Mexican Independence day on September 15th was pretty much celebrated
the entire week leading up to the Sunday it fell on. We had the opportunity to go to Jordan's
school celebration on Friday the 13th where the parents all cooked food for a
potluck style buffet while the kids did traditional Mexican dances and talked
about the pride they have for their country.
It was one of the cooler cultural experiences we've had in Mexico and a
side of this country few Americans have the pleasure to take part in. Melissa learned to cook tacos dorado (fried
tacos with chicken and potatoes inside) with help from Anjelica a local friend
and our nanny which we brought to the event.
Later some locals from the school celebration told Anjelica that "the
gringo can really cook" referring to her plate of tacos. She kept Melissa's secret not letting them in
on her helping out.
Jordan with his classmates.
Tacos Dorado
Right after our Friday celebration two weeks ago tropical
storm Manuel plowed up the Mexican coast line dumping between 20-25" of
rain between Acapulco and Mazanillo. It
then took a break, went out to sea, decided to become a hurricane, then came
back inland stronger than before to lay another ass whoopin' on Mexico from Mazatlan to areas
north. While not a serious category 2+
hurricane it dumped more than enough rain to wash out bridges, cause rock
slides, flood the streets of Zihuatanejo
to the point of having cars float off into the bay and wash away just
about everything in its path. This
impacted the majority of the Pacific side of Mainland Mexico. Needless to say it probably has been one of
the worst tropical storms we've experienced.
Being on the top
floor of the condo building and having an open air palapa as a living room really
trashed everything. We had a couple of
inches of rain consistently over 3 days to wade through in the living area and
we've been without internet for almost 2 weeks running. Fortunately power was only out for a little
over 12 hours and didn't ruin all of the food we had just purchased a couple
days earlier. Surfing was basically out
of the picture for the first week after the storm with the rivers running wild
and emptying anything that got in their path into the ocean.
The road from Troncones to Ixtapa swallowed up by the river.
The view trapped inside for a five days.
Saladita where we surf most frequently is a long point break
a click north of a river mouth. When we
went back a week later, whole trees that had been ripped from the river banks
littered the shore line and floated just outside the lineup. Sand had been scoured off the beaches which
was replaced with a combination of ankle to knee deep wood, plastic bottles and debris of
all shapes and sizes. It's been a real
wreck and we didn't even get the worst of it.
Acapulco probably got the brunt of the damage from what I saw on the
news a week later when I could finally access the internet. Supplies were cut off from there with the
main highway to Mexico City closed.
Things seem like they are finally getting back to normal here 2 weeks later.
The storm was a real kick in the teeth considering surf had
been horrible or nonexistent for almost 6 weeks leading up to the devastation
of Manuel. Afterward we had a few decent
days of surf and things really felt like they were getting back to normal. That's when we decided that we'd hire a boat
and hit a couple of remote spots that are difficult to access by car knowing
that they would likely be devoid of surfers.
After 3 days of clean conditions and fun overhead waves, we
hopped on a panga boat we hired in Mahajua just up the road from our place
yesterday. We had a few close friends
we've been surfing with join us for what we thought would be a fun day of good
swell and surfing breaks that we would virtually have to ourselves. As we departed the bay, we noticed that a
mild off shore wind blowing which was a good sign. The dark clouds look like they were pushing
north and the sun was rising behind us which was another good omen. Within 30 minutes our ride to our first
stop, a break known as Palo Alto, turned choppy but largely unaffected us since
the pushing south swell was coming in directly behind us.
When we saw the break from the boat it looked like it was
surfable although not the perfect conditions we'd hoped for. Since this was a paid expedition we waxed up
our boards and jumped into the open ocean for the creepy deep water paddle over to the the breaking reef. It's really
difficult to tell what the wave are like when you watch them sweep in from
behind the boat and disappear over the reef.
Once you're near the impact zone though you find out very quickly what the
conditions are truly like. Storm swell
was mixing in with the solid ground swell making for a disorganized peaky mess yet
still surfable. We stayed in the water
with our crew catching a few 6-7 foot waves.
Melissa rode a nice one in a bit too far and paid the price with a 10
wave beat down on the inside which took her about 10+ minutes to paddle back
out through. I took off on a wave in the
same set and kicked out when the wave I was riding shut down only to see 4
hulking waves behind it. All 4 crushed me as I duck dived them to get back out to
the take off zone. When I did, I noticed
everyone on this suicide mission had been washed up into the rocky inside
leaving me floating alone in the lineup.
When the team finally made it back out we decided it was too
disorganized at Palo Alto and we should check the Ranch which we surf off and
on when the muddy road is passable to the break. We all piled back into the boat to see our 15
year old captain surveying what was becoming an increasingly choppy ocean as
the wind picked up. The ride over to the
ranch was short and very bumpy. When we
got there, it looked much better than Palo Alto since it's a point break the waves
appeared to be sweeping down the point
versus slamming head on into the reef we were just at. Once again, we tossed our surfboards over the
side and jumped in the water to paddle over to the few guys already surfing it.
While ridable it still wasn't what we were hoping for. Since we were shelling out cash for the boat
we all stayed in for about 90 minutes surfing.
We all caught mushy head high rides that hardly justified the cost of
the boat. When we'd had enough we
started back to the boat. I was first to
start the paddle back since I have a rib injury and it was really beginning to
hurt. The instant I started to paddle
for the boat our captain who was fishing moved it further south of us in what
appeared to be an effort to find fish while he waited for us. This also positioned the boat so that it had
about 300 yards of open water with the south swell pushing directly at us. This caused what we've been calling the treadmill
effect. You paddle your ass off, yet you
go nowhere. As I paddled for the first
10 minutes, it was like the boat was no closer than when I started. It kept appearing a disappearing as it bobbed
up and down on the building wind swell.
Somewhere around the 20 minute mark I finally made it back to the boat exhausted
from the paddle back. Slowly our crew
started to appear on the horizon working hard to reach the boat as our captain
dodged incoming rouge peaks to pluck everyone from the ocean.
Once back on the boat we caught our breath and started back
towards home. The same swell that we had
to paddle back into was now plowing head on into our boat spraying us with
water constantly and threatening to toss us out. Our top speed was probably between 2 and 4
knots which put us into a dicey situation having to spend 2 hours chugging back
home through a white capping ocean. I
was pretty concerned at many points during the ride back that we'd run into
serious problems as the conditions continued to deteriorate. However, our captain navigated the terrain
well and got us back in one piece. A job
well done by a kid that couldn't have been more than a freshman or a sophomore
in high school.
As I type this, it's pouring down rain again with blustery
winds. We're really, really looking forward to the dry
season in Nicaragua in November.
Tree Frog staying dry in the breezeway.
Double rainbow post storm.
