Cancun and Furnal Equinox: The whole adventure!

Seriously do you want to read all my adventures that happened to me the past two weeks?
It is a lot, so here is an index of events in case you want to skip something that doesn't seem so interesting for you:

CANCUN
- The airport
- The hotel and the Cancun's bar area
- Chichen Itza and Ik Kil
- Beach and Kayaking Day
- Viernes Furry Podcast

ROADTRIP IN MEXICO

- Trip to Chetumal
- Trip to Coatzacoalcos
- Trip to Mexico City
- Mexico City

FURNAL EQUINOX

- Snowy day in Toronto
- Artists Alley
- Fursuit Games, Fursuit Festival and Toronto walking
- Cutthroat Artist
- The end of the adventure.

CANCUN

The airport

All this trip was a plan that came up very unexpectedly, a few weeks before I didn't know that I would go on a trip to Cancun, and even less than it would be with Fox Amoore, Majira, Kurtt, Dixie and Ed Puma. That unexpected is life with me, obviously I can't complain, it has been great. I LOVE IT!
Fortunately the flight went very cheap, I didn't pay more than 1,000 pesos (less than 50 dollars), a direct flight from Guadalajara to Cancun. And it was also fortunate that I arrived at almost the same time as the guys who came from the United States, but at another terminal. I arrived in terminal 1, they in terminal 3, and there was no way to go from one terminal to another, maybe they think "Who wants to travel from terminal to terminal in this airport if people only come for vacations?" so with baggage and backpacks, I had to walk to Terminal 3 to wait for them.

I must say that I was very nervous, not long ago I had started talking to Majira, and had spoken ver few with Fox Amoore, I didn't know Dixie, and suddenly knowing that I was going to spend a whole vacation with all of them, I felt I was not going to have much to contribute and I could feel intimidated since they know each other much more than I knew them. They are already like a family, I am just someone else, who is known in the fandom for drawing cute and such, but in reality I don't feel that I'm someone as interesting as them, I almost don't speak, I am very nervous and quite shy.

When waiting for them for a long time at the exit of terminal 3, there was a lot of confusion, because they thought that they were already outside the terminal and that I should go to where they were, that it was a place full of restaurants and bars, but I didn't have access to that area, it was still a place inside the airport arrivals.
While I was waiting for them, a taxi driver, astutely, made an ephemeral friendship with me so that he could take me to the hotel as soon as my friends arrived; At the end it was good because it really gave me a price much cheaper than the one originally charged to me by other taxis. He told me that it was not as hot those days as it had before, he mentioned that when he saw me that I was sweating a lot, but believe me it was more from nerves than from the heat.

In the end they knew where I was, and they were already escorting by another taxi driver who was willing to charge them much more than even the normal fare. What a pity that in Cancun there is no Uber, because all taxi drivers were charging us dearly. However, we went with that guy who had already talked to me several minutes before. I made them save 180 pesos, which for Mexicans is a lot, I don't know if 9 dollars for them is a lot of difference but for us it's like several days of food XD hehe.

While we were on our way to the hotel, I still felt very nervous, as someone very inferior to them, I was more intimidated than they spoke in English, something that I didn't have a hard time getting used to, my English is not perfect but we can have a very good comunication. What I liked is that they quickly made me feel integrated into the group, with hugs, selfies, and very casual conversations. I realized at that moment that nothing would go wrong.

The hotel and the Cancun's bar area.

When we arrived at the hotel we met Ed Puma, who had already checked in the room several hours before. We went out to walk on the streets. It was evening and we went to the bar area.
This was the fourth time I went to Cancun, I love to go even though it is one of the most expensive places in Mexico, the beach is so beautiful that you never get tired of being there. However many foreigners see Cancun as the place for spring breakers and crazy parties without ceasing; for me that was not Cancun, for me Cancun was a place of relaxation and swimming on a very clean and beautiful beach. So I had never even stepped on that area of bars, which each was more bizarre and stunning than the other. It is a place like anything but Mexico:
All speaking in English, with prices in dollars, they charged tickets for entering any of those bars, the only ones that seemed to be in that area were American people.

