MEXICO CITY 2012, Parte Dos: Condesa & Couchsurfing

I arrived in Mexico City in the afternoon of October 24th, 2013 and proceeded to my hostel for the duration of my stay:  Hostal La Buena Vida, in the hip neighborhood of La Condesa, about 4-5 km southeast of the main tourist district of Mexico City (the Centro Historico).

Mexico City map courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.  This thing makes Mexico City almost look small.  Hah!

I always pre-book my first 2-3 nights of lodgings on a trip, just so I have somewhere to go and drop my backpack upon arrival, and so I don’t have to move said backpack for the first couple of nights.  This is most important when jet lag is an issue and you need a bit of time to acclimate (not applicable in this case).

My primary criteria for picking a place to stay in a city I’ve never been to nor seen:

I don’t want to stay in a party hostel ever again if I can help it.  I’m not an old fuddy-duddy, but beer bongs and pub crawls with vapid, horny 20-year-olds make me want to puke in more ways than alcohol ever could.  I’d prefer to meet travelers a little closer to my age range and experience level, then get drunk with them and act like a 20-year-old.  See the difference?  Disclosure:  the author is 32 years old.

Yeeeeah bro. A rough night at a party hostel in Tallinn, Estonia in August, 2012.

I want to be close to the action, but I don’t want to stay directly IN it (unless we’re talking about a big festival atmosphere like Carnevale, Dia de los Muertos, or Holi, of course!) unless my time is severely limited in that city.  Multiple reasons for this:

1.  For some inexplicable reason, the food is always both the worst and most expensive in the tourist area in almost every city on planet earth.

2.  In the tourist district, service personnel and locals are tired of dealing with an ever-rotating impermanent flock of tourists, so you’ll almost never connect on a meaningful level.  Why would anyone extend their hand in friendship or camaraderie?  You’ll just leave them like the rest did, boo hoo!

3.  Tourist zones are often noisy places, which can affect your quality of sleep.  Then again, lodgings in any part of a busy city might have thin walls or windows that don’t close.  Read reviews before you book – most negative reviews will mention noise level if it’s a problem.  Oh, and bring earplugs along for any trip!

4.  Pickpockets, touts and scammers target tourists, and tourists stay in the tourist zone, so the jerks do too.

5.  Sometimes staying a little ways outside of the center means a better nightly rate, better value, or both.  Not always, but often.  Depends on the country you’re in.

Here’s how I pick my first place to stay, in research and execution:

1.  Buy a guidebook for the country/city you’re visiting, and review the map for lodgings as they relate to the activities you’d like to pursue.  Most big cities have multiple districts that you can stay in, each with their own benefits and drawbacks, from price to accessibility.  Pick an AREA that would serve your needs best, so you can start narrowing your search.  My guidebook in this case was Lonely Planet Mexico, which did a nice job of delineating the different neighborhoods in Mexico City where a traveler might want to stay.  My top contenders were:  Centro Historico, Colonia Roma, Zona Rosa, La Condesa.

2.  Investigate possible lodging options in the area you’ve selected.  If a particular property looks good, note it, and double check current reviews on sites like the following:  Tripadvisor.com, Hostelbookers.com, Hostels.com.  Sometimes the guidebook’s writeup and the online reviews conflict; sometimes the negative online reviews are worth taking with a grain of salt.  Then again, sometimes you find an immediate winner.  Cross-referencing can take a bit of time.

3.  If you fall in love with a particular place to stay, e-mail them straightaway and ask about availability – most places listed in the guidebook or on the internet will have a command of English (and often additional languages) and will be able to tell you what you need to know.  There’s no harm in getting this done early on, but be mindful of stringent cancellation policies if you have to put a credit card down.  Also, I prefer to only book 2-3 nights just in case my travel plans change or the property is considerably worse than expected.

4.  If NOTHING looks good or if everything is unavailable, start over with a different property or a area of town in mind and repeat.  If you come up completely dry on all your picks, start lowering your expectations or raising your budget.  And at some point, be willing to just pull the trigger on whatever’s available… or be willing to fly by the seat of your pants upon arrival and investigate lodgings in person upon arrival.  Don’t discount the latter option – it’s my usual way of booking rooms while I travel and generally works pretty well, provided that you’re willing to haul your heavy pack around while you get repeatedly turned away from lodgings like a modern Mary and/or Joseph.

Hostal la Buena Vida was spotless and well thought out – head and shoulders above the quality/value of a lot of hostels at which I’ve stayed.  Prices at in October 2012 were a little over $20/night for an 8-bed dormitory.  The staff was FRIENDLY, the internet WORKED, the hot water was HOT, self-service laundry was (is) available, the hostel is situated close to the metro and plenty of food options, the breakfast was pretty good for a free hostel breakfast, etc etc.  And more:  they change the sheets for you (daily, I believe), and the beds even have their own throw pillow – both hostel firsts for me.  Things don’t always work out quite this well.

“La Flaca” dorm room at Hostal La Buena Vida.  Good setup.

