This winter I’ve decided to try writing a monthly blog overview. Hopefully this will allow me to keep it more up to date. It might mean it’s a bit longer read, and will definitely mean more pictures but heh, who doesn’t like to look at pictures! *To enlarge any pictures, just click on the picture.
We arrived in Lo de Marcos the afternoon of Halloween - October 31. The following day the town was in full swing celebrating Día de Muertos. It is a very small town, but that doesn’t impact their ability to put on big celebrations. They really go all out and everyone in the community gets together to honour and celebrate the various Mexican traditions.
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Lo de Marcos & Día de Muertos
*These amazing photos were posted in a local community FB group page by Jared Torres. |
The first week of our arrival we spent most of our time setting up our site. You’d be surprised how much time it takes. But that is partially because it is hot and also because well… what’s the rush? 😊 We also took the opportunity to get the RV washed, polished and waxed. We had a wax done on it last year when we were in here, but it wasn’t done very well and left tiny swirly scratches all through the clear coat. It drove us nuts for the entire summer. It looked particularly bad when it was in the direct sunlight. This year we hired a different person. Santos and his team did a FANTASTIC job! In total he had 3-4 guys working on it and in only one day they finished. It is quite the job given the size of our RV, especially polishing out all the swirling scratches we had in the clear coat. Total charge was $5000 pesos (approx $350 Cdn), a bargain considering when we priced it out back home in Nanaimo it was going to cost a minimum of $1200!
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| Look at that shine! Muy Bonito! |
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| Almost a mirror finish ✨ |
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| Our outdoor kitchen, sun shade coverings for privacy and to reduce the heat on the RV, my outside laundry room and of course the “boyz” tent and tunnel. They spend most of the day outside either lounging in it or running from one end to the other playing. |
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| Our Hobie Tandem Island “garage” 😊 |
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The sunshade we put on the driver side of the RV keeps that side of the rig much cooler in the hot sun.
It also doubles as a privacy shade too! |
This year monthly rent went up by $1k pesos to $12k pesos per month (equivalent to approx $850 Cdn). There is also a charge of $3.5 pesos per kWh used. You can pay the electricity month to month with your rent if you wish, or pay in one lump sum at the end of your stay. The owner Juan Jose takes a picture of the meter reading when you arrive and then again at the end before you leave (or month to month if we want). I usually pay what we owe mid way through our stay and the balance when we leave. We run one of our A/C units non-stop (we have two but there is only 30 amp service so there isn’t enough power to run both at the same time). I’ve noticed that there are many people in the park who don’t run their AC at all, but we really don’t like to be hot and sticky. Plus, the AC also acts like a dehumidifier. With humidity going up as high as 99% overnight things can feel wet very quickly. For the most part the AC keeps on top of that. We alternate between the front one and the back one to help keep the humidity in check throughout the RV. Last year our total hydro costs for the four months we were here came to just under $700 Cdn. We’re on track for it to be around that much this year too by the time we head out at the end of March.
In terms of heat and humidity, we realized very quickly why the park was still so empty when we arrived. Although to the locals the temperatures had cooled down from their summer temps, to us it was scorching 🥵 For the first two weeks the daily temps got up to 32 Celsius (90 F) with humidity hovering around 60% during the heat of the day and climbing well into the 90% range overnight. About mid November it cooled a bit, highs of 29 and cooler nights but then climbed back up again near to the end of the month. Next year we won’t come down this far until probably the end of November or early December. We like the heat, but too hot can be a bit uncomfortable.
This year we noticed a big difference in the reliability of the two ATM’s in town. For the first week both machines had no money in them, making it difficult to pay the rent in cash. But because we were challenged with this, we had to find an alternate solution. We stumbled upon an ATM in a town just 16 km south of us in San Francisco (also known as San Pancho). It was a great solution because not only did it let us take out more than $5000 pesos at a time (the most the ATM in LDM allows), the service charge for the ATM was much cheaper. In the end it saved us about $20 Cdn in charges we would have paid if the machines in LDM were working. That can add up over time, especially when cash is king here in Mexico!
Within a couple of days of our arrival we had new neighbours move in and set up on one side of us who also had a Rottweiler puppy. Yogi and Heffay became instant buds. I swear they’d wrestle with each other all day long if we let them. A great outlet for both of them.
