Maria Zache

"I don't know if thinking about my grandmother got me baking or if baking got me thinking about my grandmother." Spanish professor, certified translator, writer and generally talented Sayulita resident Leah Jewell has returned to her baking roots. Raised almost exclusively by her father, Leah and her sister divided the household chores by interest; her sister cleaned and Leah learned how to cook and bake.

We all know the horrors of Styrofoam for the environment. Its decomposition rate is akin with never, it often ends up polluting the ocean and is toxic when burned. Though I love takeout as much as the next person, I am conscious of the serious, negative impact of Styrofoam, and especially, restaurant to-go containers. I have been known to wash the clamshell containers and bring them to a restaurant if ordering to-go, to bring my own plastic storage containers for restaurant leftovers and much to the chagrin of my husband, have also been known to haul the clamshell containers back to the U.S., where Styrofoam is recyclable in the county where our cabin is.

Meeting in Guatamala in 2004, Halo Weiss and her husband, Arturo de la Fuente Montiel, began their adventure, traveling around Mexico selling handmade jewelry and spending a year in Israel, Halo's country of birth. Settling in Sayulita three years ago, the couple decided to fall back on Arturo's restaurant training in the city of Guanajuato, Arturo's birthplace and where he spent eight years making sushi at a sushi restaurant.

Ramona Froehle-Schacht has been working very hard all growing season in Canada and can see the payoff around the corner: four weeks in sunny Sayulita in early 2012. Intended to be a working retirement, Sol Farm (solfarm.ca), in the Cowichan Valley of Vancouver Island, British Columbia, has turned into a second, more-than-full-time career for Ramona and husband Stephen. Son Jeremy - putting to use his chemical engineering degree - and girlfriend Jessica have also moved to the farm and have jumped in with both feet, making Sol Farm a true family enterprise.

One of the best things about settling in as a part-time resident in Sayulita and joining the Sayulero staff has been the friendships that I've made. Sayulita attracts those creative, smart, fun, warm, and welcoming and one of the very best among them is Sayulita-born Yésica Doreli Ramos Gómez.

Hot, Hot, Hot. The forecast for the northern U.S. and Sayulita (and most of North America, for that matter) is hot and humid, for at least the next few days. My answer? Margaritas, or derivations thereof. Though likely not original, I had the idea for Watermelon Margaritas one similar summer evening while entertaining friends from England and serving an all-American (in the Americas sense) menu.

One of the luxuries of spending part of the year in Sayulita is the opportunity for reading. Though I keep myself busy and involved within the community, I do have more time to read and occasionally steal a lazy morning in bed reading in my pajamas, until the hour makes it seem indecent to do so. Each winter I have read something a little meaty, maybe a book I wouldn't have tackled while in the North because of its length or subject matter. I have reread Kafka and Edgar Allen Poe and read for the first time Gone with the Wind, Lonesome Dove and Dr. Zhivago.

"Turn left at the next road past the Big Rock." These were part of our directions to our vacation casita on our very first trip to Sayulita. For many years, the "Big Rock" on calle Ninos Heroes (the street on your right on the way from the plaza, just before Rollie's restaurant), has been used as a landmark and a point of reference. The rock has, in the past, also been the site for graffiti and trash.