Charlie and I moved from Murrieta, California to Mesquite, Nevada five years ago to escape the urban drama, high cost, congested roads, and costly state income tax that didn’t fit a retirement lifestyle.
We didn’t know anything about Mesquite except that it was a “border” city with several casinos and a Del Webb community that was under construction, and it got nasty hot in the Summer. Oh, yeah… it was also home to eight golf courses!
Once we got to poking around the area, and making friends in the community, we discovered a couple of very pleasant surprises: (1) The health care in the region is 10+; and (2) the natural environment presents numerous opportunities for world class hiking.
Mesquite itself has a basic hospital for emergencies and simple procedures. One goes there if he is squirting blood or has broken a limb. The regional hospital, a 45-minute drive north on I-15 in the city of St. George, Utah is a very high-level campus with the most modern facilities and equipment combined with excellent doctors and staff. Both Charlie and I have worked at hospitals in previous lives, and we can assert that the medical care provided in St. George is on par with Scripps in San Diego or Cedars of Sinai in Los Angeles. First Class all the way… and they take our insurance! Another benefit: many of the specialist physicians have convenient office hours in Mesquite for consultation!
Over the past five years, I have availed myself of this wonderful medical care by having both of my hip joints replaced with artificial ones and, most recently, having cataract surgery on both eyes. Charlie, who has all manner of medical issues, has found great specialists in St. George to tend to her regular needs. In addition, she found a very sharp podiatrist who resolved her broken foot and a pain specialist who “reinflated” a crushed spinal disk that occurred when she fell from a ladder. In a week, Charlie will be undergoing a hiatal hernia surgery up in St. George, something that she has been looking forward to for many months.
Kudos to the superb medical care in this area!
I was not a big “outdoors” person when I moved to Mesquite. I had done a lot of hiking when I was younger in Yosemite National Park (Yosemite Falls, Half Dome) and the high Sierra (Mount Whitney a couple of times), and had skied quite a bit in Mammoth Mountain, Lake Tahoe, June Lake, Badger Pass, and Dodge Ridge. I did a “down and back” hike into the Grand Canyon and a number of cool hikes at Arches National Park. But all of that was back in my salad years… before age 70, before the artificial hips, etc.
It was not long after we relocated to Mesquite that I met a bunch of old coots like me who enjoyed hiking around the deserts and mountains of this region. There was an organized hiking group, called the Desert Fossils, and an informal group, consisting of my neighbors Mac and Lloyd. The hiking club typically planned two treks per week on established trails, while our informal group usually did one major hike per week… typically “off trail”.
Between the two hiking groups, I have now hiked most of the interesting stuff within a 90-mile radius: Valley of Fire, Lake Mead, Desert National Wildlife Refuge, Beaver Dam Wash National Conservation Area, Pine Valley, Gunlock, Virgin Mountain, Cedar Pocket, the Arizona Strip, Grand Canyon Parashant, and Zion National Park.
I did not know, when we moved to this area, that it is in a complicated geologic setting featuring earthquake faults, volcanoes, “red rocks”, slot canyons, and such. The 45-minute drive north to St. George on I-15 drives through the Virgin River Gorge, which is a “mini” Grand Canyon visual feast that I never tire of. Pine Valley Mountain, which forms the backdrop for the city of St. George, is 10,365 feet tall and is the largest laccolith (a mass of igneous rock that has been intruded between rock strata causing uplift in the shape of a dome) on Earth.
Last week, I joined up with the Desert Fossil hiking club to do the “Yant Flats/Candy Cliffs” hike, one of the few popular ones in the area that I’d never tried. We had to 4×4 drive a Jeep about six miles up a graded road and then trek another mile on foot up a sandy trail to Yant Flats. The “payoff” was the so-called Candy Cliffs, which are sandstone cliffs and petrified sand dunes colored in shades of white, orange and red. Very pretty and unusual.
There were 24 people on the hike. When we arrived at the Candy Cliffs, I followed an experienced guy named Gary… and we almost immediately got separated from the other 22 hikers. Gary seemed to know what he was doing so I tagged along, descending several hundred feet down a sandstone cliff. It was beautiful and dramatic, well worth the effort.
All the while, there was no sign of the bulk of the hiking group. Finally, we hiked up the steep sandstone cliffs with great effort to the original place where we’d last seen the rest of the group. No sign or sound of them, so we looked around until we found footprints in sand and then followed them about a half mile until we came to another sandstone canyon area. There they were, down the slope a bit, having snacks. The group seemed quite pleased with their adventure, so I didn’t let on that they’d missed the most spectacular formations in the “real” Candy Cliffs area.
Ignorance is bliss, I guess.
One of the great things about living where we do is that visitors (friends and family) often want to do some hiking. Zion National Park, which is only a 90-minute drive from Mesquite, is always a Bucket List goal of visitors. However, it has become so crowded in the past few years that I avoid it if possible. Angel’s Landing, one of the most famous hikes in America, now requires a permit, and The Narrows (a slot canyon with 1,000’ cliffs) is only doable at certain times of the year. Anyway, “been there, done that”. Accordingly, I try to direct visitors wanting to hike to places like Valley of Fire, The Vortex, and (now) the Candy Cliffs. Lots of drama with a minimal investment of time and ground-pounding.