La Condesa is a cool neighborhood, too – I can see why people would want to live here.  Mixed residential/commercial with wide walking paths under tall shade trees, lots of taquerias for a quick and cheap bite, inviting unique open air bars and cafes, boutiques and shops of curiosities, cool art deco architecture and a nice urban park, and relatively young, somewhat arty residents (mostly affluent, I’m guessing).  Gentrified?  Maybe a bit.  But not in a terribly ugly way.

I spent the remainder of my evening walking through my new neighborhood with no destination in mind.

A dog should be so lucky. Nieves (ices) and helado (ice cream) in La Condesa.

Choices like these = multiple visits required. 15 Pesos = about $1.25 US.

Art deco sign in La Condesa. No relation to the neveria above to my knowledge.

I had dinner at the taqueria that claims invention of tacos al pastor (“Shepherd’s” tacos) washed them down with an horchata (sweet rice-based drink) and wandered the neighborhood a bit, landing at Parque Mexico, where space was shared between practicing skateboarders, jugglers, packs of runners and happy dogs off their leashes.  Parque Mexico was originally designed as the horse racing track of La Condesa de Miravalle (The Countess of Miravalle), herself the namesake of La Condesa.

El Tizoncito, the (claimed and advertised) originator of tacos al pastor. There are multiple locations in La Condesa.

Pork roasting on a spit for tacos al pastor, as well as huaraches al pastor and a host of other menu items. There’s a reason this looks like doner kebap meat – it’s likely that Lebanese immigrants brought this style of cooking to Mexico.

blurry tacos al pastor. whoops.

pickup game in Parque Mexico.

5-0 grind. Parque Mexico.

practicing in public. Parque Mexico.

I retired to Hostal La Buena Vida after dark to find my eight bed dorm completely empty aside from myself.  A private room might seem like a blessing, but when you’re traveling solo, it’s nice to meet others with which to interact, share food, see the city.

Well, at least they were showing the original Karate Kid in the hostel lobby. It’s a start.

I was a little lonely, so I did what so many of us do in such a situation – I logged on to the internet.

THUS BEGINS THE TALE OF MY FIRST TRUE “COUCHSURFING” EXPERIENCES.

“What is this ‘Couchsurfing?’” you might ask (I’ve found that many of my friends aren’t aware of this phenomenon).  And I’d reply, “Couchsurfing is a social website by which you can host/lodge travelers that are passing through your town, or by which you can request a (free) place to stay with hosts in other cities/towns.”  Then, I’d pause thoughtfully and add “It’s a great way to connect in a meaningful with people that you otherwise may never meet.”

Click through to Couchsurfing.org.

“Why would I want to invite a stranger into my home?” you might ask.  Or conversely, “Why on earth would I put myself at risk by staying with a complete stranger?”  And yeah, these are valid questions – there are a lot of unknowns associated with offering quarter to someone you’ve never met, or asking for a place to stay in the same manner.  By hosting or by surfing, both host and surfer take a certain leap of faith.  Each is taking a risk.

Do bad things happen via Couchsurfing?  Occasionally, yes. Some, far worse than others.  But most of the time, no.  I’ve never met a traveler that’s had a wholly negative experience.  Inconvenient?  Sure.  But I’ve never overheard stories of physical or sexual assault, robbery, etc – and backpackers talk their asses off in the common room of the hostel.

At its best, Couchsurfing yields new friendships, new connections new shared experiences.  It’s less about finding a free place to stay and more about people connecting.  It can be a really amazing thing to get this kind of access to new people outside of your usual social circle.

A successful surfing/hosting experience requires a balance, of course:

As a surfer, you need to be flexible – a host’s house is NOT a hotel, and accordingly your experience of surfing at their place may require a little patience or understanding.  For example:  maybe your host further out of town than you calculated.  Maybe their lifestyle is significantly different than yours.  Maybe they want to spend every second with you, or maybe they have absolutely no time to show you around and were just nice enough to put you up for a night.  OR, maybe they have the poshest pad in town.  Who knows, everybody’s different!  Your touristic plans will also need to be flexible – if your host is throwing a barbeque, it wouldn’t necessarily be a bad idea for you to shelve your museum visit for another day and hang out (I know what I’d rather do anyway).  Et cetera.  You get the idea.

As a host, you need to make your guest feel welcome.  Sometimes just a couch is enough, but sometimes it’s nice to show your surfer around your city all day!  You never know what kind of friendships can emerge from the simple generous act of giving a person a place to crash for a night or two.  And it doesn’t cost you anything, either!  The cool takeaway from this is that you may end up with a friend worth visiting in another part of the world that owes you a couch and some merriment.  Pretty good trade.

I didn’t need a place to stay in Mexico City – I was happy in my hostel, and I can afford $15-20/night (to be clear, some backpackers’ budgets don’t allow for this) in order to have secure lodgings from which I can come and go as I please.  Saving a few dollars wasn’t why I tapped into the Couchsurfing network – what I wanted was to meet some new people, especially Mexico D.F. locals, and engage in some activities that weren’t wholly on the tourist trail.

