day two of the surf competition was great fun as well! it was exciting because all the final heats were on today, plus there was a 5km (3.1 miles) and 10km (6.2 miles) paddle board race. it was tiring just watching these guys paddling furiously through the waves. at least it wasn’t too windy! the swell was perfect for the longboarders – shoulder height, clean and consistent. i could hear all the surfers stuck on the beach talking about how they wished they were out there.

once again our camera was trained to the action on shore as we can’t zoom far enough to catch the events on the water. still got some good shots though! here are four finalists for the women’s division entering the water.

and here are risa and michelle. risa made it through to the semi-finals, and michelle made it to the finals. we’ll find out tonight whether michelle will take the #1 spot!

one of the events today was an “expression event”. this was a free-for-all where anybody could enter and the best trick won. all the guys busted out their shortboards and we saw some spectacular aerials.

and here are the finalists for the men’s longboarding. unfortunately neither israel or joel made it through which was a surprise, but these guys definitely represented! rojelio, the guy on the far left, has amazing style. if i could surf like him i would die happy. actually, if i could surf like any of these guys i would die happy!

this is our friend arturo from santa barbara. among other things he is a yoga teacher, a crani-sacral therapist, an aikido teacher and a very cool guy.

here is tigre with his lady friend karmeyn. these two are having a baby girl in about five months!

i took this photo of some random cute chick on the beach. love the pocahontas earring!

lastly say hello to the legend that is chuck patterson. chuck is a professional sportsman who was invited to come and participate in the competition. not only did he win the 10km paddle board race, he then went on to compete all the way to the finals in the paddle board freestyle. this is on tough dude. he had a smile on his face the whole time too!

today was day one of the 1st punta sayulita surf classic, a two day longboard and paddle board tournament in sayulita. apparently this is the first major surf competition to be hosted in sayulita. there are professionals who have been invited from hawaii, california and other parts of mexico so its a pretty big deal in our small pueblo. the waves have been practically non-existent for the whole week so everyone was worried, but mother nature pulled through with gorgeous rolling waves! we got to see the local homeboys and homegirls rip it up with some of the international stars all day long. unfortunately i don’t have any lenses can zoom far enough to capture the surfers in action so i had to content myself with snapping portraits. but this is a good chance to introduce you to some of the people we play with every day.

first up is our old neighbour leila. this girl has mad attitude and a heart of gold.

this is joel, one of the smoothest, most bad-ass longboarders i have ever seen. he was on fire during the competition today. i hope he wins tomorrow!

eric has made an appearance on this blog before. this guy has a lot of show-y tricks that he likes to pull when surfing, like doing a headstand while he’s on a wave. we just found out today that he is joel’s brother!

and this is hector. he works at the local surf shop and is also a really good surfer and paddle boarder. nayou likes to play soccer with him, but he is kind of a grumpy guy (sorry if you’re reading this hector!).

mateo sharing a moment with his dad tigre. lots of the guys in sayulita have nicknames of animals. tigre’s brother is called pato (duck). we also know a pollo (chicken) and a guy called chilly willy. seriously. and tigre’s girlfriend told me about another guy called ching-a-ling!

this is one of the competitors from puerto escondido. he is a pretty scary looking dude. good paddle boarder though.

this guy got invited to the competition all the way from hawaii. it must be pretty awesome to jet around the world for free to surf!

our friend risa makes longboarding look so graceful. this girl has some serious chops on the water. she’s my pick for the #1 spot in the women’s division. go girl!

this is risa with sondra. we have been hanging out a lot with sondra lately because she is just so awesome. she’s a deep thinker with a hilarious sense of humour. i wish i could repeat some of the stories she’s told us about herself but i’m afraid she might kill me. it probably wouldn’t be as funny anyway – she is a great storyteller.

israel is another sayulita local who can longboard like nobody’s business. the trophy for the competition tomorrow will be a fight between him and joel for sure. i wish i had video of this guy on some waves. its truly a sight to behold. i feel like i’m gushing about every surfer i’m writing about today, but the caliber of local surfers in sayulita is pretty stellar. you get a little bit jaded when you’re around it all the time, but seeing everyone in the spotlight today reminded me of the incredible skillz these people have!

kalani is one of the sweetest kids i know. he is always really happy and loves to play with nayou. his name is from hawaii and means “sky breaker”.

and lastly here is nayou getting into his “chippies” on the beach.

