Building Our Beach Bungalow in Tenacatita, Mexico

A few years ago, Sharon and I fell in love with this cool place in Mexico. The place is Tenacatita in the state of Jalisco. We loved it, so much we bought a beach lot and soon after began to build our beach bungalow, Casa Lirio Azul. It is almost finished, but we've been assured it would be done by time we get back in June (ha! ha! I don't believe it). The house is basically done, only needing insect and security screen around the patio.

Wow! Building this small house in many ways was typical of experiences people all over the world have when contracting construction jobs. Let's see, delays, and more delays; crew doesn't show, subs don't show, and builder doesn't show and his cell phone immediately goes to voice mail. After all, we've all experienced these problems during building projects, or heard from friends about their building ordeals. Yet, building Casa Lirio Azul, reached new heights in delays. It took 10 months to build our 600 sf bungalow; the crew broke ground in June 2006 and finished April 2007. That's 60 sf/month, or 2 sf/day! Get the idea?

I don't want to entirely blame the contractor and crew for delays because I was responsible for some of the delays. Joining in, or my encouraging a fiesta or two, I must admit, led to some lost afternoons in drinking beer and tequila; barbecuing fish and carne; male camaraderie; and then stumbling home in giggles.