The murals of Coatepec

February 19, 2023 / edebock / 9 Comments

Each time we come to Coatepec, Mexico to visit our friends who live here I fall in love with the vibrant colours again. Maybe that has something to do with coming from a place that is covered with snow for many months of the year and where buildings tend to be mostly neutral in colour.

This visit, it’s the murals that have really caught my attention and so I thought I’d share a few of them with you. All of these are within walking distance of our friends’ house. The first is one of my favourites.

I’m guessing that the next one is real estate advertising, but I’m not sure. It’s located at the end of the street where we’re staying.

This gate, just down the hill from here, is very fitting for Coatepec as I’m sure there are more old style Volkswagen Beetles here than anywhere I’ve ever been! I like the way that the artist made the handle of the gate look like it was the door handle on the vehicle.

I don’t know who the people in the next two murals are, but I think they’re gorgeous.

These birds caught my eye on a walk down to the centre of town today.

And finally, here’s another of my favourites. I can’t believe the amount of work that must have gone into this one which is located on the side of a building at the entrance to a small alley. The caption “La Naturaleza es Vida” means “nature is life”.

I’m going to continue photographing murals as I come across them. Perhaps I’ll even find enough for another post!

What I wore to travel

February 17, 2023February 15, 2023 / edebock / Leave a comment

It was unseasonably warm when we boarded a plane in Calgary on Sunday morning, but even -1ºC (30ºF) is chilly. When we left the airport in Mexico City at almost midnight it was +19ºC (66ºF). How do you dress for a day with that kind of temperature variation?

The answer, of course, is layers.

My base layer was a long-sleeved, striped sweater. Next came a hoodie and then my ultralight down vest from Uniqlo. The final layer was a spring jacket that is both wind and waterproof. While each layer was very lightweight, together they provided ample warmth on a chilly Alberta morning. After the photos were taken during a layover at the Vancouver airport, the vest came off and was tucked into an outer pocket of my tiny suitcase. Some people find jeans uncomfortable for long days sitting on a plane, but I practically live in them and find them very comfortable. A pair of good walking shoes completed my ensemble.

Not only is YVR Vancouver’s international airport, but it’s also home to a permanent collection of more than 210 pieces of art, much of it work of British Columbia’s indigenous artists. The pieces behind me represent The Story of Fog Woman and Raven. Carved of cedar wood in 2007 by Dempsey Bob, they tell the story of how the annual salmon run originated to benefit the people of the northern coast of BC and the southern coast of Alaska. Immediately behind me, Raven perches on the side of a pool, beak uplifted, smiling and well fed, while to the side, Fog Woman kneels at the head of a stream.

Once we reached our destination, the clothing that I wore to travel in was set aside and won’t be worn again until our return trip unless we have a really chilly day while we’re here.

Reunion!

February 16, 2023February 16, 2023 / edebock / Leave a comment

Ten years ago this month, hubby and I arrived in Dalian, China where we were to spend the next semester teaching English at Liaoning Normal University. There were six of us on the native English speaking staff and this week four of us were together again for the first time since we completed our contract there.

Richard M (yes, there were two Richards on our staff of six) and his wife, Colleen, who was with him in China are Americans who, after spending a few years living in China, Cambodia, and then Vietnam, have retired to Coatepec, Mexico. They are close to our age and were the only other couple amongst the teaching staff, so we spent a lot of time together in China, even climbing the Great Wall together. This is our third visit to their home here.

Cliff, also an American expat, was our lead teacher in Dalian and after also living in various locations in Asia, he retired to Xalapa, a larger city just 15 km from here. He arrived shortly after our last visit to the area four years ago.

On Tuesday, Cliff came out to Richard and Colleen’s and what a reunion that was! The afternoon was spent reminiscing, laughing together, looking at the yearbook that Cliff had so thoughtfully brought with him, and enjoying a delicious seafood meal prepared by Richard M.

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Then yesterday, the four of us met Cliff at Parque de los Tecajetes, a beautiful jungle-like park in Xalapa. Though not a huge park, it was easy to forget that we were in the middle of a city.

Although you can’t see any in the photo above, the pond was home to many koi. If you look closely though, you’ll see a couple of the resident turtles of which there were many. Here are two others sunning themselves in a sheltered nook.

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The egret and the greckle seemed to be posing for me!

And, of course, there were flowers! Flowers in February always amaze me.

After enjoying a stroll, we had a delicious lunch together in La Estancia de los Tecajetes, a beautiful traditional Mexican restaurant overlooking the park.

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That’s Richard M, Richard D, myself, and Cliff. Thanks to Colleen for taking this and a couple of the other photos.

Packing again!