I am not sure how much more hiking I will be doing.
I will be 76 years young in a couple of weeks and don’t have the leg strength or stamina that I used to. My informal hiking group (Mac and Lloyd) has dissolved, as Lloyd moved to South Africa and my neighbor Mac has developed a severe medical condition that does not allow hiking or bike riding, things that he loves to do. I could still hike with the Desert Fossils; however, I’m not keen on big hiking groups… they tend to overwhelm the peace and nature that one seeks on a hike into the Southwest desert.
My son Jeff and wife Carol will be visiting us during the holiday season. They will probably want to do a little hiking.
Believe it or not, America is just short of twelve months away from the next Presidential election, potentially the last one ever held in this country.
It looks more and more like the election will pit two old farts against each other… for the second time. President Joe Biden, who turned 81 years old on Monday will apparently be the Democratic Party candidate, while ex-President Donald Trump, a youngster at 77 years old, appears to be a lead pipe cinch to represent the Republican Party. Biden beat Trump by 7 million votes in 2020; however, inflation, the wars in Gaza and Ukraine, and a very leaky Mexican border have resulted in the 2024 race being forecasted to be a very close one.
Incredibly, the disgraced former President could win the contest despite the many legal problems that he is facing at this time.
I shudder to think what would happen to, and within, the U.S.A. should Trump be elected. In his first term, he surrounded himself with fawning idealogues, ignored the advice of experts, ditched the traditions and protocols of the Presidency, and embarrassed our nation on the world stage by undermining our traditional allies and sucking up to dictators. And then, pooh poohed the Covid-19 pandemic and measures taken to combat it, resulting in the worst effort of all industrialized countries… a whopping 1 million deaths from the coronavirus.
This time around, candidate Trump is promising, if elected, to carry out a war of retribution and vengeance against all his “enemies”, which include Democrats, moderate Republicans, Jews, Mexicans, Chinese, journalists, FBI employees, judges and prosecutors, BLM activists, and former Trump Administration employees who had the temerity to rat out his illegal activities and half-baked policy ideas between 2017 and 2021. Trump recently referred to this group of perceived antagonists as “vermin” that needed to be eradicated.
Adolph Hitler used that same wordage to refer to Jews, intellectuals, and his opponents… who were later sent to gas chambers.
I have no doubt that Donald Trump, if elected in 2024, would cobble together some sort of Brown Shirt brigade to wreak havoc on our heretofore democratic country, much like he did (illegally) while in office during the Black Lives Matter protests.
Protesting government decisions would be a risky proposition under Trump II, as autocrats don’t like criticism. Elections would be in jeopardy, as well, because Trump doesn’t trust them and (based upon the Jan 6 Capitol Riot) doesn’t think he has to abide by them.
It is incredible to me that Donald Trump, with all his warts, could be elected next year. This prospect is the clearest evidence to date that the United States is circling the drain, potentially becoming a laughingstock among nations for its bad judgment. The guy has nothing to offer except hate, narcissism, and bad ideas.
Evidently, many Americans are willing to cast aside the Constitution and the rule of law and take their chances on a guy who already failed them once.
Joe Biden is quietly doing the job he was elected to do. He inherited an economy on the brink of a depression, which has been avoided thus far by drastic action from the Federal Reserve. Higher interest rate hikes have affected everything from soup to nuts, producing lots of wailing and gnashing from potential voters. However, the overall economy seems to be weathering the storm.
The biggest issues facing Biden’s re-election plans are (1) his age, and (2) illegal immigration. He can’t do anything about (1) and doesn’t seem to be doing anything at all about (2). Also, the military aid that the U.S. is providing Ukraine and Israel has struck a nerve among a lot of potential voters: wouldn’t that money be better spent here in America, making our country stronger?
I’m old enough to remember democracy working in this country. Up until a half century ago, leaders from both political parties would iron out their differences and create policy that made lives better for most Americans. “Compromise” was the key, and it resulted in the transcontinental railroad, the interstate highway system, putting a man on the moon, and so forth. Nowadays, the entire country is so caught up in partisan positions (Red vs. Blue, Religious vs. non-Religious, Gun Rights vs. Gun Control advocates, Pro-Life vs. Pro-Choice, etc.) that public officials elected to solve problems instead spend all of their time in D.C. blaming the other side and publicly badmouthing each other. These “adults” are engaged in an unending spitwad shooting contest… and seem proud of themselves for doing so.
Our system of government seems to be, in the Digital Age, incapable of functioning in the interest of the majority of Americans. Perhaps voters are ready to throw in the towel on democracy? That could very well be what happens in 2024.
Unfortunately, when a country moves from a democracy to a dictatorship, it is usually a permanent thing. Authoritarian figures don’t want or need input from the average citizen, and they certainly don’t like criticism. Scapegoats (religious, ethnic, racial) are used to deflect attention from the failures of the regime. Nepotism is almost assured. Elections, if they have any, are truly “rigged” to the benefit of the despot, much like the elections in Russia.
We Americans have become very used to free speech, freedom of movement, freedom to worship whatever God we want, freedom to possess firearms, and the Rule of Law. Authoritarian governments are not keen on any of these “rights”.
