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Featured Article #1

Reviewed: Hotel Ibis in Merida

Having stayed in our share of small Mexican hotels that are trying to copy the larger chains, usually with limited success, we had been regarding the newly-opened Ibis Hotel with a bit of a raised eyebrow. An overnight in “the big city” is not uncommon for us; we book a hotel room at the drop [...]

| February 26th, 2010 | Continued

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Featured Article #2

Renovating Our Beach House, Volume 7

If you have been following along, you know it has been a long road to take our squat, one-level “beach box,” a structure whose only intended purpose was to have a shady place for a wealthy Meridano to hang a hammock and drink a Sol in the summer, and turn it into a modern, year-round [...]

| February 5th, 2010 | Continued

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Featured Article #3

Renovating Our Beach House, Volume 6

As we may have mentioned in prior volumes, our house was built by the previous owners one room at a time, as money allowed, with no (as far as we can tell) over-arching plan driving the whole thing. Because of this, the bedroom was tacked on to the house with a separate entrance, which meant [...]

| February 3rd, 2010 | Continued

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Featured Article #4

… And We’re Back (But Not For Long)

As it turns out, as we have proven, you can abandon your pressboard life, board a plane to a place you’ve never been and carve out an existence – and a pretty sweet one at that – in an uncanny valley far, but not too far, from home. We didn’t drop off the edge of [...]

| February 2nd, 2010 | Continued

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Featured Article #5

Dropped Out.

Jillian: How will it end, I wonder? In order to address this unanswerable question with poetry and symmetry, I look back to the beginning. Rereading the early entries, from the planning stages to our first enthralled weeks in Mexico, through all the trials up to this present moment; as I listen to the waves, I [...]

| May 4th, 2009 | Continued

About this Site

We’re Malcolm and Jillian, two young Americans who decided against waiting until retirement to bail out on America, hit the road, and live out our dreams. Our blog has been around for a couple of years now, and a lot has changed. Here’s how we introduced ourselves to the world way back in October 2005, [...]

Other Recent Articles

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The Reports of my Death are Greatly Exaggerated

As they are wont to do in a small town, the so-called “coconut wireless” has been abuzz with news of our departure. Gawd, what a dicky sentence. What am I, the Pope? Actually, I’m pretty sure no one has noticed our plans to leave, since following our year’s hiatus, no one really reads this blog [...]

10Mar2010 | | 2 comments | Continued
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Good Times

Like I told you, I didn’t experience the layered love embrace of Mother Mexico upon arrival in this country, or really ever. So be it. Some people discover a love of this place that burns like a thousand suns. For others it just burns. I know that sometimes my tart reactions are triggered by the [...]

9Mar2010 | | 0 comments | Continued
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On The Town: Wicky’s in Playa del Carmen

We are so lucky to be just four hours from the crazy amazing waters of the Caribbean. We don’t make the drive very often but when we do it is with gusto and great dedication to pleasure. Laying supine in a beach chair, staring at the sky and taking intermittent dips in the ocean is [...]

9Mar2010 | | 1 comment | Continued
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Ramblings

When Mexico is adorable it is wonderfully so. Children chasing chickens in the yard, festivals of colors and lights and saints, spontaneous parades, palm trees, colonial architecture and cheap delicious street food are all undeniably very good things. But when Mexico is awful*, it is terribly so. We’ve discussed how there is not really anything [...]

1Mar2010 | | 5 comments | Continued
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Norte #33 was a Doozy

I am typing this from the one room in the house that has power, after getting socked for the last 24 hours with one of the most powerful nortes I have ever seen. The waves were breaking on people’s houses, and our neighbor’s house was covered in foam that was being spit up from the [...]

25Feb2010 | | 0 comments | Continued
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The News Not The Weather

I remember a tempestuous August storm. It was nothing more than a strong summer rain. But sheets of water were falling from the sky and collecting in quick inches on our street and I was scared. My parents flung open the doors and stood outside to marvel at the intensity and I thought, not for [...]

25Feb2010 | | 0 comments | Continued
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Things to do in Yucatan Before I Leave aka My Yucket List

Dance all night at The Mambo Cafe We had our wedding reception at this live music venue/dance club at the Plaza Las Americas mall and it was amazing, shiny, loud, and vibrating. But I was a little distracted/overwhelmed/intoxicated and would love to go back to shake my money maker without worrying about our forty friends [...]

23Feb2010 | | 4 comments | Continued
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That’s Debatable: A Person of Interest

This house maintains that living abroad makes you a more interesting person. Pro To live abroad successfully you have to be adaptable and open to new ways of thinking. Your worldview is cracked wide open, if not totally destroyed and forced into a new configuaration. It’s a symbolic death, such as one experienced by the [...]

19Feb2010 | | 0 comments | Continued
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Part-Time Paradise is a Full-Time Hell

Believe me I flagellate every time I even think about complaining, so don’t get upset and decide that I’m awful. But every holiday must end and even the beach gets boring, especially in a town such as this. Chelem, like the mysterious city Brigadoon, is not meant to exist all the time. It only comes [...]

18Feb2010 | | 0 comments | Continued
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Waiting For My Man

We’ve had one norte after the next blowing through our port, the skies are opaque gray and all the Yucatecans and casi Yucatecans are bundled up and battened down. We drove into Progreso to run errands while the help leveled rubble and planted and washed our pots and pans. I picked up our laundry and [...]

17Feb2010 | | 0 comments | Continued
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Mexico Micro and Macro

I would say we keep our distance. I prefer that my hands are clean. I want to want to look more closely at life, to face certain facts about the world, but when I do it’s with shock and sad horror. Perhaps I’m too empathetic. Or is it selfish? Or just squeamish. Maybe I would [...]

16Feb2010 | | 2 comments | Continued
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