February 10, 2023February 9, 2023 / edebock / 4 Comments

For the first time in almost four years, we’ve purchased tickets, made our plans, and I’m busy packing our suitcases! This will be our first flight since Covid, but our third trip to visit friends who live in Coatepec, a typical Mexican town located in the highlands about four hours east of Mexico City. On both previous trips, we checked a large suitcase, but this time we’re going carry-on only. Everything we need for two and a half weeks has to fit into our two tiny suitcases, my purse, and hubby’s small backpack.

First, let’s take a look at what I was hoping would fit in my suitcase. The photo and list below also include what I’ll be wearing on the plane.

Packing list:

1 pair of jeans
2 pairs lightweight long pants
2 pairs capris
1 pair leggings
1 camisole
7 tops – 3 long sleeved, 1 with 3/4 length sleeves, 3 sleeveless
1 dress
1 dressy black jacket
1 ultra light down vest
1 lightweight hoodie
1 light jacket
1 hat
1 pair sandals
3 pairs shoes
sleepwear, underwear, and socks

You’ll probably notice that this isn’t what a typical tourist would pack for their trip to a Mexican beach resort. That’s because Coatepec isn’t a tourist destination and doesn’t have a beach. At approximately 1200 metres above sea level, the weather is pleasant, but not always hot. It cools off significantly at night and the houses don’t have central heating so we need to be prepared to dress accordingly. Although I don’t actually expect to have an opportunity to use it, I did decide to tuck a swimsuit into the bottom of my suitcase just in case! I really don’t like to leave home without one. At the last minute, when I saw that there was enough space, I also decided to squeeze in a pair of shorts.

There are two keys to successfully packing light. The first is coordinating colours. As you can see from the photo, I’ve chosen a simple colour palette and pieces that will easily mix and match to create numerous different outfits. The second key is layering. For example, the dress is very lightweight. It can be worn alone or with the little black jacket. For a chillier evening out, it can even be worn over the black leggings. The light blue denim shirt on the bottom of the pile above can be worn alone or as a third piece over any of the sleeveless tops. Depending on the weather, the hoodie, down vest, and jacket can each be worn individually or I can layer them as I will be doing when we board the plane in sub zero temperatures.

Another trick to successful packing is utilizing space wisely. Can you see hubby’s sandals, a pair of my shoes, spare eyeglasses for each of us, and two pairs of socks in this photo? I can!

Many travellers swear that you can fit more into your suitcase by rolling everything instead of folding, but that hasn’t been my experience. I prefer to fold basics like pants and tops, but I roll a lot of the other items. I’ve also never used packing cubes.

Our clothes pretty much fill the tiny carry-on suitcases. My laptop (a lightweight 13 inch MacBook Air), my camera, cords, chargers, our toiletries, and our prescription medications will be in hubby’s backpack. We’ll also tuck in a few paperback books for him which he’ll leave behind when he finishes reading them. That will give us a bit of extra space if we need it on the way home. I’ve loaded five books onto my Kindle which takes up hardly any room in my travel purse.

Hopefully I haven’t forgotten anything, but if I have, there are stores in Coatepec!

70!

October 5, 2022October 5, 2022 / edebock / 29 Comments

Today is the day that I’ve been looking forward to for a long time… my 70th birthday! When I was diagnosed with my first cancer nine years ago, I didn’t expect to live to see this day, but here I am and it feels like a victory!

Months ago, I began to think about what I wanted to do to celebrate this milestone. Being an avid traveler, the first thing that came to mind was a trip. I visualized us packing a suitcase and climbing aboard a plane for the first time in over three years. Where would we go? The possibilities were endless, but Newfoundland was high on my list. We’d explore its rugged landscape, visit isolated coastal villages, and eat our fill of fresh seafood! Yes, Newfoundland was a definite possibility.

Then came hubby’s cancer diagnosis and the all-important consultation with a specialist to determine whether or not he’d be able to have surgery was booked for October 4. So, we’d be in Edmonton, not Newfoundland or some other more exotic location. The iconic “going to Winnipeg” ad that used to air on Canadian TV came to mind.

Oh well, there are lots of things to do in Edmonton. I looked into booking a hot air balloon ride as that’s been on my unwritten bucket list for a long time. We’d enjoy the fall colours in the river valley as we drifted silently over the city and then we’d sip champagne when we came back to earth. Unfortunately, however, the hot air balloon season closed last week! I’d have to think of something else.

Then came Covid and even the long awaited doctor’s appointment had to be postponed. So here we are at home, doing nothing but watching rain fall outside the window! Earlier in the week, I felt pretty depressed about the lack of a plan for celebrating this special day, but we’re both feeling better and we’ve put in our five plus days of isolation. Regardless of where we are (or aren’t) and what we’re doing (or not doing) I’m 70 and I’m excited to be here!

Now, what will I do with the rest of this day?

