The Utterly Soul Crushing Costs of Altiplano Living

 

So many choices but so mega expensive thus.......

The ways I suffer down here at latitude 17 north. This eternal spring weather, with attendant 4 growing seasons and shit ton of small indigenous truck farmers all about, means one wastes away, especially with the simply awful, exorbitant prices.

NOT..................................................................   Actually I can think of no other climate or spot on planet earth as beneficial and wonderful to live than the altiplano region, aka the high tropics. Most specifically about the mile high mark. 3000 feet is about the lowest I would go since days would be hot but nights just cool enough to sleep well and still not require AC or heating. 7000 feet and above means nightly heating of some sorts to truly be comfortable..... nice for some folks. Not me. 5000-6500 is the sweet spot, requiring no air conditioning or heating and nothing a good stack of sweaters cannot handle on the occasionally cooler nights or a fan in the few months of the heat season.

So: a few costs in a few key categories.

Power: I live in a modest country casita (small house) and run only a small refrigerator, a few lights, and my computer rig. I have a small solar generation rig on my van but it simply makes no sense to invest in solar for my little house since, at this level of usage, I fall into the lowest tier of electricity fees in the mexican system. In short, folks who use my level of power are considered low income (would not a wealthy mexican naturally have a monstrous house with all new doodad appliances and such?  >>>>>  western brainwashing and sadly the gringo wanna-be syndrome is rife with the wealthy down here) so we campesinos are subsidized by the mexican national power company. My monthly bill is $4.

Water heating and cooking gas:  we have 3 wells on this property, pumped up to 200 gallon tanks on the roof, then gravity fed to the house. Campesino (country person) style. No pumps to give out or maintain once in the roof tank. A small 2 gallon gas water heater is turned on once a day for a daily shower then turned off right afterwards. Hot water at the sink is not necessary and cold water dish washing works just fine. Cooking is by gas stove. We have 3 tanks we alternate with for deep storage and each is filled for about $20. One tank lasts about 2 months at our level of usage.

Rent:  since I have, to date, elected to not seek permanent residency it has made no sense to buy a house or land. My rent on a well built little cement house, in the country (the campo, thus I am, by definition, a campesino), is 2500 pesos a month. At the current exchange rate about $130 a month. Which I consider cheap for a human (which prompts the philosophical question: if man is the most gifted and intelligent creature on the planet why are we the only species that has to pay to live here?). I frequently pay our fairly cool landlord 6 months ahead which, of course, he revels in since mexicans, in general, are notorious for getting months behind on their rent..... even wealthy ones.

Car costs:  a years insurance on my van is $140. Gasoline cost has held fairly steady these past 3 years at about 4 bucks a gallon (21 pesos per liter, 3.8 liters per gallon). I have a mechanic I trust who works diligently to keep my trusty 1988 (classic) van in tip-top mechanical condition. I would estimate at a fifth of similar USA mechanic costs. Parts are about the same as the USA. My two mex import permits, per year, cost about a hundred bucks.

Medical and dental:  my english speaking doc charges 25 bucks for a office visit. A colonoscopy costs $300 all in. I had a hernia operation a few years back and it was $1500 for everything. Ultrasounds about $40. Drugs much cheaper than the very same pill in the USA. Dental costs about a fifth of USA costs and I have a wonderful lady dentist who does bang-up work. Full set of mouth x-rays for $17. Cleaning for $25.

Food:   fruits and veggies, tons in the markets, maybe a fifth of the USA costs. Red meats about the same as the USA. Top quality beer (Bohemia.... the best of the mass producers) about 5 bucks a six. Good wine $5 a bottle.  I do not drink anymore. If you do then go crazy. Eggs a bargain, especially ¨criollos¨ (brown, organic eggs). A variety of local cheeses. Street food delicious in Oaxaca and a bargain but be ready for a gut bug once ot twice a year..... the price paid for adventurous eating.

Internet:  wireless for this country house, capable of streaming but not fairly fast for up and downloading big files, runs $20 a month. Faster then up to $50 a month. In the capital city faster, cheaper, and up to 100 meg speeds. Oh well...........

In short: entirely affordable in a delightful climate with friendly locals and cops who do not go out of their way to be surly or bad asses. How I suffer here. It is crushing to the spirit. Do NOT come here. Stay away. You will NOT like it and will flee like little girlie men or dainty ladies. I will tough it out for you. Feel sorry for me, please.

