SolMate Santiago

Log #77, March & April 2009

Posted Tuesday, 19 April, 2009

Remembering Casey

Didn't get many, but here are some pix from the memorial at Toutle Lake HS.

Casey 1946 - 2009

Notice in the local paper, and the notice in The Daily News that Kylee wrote. The guest book will be active for a year, thanks to donors.

Chelsea and Casey, 2003

Chelsea, Casey, Mom and me

Posted Saturday, March 14 2009

Making Bricks in Armeria

Local knowledge saves MX $92 in highway tolls, and opens new vistas on the road to Colima. The libre around the inside of the lagoon passes through groves of cocos, bananas, and papayas; winds along the lagoon's shore past salt "mines" and meanders through interesting little towns.

Armeria is the last town before the libre re-joins the 4-lane cuota, conveniently located after the toll booth. The little village is punctuated with red gouges from clay excavated out of the surrounding hills and backyards. Brick ovens are scattered around the town and countryside ... some going up, some coming down, and some spewing.

The brickmakers

Four-brick form

Clay into the form

Smoothing and forming the bricks

Flopped once to dry the bottom for a day,
then stacked to continue drying for another day

Ovens constructed
of dried bricks, slopped over with mud ...

... and filled with combustibles, scrap
lumber and coco husks, ready for firing

After the oven cools, it's dismantled, the mud falls off, and the finished product is stacked onto flatbeds. Some of those trucks make their way to a Manzanillo wayside, where they wait for customers in the shade of tall trees on the shoulder.

We had seriously considered buying some Armeria bricks off the truck for our landscaping needs, but then Stan fell into a deal with an uphill neighbor, and for now we have all the bricks we could ever want to pave a path with.

GRATIS for the hauling, stacked in the back yard

Half-size ladrillos, perfect for garden landscapes ... Stan hauled 1,500 of 'em from the neighbor's overgrown lot to our back yard, in the little ole wheelbarrow, over a 4-day period; a grimey, sweaty job, and sometimes a little scarey when 4-inch centipedes disagreed with urban renewal.

Posted Saturday, March 7 2009

Sharing Pictures - Help Yourselves

For those who didn't have cameras at some of the SolMate gatherings...click on the thumbnail for the big picture.

SolMate Santiago contact: mj(at)solmatesantiago(dot)com