I logged onto Couchsurfing.org on my MacBook Air (yeah, I know this is a little bourgeois for a backpacker, but it’s a blogging and photo processing tool!) and started mining through the profiles of the Couchsurfing denizens of Mexico City the same way I dug for my hostel.  I picked four profiles based on the following criteria:

• High rate of response to messages
• Plenty of positive reactions from previous interactions with other Couchsurfers
• Moderate to expert level of English (because my Spanish is poor)
• Shared interests of some sort – or completely different interests, why not?

Then, I sent each of them a variation of a message that looked something like this:

“Hello!  I’m 32, from the US and am in Mexico City until Sunday.

I’m traveling solo and have a place to stay in Condesa, but have found the hostel that I’m staying in is completely, completely empty – so I thought it was probably a good time to reach out through CouchSurfing and find the quality of person I was looking for anyway!

I’m not so much looking for an insane party while I’m here as I am good people to meet up with and have dinner, drinks, walk around town, whatever.

I’m a good traveler, but have found that the amount of value that I can get from traipsing around by myself in a city of this size is fairly limited. I need help and insight! I’m very interested in what makes places like this tick, the socioeconomic/geographic dividing lines, stuff like that – ideas that bring a place to life.

I also like live music, dive bars, new people, all that as well – and this town seems to have no short supply of it.

I work in film at home – mostly commercial production work – and travel when I’m not working. This year it’s been 3 months in India, 1 month in Finland, 1 month in Poland/Baltics, and now two weeks in Mexico. It’s been a cool year.

Anyway, you sound like a good person to know – give me a shout if you’ve got some free time over the next few days! If you respond, I’ll try to get back with you Thursday evening when I have internet access again.  Thanks and hope to hear from you!”

I didn’t expect much – maybe an email back a week later to the tune of “lo siento guey, I was out of town”.  But miraculously, all four of the Couchsurfers I messaged replied within 24 hours and were interested in hanging out.  Wow!

I know what some of you are thinking:  “So you’re just going to go meet up with people you don’t know, alone, in a foreign city in which you just arrived?”  And, uh, the answer is yes.

In the days that followed, I would spend time with three of the four I messaged plus another unrelated Couchsurfer via these three interactions.  And yes, it was eventful, and I’ll tell you all about it IN OUR NEXT INSTALLMENT (or maybe the one after that – Mexico City apparently needs LOTS OF WORDS).

I shut the laptop and the light and set my alarm for a reasonable hour.  In the morning of DAY 2, I would set out for the obvious touristic destinations of Mexico City (I like to get this stuff out of the way early), starting at the Zocalo and working my way through the Centro Historico.

Previous Mexico City posts:
No Reason To Go To Mexico
MEXICO CITY 2012: Parte Uno – Seven Days in the Megalopolis

MEXICO CITY 2012: Parte Uno – Seven Days in the Megalopolis

I arrived in Mexico City on October 24th of 2012 and proceeded to spend an entire week there, even though I expected to get out after 3-4 days.  The city was just that good, that interesting, that varied.  I was hooked.

It’s not just a big, congested, polluted city (although it’s that too!) – Mexico City is a place of tremendous energy, ancient history with bloodlines to the present, fantastic food, travel available on all budget levels, nice people and plenty of transit connections to get to you wherever you’re going next.

A few facts to get things started:

• Population:  around 21 million (metro area)
• Elevation:  7,940′ (2,420 m)
• What Americans call it:  Mexico City
• What Mexicans call it:  D.F. (pronounced in Spanish, “day-effay”, referring to “Distrito Federal”).  The city is also known simply as “Mexico”.
• What an inhabitant of the city might call themself:  “Chilango”, though you probably shouldn’t use the term.  It’s kind of deprecating when a non-Chilango uses the term.  Avoid this.

And a little history:  in 1325, the Aztecs (or, more appropriately, the Mexica people, pronounced “Meh-shee-ka”) founded Mexico City as Tenochtitlan in the Mexico Valley, which was largely under the waters of Lake Texcoco at the time.  Why there, on a small island the middle of a marshy lake?  Because prophecy fortold (it’s impossible to type “prophecy foretold” without sounding like a creepy mystic, btw) that when the wandering tribes of the Mexica witnessed an eagle eating a snake while perched atop a nopal cactus, that would be where their new home and capital would be.  Enter eagle, snake and cactus, on a small island in the middle of the lake.

The eagle/snake/cactus motif on the flag of Mexico makes a lot more sense now, doesn’t it?

As the city grew, the lake was drained, leaving a basin in which Tenochtitlan grew into city of 200,000 inhabitants by 1519 – one of the largest cities in the world at the time.   Then, Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés and his men arrived and started ruining everything for the Aztecs – colonizing the area, destroying its temples, spreading disease, etc.  Great guys.

Building a city on a spongy lake bed isn’t architecturally advisable, but I doubt the Aztecs had a city of 21 million in mind when they saw the eagle/snake/cactus combo. When earthquakes occur in or near the Valley of Mexico, the entire area jiggles like a bowl of jelly, amplifying damage and death figures. This picture is from the 1985 magnitude 8.1 earthquake that caused the deaths of 10,000 people. Worse still:  soil conditions for Mexico City are so unfortunate that even distant earthquakes can set buildings swaying, as they did on March 26, 2013 when a magnitude 5.5 earthquake occurred 227 miles from the city. Yikes and double yikes.

