holy shit...

he's bloggin'!

sorry for the delay in posting. i know you all are used to an occasional three week hiatus, so the apology and rusty comments are nothing new.

well, pauline and ken (lois' sis and bro-in-law) left yesterday. in the week that they were here, we did little but eat, sit on the porch, eat, and play dominoes. they pretty much filled us in on all the details of their adventures in alaska...fishing, viewing Denali, the midnight sun, vast open space. they even brought some of the halibut and salmon that they had caught. we had the salmon a few nights ago...delish. it had a more subtle flavor than what we get at the store yet much richer. i'll have to figure out what to do with the halibut this weekend.

we did manage to go out a couple times. in the four months that they've been gone, good mexican food has been hard to come by in alaska, canada, and montana. ya think? first thing we did when they got here was whisk them off to La Cocina de Marcos - still our fave mexican.

speaking of mexican, our trip to mexico city and cancún (and maybe villahermosa) is still on. unfortunately, purchasing the tix were put on the backburner while they were here. of course, the fantastically priced $385 fare (den-mex...mex-cun...cun-den) ended last friday. so...our seats are now just a good deal at $483.

with the $98 increase, we're looking at getting an open jaw fare instead and bussing it from mexico city to villahermosa for a couple days before heading to cancún. luckily, there's still a $341 open jaw ticket on American. i know i've mentioned the term open jaw when it comes to air travel, but in case you've forgotten or are not familiar, an open jaw route is when you depart for one place but return from another. this is an excellent idea if you want to take a long trip in a country, but don't want to double back to your landing point. often the price will be about the same as a R/T, or even cheaper. of course, in many cases, the price is a bit more expensive (depending on the market). for example, even though there are some $350 fares to cancún right now, an open jaw from denver (but leaving from mexico city) is in the $600 range. however, the cheapest fare to mexico city right now is in the $400-500 range. and yet, we'll be able to get an open jaw that goes to mexico city and leaves from cancún for $341.

yeah, it's freakin' strange. when we first started doing open jaw trips, i thought i had the formula...fly into cheaper market + depart from more expensive market = either equivalent price of cheaper market or divide difference between two markets and tack it on. and now, with this upcoming trip, that formula falls apart. gosh, i wish my teacher in travel school would have divulged the 'secret' open jaw formula...

anyway, looks like we'll be departing between 9/12-14 and coming back on the 22nd. as long as we spend 3-4 nights in mexico city, 1-2 in the villahermosa area, and the rest in cancún, we'll be happy. lois will get to go the san juan market in mexico city for gems/jewelry and get to see our friend, Ileana (aka, Yani), in cancún. and i'll get to eat my tacos in villahermosa (at Rincon Brujo), see the Trotsky museum, drink coffee at Café El Reloj, and get my bottle of Xtabentun.

be back soon...gotta start dinner...it's shish kabob time (w/ grilled veggies and corn)

come on over and join us!