About an hour in we stopped for tea and both Jay and Beija looked awfully pale. We did a poor job of avoiding altitude sickness. But our failure is your gain! Now I’ve done the research and have tools in my altitude toolkit for you.
Tips
Active, Kid-Friendly Oaxaca Itinerary
I am writing this with a spot of mole on my glasses as I cook up a pot of my new favorite dish for friends. Oaxaca surprised us with its ability to transition us from big city bustle to wet pine forests with wild mushrooms and silent trails to the heat of its isolated beaches monitored by black iguanas.
Car Rental in Oaxaca: Smooth(ish) Sailing
Our car rental in Oaxaca was mostly awesome. It enabled these adventures: being the first ones to arrive for sunrise at Monte Alban, seeing two-day old puppies during a mountain pull-over, beach hopping from Puerto Angel to the nudist beach at Zipolite, and delicious roadside snacks of coconut and Mezcal.
Put the phone away!: Tweens, Travel, & Technology
Tweens are some of the most amazing and frustrating creatures on the planet. Being your best self with them while traveling – and probably all the time – takes flexibility, clarity of purpose, and a lot of deep breathing. This is the first in a series of posts on successful travel with tweens. Success to me means minimizing the conflict and maximizing the fantastic. I’m going to start with one of the most painful lessons we’ve learned: technology.
Car Rental in Cuba: Cool or Crazy?
We don’t drive on every trip, but a car rental in Cuba led us to a roadside cafe overlooking the jungle, fun conversations with a rural fruit seller who showed us letters he’d received from around the world, seeing horseback riders carry two live pigs each to their New Year’s Eve party, an offer to sell Jay a restaurant/orchard (of course you’d have to divorce your wife and marry my daughter), and land on the doorstep of a Soviet-era spa.