Both Mike and I came down with some sort of dysentary-type thing - Mike was actually sick in bed with it, but I only had some annoying, TMI symptoms. But when our nephew had the same thing in La Paz, I kept the prescription information and went down to the pharmacy yesterday and picked up a cure. We are all better now. I suspect the water here is a bit dicey, so we will have to be more careful. I do get careless about that sort of thing even though I know I shouldn't. After all, I have been in Mexico for months and want to get used to all this, but I am beginning to think it doesn't work that way. And every locale is different and gets their water from different sources. And the smallest street vendors all sell bottled water along with soda and juices. So there is no need to actually drink the water.
Otherwise there is not a lot of exciting news. We have had a couple of days of threatening weather that did not turn into anything, although the night before last all of us on boats were awakened at 2 am by our rocking boats and the sound of wind in the rigging. We cleared our decks of anything that might blow away or cause a problem, checked our docklines, and settled down to wait for another chubasco (short violent squall accompained by high winds, rain, thunder and lightning) but luckily it never came. It did thunder and lightning and rain on us, but the wind didn't get high like the last time. I just looked at the weather and there is something brewing south of us, but so far no indication it will be a problem here. Right now it is overcast, a little windy, but nothing dramatic. There is a cloud bank that looks suspicious, but that's all and it is a distance from us.
This is the town taken from a hilltop. The big smokestack is from the old mining operation that is not functioning anymore. They never got rid of the old smeltering operation. It is just sitting there, rusting away.
Here is the marina gate with Mike carrying a load of groceries to the boat.
Here is Magda Jean in her slip.
And here is the marina office.
So now you can see where I am spending my days. We usually stay at the most yuppie marina we can find - believe it or not, that is Mike's choice, not mine - but this place is actually a lot of fun. They have a big lending library inside - most marinas do - which tends to run towards Tom Clancy, James Patterson, and Barbara Taylor Bradford. They do have some good stuff - I found a John LeCarre I hadn't read, and right now I am reading a T.C. Boyle I hadn't read, so that is pretty good.
Mike is still in bed. We went out last night for the famoous hotdogs, but after that we decided to go to a pool hall. It was interesting. My friend Heather and I were the only women other than the one running the place. We were quite a novelty - I had no idea I was one of the most beautiful women in Mexico, as I was told repeatedly. There was a lot of beer flowing, and what was nice was that after a while, it was not just the gringos buying. Mike and our friend Ron were playing pool all night with some guys who insisted on buying the beer as well. The woman who runs the place kept giving Mike back some of the extravagent tips he always leaves when the beer is cheap (I think she thought he was too drunk to know how much he was putting down). Heather and I did have to fend off some persistent suitors - we have decided that there are times when it is best to pretend to speak no Spanish. The woman who ran the place did run some of them off for us - we saw her take one or two of them aside and talk firmly and they slunk away. I suppose we should not have been there once we saw there were no other women, but too late now. It was a good time, and is the way things go when you are not in a tourist town.
By the way, when you are in Mexico, sometimes you see bars that bill themselves as "Ladies Bar". I thought that meant it was a good place for women to get together and have drinks with their girlfriends, sort of like "Ladies Night" in the US. Well, I was wrong and I am glad I found out before I blundered into one. Here, a "Ladies Bar" is a brothel, pure and simple. I found out from one of the septugenarians living down here on his boat. The old fellow was very interested in telling me he frequented the one here. Who knew? Mike almost split a gut laughing at me when I told him what I had thought.
Well, that is enough for now. I wish everyone a really good day!
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