I must say in advance that it was the only bad experience I had during the whole adventure, the only one I didn't enjoy even a little, what a pity it was of the first things that happened, because it made me think that it would not be a good start. But all the rest of the adventures on this journal were positive, this is the only one that I'll tell which was negative:

We go to a bar, I must give the name of the place, to recommend avoiding it if possible: "Señor Frogs". Where I paid the most expensive beer I've paid in Mexico. I have paid more expensive beers in other countries, and I haven't complained, but in Mexico, not even in a concert I have been able to pay that amount, they definitely take advantage of the fact that foreigners don't get so stratospheric prices, so these places are thought only for them. And something that made me confirm that fact was a terrible experience I had with one of the local waitresses:
She put in front of me a bottle of ... I do not know what it was, I completely ignore the drink, and she just yelled to me "SHOT", I really didn't know what she meant by that, if it was like a challenge from part of the place , or what was going on. I told her in Spanish, asking questions about that act, that if she was inviting me to challange that I could have a shot of that drink (even didn't know if it has to be directly to the bottle or if she had one of those little glasses) or if there was a price for that challenge to which she wanted to instruct me. Yes, if I had it, it costed me, and it was not cheap, and even though she understood perfectly what I asked her in spanish, she continued speaking to me in English, she asked me where I was from, when I told her my home town, she saw me with the worst possible face , almost like disgusting, and she said "What the heck are you doing in this place?" In short, I was being discriminated in my own country for being in a place that ideally is only for people who are not Mexican. That's horrible!
Actually I didn't mention anything to our guests about this fact because I didn't want to leave them with a bad first impression of my country. I preferred that they didn't know that happened; if any of them for some reason is reading this long journal: yes, it happened, an apology for not telling you, I think the right thing would have been to leave that place immediately. I appreciate that nobody left tips, haha.

On the way back to the hotel, while they wanted to take pictures with each of the funny sculptures that were on the street, a man offered to take the picture for us, he was a tour salesman, and of course he took advantage to offer some tour prices to us. It was where they learned that we had to ignore those people and just go indifferent, saying no. Well, they didn't do it with this man, they listened to him, and he wanted to sell us some tours, very similar to the same plan we were already willing to do on our own, but he wanted to sell that for only 99 dollars, Dixie thought for a moment that in reality It was a good offer for only 6 people to pay that. Oh, but no, the offer was BY PERSON! Dixie couldn't help but laughing in front of her face and leaving at that moment.

Since we were back to the hotel, Kurtt arrived. We went out to buy food at Oxxo, a very popular self-service store in Mexico, very similar to a 7 eleven. Majira bought a gallon of purified water, which lasted him absolutely the rest of the trip to Mexico City.

Chichen Itza and Ik Kil

The next morning we left in a van that we rented to Yucatan. We stopped for breakfast at a cochinita pibil taqueria, which were quite delicious and very cheap.

Upon arriving at the archaeological site of Chichen Itza, I could see how amazed they were to see the main pyramid: the castle of Kukulcán, which is the first to be seen when arriving at the place. There we took several pictures and then we walked to the big ball game, a few moments later it started to rain.
We continue walking until we reach the sacred cenote, where we had to see a very beautiful iguana.

We missed a lot of the site, because unfortunately we arrived a little late, and they also wanted us to spend the same day at the Ik Kil cenote. Those who don't know what a cenote is, are natural formations from underground rivers, which regularly flow into caves. And in some you can swim. I recommend looking in Google images: "Cenote" to give an idea of how they look, they are beautiful.
The sacred cenote of Chichen Itza is not apt for one to swim, however the one of Ik Kil does. And that's what we went to!

The use of life vests was completely optional, and the only one that rented one was Majira.
Warned that swimming in a cenote was a freezing experience (its waters are very cold), they agreed that we should dive in from a very high platform of around 8 meters. The cenote had a depth of 50 meters, so one definitely has to know how to swim to decide to get into one.

We dived several times in the water, and the last time, which incidentally was recorded, my arms lashed with water, and they hurted me all that day. It was a very fun day, tho. I think it was of my favorite parts of the trip.