But that’s not even the whole story – there were ancients BEFORE the ancients:  around 100 BC (long before the Aztecs rose to prominence), a large and impressive pre-Aztec city was established about 48 km northeast of modern day Mexico City.  The Aztecs discovered this site long after its fall and abandonment ( around 7th / 8th century AD) and were so impressed that they called the place Teotihuacan, or the “City of the Gods”.  The Aztecs came to believe that the sun, the moon and the universe were all founded at Teotihuacan, and accordingly adopted many of the site’s symbols and motifs.  Today, the Teotihuacan archeological site is still the home to the third largest pyramids in the world (and yes, you can climb this one).

Pyramid of the Sun, Teotihuacan.

Modern Mexico City is the home of lucha libre masked wrestling, the music of the mariachi, the art of Diego Rivera & Frida Kahlo, and prominent film directors like Alejandro González Iñárritu and Alfonso Cuarón (and I’d mention him, but Guillermo del Toro is technically from Guadalajara).  Same sex marriage has been legal here since 2009, and civil unions since 2006.  Small amounts of drug possession for “personal use” has been decriminalized since of 2009.

I spent seven days (out of my 15 days in Mexico) in the D.F., which isn’t my usual plan for capital cities.  By past experience, many capitals have required/deserved only a few days of a travel itinerary.  For example, a selection of capital cities that you can cover in a bit less time:

• Vientiane, Laos – worth one day, no more.  There’s nothing here and plenty to see in surrounding areas.  Don’t linger.
• Delhi, India – 2 days.  This huge sprawling place is a mess (even for India) and lacks charm.
• Helsinki, Finland – 2-3 days.  Really very nice, but compact enough to cover quickly.  Oh, and it’s quite expensive to be here.
• Tallinn, Estonia – 2 days.  The old city is nice, but Europe has plenty of nice old walled cities.  You’ll find plenty of Finns that escaped previously mentioned Helsinki to come here for lower prices on booze.
• Warsaw, Poland – 2 days.  I like Warsaw, but it’s difficult to get around and just not all that attractive.
• Madrid, Spain – 4-5 days.  I enjoyed Madrid quite a bit, but I don’t think a week is necessary here.

Wonderful exceptions:

• Bangkok, Thailand – Ah, Bangkok.  My friends told me it was a big dirty mess.  It is, but it’s a fantastic mess, and I love it in similar ways to the way I love Mexico City.  Great food, easy transit, nice people, etc.
• Washington DC – spend a week here if you’re a freak for museums.  On second thought, full week of museums sounds like a daunting proposition.
• Berlin, Germany – I could move to Berlin today.  There’s so much to do there – arts, music, a great international community, everything.  Winner.

crazy fun in Berlin.

Upon arrival, Mexico City seems like an inconceivably massive tangle of 21 million people.  But it’s not that bad, really – it’s a city where budget travelers have options, and things aren’t altogether inconvenient.  Here’s what makes it quite workable:

THE AIRPORT IS PRETTY MUCH INSIDE THE CITY, WHICH MAKES ARRIVAL AND DEPARTURE FAIRLY PAINLESS.  The metro system conveniently connects to the airport and gets you into the city quick.  I didn’t find Mexico City’s airport to be too much of a pain in the ass (unlike flying in/out of big American airports like LAX, Chicago O’Hare or JFK).

THE METRO SYSTEM IS HUGE, CRAZY CHEAP AND CAN TAKE YOU ALMOST EVERYWHERE YOU’LL WANT TO GO.  Mexico City’s metro fares are heavily subsidized and accordingly make for one of the cheapest forms of mass transit on the planet – a ticket costs an unbelievably low three pesos ($0.25 US), and you can go from one side of the city to the other, with transfers, on one ticket.  WOW.  If you’ve traveled in cities like London, this should make your jaw drop.

three pesos from anywhere to anywhere. awesome.

YOUR BUDGET IS SAFE HERE.  Hostels are affordable (think $10-20 US per night for a dorm bed) and plentiful – there are options throughout the various parts of the city, from the Centro Historico to Colonia Roma to Condesa, etc (check Tripadvisor for current reviews).  Cheap street food options dot the city, and there are plenty of informal cafes and restaurants that won’t break the bank, either.  If you want to go bigger, that’s doable too.

OMG MEXICAN FOOD.  I don’t need to explain this.  Also of note:  vegetarians shouldn’t have too many problems here.  The city’s fairly liberal and there are options (though being an omnivore here is great).

I DON’T SPEAK SPANISH PARTICULARLY WELL AT ALL AND I HAD NO PROBLEMS GETTING BY.  Friends often ask me if the language barrier is a problem in whatever country I’m visiting at the time.  The answer is always no, because one really only needs a few things to get by in a foreign land:

• Food
• Lodgings
• Transit
• Something to do or look at
• Sometimes you get sick and need some medicine, but hopefully not
• I think I need some more food?

