A Weekend At Tenacatita

Weekends matter. You might think this is obvious but lest you forgot I am retired and traveling through a world where time has so little meaning I can rarely remember what day it is. Yet, to my surprise I find that weekends really do matter.

We discovered this obscure fact when another resident of the Punta Pérula RV Park came by and explained why the prime waterfront spot we occupied is not preferred by cannier long term residents. I thought it was the low hanging wire but Dave explained the RV Park rents tent space along the waterfront and we would be inundated with weekend visitors mask free and paying to use the RV Park facilities. Time to go, as we were ready anyway to see more of the coast. 

Highway 200 runs down the coast from Puerto Vallarta and once it’s clear of the big city the pot holes disappear and the surface is smooth and just about perfect. The winding ribbon passes over rivers, mostly sand in dry season, through woods and past small settlements. “Stop!” Layne called out when she spotted water jugs. I got out our hose, as suggested by Bruce who said “siphon” when I used to struggle with a funnel to fill our water tank.  So now with minimal effort I siphon the purified drinking water from the five gallon jugs and it is so much easier. Then lunch which was two tacos each taken in the shade with Rusty watching the world at our side.

As we sat there sipping our Coke Zeros watching traffic buzz by on the highway I really felt I was where I should be. I enjoy the mystery of the unraveling road. I’m a bit ashamed to say it but I find driving much more relaxing than sailing and I love the opportunity to see the back country. 

Driving is like getting a chance to go backstage at a production where sailing down the coast is like watching the play from the front row. I’m curious about the life that goes on behind the lovely beaches. I also like navigating road hazards over sailing hazards I find. For instance after lunch I got to see this motorcycle delivery, a nothing moment in a nowhere town. Yet I  noticed the custom built rack to hold an ice chest perfectly on the machine. I never noticed such a smart accessory among the many delivery machines in Key West. 

After lunch we got back on the road and meandered south at 35 or 40 miles per hour. Google Maps said we had a half hour left to drive. We were half way to our next beach already. I think a lot about our sailing trip down this coast in 1998, how much the landscape has changed and how much I have changed. How much more serene I feel and how much less there is to prove as the years pass. 

“Stop!” My wife shouted as we sailed toward another roadside attraction. This one was whole roast chickens, something Layne has been craving since we arrived in Mexico a month ago. She crossed the street while Rusty and I mooched on our side of the highway. 

A mechanic was wrapping up a job for a customer.  A nearby bus shelter had been built using recycled materials by the energy company according to an engraved sign. Some guys were sitting in the shade waiting for Friday evening. They gave me a cheery greeting and a wave. Just another day in Mexico. 

Eight dollars for a full chicken dinner. Layne came back loaded with food and beaming. Google sent us down a dirt road (the shortest distance, not the smoothest we figured out afterwards!) and then got us back on smooth asphalt and then suddenly we were at the beach. Tons of food trucks and beach umbrellas greeted us. People were everywhere and it felt overwhelming. I drove on  by, hoping the iOverlander app was correct. Faced with a ghastly steep dusty hill I engaged the front wheel lock and gunned it. The hill is short and hard and separates the smaller quieter beach from the pandemonium of the main beach. 

We skidded and bounced and the tires scratched for grip in unison, the factory issued street tires, and up we went. Amazing ten thousand pound Promaster. We left a vast dust cloud in our wake, a dust storm of our own making…

We parked to one side overlooking the small bay called Isla Tenacatita and asked Carlos who rents tables and chairs if we were okay. He smiled and said of course. No problem. 

By 3:30 most people were leaving. We loaned Guillermo a Tervis tumbler as he hadn’t packed a glass for his picnic. After we swam he gave us Coronas and we chatted. He and his 30 something fiancée live in Guadalajara and he stays at his friends house on the beach from time to time and works remotely. We admired the beauty of the spot together. 

Our early dinner laid out below. Chicken coconut rice coleslaw two types of salsa tortillas and chips. Pacifico beers and we felt no pain. 

