Valladolid

After almost 2 weeks in Playa del Carmen I wasn’t necessarily ready to leave, but my move was scheduled so I didn’t have much choice but to go back and let the movers in. I had spent the previous week with Jana and Hugo, both ex-SLB from Carmen. We were leaving Playa together, Jana planning to travel with me for the next month and Hugo just catching ride to Merida on his Mexico tour. 

We checked out of the Penthouse in Carmen and set out towards Chichen Itza, one of the most famous set of ruins in Mexico and one of the new 7 wonders of the world. It’s a ‘must see’ on the ruins of Mexico list and also happens to be well spaced between Playa del Carmen and Merida. Perfect placement for a day trip before staying in Merida for the night.

Happily we cruised along the paid road, which is expensive, but with less towns to slow down for and much better road conditions. We had just passed the sign announcing the next service station in 65km when the car started to shutter. We went along for another 5km or so, playing with the engine RPM, when it finally died. We drifted over the shoulder and popped the hood. Maybe it’s just low on oil? The check engine light WAS on. 

Travel Reflection - Playa

I know everyone is curious about how the travels have been going. I’ve been lucky to be able to stay in Mexico and travel with friends that are in the same situation. I’m going to write a series of posts about the travels. I’ll put up pictures. I’ll spend more time with the experiences I think are unique and fun and probably less time on things that are more common or can be better described in picture. Writing about travel is supposed to be fun to write and fun to read. If it’s not fun to write, I won’t bother with it. At this point I’m starting to write about experiences happening a few weeks ago and I’ll just break posts up according to how I feel tells a good story. Anyway. that’s the mechanics. Enjoy! 

Immediately after being laid off I booked a ticket back to Houston to see my family. Sometimes you just need some recovery time. I spent about 10 days in the US, traveled up to Arkansas to visit family there and then returned to Houston. I had the chance to make some decisions and get a rough plan together. I also brushed up my resume and applied to jobs, just as a long shot. 

I was hoping to come back to Carmen and pack my things up right away. However, as you’ll read along, you will see that travel has been a study in making plans and immediately having them changed. I learned that I needed to get quotes from different companies and then it would take another week to make estimates and another week for big blue to decide which company would actually do the move. Drat. Two more weeks in Carmen was not what I was excepting. I discussed with HR and finally determined I didn’t actually need to be in Carmen. I left the next afternoon. 

On some big changes...

I’m not sure how much you, my lovely audience (like 3 people and my parents) know about what’s going on right now with oil prices. I am sure everyone has noticed the drop in gas prices. On the other side of that drop is the layoffs. There’s been news stories about it, major service companies laying off thousands and thousands of people globally. While for most people this has been nothing more than a news story, for me it’s been my life for the past months. Watching friends leave, watching people have their lives change in a minute. It’s been difficult to witness, to say goodbye to so many friends and to stay behind in the environment of tension and fear. 

Two weeks ago it was my turn. Since I’ve been working in the office and I’m good at my job I was shielded from the first and second wave of lay offs. My superiors spent at least two months trying to transfer me to a location that could afford to keep me, but couldn’t find one. Most locations are trying to reduce staff, not increase it and my experience of only 7 months in the office didn’t help me. I’m very confident my boss did not want to lay me off and worked hard to fight for me. I’m not the first to leave and I already know that I’m not the last. Unfortunately this drop in prices will effect many, many more lives before things stabilize. 

For anyone wondering what comes next I can give a very general plan that changes about everyday. Big blue will be paying for to move my house of things back to Alaska or anywhere cheaper, which is like… anywhere in the US. Probably everything will end up in Houston in storage until I need it next. I’ve also been given a decent severance package and 3 months of free health care. The cost to break my lease should be covered, although that’s still being negotiated, something to be settled in this next week after everything is packed up. 

Ciudad del Carmen

Lots of big changes in the last two months.

I came back from vacation Sept 8^th. Sept 9^th I got my transfer letter to report Sept 16^th in Ciudad del Carmen as a Junior Drilling Engineer. What does this mean? Where is Cd. Carmen? All these questions and more, answered below!

Ciudad del Carmen is just up the coast slightly from Villahermosa. It’s in another state, Campeche, instead of Tabasco and now I’m actually on the coast. In fact, my city is an island. 3 years later and I’m finally getting the lifestyle everyone thinks I had in Villahermosa. I live near the beach (1 km away to be exact) and I finally work with offshore platforms (I was completely land rigs before. No offshore). Maybe I’ll even get a tan.

I’m also working in the office, which is a big change from being a field engineer. I’m excited not to put in anymore 24 hour days and not be constantly woken by trainees. But I’m also going to miss the field. All the sudden my days off are weekends. I’m expected not to watch movies at work and I have to put on real clothes and shower a lot more often. Taking a nap at my desk is also frowned upon.

There’s a lot of benefits that come with moving to the office. I get to go home to my own bed every night. I get to buy food with a much higher probability of finishing it than before. I even get to buy furniture (still working on this one). I have friends that I get to see more often than every few months and my life has a new sense of normality that it didn’t have before.

My job has changed again, for the third time in 3 years. It’s exciting and brings on some new challenges. Previously I was a directional driller, which meant I was in the field executing the well. Now I’m in the office doing the planning. The most difficult part of this right now has been adjusting to the different scale of things here.

I’m working in the Cantarell field, the largest oil field in Mexico and one of the largest in the world. It’s also been declining in production for the past 10 years or so which means Pemex is working very hard to keep that oil flowing in. This results in high volume drilling. We’re working on new wells and also windows off older wells for several different drilling platforms. Sometimes we’re planning for wells happening months in advance and sometimes it’s for wells happening in a week. This creates the environment of low level stress combined with moments of insane pressure that I’ve become so accustomed to. I also get to stay relatively close to the action of the field with daily contact with my field crews.

As an added bonus I suddenly getting some face time with my client. Before, I interacted with the client at only a field level. Now I’m going in front of the guys making the decisions. This is putting a little more stress on my Spanish and I’m really hoping I’ll be able to improve and also unlearn all the bad Spanish I’ve picked up after three years on the rig.

All and all it’s an interesting change and I’m excited to see where it takes me. I’ve been told this is another 3 year assignment. Another three years in Mexico scares me and excites me. It will certainly challenge me either way.