Beach Day

Today (after Hilda stopped by the boat and dropped off our clean laundry) we took the dinghy and went to a beach just down the way from where we are anchored.  It is the proverbial palm-fringed-soft-sand-curved-shoreline beach you see in pictures in travel magazines.  There are palapa restaurants all along the shoreline, and they serve wonderful fresh seafood and cold beer.  We had some of both, then went swimming in the nice clear water.  However, we are spoiled after spending the summer in the 90 degree water in the Sea of Cortez, and this water is about 80 degrees.  It actually felt sort of cold.  Not too cold for me, it felt nice,  but not warm.  The irony is that if the water had been 80 degrees in San Diego, you would not be able tyo get me out of it.  How fast things can change!  But it was still a lot of fun.  I have not been swimming since October in Mazatlan, not counting in a pool.  I do miss jumping off the boat for a swim the way we did in the sea.  But it gets warmer the further south we get.  If we were in Mazatlan now, I would not dream of trying to swim - it would be too cold. 

Other than that, we haven't been up to much except researching new refrigeration systems.  I think unless the friend we are planning to hook up with in Huatulco (our next stop) comes up with a fix for this one (between him and Mike, most things seem to get fixed) we will most likely live without refrigeration until Panama, which I figure will be later on this summer.  It is becoming a really attractive idea, doing without it - but I must be honest, we are in port, have access to plenty of ice to keep everything cool, and access to tiendas we can shop at every day for fresh food, or we can eat out.  Once it gets the slightest bit of a hassle or I have to do without something, I will likely change my mind.  Right now there are a bunch of formerly frozen things buried under a big layer of ice - neither of us wants to dig through it - you get the picture.  Meanwhile, we are sampling the restaurants here!  Last night I had chicken mole - it was excellent, with a strong chile flavor mixed with the chocolate. 

Tonight we are having left over bean soup Mike made that has been on ice for a day or so - I am looking forward to it, it is very good.  He is a good cook, as good as I am or better.  But we both have our specialties, so we balance each other out, I suppose.  We are also planning on watching a movie, maybe two if we aren't tired.  We can buy DVDs on the street here in the mercados for about 25 pesos, which is less than $2.50.  They are in English too, no problem.  We set them so we can watch them with Spanish subtitles.  That has turned out to be surprisingly helpful with a couple of British movies where I could barely understand the English being spoken in the film. 

Well, that sums it up for today.  A nice, quiet, peaceful day here in the anchorage - another Valiant came in - they stopped to talk with us.  We Valiant owners stick together!

"What a long strange trip its been!"  (Grateful Dead)