Back in Cancun, we had the bad luck that two policemen at different points stopped us, one of them sadly asked for a bribe. Bad!

That evening I asked Majira to record an advance video for the podcast "Viernes Furry", and then after that we had pizza.

Kurtt, Dixie, Majira and I went to the beach at night, only to wet our feet while we talked. It was a very pleasant and enjoyable night.

Beach and Kayaking Day

In the morning we had breakfast in Vips, they did a few purchases in souvenir shops (Fox bought some cuban cigars, which really came out very cheap, I feel that they gave him an incorrect price, because they were too cheap; when I asked the price, the lady doubted the amount she had to say), and the rest of the day was more of being on the beach.
We rented some Kayaks, I had never rowed before. My Kayak companion was Majira, it was fun to see how anything frightened him: the waves, other ships around, the water...
It was very tired but fun, ended up hurting my arms and legs.

That day we were in the hotel pool, swimming on the beach, suddenly it started to rain very hard. We ate very "mexican" in a Jhonny Rockets

Viernes Furry

As many of you know, I am one of the 3 hosts of a weekly furry themed podcast called "Viernes Furry" (a correct translation would be Furry Friday), broadcast only in Spanish. Sometimes we have guests in the shows, which had always been people who spoke Spanish (or Portuguese, once), but this time there was an exception, it was the first time we had an English speaker: Majira Strawberry.

That at the beginning of the broadcast was also Fox Amoore, but he went to sleep early and only left us Majira and me in the microphone that we transmitted from Cancun, although much of the program was also Kurtt with us. And of course with Koidel from Guadalajara and Apolo from Mexico city.

It was a particular difficult show, because at the beginning I didn't feel that Majira felt completely comfortable, although he had gladly accepted to participate in the show (thanks, Majira, I appreciate it a lot), the good thing is that the longer the time passed, the better he would let himself talk more (I still think that he was very tired that lasted 2 hours, we are already used to being in a microphone for 2 hours in a row talking). But the most difficult thing was to have been translating everything we said both in English (so Majira understood) and in Spanish (so that our audience could understand what Majira was saying and what we were saying to Majira). I think it could have been better, but we are not professionals in translations in real time.

If you want to see the podcast:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WBNli7hxtA4

ROADTRIP IN MEXICO

Trip to Chetumal

We had a great plan, the idea was to go very early from Cancun to Bacalar (from the north of the state of Quintana Roo to the south) and stay the night in Chetumal to continue our journey the next day.

But we never have the great delay we would have with the car rental, because the car we used the previous two days we had to return and rent a new one that we could take to Mexico City and deliver it there, but the time they made us wait for was until 3 o'clock in the afternoon in Cancun. While we waited, I was advancing work from the ipad, and Majira was taking videos.

Already on the way to Chetumal, we stopped to eat in Playa del Carmen, a very express stop where we tried to decide a plan B to stay better there and leave aside the Chetumal plan, because we would not have time to get to Bacalar . The plan B couldn't be made because the Chetumal hotel couldn't be canceled, as the hotel in Playa del Carmen couldn't be reserved. So we went to Chetumal, where I helped in driving, just to spend the night.

It was not bad, because the Chetumal hotel was very nice, it had a pool on the terrace and a bar. I liked that evening a lot, the 6 we played the tag game in the pool, running around like children all over the pool. And then Kurtt, Ed, Majira and I sat at the bar, both to talk with the waiter (who had some flirtations, because he had beautiful eyes and a cute smile) and of course talking among us. According to Majira, that was his favorite dinner in Mexico. It's funny that it's the second time I have a friend from another country in Mexico, I take them to eat all kinds of Mexican food, and in the end they say that their favorite food was nachos, which is not even so Mexican altogether.

Trip to Coatzacoalcos

Much of the next day was driving, and not even for a very fun road. It is nice to know that we are on a road in the middle of the jungle, but the landscape is very repetitive, and it is a very long straight where you don't go through any interesting place, and where there are no gas stations or any place to eat. It was me who drove all that way, from Chetumal, Quintana Roo to Escarcega, Campeche, which was where we stopped to eat at a Burger King. Yeah, Burger King, hehe, there were not many options in that small town either.

