A frisson of guilt

There is a wonderful word in German that I can´t quite put my finger
on, essentially it means to take a subtle pleasure from the misfortunes
of others... Every letter we have received in the two weeks we have
been in Melaque has mentioned the oncoming winter, rain, cold, grey...
Well if it makes you feel better we had rain last night... Otherwise
the weather has been that typical pacific coast Mexico fall stuff, mid
80´s and lots of sun...
Melaque is situated on a 4 mile long sandy curve with a rocky headland
on each end, it forms 3/4 of a circle, to the south down the beach 2
miles is the town of Barra de Navidad, the Christmas bar. Not a
reference to holiday celebration, it refers to a sand bar there that
forms a lagoon behind the town. Once famous, Barra de Navidad was where
the Spanish first sailed across the Pacific to the Philippines in 1565
proving Colubusus´s theory that it was faster to go east by going west.
Only a few decades later Acapulco with it´s easier road access to
Mecixo City superseded it and it faded into a quite fishing village.
There is a small surfable break of the town jetty but nothing remains
to indicate it´s history. The two headland that form the bay extend
back into the coast range forming a fertile farming valley behind us.
The only disconcerting thing is the ghost town aspect of the pacific
coast at this time of year. Like bicycling in Brittany out of season we
are left to wonder though a landscape obviously designed for huge
influxes of tourist but they are not here yet. We are usually the only
guests at our hotel, a place with 45 rooms... On the weekends there are
a few others but generally it´s just us... The migration is starting,
we took a field trip on Friday 20 miles up the coast then 5 miles west
out to the small seaside village of Tenecatita. At the end of the road
we turned right and at the end of the beach side palapa restaurants
headed up a short steep dirt road over a small headland. On the other
side we found an isthmus of sand maybe 200 by 30 meters connecting the
headland we had crossed with what would have been an island without the
isthmus. On the left was a series of rocks and reefs forming a
breakwater protecting a calm bay with coral reefs and on the right was
a narrow rocky cliff enclosed bay open to the ocean but oriented in
such a way as to avoid most of the big swells. An idyllic spot. The
early birds where already setting up camp, building palapas and
claiming their spots. We meet a couple from Vancouver who had been
coming for 32 years, a man from Port Townsend on his 15th year and a
couple from Colorado coming back for the 17th time... They had nabbed
the prime spots, big shade trees located where they could the sea
breezes and where busy improving the places. They all said the 4-6
months was normal for them and that by December the place would be
packed, maybe 75 people... There are good things about traveling out of
season, we enjoyed an afternoon of uncrowded snorkeling and sitting in
the shade reading... Did I tell you it rained last night?

The photos are of the hotel in Melaque...

Relaxiation

Two weeks in Melaque and two to go. We are loving it! Reading all the time, walking into town for a fish dinner, exploring the country. Yesterday we took a field trip to the itty bitty town of Tenacatita, lovely. A muy bonita barre with Tenacatita Bay on one side and open Pacific on the other. A beach made up of chunky bits of coral. The reef is almost up to the shore, filled with interesting fish and dark coral. We met winter campers from Colorado, Seattle and Canada. The most interesting people with their converted school bus, a custom bumper with, of all things, a commercial pizza oven strapped to the back... Turns out they spend every winter along the coast of Michoacan, they befriended a widow and her disabled son who both bake to make ends meet and they were bringing the oven down as a gift for her. Most campers here hire a team from the little town to rebuild the big palapas, often large enough to park their vehicle under, dig a toilet, and basically set up camp for six months. The folks from BC have been camping here for 30 years, they had to hack the road every year with machetes when they first started. We feel like we are just starting to explore, more adventures to come!