Amsterdam

This is the beginning of a three week adventure in Europe. It starts with three days in Amsterdam. A city that I only imagined was full of drunkenness, stoned tourists, filthy streets, and hookers. All of which I encountered. What I did not know about this old city was its history, its beautiful architecture, friendly locals, and gorgeous canals. So on my first day, with a natural wake up of 3:30am (due to the large time change), I decided to get up and walk about. With the sun coming up around four am, I grabbed my camera and snuck out of the room quietly and went for an adventure. Each day consisted of "coffee shops", espressos, small heinekens, and logging many miles on foot wandering aimlessly to see what I could find. Even getting a chance to run into old friends. Amsterdam, you were wonderful. Please enjoy what I snapped along the way. Using a 7dmkII and a Fuji GS645 and pockets full of 120 film I shot everything I saw. 

Oaxaca

A couple weeks ago I went on an amazing 5 day trip to Oaxaca city to visit two very good friends and to visit a couple of my favorite mezcal producers and their palenques while also making new friends. What a great trip. Was truly a great experience to finally see first hand how things are done and how differently they can be done. Thank you to everyone who made this happen. I will be returning soon.

   Our second day we met Francisco Terrazas and he took us out to the town of Sola de Vega to meet master distiller Solomon Rey Rodriguez (Tio Rey) who produces for Vago mezcal. About 2 1/2 hours outside of Oaxaca city and in to the mountains we arrived at Tio Rey's home and palenque. He welcomed us in, showed us around and gave us copious amounts of mezcal for hours. His wife made us an amazing goat stew and I took a nap in a hammock. Hospitality at its finest.

  On day three we met our new friend Asis Cortez. He took us on a tour of couple of his palenques in Santiago, Matatlan that produce for Nuestra Solidad, El Jolgorio, and Agave de Cortez. He gave us  pulque that his family made, took us to a bomb lunch, and again drank copious amounts of mezcal. By this time our group had expanded and unfortunately I sat my camera down for a lot of the day. After the palenques we headed a couple hours out of town to natural hot springs and continued to......... drink mezcal 

Año Nuevo

Gonna keep this short...

This weekend I finally experienced the elephant seals at Año Nuevo. Totally worth it! If you haven't gone, go check it out. Pretty wild.....