It’s not astrophysics, it’s just getting by, which, provided a bit of patience and goodwill, anyone can do.  Also, Mexico City has plenty of English speakers wandering around.  You’ll be fine.  Note:  I still plan to spend 4-6 weeks in immersion Spanish language courses in South America this year, because I said I would (so I guess I will!).

I NEVER FELT UNSAFE IN MEXICO CITY.  Americans, especially, have been served an unbalanced view of Mexico thanks to a sensationalist media following the what-bleeds-leads method of journalism, so naturally the primary advice I received from friends and acquaintances was “Don’t get kidnapped!”  Was I supposed to laugh?  Or do I have to come to Mexico’s defense and talk about how much I like it?  Mexico City is like any other huge crazy city – it has crime, it has problems, but it has so many things to offer!  A little salt makes the sugar that much sweeter.

Plus, what am I supposed to do, stay home where it’s SAFE?  I’m from St Louis, Missouri, where things like this, and this happen, and where many murders never even get reported by the local media which is too scared to head into North City (see a St Louis murder map from 2005-2012 here) because people’s skin is just a little too dark to make the kind of national headlines a blonde volleyball player’s murder can generate (for example).  I don’t mean to trash my hometown, but how safe am I at home, really?  Keep your kidnapping comments to yourself, experts.  Or better yet, go travel in Mexico!

tiny tourists, foggy day, St Louis Arch.

That said – Mexico City, like any big city, should be treated like a beautiful but poisonous flower.  Don’t wander through unfamiliar dark alleys, don’t show off your expensive jewelery or camera equipment in the wrong places, don’t accept drinks from strangers, blah blah blah.  Same advice you should follow when you’re traveling ANYWHERE, or even just staying home.  Exercise common sense.

One notable potential risk that travelers in the D.F. should mind:  Mexico City taxi cabs.  Unlicensed, unmarked taxis are the source of a disproportionate amount of theft and violence here and are probably the biggest point of exposure that any tourist or traveler will have during their time in Mexico City – but with a little knowledge, you shouldn’t run into any problems.  Before a trip to Mexico City, I highly suggest you read this list of tips on cabbing it in Mexico’s capital.  To summarize a few key points:

• Avoid hailing cabs on the street at night.
• Avoid taking cabs alone.
• Familiarity with Mexico City, and a working knowledge of Spanish are really useful first lines of defense against potential problems.
• If you don’t speak Spanish and don’t know the city, have your restaurant or hotel call a radio taxi for you.  They cost a bit more than street cabs, but they’re no runaway.
• Properly licensed drivers must have a picture ID and proper license plates (see here for exact details/checklist).  Don’t be bashful about asking for ID and making sure things check out before getting in the cab.

In an effort to avoid writing a “War and Peace” sized blog post, the events of my week in Mexico City will be in the next entry.

A few highlights:  my first real Couchsurfing experience, climbing ancient pyramids, being serenaded by mariachi, too much Polish vodka and just enough mezcal, eating grasshoppers, and making new friends that I’ll keep for as long as they’ll have me.  In other words, nothing happened.  Thanks for reading!

PHOTO: Why I’ve Quit Using UV Filters

I bought my first DSLR in 2008.  It was the Nikon D80, and I bought it with the Nikkor 18-135mm AF-S DX kit lens.  Why?  Because my brother in law had the same gear, and when I got drunk on Christmas Eve and decided I should have a camera too.  Real talk.

Any camera salesman knows that if you have no business buying a camera, then you’ll obviously have no idea about filtration either.  That’s how I ended up with the cheapest Sunpak UV filter Best Buy had to offer.  “It will protect your lens” he said.  “OK I’ll take it” I replied.

The Sunpak filter cost under $10 and performed like it.  It was a cheap, optically flawed piece of glass, and a dust magnet to boot.

I had next to no idea how to properly use my D80, so I also had no idea that my cheap UV filter wasn’t helping the situation.  Historically, it’s a bit of a wash.  If your photographic technique is bad, you’ll never be able to understand the real capabilities and limitations of your equipment.  That’s where I was.  So I guess the Sunpak was a fine filter for me at the time!

In 2009, when Barcelona metro pickpockets lifted my D80 with the 18-135mm attached, the Sunpak filter went with it.  My travel insurance covered about half of the loss at the maximum payout of $600 for theft (which I now think of as “serendipitously/unexpectedly finding a buyer”), and I shot the rest of the month long trip on a Holga and a Canon point-and-shoot.  I wasn’t really even capable of dealing with the resolution and image quality that the D80 presented anyway, so I guess this wasn’t the blow that I thought it was at the time.  I admit it!

Sevilla’s empty bull ring on Holga.