Our good friends dad, Pete, bought a bunch of kites to give as presents to the kids here in Mexico (and left them with us to distribute).

He’s certainly made our neighborhood kids day! thanks Pete, love ya tons!

this kid loves to be nekkid!

the mango season is long in the tropics. every week they seem to get bigger and juicier. every night after dinner we cut one of them up and eat it for dessert. sometimes they are so good i can feel my saliva glands going haywire when i put a piece in my mouth. i know some people will call this heresy, but i think mexican mangoes are better than australian ones.

i’ve been fantasising about being able to sit down and eat a whole mango just by myself. today my dream came true. while i was out surfing brenda bought me a mango on a stick. it was just an amazing as i imagined it to be. maybe even better. so good, in fact, that i had to start french kissing it. there’s not such thing as shame when it comes to mangoes, especially if they are on a stick.

there is a friend of ours, minka, who owns tierra sayulita, a fair trade textile store that has lots of gorgeous stuff. i’ve heard many ladies talking about her dresses with dreamy looks in their eyes. the dresses are made from recycled saris and are pretty cool. the day brenda saw them for the first time she had that faraway stare as she described them to me. since our cash flow can only be described as a trickle, we have been avoiding unnecessary expenses, of which the dress was one. but often the universe conspires to provide one way or another! last week minka asked brenda if she would like to model some of the dresses as part of a fashion show that she was putting on. brenda would get a free dress in return and a day of fun strutting her stuff. it turns out that one of these posh all-inclusive resorts that dot the coastline south of sayulita had asked minka to put on a show for them.

wednesday was show day so we hung out at the beach in the morning and packed up the car around lunchtime. of course the waves were absolutely perfect that day which was so sad, but at least i managed to sneak a short session in. our first stop was the hair stylist’s house where the six ladies were getting their hair and makeup on. the stylist lives in this humungous gated community where there are just rows and rows of houses that look exactly the same. it was more than a little bit weird, and reminded me of how much architecture influences us. seeing these hugs tracts of identical houses made me feel like an automaton. all we need are four walls and a roof. forget about individuality! check out their gallery to see what i’m talking about. at least they had a pool, which nayou made good use of while the ladies got dolled up.

once everyone was done it was time to hop into the car again and head to acqua vallarta, the resort where the show was happening. i knew the place was going to be upscale – every resort in nuevo vallarta is. when we first arrived in sayulita we used to go to a place called flamingos on really hot summer days. flamingos, for what it is, was very fun. they had a nice big pool with friendly staff and luxury touches like free towels. acqua vallarta, on the other hand, was like walking into a sterile version of miami. everything was white and minimal, there were grumpy security guards, and no waiters. when we finally got a drink, they came in those big red plastic cups that people in american colleges use. classy.

but hey, we weren’t there to case the joint. we were there to dazzle some people! everyone got ready just outside the resort, putting on last touches of makeup and rehearsing their walks and turns.

after a while it was clear that something was very wrong. minka was running around looking very stressed with only ten minutes before the show was supposed to start. i walked into the resort and saw that there was no catwalk set up and that there were hardly any people there. no-one who worked there seemed to know that there an event going on. oops. eventually we located the lady that was supposed to be promoting the whole thing. i didn’t hear her story but she mentioned something about flying in that day and not having time blah blah blah. so the show never ended up happening, but we hung out for a while and took some photos anyway. it sucks for minka because she put a lot of time and money into this. i hope she gets compensated, especially because they asked her to do the show!

at least everyone looked gorgeous. i like how minka chose beautiful women that don’t look like they’re thirteen and have been anorexic their whole life. they all looked very sexy in their dresses, especially brenda!

in the end it was a pretty cool day (for brenda, nayou and myself). we got to see some parts of vallarta that we never thought we would see, which really made us appreciate our little pueblo called sayulita!