Therein lies the crux of the matter: discarding the democratic model (because you are frustrated by it) could put Americans in a worse position… and it’s a decision that is almost impossible to reverse short of a civil war.
I don’t know what will happen in 2024. I’ve been lucky to have lived under democracy for my entire life and think it is a viable model if elected officials take their roles seriously and TRY to solve problems. However, if most Americans want to experience something different, where all ideas and solutions emanate from the same narcissist, then so be it.
I won’t be around much longer to endure the consequences; let the Gen Z folks deal with it.
I recently made reservations for Charlie and I to spend our 50th wedding anniversary at a beach resort in Zihuatanejo, Mexico in March, 2024.
We are very comfortable down in ‘Ol Mexico, having traveled there a lot over the decades. My personal history with Mexico involves almost 70 years of travel, recreation, and good times. I can read and speak some Spanish, so I’m pretty at ease with the culture, and the locals are always friendly.
It began back in the 1950’s when my parents built a vacation residence in Baja California just a few clicks north of Ensenada. Our abode was a small travel trailer with an add-on structure so that there was sufficient room for two adults and four children. We had a family ski boat at the time, and it came in handy for skiing, fishing, scuba diving for lobster and abalone, and cruising in the ocean, which was a couple hundred feet from our “house”. My brother Terry and I had a ball there, goofing off around the beach and shooting off any firecrackers that we could find. My Dad’s uncle Les also had a residence there, along with a fishing boat, and I got to go out with the serious anglers from time to time.
The toll highway from Tijuana to Ensenada hadn’t been built back in the Fifties, so the 104-mile drive was made over lousy, narrow roads in dicey areas. We had to climb up over a mountain on the way, typically in the fog at night, as we would usually do the trip down from Los Angeles in the afternoon after my Dad got off from work. Once, we came upon a grisly auto accident on that mountain pass, found some bloody survivors, and we took one of them with us to a hospital in Tijuana.
The Tijuana-Ensenada corridor was pretty seedy then: lots of run-down dwellings, the ever-present odor of sewage, and roads with lots of potholes. Tijuana, back in the Fifties, was kind of an “anything goes” playground for young folks and American soldiers stationed in San Diego and Oceanside. Needless to say, my Dad always got us through Tijuana as quickly as possible to avoid auto accidents and crooked police officers.
The border crossing at San Ysidro was interesting to me, as a kid, because crossing the border going south involved passing a Federale official sitting in a folding chair, usually taking a nap. Coming back north, crossing the border, involved a large traffic jam where Mexican vendors would walk alongside cars hawking souvenirs and U.S. Border Patrol officials would give your car and passengers the once-over with minimal fuss. They were generally looking for contraband like fireworks and illegals hiding in the car trunk. Drugs were not a problem back then.
I think my parents sold that beach house in the late Sixties. The trailer park property was later leveled to make space for the Autonomous University of Baja California and a very nice seaside restaurant (Punta Morro).
In the early years of our marriage, Charlie and I visited Tijuana, Rosarito Beach, and Ensenada on numerous occasions to eat, drink, and shop. We took the boys down to Estero Beach (south of Ensenada) to do some beach camping with my brother Terry and his family. One of the fun things to do when visiting that area was to see “La Bufadora”, which is a famous blowhole located on a rocky point jutting out into the ocean (and where my Dad almost died many years earlier when scuba diving at that spot!).
By that time, the toll highway was in place and made the trip a breeze. I recall a fishing trip down to Ensenada that I made with some buddies one time. We got eaten alive by mosquitoes while sleeping on the beach, caught a lot of yellowtail, and stopped at a bar on the way north which was infested with prostitutes. One of my friends, who got chummy with one of the girls in a restroom, got a very itchy souvenir that day, if you follow me. HaHa.
We’ve visited Rosarito Beach numerous times for shopping (lots of great pottery, furniture, and yard art) and eating. Our favorite restaurant was called El Nido: great food, good service, very interesting décor.
For a while, Charlie and I and friends would make the trip south from Southern California to Puerto Nuevo (just south of Rosarito) to enjoy the famous lobster dinners. Originally (back in the early days with my parents) the place consisted of a couple of restaurants serving nice-sized lobsters. However, as time went on, Puerto Nuevo became overrun by many lobster restaurants and the lobsters got smaller and smaller and the price got more expensive. We finally gave up on the place.
Years later, we discovered a golf resort south of Rosarito Beach called “Bajamar” where we had some great times with some of our neighbor friends from Bear Creek. A portion of the golf course is located along the rocky shoreline, with four spectacular holes that would rival Pebble Beach at a fraction of the cost.
Charlie and I have been to Ensenada many times over the years by car and cruise ship. It has grown into a very large city, it’s a major port, and the downtown area where tourists go has become quite respectable. There are lots of good places to eat and drink. Hussong’s Cantina is a famous dive where you can get an overpriced cerveza. Our favorite restaurant is El Rey Sol, which is an elegant place serving a French cuisine.
