La Playa - Day 3

Date: July 1, 2007 9:25 AM


Hola mis amigos y amigas!

Yesterday was just one exciting event after nothing. I did manage to escape the confines of our luxurious jail briefly when I arranged (finally!) a driver to come pick me up and take me into Monterrico proper. It wasn’t much and it was hot as blazes but at least I got to see it.

More importantly, I managed to arrange today’s adventure. which was a dawn tour of the protected preserve that is down here. Yes, that’s right, yours truly, got herself up at 4:15 for a 5am pick-up to go tour around the preserve at dawn. And it was so worth it. With any luck I got some good shots. I certainly tried taking enough of them. But more about that later.

I spent about an hour and 1/2 in town. Crystal was feeling better, but wisely opted not to go as she wanted to stay close to a bathroom. I’m pretty sure there was another ‘major’ street there, but I wasn’t sure where it was and didn’t want to wander too far off the main street I was on by myself. I bought a necklace made from agate washed up from the sea. I gave that to Crystal, since she hadn’t felt like doing anything while we were here except sleep and I bought myself a Montericco t-shirt, which probably won’t fit after I wash it the 1st time. (They do not make anything with any hip room down here.)

I also bought Crystal some soda crackers just in case she went back to not being able to keep anything down. Those came in handy for her as an easy snack. I tried to buy myself a snack but together it was more than the small bills I had and the ‘big’ convenience store didn’t have change for Q100.

I felt better about being “trapped” at the resort once I had the opportunity to go and see and know that there wasn’t much I was missing.

The worst thing I saw was the 6 poor horses someone has so tourists can ride on the beach. They were out on the beach, standing on the hot, hot sand, no shade and no water for them to drink. I took some pictures, just because it was interestingly juxtapositioned with an upturned boat, but I felt really very sorry for them. I just don’t understand how someone cannot take care of animals that are providing you with a living. It reminded me of the poor donkeys on Santorini, standing in the broiling sun with no water to drink.

(Returning after a brief pause for desayuno (breakfast)) ANYWAY, I came back, we ate lunch and then retired to our room to relax while the heat of the day blazed on. It is pretty hot and humid down here at the beach. Think Florida in the summer. I napped for an hour or so. Crystal napped the rest of the afternoon. About 4 I finally got my suit on, slathered myself up with sunscreen and ventured out the lovely zero-edge pool that faces the beach. It’s great! You can hang on to the edge of the pool and stay cool in the water and watch the huge waves pound the beach. It’s the best of both.

I stayed at the pool until after the sun set, having my afternoon Bombay and tonic and wandered back to room around 6:30. Crystal was up but had been so for only about 40 minutes or so. She’s calling this her lost week-end.

We went to dinner and I bravely tried the grilled shrimp. I say bravely since I hadn’t eaten shrimp since my unfortunate episode possibly caused by shrimp not cleaned very well. Once again they served them with their heads on. A practice I do not get. The things look like giant sea bugs. Why on earth do you want to see their heads on your plate? If I decide to have any more shrimp (unlikely), I must remember to request “No cabezas de camerones, por favor”. I ate 4 out of 6 and they were very good and I’m not sick today, so I guess everything is fine.

i had a white Russian for desert. One of the best I’ve had, I must say. And Crystal and I retired to our bungalow and watched an episode of The Closer I had downloaded earlier in the week from our machine at home. (Gotta love technology sometimes!) Read some and went to bed because.......

I had to get my ass out of bed at 4:15 this morning in order to be picked up and taken back into Monterrico for our dawn excursion into the protected wetlands. Altho, they don’t allow development they do allow the shrimpers of Monterrico to continue to shrimp in the area and we saw a couple of boats doing so.

It was absolutely worth the early call to be out on the water as dawn broke. I took a ton of pics and will have them up real soon, I promise. I hope some of them turned out. There were dozens of white cranes I kept trying to get a picture of, so I probably have a bunch of foilage shots but no cranes because they were too far away. Lots of mangrove forests and swamp grass areas that made me think of the salt marshes around Tybee Island. The depth of this area also fluctuates with the tide but not to the extent of the Tybee marshes. These always have water, but certain times it is higher or lower depending on the tide.

Also, as it dawned and the sky lightened, the full moon was still visible in the sky opposite for a while. It would have made a great pic with the right equipment, but not my equipment.

So, now it’s all of 9:30am and we are here until 2:30 but it’s really too hot to be outside unless you are around the pool. So we’re just going to chill in our room until it’s time to go back to Antigua and I can get the lastest news posted.

It turned out to be not a bad week-end (at least for me, I’m not sure how Crystal feels about it. But she’s a good trooper.) I did find SOMETHING TO DO and also did a whole lot of nothin’. Which is a good thing sometimes, too.

Hasta luega!
mel