During the trip there were many check points, because we were very close to the borders with Guatemala and Belize, and there were many military checking the cars, something funny is that there were always street vendors who took advantage of the small traffic of the check points to sell anything: fruits, giant tortillas, cell phone chargers, windshield wipers, etc. And everyone chased us with their products in hand. Majira took pictures of them, some of them were gold pics.

From there we stopped to Coatzacoalcos, Veracruz, where the Ed Puma's family hosted with an incredible kindness, which was much appreciated.
That evening we had dinner in La Parroquia, and we walked by the pier of Coatzacoalcos, funny thing is pier in spanish is "Malecón", I laughed a lot when they said that was the Male-Con, the convention of male.

In the Malecon there were many people, because there were some clowns doing a show, one of those clowns offered us to take a picture in a pyramid that was by the sea, and then we all took a picture with that clown.

We were watching the waves on the seashore in the dark, and we also saw the cargo ships in the distance. As Coatzacoalcos is a port, mainly oil ships. I wet my feet with shoes on, and then I chased Majira threatening that I was going to get him wet too. It was a fun evening.

At Ed's parents' house, we watched the Over the Hedge movie and then we slept.

Trip to Mexico City

We left early from Coatzacoalcos, not before having breakfast at the house of Ed's parents, who very kindly cooked for us.

We made a very express stop in Orizaba to eat, what a pity that we didn't stop there longer, because in January 2017 I went to Orizaba with Roni and it's a really beautiful place.

Before entering the state of Puebla, we passed through the summits of Maltrata, curves on the road that were very scary, and that there was also foggy. However Kurtt was driving at a speed as if the fog didn't exist, so we were very afraid, but at the same time a lot of laughter.

In Puebla it was my turn to drive to Mexico City, but there was an accident on the Puebla highway (don't worry, didn't affect us directly) that made us stay stucked in a traffic jam for more than an hour. But at last we reached Mexico City, and with it our hotel, in the Zona Rosa.

Mexico City

We had many plans in Mexico City in mind to take them, since it's the city that both Kurtt and I know as the back of our hand, we had many places in mind. But the traffic in Puebla, and other extra traffic in the summits of Maltrata made us arrive later than expected to the city, so we couldn't do much.

That night we made a spontaneous furmeet with some furries from the city, Apolo (great friend and fellow host of the podcast Viernes Friday), Alf (whom I had the pleasure to meet for the first time, after chatting with him on the internet for some months) arrived behind, Metalpuppy (whom we would later see in Toronto, for Furnal Equinox), and several others, whom some of them I completely didn't know them.

We went to dinner at "Casa de Toño", a place of pozole and verious Mexican food, quite delicious and excessively cheap. We were about 15 people at a large shared table, and when the bill came, Fox Amoore was very impressed how cheap it was (and we all really ate a lot) who offered to invite us all. (Thank you very much, Fox!)

We went for a walk along Reforma Avenue, one of the main avenues in Mexico, until we reached the Angel of Independence, a symbol of the city. And after we returned to the Zona Rosa, we stopped at a 7 eleven, where we bought many candies that only exist in Mexico. We went back to the hotel, and after an argument with the hotel managers to let everyone into the room, only to record a video, they allowed us to do it.
We recorded a video for the Majira's channel, where we tried Mexican candies, both typical sweets and commercial candies that are only sold on this side.

It was very funny, but also very tired, because we were arriving from a very long roadtrip, it was already late night, and we had to wake up early the next day, as Majira, Fox and Dixie had their flight at 1 pm. So immediately all the guests left, we fell asleep.

The next day we still went to the Mexico City downtown, where we saw the facade of the palace of fine arts, we entered the postal palace, and we walked down the street of Madero to reach the zocalo. Everything was very fast, because in a few hours their flight departed.

We said goodbye to Fox, Majira, Dixie and Ed Puma at the airport, I went to my sister's house to leave my bags, only to have a place to leave them, because in a few hours I was also departing to Toronto. While I was waiting, I went to a mall to see the Winchester movie. A horror movie which I liked and didn't like at the same time, because the story went well until it turned out that the ghosts had super powers, and that they used all the time the screamers resource to make the audience jump from their seats, instead actual situations that really provoke terror.