The last time I drove the coastal highway south of Tijuana was on a golf trip to Bajamar with some buddies. We had a great time, but the trip was spoiled coming back to the U.S. when a Mexican cop braced us near the border for a $100 bribe, which we paid to get the hell away from him. By that time, the border crossing at San Ysidro had become a massive circus, what with the thousands of cars, thousands of vendors pestering the in-line drivers, and the increased security. The crossing now took at least an hour. So, that was the last time I drove a car south along the toll highway into Baja.
For a time, Charlie and I (and friends) used to do some short vacations down in San Felipe, which is a small fishing town at the northernmost point of the Gulf of California. To get there, one must drive south from Mexicali about 200 miles through a very desolate desert, with military checkpoints every so often to discourage local bandidos. The trek is comparable to driving the length of Death Valley… and then another 60 miles.
San Felipe reminded me of Ensenada back in the Fifties: a few restaurants, several bars, no crowds, cheap prices, and laid-back attitude. Our favorite nightclub was called the “Rockadile”, where they played loud rock and roll music, and the place featured an indoor sand volleyball court where drunken patrons would blow off steam. Another cool place in town was an open-air enclave of taco joints where the lunch special was several street tacos and a Pacifico beer for one dollar, and that included all of the chips and guacamole that one could eat. We would spend a whole afternoon there, eating and listening to Mariachi music. Just down the street, there was a bar with one of those automated bulls that daredevils could attempt to ride. I tried and failed.
On one San Felipe trip, our group of neer-do-wells decided to participate in the annual Pete’s Camp off-road 50K poker run in the desert. We drove in our friend’s Jeep 4×4 and trashed it but had a fabulous time, particularly at the 25K point where there was a giant marlin barbeque, free beer, and a wet tee shirt contest for the thousands of shit-faced participants.
Over the years, I did a lot of fishing down in Baja waters. My brother and I got started with day trips out of San Diego to catch albacore and yellowtail. Then, we graduated to 3-5 day trips to Guadalupe Island, which is probably the Great White Shark capital of the West Coast. The waters around this island are infested with big fish, seals, and big sharks. It was not uncommon to hook a fish, have that grabbed by a seal, and then watch the seal be brutalized by a huge shark. I can recall one time when I was fishing along the rail when a Great White, that had to be fifteen feet long, cruised just under the surface about five feet from me: awesome!
We later upped the fishing ante by taking 8-day trips on the deluxe Excel fishing boat (125’ long, 32’ wide, deluxe cabins, only 28 fishermen) to do stand-up fishing for bluefin, yellowfin, and albacore tuna, yellowtail, dorado, and wahoo. It was expensive but an adventure, fishing the famous Alijos Rocks, volcanic pinnacles which are about 180 miles offshore and 500 miles south of San Diego. My favorite parts were fishing for squid (bait) at night, bottom fishing for huge Yellowtail, and “kite fishing” for large tuna.
My brother Terry, my friend Ken Mohr, and I took a bunch of those trips. On one of them, we were returning home to San Diego when the captain came on the intercom and informed the fishermen that the Twin Towers in New York had just been attacked. On the way into San Diego harbor (a major Navy port) we were boarded and searched by Seals. It was a very sobering moment.
On other trips, my brother and I fished at La Paz (for Dorado; i.e. Mahi Mahi) and at Punta Colorada, which is a fishing camp midway between La Paz and Cabo San Lucas. That part of the Sea of Cortez used to be a world famous fishery, but illegal trawling in the area by the Chinese has decimated the stocks of game fish. We caught a few fish in Punta Colorada, but were not successful in finding many Roosterfish, which are said to abound there. My brother Terry caught a small (100 pound) Marlin by accident.
On another trip, we fished out of Cabo San Lucas for tuna but had little success. I caught a bull Dorado while trolling on the way back to the harbor; it was a monster. The highlight of that Cabo trip was driving ATV’s in the sand dune complex just north of town. Terry and I got to racing through the dunes and desert, going faster and faster, until I flipped my rig and got crushed by it. I was damned lucky to survive that wreck; my pelvis was black and blue for a month. What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger, right?
Speaking of Cabo San Lucas, I have been there many times, and it has really changed over the years. Initially, it was a sleepy fishing port where American anglers would attempt to land huge Black and Striped Marlin in famous billfishing tournaments. There was a small harbor adjacent to a small, dusty town with several restaurants and bars. I liked it then. Nowadays, there’s a big city, a big harbor, lots of pricey eateries and watering holes, and cruise ships unloading thousands of tourists each week. It’s now as American as San Diego… very touristy.
Years ago, Charlie and I and some friends stayed for a week at Pueblo Bonito Sunset Beach, which is a high-end timeshare resort located on the coast a few miles west of Cabo city. It was gorgeous there; however, it was on a hillside, and it required a golf cart taxi to get around. It also had a signature Jack Nicklaus golf course on the grounds (very pricey and always windy), along with a high-end restaurant which we frequented.
Charlie and I have taken many “Mexican Riviera” cruises on different ships over the decades, and they all stop in Cabo. Probably the most fun one can have there is ATVing the sand dunes and paddling a canoe out to the big arched rock called El Arco. On one cruise, with our grandson Craig, he and I jet skied out of Playa Medano… it was a lot of fun.
