My friend in Izmal who raised 100's of banana trees tried telling me last summer that Banana trees grew very fast.  So when I planted my orchard of 120 fruit trees, I made sure to include 20 bananas.   When we got them in mid-September, they were about 1m tall.   I wish I'd taken a photo but I did not. Here is one of the trees, one month later, after planting them in my mixture of red dirt and cow manure, Vertigrow fertilizer, and diluted bull's blood: And here is a photo of the tree on month later after the photo above, on November 15, 2022: And here is a photo of the tree on month later after the photo above, on December 27, 2022:

 I was blessed today when I heard my Mayan interpreter in the pueblo call and tell me that the previous owner of the ranch was at her house, with his daughter and granddaughter and they wanted to know if it would be alright for them to drive out and see the ranch, because they had heard from the fiesta about how nice it was and the Paradise that it was now.  Of course I said yes. They came and the interpreter came with them.  I told her to show them around and in the house and that anything they wanted to see was open to them. The old man is 92 years old (more or less).  He lived his entire life on the ranch, until about 2 years ago when he kids moved him to Teabo to live with them.  His wife has a form of dementia and they just weren't capable of living remotely any longer.  Before him it had belonged to his father, and before that his grandfather, and he's not sure how many generations before had owned it. It was delightful to see the old man walk around and smile and be happ

 In celebration of having the house finished, and the gardens and orchards not only planted, but thriving, I had a little fiesta today on a Sunday afternoon.  All of my co-workers have families that have been very curious about what their husbands have been doing here.  As I've said, I'm a bit of a curiosity with the local pueblo Mayans because some of my farming and agricultural techniques are not exactly Mayan orthodox, plus I'm the only non-Mayan anywhere near the pueblo or in the village. It was funny though with the group who turned out.  I've got 5 full time guys and 2 part time very young helpers. The 2 p/t have only been working for a few weeks and this week will be their last for a while.   I told the 5 guys who have been with me from the start, that they could all bring their spouses, and their children, and grandchildren if they had any.  Then I also added, if they had a very close family member that they wanted to also bring, that was fine.  It was planned f

 We've been working on the pool for almost 6 weeks.  It's been a big labor to do the irregular shape and also from solar rock with exposed rock facing.   But today my construction guys stayed until 9 pm and finished the inside so it would be able to be filled in time for the fiesta this coming weekend.  We still have some piping for the filtration system to be covered over and landscaped, but the pool itself is done, and the video shows it being filled.  I estimate it will take about 18 hours to fill to the top.  At the top end of the pool (with the steps) the water will be 1m deep.  In the middle it drops down to about 1.25m and at the deep end it is 1.5 meters (about 60 inches) deep.   It's about 7m long and so it's truly a swimming pool and not the typical Yucatan "dipping" pool.

 We got the bottom of the pool poured today.   It just needs to cure a few days and we can start to fill it.  It's taken longer than I thought it would be the finished product is exactly what I saw in my imagination. We're putting a new palm leave roof on a little palpala bodega next to the house.  Ultimately I want it to be a chicken house, but for now it's just storage for my tools, and bags of fertilizer and stuff.   Before the coconut palms can be put up they have to lay flat on the ground a few days to thoroughly dry.  I was doing something nearby today, and out of the corner of my eye, I saw Liboria (my oldest worker who "thinks" he is about 62 years old) pull out his machete and swing it at the ground, all in the flash of a second or two.   I walked over and saw that he had picked up a drying palm and there was a snake under it.  The rule is "if it has rings, it's mah-ma'loob.  Mayan for no good.  I'm not sure, but I think it is a copperhea

 I made a decison today that's been on my mind for a while.  The old building that we have called Casa 2, was planned for renovation to be a one bedroom and one bath guest casita.   After looking at the construction of the walls for these many months, I just decided that it wasn't good and wouldn't last, and that for the money it would cost to strengthen it, I could probably build a new casita for less money and have a better finished product.  The first photo is what it did look like for the past 60 or 70 years. I had estimated that since the walls were almost 50cm thick that it might take a back hoe the better part of an afternoon to knock it down.  In the end, it was weak as I imagined and from start to finish, it was all in a big pile in about 20 minutes.   

 This has nothing to do with the ranch, or the pueblo, but it's important to me and I'm posting it.   When I was a kid back in the 50's and 60's I woke up every morning to the smell of fresh brewing coffee that my parents made every morning in a coffee percolator.  There was none of this KCup business or instant coffee or drip coffee from Mr. Coffee.  It was done in a percolator, and you watched the glass top to see when it stopped "perking" and then you knew it was ready.  You could hear it perking and you knew when it was done because the perking stopped.  The smell of it permeated the entire house.  It was not only great coffee, but a great memory for me.  I ordered this stove top coffee percolator from Amazon almost 2 years ago and had it in storage since, just waiting for the day to have my own kitchen again, and coffee made again the "old school" way.