Where Wonder Meets Wander

I love to sample new foods and I love to try things that are very local. Hojaldras, for instance, are Panama's equivalent to fried dough and when served with breakfast make you feel like you are getting eggs at the fair. There is a tendency for travelers to eat at places that look clean and have a nice ambiance. Occasionally those places are fun to visit because they offer high-end foods that appeal to the tourist's tongue. But they are usually expensive and, in all honesty, don't always offer the best food. Little local joints typically don't look the cleanest from the outside and in some cases look down right terrifying. I am fearless when it comes to trying new places to eat, but occasionally I have paid a very dear price for my bravery. Once I stopped at a little restaurant in Mexican Rivera Maya, just south of Cancun. It consisted of two plastic tables sitting outside a tiny cement home. Two people were sitting there, but they had the appearance of being ...

Walking the back streets can seem a little daunting. I know, I do it all the time. You find yourself in places that are a little uncomfortable, out of your comfort zone. In fact, it can be quite a culture shock. Usually when people travel they go to the tourist spots and focus on carefully pre-planned stuff to do. For example, on the main island of Bocas Del Toro, you walk down the strip, go to a nice restaurant, and buy a ticket for a boat tour that will take you to a nice beach. That's fine, and you should do it because it is part of the experience. But to get a little deeper into the culture, all you have to do is walk a few streets back into the neighborhood and you will see a different world. Yes, it is dirty, yes, it may not smell very good. But if you stop looking at the poor conditions and look at the people, your perspective will start to change. You will see grandmothers sitting on porches watching the world go by. And if you smile and wave, they will wave back ...

If you are traveling in Costa Rica and have never been here before, you should be excited about the roasted chicken sign. The chicken will be tender and juicy and accompanied by black beans and rice and most likely some kind of coleslaw. It will be cheap and served to you by a small Costa Rican woman who has lived here all her life and speaks not a lick of English. Signs like this are a treasure to the traveler. They represent the chance to connect with the culture in an authentic way. However... If you have been living in third world countries for the last two years, and you have enjoyed enough chicken that it is coming out your ears, you will find your heart leaping at the appearance of a sign directing you to PIZZA out in the middle of the Costa Rican rainforest. The pizza may not have a thick crust and it may not be dripping with layers of mozzarella cheese, but that is OK because it is not chicken.  Of course you can get your pizza topped with chicken, OR...you can get...

Pesos in my pocket and camera in hand, I parked my car in the pueblo and got out and walked. It wasn't long before I came across the bread bike. A tiny Mayan man had piles of decadent goodies in a big tray on the front of his bicycle. I hadn't planned on eating four pastries for breakfast, but I just couldn't decide which one to buy. This is the way they do street food in the little villages that dot the jungle along the coast. Bicycles designed to carry large loads roam the streets, their peddlers ringing little bells or sounding horns to announce tortillas, or fresh squeezed juices, or slow grilled chicken, or, in this case, dessert. I paid a whopping 18 pesos for my find, immediately stuffed a sugar coated bun in my mouth, and kept walking. Just around the corner I saw this little guy... He was waiting so patiently in a little plastic chair while his mother sold banana leaf stuffed tamales from an old cooler. I am amazed at how well behaved the children ar...

This 1973 VW Bug ...called a Vocho (pronounced Bocho) here in Mexico, has been sitting in the Pueblo getting painted for almost a month now. At least she is finally green. The origianl plan was to paint an OM symbol on the driver's door, but I am getting impatient. Did I mention patience? This is a trait you need to cultivate if you want to spend time in Mexico. Manana means "some time in the future" and that's ok if you are enjoying the sun and drinking a margarita. But when you get into the nitty gritty of life and you need to get a car painted, you better believe it will test your patience. When I first dropped this car off, they said it would take a week. Its been a month. Well at least there isn't a dog named Tranquillo living under it. My old BMW that I took to the shop around the corner to get some engine work done had to be retrieved 6 months later and poor Tranquillo had to be evicted from his home. That car is now sitting in my garage waiting f...