I first visited Mazatlan about 40 years ago when I went fishing down there with some friends. It was a much smaller metropolis back then and the touristy attractions were all located in the “Zona Dorada” and adjacent to the Malecon… where the original Senor Frog’s was located. Of course, everyone went there to get drunk, dance on tabletops to loud rock and roll, and act like fools. Lots of fun.
Over the years, Charlie and I took several cruises that stopped in Mazatlan and some other trips where we flew down there for a week on the beach. It was always fun, particularly riding around town in the “pulmonia” open-air taxis. They are modified VW “Thing” vehicles with custom horns that honk out playful sounds like La Cucaracha, Oooogah, Wolf Whistle, and such, and also blare loud rock and roll tunes.
We visited Mazatlan one time with friends who owned a timeshare at Pueblo Bonito Mazatlan near the Zona Dorada. It was very fancy and had a great beach full of walking vendors, parachute rides, and palapas where one could have lunch and drink Margaritas. We liked it and fell for the pitch… that we could shave $100 off our room bill if we attended a timeshare presentation. We fell for it and were driven out to Pueblo Bonito Emerald Bay, a sister resort owned by the same corporation. It was much fancier than P.B. Mazatlan, the facilities were new, and there were plans to build a Greg Norman golf course on the grounds. We fell for the pitch and purchased a “Junior” suite.
From that point on, we vacationed in Mazatlan every year at Emerald Bay, sometimes by ourselves, sometimes with family, and sometimes with our So Cal friends. At some point, two of those couples bought timeshares there and we proceeded to have a lot of good times over the years. We even upgraded our timeshare to a Presidential unit (two sleeping units) for two weeks per year. It was an extravagance, but we were making good money and enjoyed the hell out of our times down there.
One of the best things about Mazatlan is the food. It is a major seaport for commercial fishing and is just down the coast from Guaymas, which is the “shrimp capital” of Mexico. Over the many years that we vacationed in Mazatlan, we discovered many great restaurants. Our favorites are La Costa Marinera, Pancho’s, Panama, and Gus Y Gus (all near the Zona Dorada area) and Topolo and El Presidio Cocina in the historic “centro” area of downtown. Another fun thing to do, when you’re not sunbathing, eating, or drinking, is to rent a motorscooter and tool about throughout the exotic city. I’ve done it numerous times; always fun. Or, you can take a walk along the 13-mile paved Malecon walkway, which is perched on the seaside cliff above the crashing surf, like many locals do in the mornings and evenings.
It was in this area that our pulmonia driver stopped the taxi one evening on the way home from dinner in downtown… to show us hundreds of raccoons that had come up from the riverbed adjacent to the street to beg for foodscraps. They were fairly polite, for raccoons, and patiently waited for the bits of bread leftovers that we had on hand. It was one of the most unusual sights that I’d ever seen.
Puerto Vallarta is typically the southernmost port of call for Mexican Riviera cruise ships out of Los Angeles. We’ve been there quite a few times and its always memorable. While Mazatlan is sub-tropical, “P.V.” is tropical, with all manner of palm trees, parrots, and steep, forested slopes that go up a thousand feet or so from the shoreline. The streets are cobbled and the town center area is chock full of great shops and restaurants. There is also a very beautiful area along the Rio Cuale (in the middle of town) with nice restaurants and views… it’s called the Romantic Zone. The central downtown environment is focused on the large church (with a crown on top) which dominates the space.
My grandson Craig and I, while on a cruise visiting Puerta Vallarta, experienced an excursion called the “Great Adventure”. We hopped on a Zodiac boat at the wharf, drove about 30 minutes across the bay at high speed, disembarked at the tiny, indigenous village of Yelapa, loaded into military-type trucks, drove up the steep mountain into the lush forest, and rode donkeys the rest of the way to the mountaintop. Then, we zip-lined all the way down the mountain (perhaps ten long zip routes), belayed ourselves down a good-sized waterfall and then a 100’ drop from the forest canopy, and finished the trip with a slide down a water-filled chute. Quite the adventure: Craig loved it.
On another cruise (through the Panama Canal), Charlie and I stopped in Acapulco. We explored the town, saw the famous La Quebrada cliff divers, and did some shopping. That night, we enjoyed our 25th wedding anniversary at a spectacular restaurant up on a hill overlooking the bay with all of the twinkling lights of the city. It was magical.
Charlie and I have been lucky to have enjoyed lots of cruises in the Caribbean. We’ve been just about everywhere in that pond, including many stops in Mexico.
In fact, our very first cruise was on Royal Caribbean’s Song of Norway, which was the smallest cruise ship that we ever sailed and probably the classiest. One of our stops was Playa del Carmen, where we went ashore to take a bus tour to the Mayan pyramid in Tulum and, later, to the Xel-Ha lagoon for some snorkeling with fish, stingrays, and turtles.
Many years later, when the area had developed significantly, we spent some time at Tankah Bay (just north of Tulum) with son Jeff and wife Carol. It was a beautiful beach setting with coral reefs to explore, gorgeous sunsets looking out over the turquoise ocean, and numerous places in the village to enjoy the local cuisine.
