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.

 This photo and video won't make a lot of sense here.  But I took it to be able to show the "before and after" in a few weeks when I'm done.   On the left is the side of my house.  On the right is what we call Casita 2 that is planned for a guest bedroom and bath.  If you look closely, you can see that I've got some clothes hanging out to dry in the tree, there next to the porch.  That's the corner of the porch where I usually sit and drink coffee or sit at night.  The problem is the view was obstructed by about 5 tons of rocks that were high.    Here we are moving the rocks to get the area ready to level and spread dirt for grass in the future.  It ceases to amaze me what you can accomplish with enough people to get stuff out of the way.   My guys can literally move mountains if I ask them to. Stand by for future photos of the new improved view. The stick house that you see on the left is the framing for a future chicken house that will have a palapa coconut

 I've told you before about my cat, Patricio, who literally just walked into the work area one day and came out of the jungle.   Well apparently, he's decided he likes staying around, because not only does he come to the house now every day about 11 to be fed, but we also found that he's sleeping high up in a tree not far from my house.  It's hard to tell how high this is, but I can tell you that's he's up in the tree about 8 meters.   I've not seen him come down, but have seen him go up, and he makes the climb in about 5 seconds. I was waiting in the town palazzio today waiting for some folks to lead them out to the ranch.  I thought you might like a little video to see what the "centro square" looks like in the pueblo.  Pretty slow moving. 

 Today, I can finally start putting all my stuff up.  I got my kitchen and bathroom cabinets installed today.  I'm very proud of the job the cabinet maker did.  What you see here, plus the bathroom, was the equivalent of about $2,400.00 US dollars.  That included cutting them and assembly.   Staining.  Hardware.  Installation.  Total package.  You can see that I built in a microwave cavity in one of the pantries and the other has a oven/broiler, instead of having a stove oven.   The cabinet man also picked up my table and 4 chairs and stained them to match the cabinets.

 My 300 asparagus plants continue to grow taller.  This is the same asparagus that everyone here told me I couldn't grow in Yucatan because it gets too hot.  Well?  Besides the asparagus, as I've already written, I'm growing 1,000 coconut palm trees from coconuts.  And I'm putting them in between the rows of asparagus and they provide shade for the plants about 1/2 of the day time hours.    Both the trees and the asparagus are thriving.  In 2 years, I should be cutting 100 kg per day of asparagus spears to sell in the market.

 I've been back to the ranch from the states for 2 days.  I'm still unpacking, and the masons continue their work on the rock walls for the new swimming pool.  The pool water level will only be about 1.5 meters deep at the farthest point.  It looks much deeper because the pool will have a masonry bottom of about 30cm.

 I got back to Merida on Sunday night, but spent the night there so I could go shopping for groceries yesterday.  Last night I spent my first night at the ranch.  It is VERY quiet here at night.  Not a sound, and a million stars in the sky.   I've got many boxes to unpack, and work continues on the construction of the pool walls. 

 Unfortunately, I'm still in the states and didn't get to be there to enjoy it firsthand, but Salvador sent me this photo of the first watermelon to be harvested.     This is the first of what I hope will be thousands.

 My back porch faces due east.  I wanted a covering over it so I could sit on the porch in the morning and drink coffee while I watch the sun come up over the jungle.  You can see clearly here that I had original Mayan style doors and windows installed.   My foreman sent me the photos.  I'll be going "home" in about a week from now and I'm anxious to get back and be sitting on the porch.

 I am back in the states for some doctor physical and oral surgery.  I loaded up all my stuff on a truck to ship back to the ranch yesterday, from Houston.  Whew!  Glad that's done, and that I'll finally have all my stuff (meager as it is) with me at the ranch.   Primarily my office chair and crock pot and coffee percolator! Meanwhile, my coconut trees that we sprouted have taken off like they were on steroids!   Photo was a coconut 8 weeks ago.   I am putting the tree plants in bags to grow up larger and putting them in the gardening beds to shade the asparagus in the afternoon from the hot sun.

 I'm growing asparagus plants and there are many of them.  To keep them from getting the hot, hot sun of Yucatan, I've decided to keep the coconut palms trees that we're raising, in the same beds, and let the baby trees give the asparagus plants some shade a few hours a day, instead of full sun.   We'll ultimately have 2,000 asparagus plants and 1,000 coconut palm trees. The asparagus is just barely starting to bud out of of the ground.

 Work continues on the finishing touches inside the house. Shelving for storage in the solar battery bodega