Ukrainian Cultural Heritage Village

August 16, 2022August 16, 2022 / edebock / 2 Comments

Prior to the recent influx of refugees from Ukraine, Canada was already home to 1.4 million people of Ukrainian descent, the world’s second largest Ukrainian diaspora after Russia. The Ukrainian Cultural Heritage Village, an open-air museum located approximately 50 km east of Edmonton, Alberta uses costumed interpreters to recreate a pioneer settlement and commemorate the lives of Ukrainian Canadian settlers from the years 1899 to 1930.

Like everywhere else, it seems, the Village is short-staffed this summer, but there were still plenty of interactive activities for us to enjoy when we visited with two of our grandchildren earlier this week.

The one room schoolhouse was a favourite. The teacher gave sample lessons in arithmetic, spelling, and grammar. She also checked to make sure our fingernails were clean and suggested that some of us weren’t dressed appropriately for school!

Learning to do laundry the old-fashioned way was also fun for Harlow and Yari.

At the Provincial Police Post, we put Yari in jail!

He also got to help the blacksmith.

For lunch, we sampled a variety of authentic Ukrainian foods including pyrohy (perogies), holubtsi (cabbage rolls), sausage, borshch (beet soup), and somewhat less authentic, but absolutely delicious, pyrohy poutine!

It wasn’t until later when I looked at my pictures that I realized that I’d taken lots of photos of the kids and almost none of the village’s many buildings!

In addition to houses, barns, schools, and various places of business that have been moved to the site from communities across central Alberta, there are three churches that are still active places of worship. As such, they aren’t open to the public.

St. Nicholas Russo-Greek Orthodox Church was built in the rural community of Kiew, Alberta, by Ukrainian settlers from Galicia. The more elaborate St. Vladimir’s Ukrainian Greek Orthodox Church, shown in the first photo above, originally stood in Vegreville. Though we weren’t allowed to enter, we were able to view the very traditional interior, with it’s cross-shaped floor plan, from the open doorway.

Although the website suggests 2-3 hours to tour the village, we took significantly longer walking the dusty streets and pathways and exploring virtually every nook and cranny that was open to us. We finished our day with a ride around the village in a horse drawn wagon.

A walk in God’s garden

July 22, 2022July 22, 2022 / edebock / 4 Comments

Several of our planned hikes over the past two weeks were cut short or thwarted entirely by flooding due to unusually high water levels. In spite of that, we did manage to complete a few and one of them stands out as being the most amazing and unique.

An esker is a long, narrow ridge of winding hills composed of sand and gravel that was deposited thousands of years ago by a stream that ran underneath a glacier that once covered the land. One such ridge lies to the west of Laurier Lake and extends south into Borden Lake in Alberta’s Whitney Lakes Provincial Park. The 5.8-km out-and-back Borden Lake trail follows the top of the esker.

The trail is considered a moderately challenging one because the esker is far from flat. As we made our way up and down its rolling hills, we found ourselves surrounded by a myriad of wildflowers in bloom. I truly felt like I was walking in God’s garden!

While I recognize some of the flowers like the wild rose, Alberta’s provincial flower, and the lone tiger lily, there were many others that I didn’t know by name.

We had the trail entirely to ourselves. There were no people for miles around. Thankfully, we didn’t see any bears either although there was some fairly fresh sign on the path and with bushes loaded with berries alongside the trail, they probably weren’t very far away. We kept our bear bell jingling and our bear spray close at hand just in case it was needed! We actually did see a young bear in the campground the following day, but thankfully, we were in the vehicle at the time and it was nowhere near our campsite.

As we continued hiking, Borden Lake soon came into view and if you look closely, you can see the esker jutting out into the water. The trail goes to the very end.

When we reached the end, hubby sat down to rest, but I took off my shoes and socks and waded right in!

The water was refreshing, but soon it was time to retrace our steps back through the garden and return to camp.

Furries, feathers, and fireflies

June 11, 2022June 12, 2022 / edebock / 4 Comments

If you’ve been following this blog for very long, you are no doubt aware that hubby and I love to camp, hike, and kayak. Here in Canada, the season for enjoying those activities is short and if we’re not careful our calendar fills up with other activities such as the meetings that we’ll be attending next week as delegates for our church. Sometimes we have to be creative in order to carve out time for the things we most love doing, so that’s what we did this past week.

Hubby had a medical appointment in Vermilion, a town a little less than an hour and a half northeast of here. (You know you’re in Canada if you measure distance by how long it takes to drive somewhere!) Vermilion happens to border a provincial park with a campground, an extensive network of trails, and a reservoir suitable for kayaking. What could have been a day trip for a doctor’s appointment became a three day camping trip instead!

We quickly discovered that Vermilion Provincial Park is built on a giant gopher colony. These furry little creatures, a bane to farmers when they take up residence in their fields, were absolutely everywhere! At any given moment, we could see half a dozen or more of them grazing, standing like sentinels, or wrestling and playing on the grassy slope in front of our trailer. The young ones were particularly entertaining to watch. They were very curious about us too!

