From Nov. 19 We had our first real Mexican adventure today. The first part was braving the surf, we both took our dinghies off the boats and paddled in to shore, it was about 1/4 mile to shore. Timing is everything, we got lucky and managed a safe, dry landing. Mungo's crew on the other hand were spectacularly spilled into the surf, oh, I should correct that, only the Captain got dunked, the First Mate, otherwise known as the Admiral rode the dinghy in with aplomb and just got the slightest bit wet, but the Captain was soaked. I have pictures, make sure you check back in a week or so.
The beach was gorgeous, long and curved with sand dunes about 50 meters from the water. There were people driving cars and trucks up and down the beach and there were about 6 in the water digging for clams. They had a pitchfork and they would plunge around in the water and then lean down and pick up the clam once they struck one. One bunch would lean down pick up the clam and then huck it ashore for a buddy to collect and put in a plastic milk crate. Once the catcher wasn't quite quick enough and a gull made off with one of the clams.
We decided that we would explore this church that was on the other side of the barbed wire fence, THAT SHOULD HAVE BEEN OUR FIRST CLUE. We climbed through the fence and then wandered towards the oasis, there was a road up to it and someone had planted palm trees along the road that were being watered. Wow, I thought someone is really looking after the church. We got there and went in and there was someone with a rake in the gardens. We said hello and asked if he spoke English, no, he didn't but he made it clear it was private so we left, then he called us back and asked us to wait a minute. Eventually another fellow came out and Steven in his limited Spanish made it known that we were from Canada and that we were on 2 sailboats and we would like to take pictures. He indicated that we could walk around and take photos, so we did. What a beautiful complex, it had gardens and fountains and fancy gates with big private signs on them, there was a beautiful house as well but we didn't pry so just walked out the gate where there were roosters and horses and a big garden. Then we walked towards the hotel that was at the other end of the beach and asked if we could go through the hotel to the beach, no problem. We stopped in at the hotel bar and had a margarita and discussed fishing and bull fighting with the bartender whose English was much better than our Spanish.
We headed back to the dinghies which were exactly where we had left them and braved the surf once again. We managed without too much of a problem, both of us had wet butts on the row back. Mungo's crew had broken a dinghy oar in the earlier debacle so they had a tough time getting back through the surf and eventually had to paddle back rather than row because of the broken oar. We thought they had gone over again but they persevered and made a clean if not a dry get away. I think it is now surf 3, Steven 3. That was a great way to start the Mexican part of our cruise, may there be many more days like this.