We have enjoyed Cancun a number of times, as cruise ships often anchor there. It has become a crowded, pretty wild place for young people to party. The nightclub scene is not really our thing, as we tend to like to enjoy cocktails from a seat in a swim-up bar and consider our options for dinner that evening.
Our favorite place in Cancun, by far, is a place downtown called La Habichuela. It doesn’t look like much from the street but, WOW!, when you enter the place your jaw drops from the beauty and classy setting. The food is GREAT. I recommend that joint to anyone who visits Cancun and has the nerve to leave the tourist zone and drive into the downtown area. Maybe the best restaurant that I’ve ever patronized.
We visited Cancun once with my Mom and sisters while on a cruise. Charlie and my sisters decided to “swim with the dolphins” (they had a great time) while my Mom and I did some shopping and I took her out to lunch. It was a special time for us. On the way back to the ship, a severe thunderstorm swept into Cancun, the likes of which I’ve never seen. It rained so hard that you could hardly see through the falling water. After sheltering in a shop, and debating what we should do, it was decided that we would make a run for the ship down the quarter-mile pier. We did that and got drenched to the bone before stepping onto the gangplank. That frantic run was even the more impressive because my Mom was in her Eighties at the time.
During a trip to Cancun once with son Jeff and wife Carol, we drove our rental vehicle the couple of hundred miles west into the Yucatan rainforest to the ancient Mayan ruins of Chichen Itza. We stayed at the Mayaland Hotel, which is located on the national park property, and it was very nice. The next day, we explored the World Heritage Site… it was awesome, one of the coolest places I’ve ever visited.
Later, we visited several of the cenotes (underground water-filled caves) that abound in this part of the Yucatan. Probably the most scenic is the cenote Ik Kil where, I believe, Jeff and Carol swam and dove in the crystal clear water. Overall, the trip to Chichen Itza was a 10+.
Probably the most spectacular trip to Mexico that we ever took was unplanned. We were both working hard and needed to “get away”, but only could spare 5 days. I got a local travel agent to come up with a plan and she suggested Mexico City. I was not amused, as I had heard that it was very smoggy and crowded (20 million people and 20 million VW’s). She talked us into it and off we went. We stayed at the luxury hotel Camino Real located adjacent to Chapultepec Park, which would be Mexico’s version of N.Y.’s Central Park or the National Mall in Washington D.C. It’s a beautiful place populated by museums, walkways, statues and lakes. The most impressive attraction was the Museo Nacional de Antropologia which was every bit as impressive as the Smithsonian in D.C. We loved it.
By accident, we met a taxi driver who was also a licensed tour guide, and we hired him for two days to take us “wherever he wanted” in the sprawling city. He proceeded to do just that while giving us a college-level lecture on the history and culture of Mexico. What a cool guy! We visited the Presidential Palace, the National Pawn Shop, the Floating Gardens of Xochimilco, the Aztec ruins of Tenochtitlan (Templo Mayor), and the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe, among other places. And ate at restaurants that he enjoyed: the food was great.
On one of the days, our guide drove us out of the city to the ancient ruins of Teotihuacan. This place is the most impressive ancient city that I’ve ever seen. It is a huge complex of stone structures built by… no one knows!… and flourished from 300 B.C. to 500 A.D. There are two large pyramids that dominate the ruins along with many other sizable structures (possibly religious or governmental) flanking a broad, stone-paved boulevard. The Pyramid of the Sun is the largest pyramid in the world, with four times the volume of the Great Pyramid of Giza in Egypt. At the time I visited, it was permissible to climb up to the top of the structure, which I did along with hundreds of Mexican locals. It was very steep and difficult to climb; one wouldn’t want to stumble, for sure. The view from the top was magnificent!
On my list of most impressive sites that I’ve visited, Teotihuacan has to rank near the top with Venice (Italy), Toledo (Spain), the Alhambra (Spain), the Vatican (Italy), the Amalfi Coast (Italy), Pompei (Italy), Santorini (Greek Isles), and Yosemite National Park (U.S.).
In conclusion, I have immensely enjoyed my decades of travel in Old Mexico. Lots to beautiful things to see, fun things to do, and wonderful places to eat good food. Probably the best thing about Mexico is the people: they are friendly, helpful, fun, and intelligent. I can’t remember running into any “bad guys” down there in my 70 years of travel… except that gangster motorcycle cop at the San Ysidro border crossing many years ago. He had a family to feed, I guess.
I can hardly wait for our 50th anniversary trip to Zihuatanejo!!
Back in the 1950’s and early 1960’s when I was growing up, things were much simpler, particularly when it came to determining fact from fiction.
If President Eisenhower or Walter Cronkite said it, there was no doubt that it was true. The same went for doctors, teachers, and scientists Even people in the financial services sector were reliable: “If you can’t trust your banker, who can you trust?”
Of course, liars have always been with us, people like politicians, criminals, con men, televangelists, and the jokers who work on Madison Avenue. Does anyone besides me recall the Congressional testimony, under oath, by the tobacco industry back in the Fifties and Sixties that cigarettes absolutely DID NOT cause cancer? Or parents lying to their children about Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny? “If you can’t believe Mom and Dad, who can you believe?”
And then the Digital Age arrived.
