Oh Canadia...

So, I'm in Canada and haning out with some of my friends here. The first is a pic of my two best friends here, Allie, it was her birthday, and Roxsann. The next is Roxs with her arthritic dog that she got the year I was here the first time, 1999. The rest are pics of the fox kits that I woke Roxsy up to make her take us at 6:15 in the morning. The first is the female - we saw her in a field behind the den and she came back as we were there, but then just left the little buggers with us right there. The second lil' fella is one of the kits in the far entrance of the den, he's so adorable. The other photos are all of one little fella that came out for a good 5-10 mins while we were sitting there. I was guarding one entrance and Roxsy was at another (there were four altogether) and she saw two come out of the bank they were in and head up the top. We went up there after about 20 mins of waiting. I saw them, but we left shortly after that so as not to disturb them more. We were there for about an hour altogether.

Some of the local wildlife...

Pity about the background of the first fella. That's a sacred ibis, I think. I'll double check at some stage. The other fella is a full breeding yellow crowned night heron. They were in Maruata, in a stinky bog thing with a heap of black vultures.

The breeding process... land based part!

The process: the top one is a piccie of the eggs under the hind flipper of the turtle, the first one I did by myself, she laid 120 eggs. The pic is of her, she was huge. The hole behind the flipper of the really little female was of the hole dug by the locals to collect the eggs as she laid them. She laid into another hole, you can almost see it there. Baby black sea turtle, such a cutie! The basket is where they collect the little fellas as they come up, you can see a couple coming out of the sand there. The last one shows the difference between the black and the golfina/Olive Ridley turtles. There's one golfina, they have a lot of ridges on the back, are grey all over, the black are white underneath.

¡Cumpleaños feliz!

The birthday bash - Friday night and it was my birthday, so we had a BBQ at Ángel and Beto´s place. The group is everyone that was there. In the window there's Jord and Mike, then Ángel and Beto inside, at the bottom, Amanda (pulling a face, as usual), Alexis and Sarah, who's gone home already. Amanda is posing for the camera with Beto behind her, and then there's Jordie's monkey face. She's very proud of it, but is going to kill me for putting it on here! She comandeered my camera that night and there are about a hundred photos of her and others, mostly upside down.

Popo gets dressed up!

This is what I woke up to thismorning. Popocatépetl and Iztaccíhuatl had got all dressed up last night. They are definately my favourite things about Cholula

Black sea turtles - Colola

A sleepy little fella. You can kinda just see, out of focus at the edge of the pic, a little claw on the front side of the flipper. Or maybe not. Anyway, the kid at the camp told me they use them to dig through the sand and it drops off soon, kinda like the egg tooth of birds. Me, with one of the babies. So cute! Bucket o´ babies. They are black sea turtles from Colola on the Michoacán coast. So cute, and they weren't moving cos it was hot. If they're like green sea turtles, their enzymes stop functioning over a certain temperature so that they don't come out of the sand during the day - where there's the chance they'll bake and are more visible to predators.

Just some more to bore you with...

Me (the devil), Alexis and Amanda at Carnaval in Veracruz. We were waiting. A long time. So bored. There´s a whole series of photos like this but far less flattering. Five of the six of us on the first DF weekend trip together, I went to see Chris, the guy in the middle and Sarah (Canada), Jordie, Alexis and Amanda came along for the ride! We are on the Castillo de Chapultecpec there and DF is behind us. This is all of us (and the guide and Jordie's Aunt, Liz) at the top of Malinche. This is us before we climbed over the mountain behind us. That´s Iztaccíhuatl's feet.

Alexis, volador, me, Amanda, Erin, volador in Puebla. The voladores fly round and round on a very unsturdy contraption. I think someone has a video. Amanda, me and Jordie getting some tacos or cemitas in Oaxaca. The cow was once again in Chapultepec, DF. We had a lot of fun with them.
Some pics of the morning people vurses the night people after we arrived at 5 something am in Oaxaca. Me and Jordie, and Alexis and Amanda. Jordie's a little scared about what to do when I go and how she's going to get people up in the morning! Amanda will kill me for putting this on here, she's just lovely though!

I'm a real nerd now...!

Just wanna put up some photos of different travels. None of these are mine, but they are of me and my friends!

The toilets were all stacked at the church on the pyramid in Cholula, we couldn't resist. Amanda, me and Phil on the way down from Iztaccíhuatl in the back of a pick up. A very dirty bus after going to Veracruz. Gross! Biggest insects I've seen squished on windscreens. "Missy the Big Blue Bunny" is actually Alexis wearing the remains of the Australia Day piñata. Jordie and I are having a bath in a cow in Chapultepec. Sorry it's not all very mexican but it is what I've been doing for the last three months here. I'll put some more up when I have far less homework to procrastinate from!