For your shopping needs in La Punta you can walk up to the main road and check out Mini Super Rubi, they will have just about anything you will need.  There is also Mini Super Rubi II, on the corner of Justo Salvador check the map here.  Although the Mini Super Rubi II is lacking in just about everything, they do sell homemade Mezcal.  Bring in the biggest glass beer bottle you can find and they will fill it to the top for 80 Pesos, 1 liter of good tasting Mezcal for 80 pesos can’t beat that.  The bigger Mini Super Rubi also has a wide selection of liquor, and all the bodegas have a good beer selection.

Now that you know where to go for cheap booze in La Punta it might be a good idea to tell you where you can pick up some good food.  La Guadua is one of the nicest spots to eat in Puerto Escondido, but it is still pretty cheap.  You can pick up a filet mignon for right around $10 USD, which is a pretty good deal.  I went twice while I was in Puerto, the first time it was great, but the second time it was pretty terrible.  I am not sure what went wrong the second time, but all of our food was cold, and the service was terrible.  It is still worth a shot though, because if you get good service and hot food, you will enjoy your meal for sure.

Just up the street from Mini Super Rubi II, towards highway 200, there is a small taco restaurant that serves up a mean Barbacoa.  You can get a full meal that will fill you up for under $30 Pesos.  If you are willing to walk a little bit more across the street from the Mini Super Rubi on highway 200 there is a great juice and sandwich bar.  The fresh made to order fruit smoothies are amazing, as are the sandwich’s, you can get one of each and be out of there for right around $45 Pesos.

If you manage to get up around 8:00 after drinking your $80 Peso bottle of Mezcal, you should head up to highway 200 and go to the bakery next to the Mini Super Rubi.  Get some chocolate croissants and you will not regret it, the earlier you get there the better the selection (try not to drink too much the night before).

Rocks at La Punta

If you are looking to rent or buy a board in Puerto, Ody Boards is a good place to check out. He has a decent selection of used boards, and will also sell you a new board with the promise of buying it back at the end of your stay.

More to come…

Down Time from Scott Lommele on Vimeo.

Dick

I don’t think I will be getting the Alta/Bird pass this winter

Richard Bass, who owns the Utah resort, has partnered with William H. Hunt to form PacRim Coal LLC, which has submitted permit applications to build a giant coal mine that the groups say would not only raise the planet’s temperature but also destroy 11 miles of prime salmon streams feeding the Cook Inlet.

Read the rest of the article here.

Take a second to send him an email, and buy a Alta pass instead.

Music Painting by JUL & MAT from JUL & MAT on Vimeo.

Snob Scrilla is an Australian performer, and the track “Heartbreak Scorsese” is from his 2009 album Day One

SNOB SCRILLA – Heartbreak Scorsese from Jan Reichle on Vimeo.

The Yes Men Fix the World

If you are in the Boulder area this Thursday come to CU and check out The Yes Men Fix the World at the International Film Series.  The preview looks hilarious, there are two showings, 7:00 and 9:00.  Entrance is $6 for non CU students, and $5 for students, click here for directions to the theater.  See you there.

Wild Cat Pow from Scott Lommele on Vimeo.

I think anyone that regularly skis Alta can agree, storm days are better than blue bird powder days.  I think the canyon may have been closed for a while in the morning, so we got some nice country club action at the start.

Puerto Escondido – La Punta

Puerto Escondido means Hidden Port, this might have been true when it was named, but today it is just a name. With one of the heaviest and most famous shorebreaks in the world, it did not take long for Puerto to become a must surf location known worldwide.  In recent years it has also become popular on the backpackers circut, attracting surfers and non-surfers alike.

I went to Puerto for a month starting on the 19th of September, 2009.  There are two main ways to get to Puerto, the first and cheapest is to take a bus from Mexico City through Oaxaca City to Puerto.  The bus ride will take you about 12 hours total, and cost you around $55 US, check Ticket Bus (essentially Orbitz for buses in Mexico).  The other way to get to Puerto from Mexico City is to catch one of the twice daily flights on Mexicana.  This method is a bit more expensive, but it will get you there less than 1/10 of the time (and with some food still in your stomatch, the roads in Mexico need some work), one way should not cost you more than $125 US.

When you arrive in Puerto either by bus or plane you will need to catch a taxi, most likely to either Zicatela or La Punta.  The taxi from the airport or bus station should not cost you more than 50 Pesos no matter where in town you are headed, so try not to get ripped off.  If you are looking for a place stay close to the famous break of Zicatela, restaurants, bars, and the super market Zicatela is for you.  If you are not going to be ripping it up on Zicatela, La Punta has a very nice point break, cheap hostels, a few good restaurants, and numerous small bodegas.  There is also Hostel Shalom which is located a short walk from Carrizalillo, a great beginners break.

More to come…

Last night I went down to the Muenzinger Auditorium at CU to check out the latest movie playing in the International Film Series.  Crude is a documentary that deals with a class action lawsuit filed against Chevron/Texaco by 30,000 Ecuadorian natives.  The film examines the suffering that the alleged pollution of Chevron/Texaco has caused in the Ecuadorian Amazon. It also looks at the struggle of the Ecuadorian and American lawyers with limited funds, fighting a multi-billion dollar company with unlimited resources. The plaintiffs alleged that Texaco dumped more than 18 billion gallons of toxic waste-water, spilled roughly 17 million gallons of crude oil, and left open pits of toxic waste throughout the Ecuadorian Amazon.  While Chevron/Texaco naturally denies any wrong doing, and blames the problems on Petroecuador the state owned oil company of Ecuador.

The movie does a great job of showing how hard it is for anyone to fight a multinational company, no matter how dedicated you are, and how obvious it is that the multinational (Chevron/Texaco) is wrong.  The way in which the director interlaced segments from the actual trial, with interviews from Chevron/Texaco lawyers, and health experts does an outstanding job in proving all of their statements false.   One of Chevron/Texaco’s health experts maintains that Chevron has sampled water flowing from pits like the one pictured below, and they have all come back with acceptable levels of contaminates.    I don’t know about you, but I personally would not want to drink water from a pit with oil floating on top of it.

Open waste pit left by Texaco

I think that the movie accomplished exactly what it intended to, which is to show what Texaco did in Ecuador to the world.  The movie does not directly villinize Chevron/Texaco, but lets the company do it for itself with the interviews and segments from the trail.  If you get a chance to check out the movie I would recommend it, you will walk away feeling disgusted, and disappointed with big business, but maybe it will inspire you to make change.

Overall Rating A-