Home

Photo & Journal Index

Total Trip Map

Recent Map

Caroline's Reading List

Email Scott

Email Caroline

Officially Done in Vallarta - Casita Encantada Is Open for Business!  

11/26/05 - Puerto Vallarta, MX

Our renovations are complete!  Time to move on with our lives.

 

Just (?) seven months after starting our condo remodeling project, it's finally complete.  Although there were several rough patches along the way, we're very pleased with the results.  It was a pretty major transformation, so we thought it would be fun to put up some before/after photos to show everyone how different it looks now than it did in May.  Click Here to see the 'before' and 'after' photos.

 

To see more pictures of Casita Encantada, go to www.scottandcaroline.com/casitaencantada  If you know anyone looking for a great vacation rental in PV, be sure to send them the link!

   
Happy Birthday, Scott and Happy Thanksgiving, Everyone!  

11/24/05 - Puerto Vallarta, MX (Photos)

Scott turns 33 as we celebrate a great American holiday

 

It was strange to wake up this morning to the sounds of construction in our building floating through the open terrace doors, just like every other day (except Sunday!), on a holiday.  But although the tourist restaurants are all offering a traditional Thanksgiving dinner for us gringos down here, otherwise it is just a typical Thursday, business as usual, for most people around here.

 

In honor of the holiday and Scott's birthday, we sat on our new balcony sipping bloody marys and enjoying the tranquil ocean view, while our housekeeper cleaned the condo.  Then we went out for Thanksgiving dinner on the beach (photo at right), complete with pumpkin pie.  Mmmmmmmm!

   
We've Come A Long Way, Baby!  

11/22/05 - Puerto Vallarta, MX

Celebrating the beginning of our second year of this crazy adventure (and the completion of our renovations)!

 

Well, if you can believe it, today marks the first anniversary of our departure from San Francisco, and oh, how much we've seen and done!  What a year it's been!  We've slept in more hotel beds than we can count (some better than others) and stayed with at least twelve generous family members and friends (thanks guys!).  We've traveled across the US three times and across a big chunk of Mexico, too, experiencing the warmth, generosity, friendliness and patience of a people with an amazing culture and history.  Although we've suffered the loss of our palm-sized, almost-niece Gabriella and our dear old Lucy-cat this year (may 2006 bring better things for Jen & Ivan), we've had the priceless opportunity to see two vast and beautiful countries and countless friends and to meet lots of new friends along the way.   It hasn't always been easy (perhaps never easy!!), it hasn't always been what we anticipated, but it has been more rewarding and enriching than we ever imagined.  This IS what we came for (even though Caroline sometimes has had her doubts!).  Maybe we're feeling sentimental since the holidays are drawing near, but for this opportunity we are grateful.  And we're ready to start Year Two of the Big Adventure, so stay tuned!

Resting in New Orleans, one of our favorite stops along the way.

   
The Light at the End of El Tunel!  

11/14/05 - Puerto Vallarta, MX

The end is so close we can taste it!

 
After a hectic two weeks and two days of  crazed furniture and housewares shopping and back-breaking, sweaty and exhausting sweeping, scrubbing, scraping and sealing 'til our fingers blistered (to clean up the incredible mess the workers left us with), while living in a Brisas Del Mar Hotel room, we spent our first night in the condo.  Yesterday (Saturday) in a sudden flurry of activity after weeks of waiting, our wood furniture and wrought iron bed were delivered within minutes of one another.  Our carpenter, Antonio (that's him in the photo at right), and his crew spent much of Saturday and all day Sunday (is this really Mexico??!!!) installing the custom vanity, armoire, kitchen cabinets and terrace doors and windows he made for us.  And after a long, tiring day, they even installed our new wrought iron curtain rods and holdbacks, for free!  They were willing to stay even later, but were unable to get the glass delivered, it being Sunday, so we spent our first night sleeping on the floor (the bed was delivered without adequate supports so when we sat on the mattress, it fell through to the floor!) with no glass in our large doors and windows.  It had the effect of luxury tent camping and would have been kind of romantic, had we not been so utterly exhausted!  The insects weren't troublesome and we fell asleep under the watchful gaze of the tiniest little gekko, only about an inch-and -a-half long, perched near the ceiling.  It's now Monday morning and Antonio and the guys are back with the glass. The only major thing left on our dwindling to-do list is getting the bathroom sink plumbing installed and fixing all of our small plumbing leaks (everything in Mexico leaks!).  We are almost there, and boy does it feel good!

And in case you were concerned for our sanity after all this crazed activity, no need to worry; the beautiful views, ocean breezes and dolphin sightings have kept us sane during the tail end of this crazy process!

 

   
One Last Remodeling Trip to PV  

10/26/05 - 10/30/05 - Guadalajara & San Miguel de Allende, MX

Finishing our PV condo, with a furniture shopping stop in Guadalajara

 

With our car up and running like a champ, we departed for our two-day drive to Puerto Vallarta.  We decided to break the eight-hour trip into two days this time so we could do some furniture shopping in Guadalajara - the halfway point.  As nice as Leon was, Guadalajara is much bigger and also has a large variety of furniture stores.  We were in town for about 24 hours, and I think we hit them all (okay, maybe an exaggeration, but it felt like it).  It was a very American-style 24 hours, with lunch at McDonalds, dinner at Applebee's, and coffee at a beautiful new Starbucks in the morning (after staying at the pleasant Crowne Plaza hotel).

 

After seeing tons of inexpensive furniture in various showrooms, we decided to have a sofa custom made for our San Miguel place (I guess that's what we do).  We spent a couple of hours at Sofas y Sillones furniture showroom selecting styles and fabrics, and figuring out our custom measurements.  When all is said and done, we'll be paying just under $1,000 for a high quality ultrasuede sofa delivered five hours away to our place in SMA!  Caroline, the custom furniture expert (plenty of experience ordering these things at her last job), believes it would've been closer to $10,000 in the U.S.  We also found some great furniture for our place in PV.  It's more than we wanted to spend (our budget allowed for a couple of overturned milk crates), but we think it'll be worth it for us, our renters, home-swappers, and eventual buyers.  The good news is they have a showroom in PV as well.

 

After ordering our couch in the morning, we made it to Vallarta on Thursday afternoon, where we were able to order our custom bed from the iron-worker and check into the Brisas del Mar hotel - the hotel in the same building as our condo.  Friday and Saturday were spent furiously shopping for final items for the place, picking out paint colors, and walking the contractor through the remaining steps.  It's looking great, and we think we'll be able to move in as soon as they finishing painting (maybe Monday?) and we pick out a toilet (very important).

Our newly finished terrace

(the post is a temporary construction support for the small terrace above us)