FURNAL EQUINOX

Snowy day in Toronto

I departed from Mexico City to Toronto from very early in the morning, however I arrived in Toronto as it was getting dark, since the stopover in Dallas lasted longer than it should, the flight was delayed.

In Toronto, it was Dumpling who picked me up to the airport. Dumpling is a great person, a great friend, someone completely adorable and who has done a lot for me, I love him very much.
That night I stayed with him at his house.

The next day he took me to a frozen lake. It was the first time I walked on a lake made completely ice. At first I was very afraid that in some false step it would break, but apparently the ice sheet was thick enough. We saw traces that looked like from a canine, probably from a coyote. And that's where I made a snowman for the first time, which was more like a snow bear. I had a lot of Fun.

After those great little adventures with my mouse friend, we went to the Furnal Equinox hotel, in Toronto downtown.

My roomies this year were Buckley [icon]BuckleyDeer[/icon], Gauge [icon]Gauge[/icon] and Stage Lion

. Great friends, great people, I loved sharing the room with them 3.

Artists Alley

I won't much of my first moments in Furnal Equinox because it did not really happen much, I was tired and I slept early. And the next day I woke up to setting up the artists alley table.

It's funny that in all the times I've put artists alley table, the only time I had not been so successful was in Furnal Equinox last year, because the place of artists alley had been very hidden.

I thought that this time would be repeated that bad luck, because although now we were accommodated in a more visible place than last year, 30 minutes passed after they had opened the doors and no one went through the artists alley. It was not until I posted a post on Twitter and Telegram indicating exactly where artists were, that people started to arrive and, as usual, my commission slots were filled immediately. But it was strange to be more than 30 minutes at the table without doing anything or receiving anyone. Actually, I did something, I made two very quick birthday drawings for Bacon Coyote and Yipee Coyote, who were celebrating their birthday that day and a day later respectively.

Majira came to my table (for the first time in life he stopped in my table!!), and he bought me some merch, paying me in Mexican pesos. Hehe, of course they were welcome, because I need them back home.

Finishing the artists alley, I went to eat something and then to the concert of Fox Amoore, who supposedly would be with Pepper Coyote, but Pepper was not in that concert. Instead of him were the members of the Xephyr band, and personally I didn't like how they sounded with Foxes and Peppers, they are great playing their own songs, very rock/alternative, but Pepper was very missed at that show, fortunately in the AD show, Pepper was there and it was very funny as always.

Fursuit Games, Fursuit Festival and Toronto walking

For the second year in a row, I participated in the Furnal Equinox fursuit games. And for the first time my streak of first places in fursuit games was stained, and not with a decent second place, but in a last place. X_X

But still I must say that it has been the fursuit games that I have enjoyed most of all the times I have participated, the contests were fun, the mood of the audience was very special this time, and I really had a very pleasant time.

Almost immediately afterwards the Fursuit Festival started, something that replaced the fursuit parade, as almost all the conventions are already doing. Personally I like these festivals more than the fursuit parades, they give rise to the fursuiters play more with people, and that not only we pass marching and having very little opportunity to interact with the cameras and with people.
Among the photoshoots, there was one of bears, and curiously we were only 3 bears that we wanted to be in that photoshoot: a grizzly, a polar, and me. So we wanted to take a photo making a pile, to make the reference of the We bare bears show, however the photographer didn't understand that reference and insisted on accommodating that pile that we wanted so much according to our size, and not to the position of: polar, panda and grizzly as it should have been. And when we insisted on accommodating ourselves in that order, the photographer ignored us and didn't take any pictures of us doing the correct pile.

After the fursuit festival, it was organized an alternative walking to the Roundhouse park, where we took many photographs on the railways and trains.

As you can read, I had already been in fursuit for several hours, around 8, so I was already running out, after returning to the hotel and taking off the fursuit, I went to lunch, I was starving.

However, I went back to put on the fursuit to dance, that evening of dancing was very fun, dancing until I got tired, and then watching the show After Dark by Pepper and Fox.

