Sunday, April 17th

Today we had breakfast at the hotel before driving to Beraka, an extreme adventure park which is in that area. We got there 40 minutes early so we had wait around for a while, but we were the first ones in when it opened. We started out at a climbing wall and then a zip-line, so I wasn't so sure about the level of extremity for the rest of the park.

But I was soon reassured. Next we went to one where you ride a bicycle across a high wire about 4-5 yards off of the ground. My mom, dad and I did it, though I was really reluctant about it.

The next one we did was a ropes course which was also very high off of the ground, again I was the one who was the most unsure. I almost feel adopted sometimes.

We did a trampoline bungee jump for a few minutes to kill time while we waited for the next thing to open.

The one we did after that was the most surprising of everything: we flew. They put you in a baggy suit and hook you up to a metal rod so you don't fly out of control, they turn on a huge machine which blasts air straight up, you jump over onto the column of air, and it supports you there. It's an amazing feeling! Unfortunately mine had a rip which was rubbing painfully against my ankle, so I quit early.

The next one I think was the most fun of everything all weekend, you had to rock it back and forth until you got up enough momentum to start doing flips! It was AMAZING and SO much fun!

We had to leave the park at 12:30 to get my dad to the airport for a business trip, so we ate on the road back.

Saturday, April 16th

We left early today to go to El Rollo, one of our favorite water parks. We arrived about an hour after it opened, but it wasn't too crowded. It was a lot of fun riding our favorites from last time and trying new ones. I even got up the courage to do a 4 meter (about 4 yards) high dive!

It was terrifying but fun at the same time, I wasn't sure if I loved it or hated it! We did slides together for most of the day, then towards the end we spent a lot of time in the Lazy River. Boy is that ever a misnomer. Every few minutes a huge wave came pouring down the river, sweeping along everything it came across. It was easy to get separated there, but a lot of fun! When the park closed at 6:00 we drove to a small hotel which we had reserved ahead of time and got a quick dinner before going to bed. We were all worn out by then!

Monday, March 21st

We got up early today to get breakfast and then go river rafting. It took about 20 minutes by bus to get up there, then about 2 hours to get down by raft. It was a blast! We all got wet and most of us nearly fell out at one point or a another, but thankfully no one did. There were some pretty bumpy rapids there! After that we packed everything in the car and drove to our next destination, a waterfall called Xica (pronounced shica). We walked around there for a while and took some pictures before finally beginning the drive home. We arrived at about 10:00 after stopping for lunch, coffee, and dinner.

Sunday, March 20th

We got breakfast at a very popular restaurant this morning, it was really good! Then we rented a boat to take us out to Cancuncito, a tiny little scrap of sand with nothing but people on it. But we didn't go out there for the beach, we snorkeled the full hour we spent there. There were lots of fish, coral and anenomy, I saw a starfish and my mom saw an eel. It wasn't the best snorkeling place ever, but it wasn't bad. After we got cleaned up and packed, we picked up lunch and then drove to another little town, also in Veracruz. It was supposedly a 2 hour drive, but of course it turned out longer. When we arrived, we checked in and then walked down to the nearby river and then walked around town a bit. We found some late dinner (which wasn't a very good dinner) and then headed back to the room.

Saturday, March 19th

Today we left at about 7:00 to drive to Veracruz. It's typically a 4 hour drive, no big deal for those of us used to road trips. But of course, it didn't turn out that way. Instead, it became a 7 hour drive when we got caught in hours of traffic. And we were only 20 minutes away from the city! Well, at least I got time to knit. I finished a whole scarf before we got there! We finally got to the hotel and checked in at about 2:00, then we went down the street for lunch. After that, we walked from the hotel across the street to the beach. We snorkeled there a while, I found about 14 sand dollars total. The coolest thing we saw was a huge fish, about 3 feet long and silver with green and blue flecks, but I was the only one who saw it! After we got cleaned up we walked about 2 miles to the Zocalo, the main square, but we were all tired by the end and caught a taxi back to the hotel. From there we took the car to Dairy Queen, then back to the hotel where we all headed straight to bed.

Saturday, February 12th

Today we went with the Etters and the Owenbys to see the butterflies in Valle de Bravo. They migrate from Canada every year and always come to the same spot. We rented ponies to get up the mountain, then the last part we had to hike so that the ponies wouldn't disturb them. It was really cool to see so many butterflies so close and all together like that! The only problem was the dust. It was like moon dust, you take a step and it puffs up around your foot. As you can probably imagine, the ponies didn't just kick up little puffs! We were all dirty by the time we got back down the mountain. The guides kind of took us each on our own, but a few of us didn't have a guide because they wanted to control their own pony. One of the people without a guide was Mr. Etter. He fell behind, and then his pony took the wrong path. We waited for him at the bottom for a while, but then people started to go out looking for him, and they eventually found him. He had come out a LONG ways away from where we had! After that excitement we went into the town of Valle de Bravo to have lunch and then went our separate ways back to our houses.

It's hard to see, but those tiny orange dots are all butterflies!

Sunday, February 6th

We got up at 8:00 again this morning, and had breakfast the same as yesterday. Then we drove to Monte Alban, an archeological site with a lot of pyramids. We were allowed to climbmost of them, and it was pretty fun, but started getting pretty hot near the end.

After that the parents went black pottery shopping, which wasn't quite so much fun. We went to the Oaxaca Zocalo for lunch, then bought a launching balloon and played with that for a while before going back to the hotel. We kids stayed there for the rest of the day while the parents went out again.