skulls carved from stone that was found at the templo mayor site in mex. city.

mexi city trip

Mine


This is actually a picture from our trip to Guanajauto a couple of weeks back.

Ballet Folklorico



This was part of our entertainment from the Cave restaraunt

Mexico city


Well we recently went to Mexico City. It was a really great trip. There is so much to see and do there. We visited the Mexican Stock Market which was kinda interesting. We got to go and see some really cool things. I really like Mexico City it is probably one of my favorite cities. You always hear so much negativity about it. We were told to be careful with pickpockets and crime etc. etc. But, really it was great. This was my 3rd trip to Mexico City and I really enjoyed it as much as any of the previous trips. It was fun to be there with Cristi and our friends. We went to the Palacio de Bellas Artes which is a really great art mueseum and has some great works by rivera and Orozco. They are just so big and vibrant and really tell some awesome stories about Mexico's past.

We went to 2 ruin sites one of which is in downtown in the centro historico. They discovered the ruins in the 70's when the eletric co. was doing some work. They had no idea that they were there. The Spainards just built right over them. It's crazy to think that one culture took over another just like that and was basically just erased. We also went to some ruins that are quite impressive north of Mexico City. They were really crowed because we went on a Sunday but, they were neat to see. I had preiviously visited them with my cousin Matt. It amazes me how the Aztecs built such large edifices. My sandle broke coming down one of the temples which made it hard to get around I had to go barefoot for a little bit. After the ruins Cristi and I showed up late for the bus and got left but our trusty prof. Morris waited for us. The rest of the group went to a restaruant which is located in a cave. It was great. They had great food and entertainment as well. We ended up walking most of the way there and then grabbed a taxi. I guess the bus driver was supposed to come back and get us and went a different way than the way we walked to the restraunt.

Mexico city is about 6 hours from Guadalajara and we rode the bus the whole way there. It was not a bad trip. There are always interesting conversations going on when we travel. Having students from all over the world and who have traveled the world you get to hear a lot of cool stories. The students here from T-bird are all really close. There are only about 40 of us but it's been a good oppurtunity to get to know everyone better and hang out.

The Mexico city trip was a good break from mid-terms as well. I feel like all I was doing for 2 weeks was reading or doing practice problems. So, it was nice to finally finish some of my classes. I actually did pretty well too for being in Mexico A in finance and an A in Accounting. Let's hope my luck holds up for the rest of the semester.


I'll post more pictures from our trip. Enjoy!

Guadalajara at night




This is a picture of the Guadalajara cathederal at night.