I picked up a Nikon D7000 body in 2010 and accordingly moved a step up with my filters as well.  After reading a lot of online reviews, I settled on a kind of generally accepted budget-meets-quality line of filters, the Hoya HMC UV(C) multicoated UV filters.  I expected this to be a fine choice, but they caused a lot more problems over the next couple of years than I could have ever expected.  My tortured Hoya history:

#1.  In 2011, I found myself shooting in Southeast Asian markets rife with exposed compact fluorescent tubes and bulbs.  The filters ghosted HARD when pointed in the general direction of any CFL.  I unscrewed them and left them in the bag for the remainder of the trip and was much happier as a result.

An unedited, poorly framed photo from Chiang Mai’s night market – posted only to show the horrid ghosting of the Hoya filters I once used.  See those awful, unintentional green spots?

#2.  About six weeks into a three month trip through India, one of my Hoya HMC filters had finally taken enough abuse.  It quietly shattered in my camera bag while attached to my Nikkor 35mm f/2D.  The jagged filter shards impacted the front element of the lens and added several tiny scratches.  Bear in mind that the whole reason I bought the filter in the first place was to PROTECT THE LENS.  Bitten by my own snake!  I’m guessing the front element of the lens was and is still significantly tougher than the UV filter – so I should have just gone without the filter in the first place!

The two white dots on the front element just inside the “AF Nikkor” text? Scratches. The other crap? A bit of dust from a hasty prep for this photo. Oh, and probably more scratches. Maybe this veteran is due for replacement with something like a Sigma 35mm f/1.4 DG HSM.

#3.  In autumn of 2012, I purchased a barely-used Tokina 11-16mm f/2.8 from a friendly middle aged guy off Craigslist.  Having sworn off Hoya filters by this point, I didn’t even want the one that he included with the lens, but I’m also not going to turn down free gear.  This filter lasted approximately two months, at which point the edge of the filter was impacted – and not with significant force – adding a scallop-shaped point of glass breakage along the edge of the filter.  Not OK for an ultra-wide angle.  I threw it away and sighed my last Hoya sigh.

Three strikes for Hoya.  But I hadn’t entirely written-off screw-on UV filters just yet – there was still another, higher tier to experiment with.

I bought a couple of much-heralded B+W brand UV filters in 2012  (specifically, the B+W 010 UV – Haze 1x MRC) and have had no real significant problems with them since.  They’re much more solidly constructed than the Hoyas, are “optically neutral” (according to marketing, anyway).  I’ve experienced lower incidence of ghosting, too.

But am I satisfied?  Nah.  And not because of the product itself – simply because of the conundrum that the expensive UV filter presents me with.It’s a catch 22:  by the time you are willing to spend $50+ on UV filters, you’re probably also willing to spend enough money to put fairly serious glass on your camera – and what the hell is the point of slapping a $60 piece of glass on a $1000-2500 lens?  You bought the lens for its image quality, but now you’re willing to degrade it a hair, and spend more money to do so?  This doesn’t add up to me.

Truth be told, putting ANY sort of filter on the front of your camera will slightly degrade image quality.  If it didn’t, then why didn’t the lens manufacturer design the lens with a removable/replaceable front element, a la a removable screw-on filter (Hey, there’s an idea that’ll never catch on!)?  Also, UV filters were designed for shooting film – UV rays have negligible effects on DSLR imaging.  UV filters should just be called “protection” filters in relation to DSLR-related photography, because that’s really the bulk of what they do – just physically protect your front element (unless, of course, they shatter and SCRATCH YOUR FRONT ELEMENT like they did to me!).

In short, I don’t think using UV filters make sense on DSLRs.  Think about it this way:

If you’re shooting on an inexpensive kit lens like a Nikkor 18-55mm f3.5-5.6 VR DX, your lens costs $200.  If you buy an expensive filter, you’ll be shelling out 1/4 – 1/3 the cost of the lens, which is a pretty expensive (and faulty) insurance policy for any lens.  But if you buy a cheap UV filter, you’re spending a little less money (albeit still spending money), but degrading your image even more.  Neither of these scenarios makes sense – you’d be better going without a filter.

On the other hand, if you’re employing a pricier piece of glass like, for example, the Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 VR II, and you put a cheapie UV filter up front, you need to rethink what got you into photography in the first place.  If you put an expensive UV filter on there, you still run the risk of degrading your image – and I’m sure you bought the lens for the image quality.  The implications of this get even more serious if you’re shooting on resolution monsters like the D800E.

Not everyone feels this way though – plenty of photographers happily still use UV filters.  Search forums on Dpreview or Flickr if you want to see people flame/troll one another endlessly on the topic.  (Man, photographers spend a lot of time online being cruel to one another.)

Caveat:  What about shooting on the beach, or in the desert?  Yeah, sand and airborne dust is just about the worst enemy a camera has (aside from submersion in water, of course), so maybe it’d be worth taking the B+W protective filters along for serious work in these types of places.  But then again, I’ve never really had a problem with sand damage on my front element – moreso in the focus ring.  Just ask my crunchy Nikkors that had to be sent in for repairs last year to the tune of a few hundred dollars!  I guess the solution is still to buy lenses and camera bodies with better weather sealing.  Serious work requires well-built tools, right?  Sometimes there’s a reason for a premium price on premium gear (not that it’ll make you a better photographer, though!).