Vermilion is hometown to Beckie Scott, Canada’s most decorated cross-country skier. A three time Olympian, Beckie won gold in Salt Lake City in 2002, becoming the first Canadian (and the first North American woman) to win an Olympic medal in cross-country skiing. The road leading into Vermilion Provincial Park is called Beckie Scott Trail and the Vermilion Nordic Ski Club, based out of a renovated 1905 train station in the park, maintains groomed ski trails during the winter which are used for hiking in the summer.

We did a 7.5 km hike on Thursday afternoon. While much of the hike was fairly level, as we made our way up and down some of the hills along the way, I was glad I was on foot and not skis! As a former cross-country skier, I knew that some of those uphill slopes would have been gut-busters!

As we set off on the trail, we noticed a “Bear in Area” sign. According to other campers, it was a mama with cubs. Not wanting to come face to face with her, we kept our bear bell jingling as we walked and we also had bear spray close at hand in case it was needed. Thankfully, it wasn’t. The only wildlife we spotted was these two bunnies who didn’t seem too concerned about our presence.

Much of the time, the trail followed the edge of the Vermilion River reservoir. The water was almost dead calm, unlike the previous afternoon when we contended with a fairly stiff breeze while out in the kayak.

Red-winged blackbirds are a common sight when kayaking on Alberta lakes and rivers, but I managed to get better photos of these ones with my feet solidly on the ground than I’ve ever been able to get from the boat.

After a day in the fresh air and an invigorating hike, we were ready to let the campfire die out and head for bed by 11 PM, but I had to stay up later. Earlier in the day, a couple camped near us had told us that they’d seen fireflies the night before, something we’d never seen in Alberta before. At this time of year, however, with the longest day of the year less than two weeks away, the sun doesn’t set until nearly 10 PM and it isn’t fully dark until close to midnight. I had to stay up long enough to see those fireflies! Sure enough, when I stepped back out of the trailer just before crawling into bed, little dots of light flashed all around! It was magical!

Hoodoos and buffalo beans

May 28, 2022May 28, 2022 / edebock / Leave a comment

The last time we hiked the Meeting Creek Coulee near the village of Donalda was late in the fall. The trees were bare and the landscape was shades of gold and brown. Today’s hike through the same area was entirely different!

Everything was so green and there were wildflowers everywhere, especially the bright yellow buffalo beans that bloom across the southern half of Alberta and Saskatchewan at this time of year.

I’ve always wondered why they were called buffalo beans, so when we got home today I consulted Google and learned that the flowers appear around the same time as the Indigenous people of the prairie used to conduct their spring buffalo hunt. Apparently the plant produces bean-like seed pods later in the season, but they shouldn’t be eaten as the entire plant contains poisonous alkaloids.

We started today’s hike on the woodland trail that follows the rim of the massive coulee, the northernmost part of the Canadian Badlands, but we soon dropped down into the valley. As we wandered up, down, and around the bluffs that form its walls I spotted an impressive looking hoodoo emerging from the bushes on the hillside above us. Of course, we had to climb up and take a closer look.

We decided to sit and eat our lunch on the hillside where Richard is standing in this photo.

As I looked at our backpack perched on the hoodoo’s capstone, I thought of all the places it’s been with us over the years. It’s even been to the top of Mt Fuji, the highest and most famous mountain in Japan!

The view from our lunch spot included a perfect mound protruding from the flat valley floor. I decided that when we finished eating, we should hike down and walk around it which we did. We considered climbing it, but it would have been a challenge and since we still had to climb back up out of the valley, we quickly rejected that idea.

Eventually, after wandering for awhile longer, we made our way back up the hillside and rejoined the woodland trail that took us back to our vehicle. After a long cold winter, it’s so good to be able to get out on the trails again! I wonder where else our feet will take us this summer.

The Great Sand Hills

May 23, 2022May 23, 2022 / edebock / 4 Comments

Today’s photos might lead one to believe that we traveled to Morocco or Mongolia, but we were actually exploring a very unique bit of Canada, the Great Sand Hills of southwestern Saskatchewan!

The Great Sand Hills is approximately 1,900 square kilometres (730 square miles) of desert-like sand dunes, native grasses, and small trees and shrubs. Sediment deposited by glacial meltwater during the retreat of the Laurentide Ice Sheet approximately 13,000 years ago, then shaped and reshaped by strong winds, created this unique landscape. The first of the giant sand hills is just a short walk from the parking lot. Climbing up the dune, you truly feel like you’ve entered a different world, a world of sand and sky!

We soon spotted a series of faint trails leading off toward more dunes in the distance, so of course we had to investigate.

Climbing up the steep side of the dune, we were greeted by another vast expanse of soft, powdery sand. After walking around a bit, I had to take my shoes off and feel its warmth between my toes!