Cutthroat Artist

The next morning, the long-awaited artist Cutthroat was there. And although I had almost no hope of winning, I went with the plan to have fun, not so much to be competitive.

In this edition we participated Anyare, Cat-Monk Shiro, Underbite dragon and me. Three Canadians and one Mexican.

What is the Cutthroat artist about?
They are 4 rounds, each round lasts 10 minutes and in each there is a challenge. The interesting thing is that during each round, there are 1 or 2 sabotages that are up for auctions. Each artist starts with a certain amount of money (fake money, only for the contest) and this money can be used to buy and buy the sabotage for one or more of the competitors.

In the first round, we had to make a badge for a fursuit in the audience, called Barkley, a blue and yellow dog. While we were doing it, the first one to buy a sabotage was me, and I maliciously applied it to CatMonk Shiro. The sabotage was about not to take off the pencil of the paper during the rest of the round.
So he bought the second sabotage to apply to me as revenge, I had to draw holding the pencil with the two closed fists of my hand, it was very difficult.

At the end of each round, a judge eliminates a competitor. The one that had the least beautiful drawing. The first one that was eliminated was Catmonk, who because of me couldn't make a nice drawing in time. U///U Sorry!!

In the second round we had to draw someone's random character in the audience, and represent it with the theme of the convention: livin 'large (BTW were the only drawings we couldn't take them pictures, the owner immediately take them with them and left the place). In that round I didn't worry about the sabotages, between Anyare and Underbite the punishments were thrown, ignoring me completely. Anyare had to draw for the rest of the round with a silver sharpie, and Underbite with his left hand.

The challenge of Underbite was really difficult, it is very complicated to do something decent with the hand that we are not used to draw, however his drawing was very decent, and even so he was the participant that was eliminated. So the final was between Anyare and me.

For the last challenge, we took two random fursonas from the audience, a black dragon and a tiger, and we had to combine them to make a hybrid.

Very difficult, because Anyare is a great artist. In this last round there was only one sabotage, which was very abusive, was to stop drawing and to play blackjack against Huscoon, and beat him 3 times to be able to continue. I bought that sabotage, taking advantage of the fact that I still had a high amount of false money with me. She took 4 minutes to beat Huscoon, so she lost a lot of time. Even so, her drawing was incredible, I was more than sure that she was going to be the winner.

However, I was chosen as the winner, to my surprise. Being that at the beginning I didn't even want to participate, but Bcbreakaway had already insisted on me for two previous cutthroat artists, and I didn't want to tell him no. Also, I was sure it would be fun, and it was, I really wouldn't have minded in the least losing even from the first round, I went to have fun.

Another thing is that I thought the cash prize of up to $ 25 was a joke, but it was not, in the end I won 15 Canadian dollars in cash, haha.

Thank you, Bc, for inviting me, it was really hilarious!!! Sorry for saying no previous times.

The end of the adventure

There was not much else to do the rest of the convention, I saw the end of the fursuit dance competition, someone who I didn't even see his performance because he was one of the first and I got to see the last 6 participants. I saw the closing ceremonies. I was not much in the dead dog party because the truth is that this year was a very boring party, literally dead. I was in the lobby chatting with friends, I packed my stuff and I was in the room talking with my roomies.

My return flight didn't leave until the next day at dawn, so I spent an extra day in Toronto, went shopping in art stores, and bought some plushies in a mall. Then Dumpling invited me to go out for dinner with the Asian group, it was very fun, I met new people, including Arco Shep, who I liked very much.

My flight ended up getting late until 7 o'clock on Tuesday morning, so Dumpling did me the great favor of hosting me one more night in his house, which I thank you infinitely for all the kindness.

And all day Tuesday was of flights and buses, until arriving home, very tired and very sleepy, but full of experiences that became unforgettable. I really feel very grateful to the furry fandom for giving me so many things, so many friends, so many good times, and for letting me be myself.

Thanks to you for reading this until the end, sure were very few who read absolutely everything, I don't blame them, I think I wrote this more for me, and for those who wanted to take a time to know how it was in the latter Two weeks I was a little absent from uploading artistic content to my networks.

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