Another terrible light sweater morning with flip-flops.

Messing About At Tlacolulas Sunday Market

 

Tlacolula is 25 miles west of Oaxaca city but is a ¨real¨ mex town to me. Lots of indigenous folks from the surrounding central valleys villages come in for the Sunday market. Exotic.................. even after 8 years here.

One Of My KCAW Raven Radio Shows In Sitka

 

In the historic Cable House broadcasting out to the Alaska sea islands and Sitka proper.....

GDRStuesday.mp3

¨Side B¨ went out weekly, a mix of jazz and rock, but this show was sitting in as host of the Good Day Radio Show, 9-10 am weekdays. The first locally manned program after the morning canned streams form NPR. Prime time for little Sitka anyway.

Such fun on Side B though with musical guests brought in for live performances often and interviews I had done out in the community. But the music was the ace. Sadly I got booted from the station finally for being ¨political¨ on-air. Shame, shame. Oh well.

EL MAT MISTERIO

 

It STILL challenges me to surf a mat. Looks so simple..... NOT!!

BAND OF FREQUENCIES

 

Film by George Greenough, the "Mad Scientist of Surfing", who just turned 80 this year and whose kneeboard "spoons" in the mid to late 60s revolutionized surfing and surfboard design, ushering in the "shortboard revolution.

Happy 80th and a fine role model for us aging salt heads.

Rust Never Sleeps

Surf Art by 7 Year Old Rafa

 

Rafael is one great kid, as are his 3 and 5 year old brothers. All bright alive kids and very healthy (no vaccines, good food, great parents). I gave them my old foam surfboard last week. Seems giving the youth boards is a theme this month.

So a few days later he gives me this art. He and his way cool traveling musician family are moving to the Shetland islands soon and, believe it or not, there is surf there. Frosty, but surf and surfers.

Here is Rafa a few months ago, following in his singer-songwriter moms footsteps. It is his composition:

PIMP

 

The music alone is fine but the production and arranging on this 1975 album masterpiece was immense........ one of many fine Tubes albums.

 The two later albums engineered by Todd Rundgren were super as well. The Tubes were theatrical onstage but their actual music endures. Some excellent compositions and arrangements from a wild grouping of serious musical DNA and talent.

Never Too Old to Wave Ride.......

 

The thrill remains the same despite the age..... the stoke endures.

Nice just to get out and float in the salt and feel the oceans might heave beneath you. Inspiring fotos for us salt addled elder dude-sters.

One fine wave shape: gently sloping but powerful. Prone... to fun.

Constrictor Knot How-To

 

This does NOT slip. I have used this on the ground end of walking sticks to prevent splitting. Throw on a coat of varnish and they can last for years. Used it also on sail rig lashings on chinese junk sails I have built. FUN TO TIE TOO.

Screaming Mat Surfer

 

Being a surf "elder" now (and NOT gifted, embued with salty wisdom, or particularly experienced beyond the average) the classic soul surfing quotient rules my particular day. To go out alone or with a good friend is deeply appreciated especially if avoiding contact with the high amp, selfish contingent (i.e. most of surfers).

 Flat out FLYING mat footage. As my balance has eroded with age my appreciation of the intimate interface between man and ocean via a thin fabric membrane intensifies. Along with the raw sensation of speed from having ones eyes inches from the waters surface, ease of tube time, and the sensation of G*L*I*D*E.........................

Expat Potluck Gathering Here

 

Does this look like a group worried about CV19?  NO!!!!  Our hood is a pleasant one. In this pic: one german, one brit, 5 yanks, 3 chinese, 3 ecuadorians, 2 french canadians, 2 mexicans, 1 west canadian and 3 dogs (out of frame).

The indian curry lentil soup won best in contest of all the wonderful soups plus fresh baked sourdough bread, fresh baked bread pudding, aguas, wine, and beer. All in altiplano dry season splendorous eternal spring climate.   L-0-V-E-L-Y.

My MicroCruiser Design-Build

 

Why a microcruiser? What is a microcruiser? Why design my own and make it only 14 feet 3 inches long? How is the build going here in Oaxaca?

OK...... 