Some additional reading to do on UV filters from smarter people than me:

DPreview:  The UV Filter

Photographyblogger:  What You Need to Know about UV Filters

Photo.net:  FIlters – UV or not UV?

G Dan Mitchell Photography:  UV Filter or Lens Cap and Hood?

Thanks for reading.  Until next time!

Quintana Roo, Mexico: shot on 35mm film in 2009.

I spent a month in Tulum, Quintana Roo, Mexico and surrounding in early 2009 with the people and animals you see below.

I shot on a Nikon N65 and old rolls of 35mm film in questionable condition, developed at super-questionable Walgreens (which unquestionably ruined several rolls of film completely by developing them as B/W instead of color – these are not pictured) and ended up with some fun coloration and texture.

Places pictured:

• Tulum
• Laguna Balacar
• Punta Laguna
• Morocoy

Places not pictured and not visited:

• Cancun
• Playa Del Carmen
• Cozumel

Hope you enjoy–

No Reason To Go To Mexico (Oct 24th, 2012)

Absolutely no one cared if I went to Mexico or not.

“You’ve done enough traveling this year” the world seemed to intimate.  ”You’ve already been out for four months this year (2012), in India, Malaysia, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland.  Spend a little time at home you idiot.  What are you running from anyway?”

Who knew.  After a run of autumn film production work subsided and I entered a freelance doldrums, I became more restless than I could have expected.  Regular home life activities like self-motivated projects, hiding in my apartment, daily exercise and/or hitting the bar with friends seemed strangely, extraordinarily stale.  I couldn’t focus.  On anything.  At all.

My 2012 cycle of near-continual travel and never-being-home-ness had become, well, normal.  The idea of resigning myself to a few weeks of relatively quiet downtime instead of hitting the road felt suddenly all wrong, especially considering that my travel wasn’t costing me that much compared to home life anyway, and offered such richness of experience.

I had been to Mexico three times prior, so it wasn’t a novel destination.  Or was it?  I had only visited Quintana Roo and Yucatan states and had “lived” in Tulum for a month.  More Mexico experience than a lot of Americans, sure, but still not enough to hang my sombrero on.  It’s horrible dad-jokes like these that make me wonder if I am indeed the unknowing father of an illegitimate child.

First trip to Mexico, January of 2007. Mayan ruins of Uxmal in background.

Mexico is huge (31 states and a federal district), and to intimate that one has seen Mexico without a considerable amount of additional exploration is like taking a trip to Arkansas and saying you’ve a full understanding of the United States.  Well, maybe this isn’t a fair example… if you travel to Bentonville, Arkansas, you’ll at least have a grip on the latent culture of much of small town America, unfortunately.  Wal-Mart, the great normalizer, colossal amoebic destroyer.

And now, to contradict myself in short order:  like any good hypocrite, I sometimes buy things like contact solution at Wal-Mart when I can’t find a Target to visit (another huge profit-minded big box from which apparently we’re all allowed to safely throw rocks at the yellow smiley-faced retailer and still feel good about ourselves).  Lazily hating Wal-Mart has become so popular, so easy, so banal.  Reminds me of when punk rock kids wear anti-swastika patches as if it were some kind of brave, cutting statement against white supremacists and fascists somehow left over from the 1940s.  You’re pretty late to the party when stated mortal enemies have died of old age.

I bought a thick Lonely Planet Mexico guidebook a week before I left and attempted a coarse outline for the two weeks I could budget for our neighbor to the south.  It looked something like this:

• I’ll fly into Mexico City because it’s got the cheapest inbound airfare (about $250.00 US one way from my midwestern hometown of St Louis, Missouri).
  
• I’ll look at Mexico City for a few days and walk around in my shoes.
• Then I’ll probably take a bus to the city of Oaxaca de Juarez in late October to celebrate Dia de los Muertos (day of the dead) because I’ve never been to said festival, and everyone says Oaxaca is a good place to go even though I know almost nothing about it, and more importantly, I’m feeling far too lazy to think up and build a Halloween costume again this year so I’d better hide in another country.  No way am I smart enough to dream up something better than the previous year’s character.

2011′s Lucky Cat (!), as scowled at by R.J. MacReady of “The Thing”

• I’ll attempt to take one million photos during De de los Muertos.  I’ll keep going until my 150,000 actuation-rated DSLR’s shutter EXPLODES TO BITS.
• Then I’ll fly to Los Angeles two weeks later because my colleague Dave is gettin’ hitched.
• Good enough y’all, why bother overplanning?  Being flexible is usually more fun.

First order of business:  surgical procedures on the massive, brand-new-smelling brick of paper known as the Lonely Planet Mexico guide.

I still don’t understand why publishers sell travel guidebooks larger than 500 pages.  If I’m backpacking, why the hell would I ever want to carry something as large and heavy as LP Mexico?  It’s REAL BIG.