I read of icy conditions across the US and record cold weather in the Keys this weekend. For us the weekend is just two other days. For working Mexicans it’s a chance to enjoy (disfrutar) the beach and crowd our “private” spaces. For you it’s a chance to freeze. 

The weekend really does have meaning. Just not what it used to, happily.

A Day In The Life

I made it a point to get up promptly at seven.  I had a dog that needed walking and a sunrise that needed photographing.

I’m glad yesterday’s pictures came out well and were enjoyed as I had a good time making them.  I find my all in one Panasonic FZ1000 is very ease and fun to use and with a built in 400 mm lens it gives me lots of opportunities to frame pictures as I like.

After our walk the daily program involves a cup of tea followed by a swim. We put Rusty in the van for this part of the day as I don’t want to worry about him on the beach while we are getting our exercise out in the water. Invariably when we come back after an hour and slide open the door we find him snoring contentedly  on his bed.

Layne tells me our antics in the water have been noticed by other residents of the RV park who have commented to her about the distances we swim. I find it odd that not everyone is out enjoying the warm crystal clear waters. We always swim alone. I even took my waterproof Panasonic TS7 out to test it. I swim without glasses so I can’t really see what I’m doing, a recipe for photographic brilliance I’m sure you’ll agree.

Ron puts up good naturedly with my camera habits. 

The fresh water showers at the RV park are welcome and then we walked into town for lunch. Actually the RV park is on a small side street off the main drag in Punta Pérula,

The restaurant we picked funnily enough was half a block away on the main road, La Campesina. I have a map at the bottom of the page. 

After our swim we were hungry and cleverly forgot to photograph our food.  Nevertheless they had no “Coca Lite” so if we were having sugar, and I don’t like regular Coke, we had it in orange juice and it was fresh and delicious in a huge glass.

Rusty sat around watching the world go by and was less bother than the itinerant vendor who finally took Layne’s firm no gracias as an answer. And made a sale with the Mexican family at the next table. 

Ron and Layne had grilled fish while I had meat in the Mexican style all with coconut rice and beans. Mexican style was in a tomato sauce, a sort of spicy stew with boiled potatoes. 

Then we walked into town. Rusty checked the room rentals (renta de cuartos) on offer. 

I ended up leashing him as he kept getting distracted by smells and he had a disturbing tendency to head into the street if he saw a local dog he wanted to avoid. 

He was not afraid of every dog he met:

Life in a small Mexican town: 

Why they weren’t in school I couldn’t say:

And here is an example of the famous Tope in action: 

Layne lost her mind and went looking for a camp chair in the beach store. Wasn’t I surprised when she found what we were looking for? 

One for $17 and two for thirty bucks. We took two, amazed at our lucky find ( thank you Layne) after our Pico chairs both failed for two hundred dollars. 

Rusty gave us our lead and we headed back to our respective vans for a nap. 

We had another swim in cooler breezier conditions under a beautiful cloudy sky. 

We had dinner in our new chairs and introduced Ron from Iowa to our Trader Joe’s canned jackfruit doctored to taste like a pulled pork sandwich on a toasted Mexican bun. Layne was very proud of her ease at using our toaster oven which has traveled with us from Cudjoe Key. 

We drank Victoria beer and ate Dulce de leche candies we had bought in town. Rusty was exhausted and took himself to bed after he had his dinner. 

I walked the trash out to the bins at the entrance to the camp sorting our few recyclables on the way, and pretty soon Rusty and I were snoring together while Layne stayed up to read before her time ran out on her library book. Today we move on to what we hope is a splendid wild camp an hour down Highway 200. 

Punta Perula

Ron showed up yesterday and brought us $4000 which in Mexico means two hundred bucks in pesos which has cleared the way for us to sit still and do nothing. This photo is for Wayne who whined at me yesterday I don’t post enough beach pictures. Sigh. 