One would think that, with every scrap of human knowledge available on the Internet and readily available to all of humanity, the truth would be easily discerned. However, pretty much the opposite has occurred: there is so much misinformation floating about, eagerly passed on by “friends” and connivers, that everyone seems to be in the fog.
Shocking information (usually untrue) is the coin of the realm on social media and on some network “news” broadcasts and individual podcasts. Anything goes, including bald-faced lies, when it comes to obtaining Facebook “likes” or YouTube clicks. No one seems to care if an assertion is valid, conspiracy theories abound, and a situation has developed where many people trust no one.
A disturbing phenomenon that has emerged in the 21st century is the effort by demagogues to delegitimize aspects of American culture like education, science, democratic elections, foreign relations, and civility.
History teachers in some school districts have been warned not to discuss the institution of slavery in America. In some cases, textbooks have been “whitewashed” to skirt uncomfortable historical facts, while in some Southern states children are taught that “States’ rights” and “honor” were the real reason that the Confederacy was born. Similarly, the genocide of indigenous peoples in North America is similarly, by policy, soft-pedaled. In some States, curriculum steers students toward the belief that “White people” are solely responsible for making America great. And sex education is anathema to Bible Belt school boards.
Home schooling is increasing in popularity, as many parents distrust the motives of professional teachers, typically for religious and political reasons. “Can’t trust those pointy-headed intellectuals!”
Scientists, our searchers for truth, have become vilified by demagogues because some scientific findings run contrary to popular political party dogma on such topics as epidemiology, vaccines, climate change, evolution, and religion.
Conspiracy theories, absent facts, have caused millions of Americans to distrust the electoral process. Ex-President Trump, all by himself, has knee-capped the belief that elections are fair and accurate… despite the fact that recent elections have been found (by Democratic and Republican states, alike) to be virtually free of any fraud. Despite that evidence, and the fact that Trump lost by 7 million votes in 2020, a large portion of Republicans voters still assert (in 2023) that the election was “stolen”.
Our elected politicians, for the past several decades, have delegitimized the democracy they serve by acting like school kids shooting spitwads when they should be working together for the benefit of the citizenry. Both political parties have participated in gerrymandering political maps so that they have an advantage over the opposition. Political parties in some states have instituted laws to disenfranchise otherwise eligible voters by making it very difficult for them to vote.
We have become a democracy that, somehow, detests democracy.
The United States likes to think of itself as “the greatest Nation in the World”. However, we have stopped being great, at least in comparison to our previous version.
In the past, America sided with democracies against tyrants, treated our economic trade partners with respect, and supported our military allies in peace and in wartime. In recent years, we have insulted our allies, slapped tariffs on goods imported from trade partners, and made laudatory comments (during the Trump Administration) about dictators in Russia, China, North Korea, the Philippines, and Turkey.
We have squandered a half century of goodwill around the world, angered former friends, and created new enemies, particularly in Muslim countries.
What does the world think of the United States? Does it matter?
The recent coronavirus pandemic is an interesting case study. When the crap began to hit the fan in early 2020, most nations treated it seriously, imposing travel restrictions, masking, quarantines, and business shutdowns to halt the spread of the disease. No one knew the lethality of the new virus and they didn’t want to take chances. Not so in the United States, where some conspiracy theorists (who had the ear of the President) pooh-poohed Covid-19, the government was slow-footed in response, and great political debate and violent protests ensued when State and local governments tried to contain the spread of the virus. The President, his close White House advisors, and Republican politicians elected to downplay the danger, refused to wear facemasks, and blamed the pandemic on the Chinese. They delegitimized science and America’s trust in doctors.
While the American ostrich hid his head in the sand, the scourge was contained in most countries, and the U.S. went on to suffer the most Covid-19 cases and deaths of any country. Almost 1.2 million Americans died from Covid-19, while India (the most populous Nation with five times the population of the U.S.) had half as many fatalities from the virus.
Not a good showing at all for the supposed “Greatest Nation on Earth”.
It is a shame that, in this terrifying emergency, our leaders chose to believe and act on crackpot advice rather than the suggestions of professional epidemiologists. Even now, with the emergency fading into the rear-view window, our Nation is caught up in political finger-pointing rather than learning from our mistakes. With vaccines now available for Covid-19, there are still millions of Americans who will not take them… sort of a solidarity test for macho men and conspiracy nutjobs.
How can the United States be considered “great” when it is heavily populated by citizens and leaders who don’t want to accept facts but who’d rather live in an alternate, “fake” reality that they choose to believe in?
Interestingly, our former President is now caught up in a nightmarish legal cobweb (of his own making) involving several State and Federal prosecutions, each of which involves lying to achieve political or personal financial objectives. There are serious crimes involved, with lots of factual evidence at prosecutors disposal. Not surprisingly, our ex-President has decided that his best option is to loudly delegitimize the courts, the judges, the prosecutors, the witnesses, and in some cases, the grand juries that brought the charges… in essence, trashing the rule of law in America. All of the cases, in all the various jurisdictions, are simply a “witch hunts”, according to the head of the Trump cult.
Lots of great empires have existed in world history and all of them have eventually faded out. The American “empire” of the past couple of hundred years will follow suit, sooner rather than later, particularly if it decides to put its stock in beliefs rather than facts.