WHY:  a MC because they are tough, can make ocean passages, have a internal protected steering station out of the overpowering tropical sun, can dry out with a tide in super shallow water, has small components like light anchors which for a old guy is critical, can be trucked or container shipped to really cool cruising grounds (Adriatic sea, Sea of Cortez, Belize reefs, Bahamas, etc.). And can cruise, supplies wise, months if need be.

WHAT: usually 12 to 18 feet long, 4-6 feet of width, super shallow draft, tough materials and thus very seaworthy, can sleep 2 but are really solo one man boats ideal for trips buddy boating with other microcruisers or long solo explorations, simple systems, carefree for the most part and low stress sailing.

Neighbor frenz and I assembling the pieces recently......

So I designed my own to just fit under the 4.5 meter length law of the mexican government..... no permits required. But a full 4 foot sheet of ply wide and barge like in the same family as the "triloboat" barge sailers but with some offshore mods. Fast to build, simple, roomy, tough. Probably with no engine and just sail-oars.

This is the basic layout: 9 feet of cabin, a rear hold or motorwell if a outboard is decided upon, a forward volumous watertight hold, then a flotation filled roll up style bow with built in open anchor well. Drawing maybe 10" loaded up. Rig will be a small chinese lugsail in the Reddish geometry. Kick-up rudder and leeboard.

"Instant boat" assembly day of the major components saw my neighbors 3 precious boys helping out. They "unschool" so this was a learning session too. Since the sides are of hefty 1/2" ply and the bulkheads too their help was, needless to say, monitored and controlled. They had a blast. No way will they be around for the heavy, double 1/2" ply bottom assembly.

Super pix and video of microcruisers can be found at the Microcruising website:

MICROCRUISING.COM

Our Homebuilt 37' Plywood Boat Home in 2003

 

Kling-on battlecruiser!!!! 12 meters of youthful funtime building and living aboard by T and I in 2002-2004. My first big build and self design and man did I make some mistakes. Floated on its designed waterline though so I didn't too too badly anyway. It was still pretty cool though and lots of fun to live aboard in the coastal waters of northwest Florida.

The finish was "workboat" style and more like a small wilderness cabin. I made all the windows and deck gear. It even had a cargo hoist to bring things aboard from a dock.... like Ts springer spaniel. The sides were single 3/4" formply and the bottom a robust double layer to 1" thick.

The vessel suffered multiple redesigns..... what I see now after 10 more wood boat builds is often a fatal mistake. The final incarnation was motor cruiser. It was a "sharpie" design overall..... long, slim, trim, flat bottomed, and super shoal draft able to dry out with the tides.

It was named after the Zappa song "Wild Love":

It was 7 feet bottom beam and 10 top built with a joined 5 sheet panel of 3/4" ply and bent around a center frame "instant boat" style with a crew of amigos one fine day when all the pieces went together. The top went through a redesign and the above pic was the final one. It even had a huge forward hatch that raised up and made a fine wind scoop at anchor.

It had a shitpot of interior room and was pleasant to live in...... very airy and that's a good thing in the often stultifying heat of a gulf coast summer.

The raised double bed in the very rear was cool and spacious with a grand view out off the stern. That is a "wylie" style window by my head. The plexiglass can either be dogged shut, left slanted out in a rain, or taken out completely and a small bug screen inserted. At Apalachicola alligators would swim by off the stern often.

The first topsides were too heavy but man were they trippy!!! It had water catch built in also to capture rainwater. The stern was the galley and dining area, then center cockpit with hold below, then a super spacious fwd master stateroom with double bed and huge hatch to open up above the bed. Kling-On Battlecruiser one friend called it and quite right.

We spent some good times anchored out in wild coves and such. T was down with liveaboard life back then and good on her for that spirit. Eventually we lived at a funky little liveaboard dock in sleepy fishing town Apalachicola and the boat was sold there finally. It was time to move on boat wise and the next one was a Pearson Vanguard 32 that we re-rigged with chinese lugsails I sewed up..... that is another post.

28 New Haven Sharpie Sailing

We had a little 15 sharpie years ago and LOVED it...... so much fun sailing. There really is nothing quite like sailing a extremely shoal draft boat with a flat bottom. These long and slim New Haven types really get up and go with a relatively small sail for its length.