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| Yogi (8 mos old) is sitting in front while Heffay (18 mos old) is lying down. |
Speaking of Heffay, we took the opportunity to get him neutered in mid November. He was at the prime age at just about 1.5 years old. The surgery was quick - only taking an hour. And SO cheap! Only $1500 pesos which was just a bit over $100 Cdn. Incredible! Most of the time it only cost $500 pesos, but that’s because “most” of the dogs down here are quite small. There are also community clinics where locals can bring their animals in to be fixed for free. The community does various fundraising activities to help support these wonderful clinics a few times each year.
HeyZeus and HoseHey settled in very quickly. I don’t know who was happier, HeyZeus because he was guaranteed at least one walk every day or HoseHey who no longer cried all night long, content in knowing the engine wouldn’t be starting up again any time soon. 🥰
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| HeyZeus’ daily routine, going to check out the beach |
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| HoseHey getting more and more brave every day on his walks |
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| HeyZeus and his new friend Chaco. He goes over to hang out with Chaco everyday 💕 |
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| HoseHey hunting geckos 🦎 |
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We added another tent and tunnel this year.
Now there is lots of room for the boys to run and snooze! |
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“Whatcha doin’ mom?”
You can see how comfortable HoseHey is in this picture. I love how he stretches out his hind legs! |
Dan and our neighbour got out in the kayak within the first week. The beach was a little difficult to navigate as summer storms had washed away a lot of the sand around the ramp which made for a bit of a drop off. But the guys managed to manoeuvre it ok. The two of us got out once more in November before we both ended up sick with a nasty head/chest cold that set us back for a few weeks.
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| Getting all the road dust and dirt off |
Near to the end of the month I had some real excitement when I left my bank card in an ATM machine by accident! The neighbour and I were in Puerto Vallarta to do some Costco and Petco shopping. I didn’t realize I’d left it in the machine until about an hour after I’d used it. Talk about stress! The good thing is it was an actual bank ATM, not one of the “generic” ones and there was nobody behind us when we left. I was fairly sure the machine just sucked it back in when it realized I didn’t take it in time. Thankfully, there were no “surprise” charges on my card by the time we got back to LDM. After a call to Scotiabank they cancelled the card and couriered me a new one. It arrived here at the RV park in less than a week. I was very impressed!
In our first month down here I also took a shot at baking my first loaves of bread with our RV appliances. First crack was using the outdoor propane oven. We didn’t have it down here last year and I hadn’t yet tried baking bread in it. Unfortunately, it didn’t work out. It was too difficult to get the temperature to stay steady. There is no temperature “set” feature on it. It works like a BBQ where you select from the dial low/med/high temperature and then watch the temperature gauge. Of course, as soon as you open the door it drops a bit. And we couldn’t figure out how to get it to hold steady at 350º. We may still try and figure it out…but I decided to give the microwave/convection oven a shot next. I’d never used the convection part of of the oven. It was definitely trial and error for awhile. After the second batch of loaves failed I decided I’d better pull out the manual - ha ha - and then guess what happened after I did that? It worked! Well, it baked nicely - the key was/is turning it around half way as the oven doesn’t always heat evenly. The only problem was the recipe was off somehow - it was way too dry and dense and wouldn’t toast worth a damn. Lucky me, there is another RV couple in the park who also bake their own bread. I borrowed some tips from them and adjusted my recipe slightly. Voila! Our homemade bread is now perfect! It’s become somewhat of a weekly routine for me, baking a couple loaves usually just before the weekend. Yumm!
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| Bread failure… |
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“If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again”
SUCCESS!! YUM! |
Another exciting addition this year is the return of the weekly artisan market in the town square. Last year covid prevented them from happening here. Although small, there are a nice variety of artisans who come every Saturday. I’m looking forward to checking out the weekly markets in San Pancho and La Cruz this year. La Cruz is a bit farther of a drive but is on the waterfront and apparently has much more variety in terms of artisans. We haven’t been to either of those markets.
Some pictures of the Lo de Marcos Saturday market in the town square
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| Beautiful beaded items |
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I love these Huichol yarn paintings. They are created using individual strands of coloured yarn pressed into a wax base on a stiff board. Incredible craftsmanship!
Click this Link for more info in Huichol art. |
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| Colour, colour and more colour 💕 |
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| Various vendors set up booths surrounding the pavillion in the town square |
That’s a wrap for the November update. I’ll start working on the December update now. Once I get that posted I’ll essentially be caught up until the end of January update. Exciting! Lots happened in December, including a couple unfortunate visits to the local vet, some nail biting kayak outings and more baking experiments 😊
Until Next Time / Hasta la Proxima Vez!
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