We have found the RV campground to be to our taste. And despite some cases of Covid among other campers we find ourselves sufficiently isolated we continue our lives unmolested. The other campers in this place treat each other with respect and everyone maintains a proper distance. The operators of the campground do their thing and never appear except to collect the modest campground fee.

I can’t tell if the seawater temperature is warm or if it is simply much warmer than the frigid waters we got used to north of here on the beaches of Sinaloa and Sonora. Whatever it is I spent two long stretches of time in the water yesterday and came nowhere near freezing. I regret the number of days we didn’t swim in the Keys because the “water was too cold.”

I got up early today, all of 7 am which because we’re in the Central Time Zone is just about when the sun rises so Rusty and I could meander the beach.

I was so tired last night after two swims some walks a few glasses of wine with dinner and conversation with Ron, a traveler with stories, I passed out.

A former colleague texted me the temperature forecast for Key West and because Rachel loves the cold I rejoiced for her at the prediction of 46 degrees.

I also got a message yesterday asking if I was homesick. One doesn’t want to be rude but home is where I park it these days. I miss the things, the people mostly, everyone misses when they are on the road and I shall miss knowing the reliable mechanic at Shifting Gears on Stick Island when the van breaks.

I miss bumping into Doug and envying his retired status. I miss ordering fried calamari and the eggplant stack to go from Square Grouper and riding the Vespa in the dusk to go pick them up. I miss dinner and conversation with Wayne and Chuck. I miss live theater and a con leche on the Bench during sound checks at the Green Parrot. I miss the mangrove walks with Rusty. Among other things. 

I don’t miss the state of public discourse in the US, the hair trigger tempers, the threats and the violence. I miss the self confidence of the country I emigrated to and the sense that if things aren’t right we can make them so. I don’t like the need by radicals to paint their political opponents as evil, or hell bent “on destroying America.”

To be a visitor in Mexico is to live in a serene bubble on the edge of world affairs. Without making any effort I have lost weight thanks mostly to the loss of inner turmoil worrying about the future of the 911 center and my suggestions to find a way ahead being ignored by my superiors. I guess they were right: no functions have been lost without me. 

Everyone is useful and no one is indispensable I reminded myself and walked away. Ron has to go back to the States  to work and from time to time Layne has to remind me we suffer no such constraints.

I hope when we return to Key West I will recognize myself as the traveler not the pasty tired office worker. I have no idea what lies ahead, illness exhaustion, mechanical failure, injury, one never knows. But that’s true anywhere and the best I can do is remind myself that the life lived to that  point is what counts. I had a motorcycle accident after a half century of riding. All the outsiders saw was me in the wreck, but what I saw was all the journeys, the commutes, the fun and the misery, the rain the cold, all the good and the bad that led to that moment. 

There are those who read these words  who get angry at me for defying convention and for “taking risks” and I wonder why anyone would follow this modest journey with that attitude. We aren’t pioneers, we aren’t carving new tracks across the planet, and god knows there are thousands of people wandering around living their own dreams on the road that you never hear from; trust me they are there! 

Mine isn’t a journey away from home, away from Gary and Barbara in Tennesse or Webb in South Carolina. It’s not a life that produces a sickness or an exhaustion, it’s given us opportunities to go and see and share lives otherwise not known. Watching snowflakes with Cousin Lynn (okay they were tiny but it was definitely snow) or climbing a saguaro canyon with Cousin David.

Punta Perula isn’t home and on Saturday we plan to get on the road and move our home down the road thirty minutes to a wild camp on the beach we’ve read about. It may work out or it may not. It’s how we live and as odd as it may sound I am happier than I have been in decades. No fixed abode suits me.

That’s about as honest as I can be to answer the question: am I homesick? I regret very little in my life and the regrets I have are the same ones you have about failed relationships, hurting people usually by accident and failing to measure up to one’s own standards. Nothing that happens on the road shall I regret. It’s not in my nature.Now I have to go for a swim and hunt down lunch in the village. Then a nap and another swim and a few more chapters of Nevada Barr before it’s lights out. How’s your day looking?