• Total pages:  904
• Weight:  1.61 lbs (0.7 kg)
• Size:  5.03 inches thick x 7.75 inches long (128mm x 197mm)

Considering the amount of planning and sacrifice that goes into packing for a trip, the idea of cramming this kind of boat anchor into my main pack (much less my day bag where the book finds most of its time/use) is thoughtless.

Before I left for India in January 2012, I hacked my even-bigger-than-Mexico India Lonely Planet guidebook to bits with an X-Acto knife and rebound it with cardboard and black gaffer’s tape.  My friend Cat saw my efforts via the blog and offered a better solution – she had a professional binding setup in her basement that could make the process a lot faster and cleaner.

I took her up on the offer and swung by her place.  Over a Seagrams 7 (and 7), we extracted 496 needless pages via a precision cut with her guillotine press, reconstituting neatly with a heat-applied binding.  The front and back of the book are made up of cardboard from a hard cider six-pack.  Cool, right?  It even has it’s own elastic closure band, like a Moleskine notebook.

orphan pages.

Final product:  a user-friendly 408 page book that didn’t tear through my rotator cuff when placed in my day bag (which is still the venerable Domke J-803).  Much better, and much prettier than my previous inept arts’n'crafts job on my India LP.

Final!  Thanks Cat!

Check out Cat’s screen printing, notebook/clothing work and graphic design at http://10foot2.com/.  She makes nice things!

I packed much the way I did for my prior trip to Finland (see link for current packing list), gave myself a haircut (less because I’m cheap and more because I’m dumb), tied up the loose ends at home like paying rent in advance and buying an appropriate travel insurance policy, and shoved off.

six bells.

My dad dropped me off at 6:00 AM on October 24th at Lambert St Louis International Airport like a good dad would (don’t worry, he was awake anyway), and another solo trip began.  That afternoon, I touched town in Mexico’s Distrito Federal, mountainous megasprawl of 21 million.

NEXT POST:  I FELL IN LOVE WITH THE MEGALOPOLIS

don’t worry, I cast my general election absentee ballot before I left.

ROLLERDERBY PICS: Rollergirls in Pagosa (R.I.P.) vs 10th Mountain Roller Dolls – March 16th, 2013

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, ROLLER DERBY IN THE SNOWY MOUNTAINS OF SOUTHWEST COLORADO!

R.I.P. (Rollergirls in Pagosa) hosted the 10th Mountain Roller Dolls on March 16th, 2013 in the gymnasium of a Lutheran Church in Pagosa Springs, Colorado, and I was invited to shoot the scrimmage.  I had never attended a derby match prior, despite the plenitude of teams that play regularly in my hometown of St Louis.

I came away with a few impressions:

• So much of derby activity/life is predicated upon people that just REALLY WANT TO DO IT.  There’s little to no money in this, and team members and referees drive for hours for matches, pay their own way, and put in a lot of their own effort to keep things going.  Labor of love / passion project.
• Derby is a relatively high-risk/play-at-your-own risk deal, no different than street skateboarding or any other injury-prone sport.  If/when a player gets hurt, there’s no safety net of league health insurance (at least that I’m aware of) to catch you.  Again, you’ve gotta WANT to do this to bear risks like that.  There’s a certain sense of purity to activities like this where money isn’t involved – it’s like watching a good, undiscovered local band play hard just because that’s what they do.
• These girls is fast.  And tough.

I’m no roller derby ref, so if you see something you don’t like in the shots below and want to use it as evidence, help yourself, but don’t expect intelligent game insight from me.  I’m just doing my best to make pretty pictures here and spent more time changing lenses than keeping score or noting penalties.  Sorry y’all.

Photo nerding for a second:  the gymnasium of the Lutheran Church the match took place in had about the worst light color cast I’ve ever seen – some of the overhead flourescents went heavy green, the others an intense magenta (and on top of that, two doors were left wide open, injecting bright blue light from the sides!  Ahhh!).  Finding a middle ground to bring skin tones back from the dead took a little work, and attempting to match them between shots got even more complicated, but I landed on a relatively consistent look that I’m fairly pleased with, considering.

R.I.P. / 10th:  If you’re interested in using images on your sites or for promotional purposes, please let me know via the comments section and I’d be happy to pass you an appropriate file size/resolution.  Also – 10th – I was a guest of R.I.P, hence the greater focus on the girls in black/pink.  Nuffin’ personal. 

Thanks for having me!

- Matt @ whereiwent

Shot handheld on a Nikon D7000 body, Tokina 11-16mm f2.8, Nikkor 35mm f2.0D and Nikkor 85mm f1.8D

2013: Superphotogenic Little Pagosa Springs, Colorado (photo post)

Pagosa Springs, Colorado gets more snow than anywhere else in Colorado, but it also gets a (pretty remarkable) 300 days of sunshine per year.

I found the intensity and quality of the sunlight here (as well as the town itself as a character) quite engaging and found that a camera was in my hand anytime ski poles were not.

Below are of my favorite photos of Pagosa Springs that weren’t included in my previous post detailing my week long trip there in March 2013.  The final two photos were shot on US-85 in New Mexico.

Everything other than the “urinate on the peak” photo was shot handheld on a Nikon D7000 DSLR.