Mex Mainstream Newspaper Sensationalism

"No more chicken!"

This is a sub-section of one of the two mainstream local newspapers. Local rags have no problem trotting out gory pix or details of local crime or accidents.

The over-the-topness of this one though is that this guy was apparently a local chicken merchant and the headline is basically "this guys not gonna be selling any more chickens anytime soon!!!!!"

From the local newspaper "Noticias" or "news".

Main page of same days newspaper.

The Sensual Glide

Yeah..... gettin old..... it ain't for sissies. The trick is not giving into it. Keepin on keepin on >>>> MOVING.  Stretching, surfing, walking, working. A measured dose in regular intervals.

My father treasured his 60s..... good years if active. Still able to sail a boat singlehanded. Still able to surf in glide fashion. Like above......  

Gustavo Cerati 2001

Way sad to discover the solo work of (Argentinas) Soda Stereo frontman then find he died in 2014.... what a huge loss and such a fine talent.

Lots of web content keeps his beautiful work alive though. One finely nuanced performance here:

Dengue Fever Hits Close to Home Again

Assassino!!!!!!

With a local highland friend getting nailed fairly severely with dengue fever this past month it's refresher time, for me, regarding its severity. And on how to possibly avoid it in the first place.

My amigo lives in fairly close quarters to other neighbors and while mosquitos vector out (spread) the disease in a pretty small radius odds are one of his neighbors probably made a Oaxacan coast vacation run, someone got nailed down on the steaming coast where dengue, malaria, zika, and chikungunya are pretty endemic, drove the 6 hours back up here to the mile high central valleys, and became a mosquito vector in his hood.

Dengue currently comes in 4 delightful strains. Catching one doesn't make you immune to catching the others later. A small % of initial infections are so bad you bleed out of your orifices. The sad kicker is a second infection is far more likely to go hemorrhagic on you and risk bleeding out.

My friends strain was obviously not the bleeding-out variety but for 2 weeks he labored with high fever, severe joint pain (dengue is nicknamed "break bone fever" as it feels like your joints and bones are breaking), stabbing gut pains, severe diarhea, dehydration, and other fun time symptoms. A friend of his lost his sister to it when her heart became inflamed and she had a heart attack, despite being in a hospital bed.

Currently a vast global uptick in dengue cases, asia being nailed hard lately but cases in Mexico up significantly as well. Seasonal temps going up yearly and thus so with the bug population. Mosquitos kill more humans on the planet than any other animal. My own uncle died of a mosquito bite years ago.

 Here's a few delightful pix:

Some mild bleeding out symptoms

Once nailed critical to isolate the patient from further vectoring out the disease to others

Wow.... gimme some of THAT, aye!?!?!?

It seems EVERYONE down here knows someone personally who has gotten dengue. My dentist got zika and her house is in the capital city center. A guy in the campground here last year had just gotten out of the hospital after two weeks in there getting I.V. fluids and care. A local surfer I spoke with down on the coast had just had his sister in the hospital with dengue.

When I was in my 20s and cruising the oceans in the merchant marine, or coming to to the latin american tropics for vacations in my off times, I was damn cavalier about mosquito borne illnesses. It's a numbers game in the end. Spend a lot of time in hot disease zones and your odds go way up of catching some bug. Less % of contraction up here in the eternal spring altiplano but obviously still a risk.

Here's some video of my own strategy in avoiding mosquitos about our house here:

In our alaskan sailing days nothing to worry about. In the tropics: watch yore top knot (as Bearclaw Grizzlap told Jeremiah Johnson).

Prone-O Surfboard Design

Prone surfing has traditionally been viewed as the wimpy outcastlandia of elder surfers and unbalanced dweebatronics but it's a wide open frontier actually.

It makes a 5 foot wave into a double overheader perceptually and is much kinder on wipe-outs. Much more tube time.......

This board is the end result of this designers quest for the ideal prone riding surfboard. The tail is broad for ease of wave catching. The width goes 5" more than the usual widest available board. The rocker is relatively flat like a fish.

Vastly increased perception of speed with your face inches above the power source. Emphasis on glide over extreme maneuvering. Dare we call it.... gasp.... "soul surfing" material.

Hippy dippy early 70s retro surf spirituality...... so sue me, melon farmer.