“Faith: not wanting to know what is true” (Frederich Nietzsche)
The recent Gaza/Israel drama is but the latest case of bloodletting atrocities in the Middle East… a serial fracas that has been going on for about 2,500 years.
For those who believe in the Bible, God gave the Hebrews the green light to violently take Palestinian lands from the long-time occupants of that area and even assisted Joshua and his armies in the task. (Curiously, the Commandments that “Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s property” and “Thou shalt not steal” were ignored by God and his holy warriors.)
Historically, the seizure of the those “promised lands” probably didn’t occur as portrayed in the Biblical myth. However, in Judaism, the faithful cling to this fanciful tale as a bedrock of belief and entitlement.
There was, obviously, a significant presence of Jews in Palestine by the 6th century B.C. because that was the period where Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar II’s army wiped out the small Hebrew kingdom of Judah, obliterated King Solomon’s temple, and sent approximately 10,000 Jews off to exile in Babylon.
So much for the “promised land”.
Later, under the Persian leader Cyrus the Great, Jews were allowed to return to Jerusalem and were allowed to build the Second Temple on the site of the original temple. That edifice stood for about 500 years until the Roman Empire got fed up with the rebellious Jews in Palestine, brutally beat them into submission, leveled the Second Temple “so that no stone remained standing”, and forced a large portion of the Jewish population to flee to other Mediterranean/European countries. That exile or voluntary migration of Jews out of the Holy Lands is known as the “diaspora” and explains how so many Jews ended up in countries such as Spain, France, Germany, Poland and Russia.
Again, so much for the “promised land”.
Eventually, the Roman Empire died out, Muslim Arabs came to wield power in the Middle East, and relatively few Jews remained in Palestine. The Catholic Church, under Pope Urban II in 1095, ignited a series of military campaigns to wrest control of the Holy Lands from Muslim control. The several “crusades” continued for a couple hundred years with Islamic forces eventually driving out the European invaders.
Once again, the God of Abraham had, seemingly, supported the attempted theft of Palestinian lands and… had failed once more. Importantly, Muslims throughout the Middle East were angered by this action and carry the resentment to this day. “Why does everyone want to take our lands from us?”
The Middle Ages in Europe were rough on the immigrant Jews who had settled there, as the various nations were heavily Catholic, and their leaders developed a very cruel antisemitism which relegated Jews to the very bottom level of society. Jews were blamed for all manner of problems (including causing the Plague, stealing babies and drinking their blood, and undercutting the economy through lending practices) and were often segregated from society into ghettoes.
This was the situation when Adolph Hitler (a staunch Catholic) rose to power chiefly on his White Nationalist (Nazi) objective of purifying the German nation of Jewish people. For about ten years, under the Third Reich, Hitler’s Nazis ran a genocide program in Germany and countries captured during World War II, resulting in the extermination of about 6 million European Jews.
When the war was ended, the victorious Allies realized the full extent of the horror (now known as the “Holocaust”) and they felt shame and embarrassment that so-called “Christians” had engineered this holy terror against Jews.
Perhaps as some sort of apology to the Jews (or perhaps to remove many of the survivors from Europe itself, as antisemitism still lingered in the Christian population), the Western powers came up with the brilliant idea to “give” the Jews their own homeland, where they could live and worship as they pleased.
Unfortunately, their plan involved superimposing a new Nation over Palestinian lands that had been occupied by Muslim Arabs for twelve hundred years. The Jewish nation of Israel was founded in 1948, whereupon (the very day after the new nation was founded) all neighboring Arabic nations went to war with Israel.
Luckily for Israel, its antagonists were not very skilled militarily and the new nation survived. There have been numerous other wars and skirmishes over the ensuing 75 years. The most recent edition, the Hamas’ terrorist attack of Israel from neighboring Gaza and Israel’s brutal military response, continues unabated as of this writing.
There can be no happy ending to this story. The nation of Israel is the “last stand” of Jews: they were “promised” this land by God and (later) the United Nations, they have a strong military with nuclear weapons, and they will fight to the death to protect their nation. On the flip side, Muslims throughout the Middle East resent the Jewish “trespassers” who control the holy city of Jerusalem. The existence of Israel is akin to a boil on the ass of Islam, and the surrounding Muslim nations will not be happy until that festering sore is removed.
Unfortunately for Israel and the rest of the world, several of its Middle Eastern neighbors have oodles of petroleum-derived money and give generously to terrorist groups like Hamas who like to torment the Jewish state and its allies. The 9/11 attack on targets in America was carried out by another Muslim terrorist group (Al Queda) with ties to the oil-rich Saudi monarchy.
Rinse and repeat.
The most we can hope for in the recent Gaza conflict is that it doesn’t metastasize into a regional or worldwide conflict. World War I was triggered by an assassin’s bullet in an obscure Balkan country. It would be a shame if a local terrorist act brought some major actors into play. The United States, a close ally of Israel, is trying to head off any escalation of the conflict by stationing an aircraft carrier in nearby Mediterranean waters. This should discourage the theocracy in Iran from getting its hands any dirtier than they already are.
The whole mess is like a cafeteria food fight that never ends.
