Dec 02, 2011
The trip, the road & the paint!
You know how much we love ‘the road’. Well after the rain a few weeks ago it has turned horrid again plus the trees are aleady overgrown. We may never be able to leave. Took us 45 minutes by car to do the 8.5 miles to Estrella & then we zoomed along.
First stop was for paint for the palapa cement posts. Like any normal paint store there are hundreds of color swatches to chose from. We made our choice and then the fun began.
There is no standard formula, in fact no formula at all. It's all guess work. The mixing is done with a huge wooden paddle.
We had chosen a burgundy and the fellow started with red, followed by hot pink. Already I knew we had made a big mistake. We should have chosen a plain beige color!
No really sir that is not the colour we chose. More red, more pink, Colin tried to suggest black to darken the hue. He said he NEVER added black to paint for colour. After 8 attempts at adding this and that we were all stumped.
After an hour he agreed to try adding some grey paint. See how he uses his finger to stop the flow of paint! Totally unique.
After the paint was re mixed ( re paddled ) he would put a dab on a piece of paper and use a hair blower to dry the sample. By now we were getting hot, tired and I was irritated. Okay good enough. 380 pesos later! Lots of money in my opinion.
Next stop Sorianna! But there was the detour to deal with, Colin figured he would have no trouble getting there via the back roads. Finally I asked the local policia for directions.
Initially they just gave us the directions, turn , turn, turn and double back and turn again, bueno, no problema I said. Not two minutes later they pass us and lead us to the store. Honestly, the detour would have been quicker but I was not driving. Got a ton of groceries as I don’t plan on doing the road again till we leave in April. Any other groceries will be done via panga.
Next stop, the vivero, the nursery, my very favourite stop in all of Mexico.
Not bad, 2 hibiscus @ 30 pesos each ( $2.24 CAD) and a 5 foot palm for 60 pesos. Time to go home via 'the road'.
Final stop for gas for the car. We were almost on empty due to all our running around on the Isla. No fuel or ATM on the Isla. Parked beside us also getting fuel was this loaded down truck full of newspaper wrapped papayas headed for the market. Colin asked to buy one but the fellow refused payment and gifted us one. We weighed it in @ 4.5 lb.
We survived the road home but it was wine time. While Colin unloaded and I put the groceries away with vino in hand, Pablo planted our flora. That is it, I am done, no more, no mas, nada. Enough plants this year. Good thing 2012 isn’t too far off!! We had an easy dinner that night.
Yesterday Colin asked if I wanted to start painting. Sure thing!
The first of 5 poles. Colin insisted I wear an old shirt of his just in case!
Colin had to do the higher up stuff. We did protect the RV with plastic sheets which was good as we ( well me ) did get a few specs on the plastic.
Kinda pink, eh! Well it has dried to a lovely Mexican rose color and we just love it, could not be more perfect.
So glad we did that yesterday as today has been a bit windy and overcast. Good day for cleaning inside the RV. Still tolerable at 80F! Que pasa manana, well you will just have to check in! Time to start happy hour a few hours early!
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Contessa and Colin, your improvements are absolutely wonderful. You sure are keeping yourselves busy, but glad to see you are not too busy for happy hours !!
Enjoy yourselves !!
Take care, TnT
TnT….gracias, we are done and very happy and hope to enjoy it all for years to come.
George…..more vino for certain.
Sandie….I really do love the colour. We so love it hear.
Longdog2……I have to agree we were surprised at all the choices of swatches and the method of colour mixing but it all worked out! Thank goodness!
Always fun venturing out into town!.
Now the work is done more Vino!
I think the color is absolutely perfect. Mexico to me is a land of color and you just fit in so perfectly.
Good thing the color ended up okay. Can’t be believe they didn’t have any formulas if they had color swatches to choose from. Looks good anyway.