Heading Home Tomorrow

This part of North Beach is really fun. It’s not extremely crowded on the sand because the water is so shallow. It’s easy for people to stand thigh deep for about fifty feet out and then it’s still chest deep for 100 yards out. The yachts start dropping anchor around ten or eleven in the morning in the chest deep water. There’s probably 30 or 40 yachts there with all of their guests standing around talking, drinking, and even eating. Joe and I go out and walk around the boats like we’re at a car show. It’s a strange experience, especially when you have all the different music blaring from each boat.

So here’s the food recommendations. Lunch: Buho’s has the best ambiance during the day, but the least remarkable food. It’s on the beach and sits directly in front of Cabanas Maria del Mar. Tarzan on the beach has great chicken tacos. It turns out that I don’t like grilled fish tacos… I like the fish breaded and deep fried. At Buho’s and Tarzan’s it’s grilled (plancha). Oceanvs has very good fish tacos and expensive too. Ice cold beer and a good glass of wine. The Mayan bar has the best fish tacos, with excellent sauces to doctor the taco with. They also have a cool vibe with swings at the bar where you can eat.

Dinner: Honestly the hot dogs rank at the top for flavor, ambiance, and price (Scalding hot bacon-wrapped dogs smothered in sautéed onions, sit on the curb, 25 pesos), on Vicente Guerrero is an Italian pizza place with great pizza, but I don’t remember the name. Dopi’s is outstanding and is a must for dinner at least once. They’re famous for their steaks. Pier 7 (Muelle 7) is excellent and very romantic out on the dock. Valentino’s has sub-zero temperature beer and good food. One little bar called Tres Menteros (3 lies) has beer from the only brewery on the island. They have a porter that is pretty darn good if you are just hankering for a craft beer, they have several IPAs too.

They have lots of little tiny stores to get a snack with small variety of beers. A larger store near the town square (el centro) has a better selection of stuff and some home necessities, but I wasn’t impressed. Apparently there is a large store called Chuapi or something like that. It’s mid-island and needs a vehicle to get there from North Beach. We never made it. My quest for a decent bottle of wine was difficult, but I finally found a liquor store with a good selection of wine. I think it was on Abasolo near Vicente Guerrero.

We rented a golf cart from our hotel. The prices are pretty close everywhere and convenience speaks loudly. (slather your legs with sunscreen for a road trip because they’re in the sun all day) We went to the southern end of Isla Mujeres and paid the 30 pesos to enter the “park.” (the sign is old and reads 30 pesos or 3 dollars… do the math… :) definitely cheaper to pay the 30 pesos)

As you walk out onto the plain sidewalk, you can’t appreciate the beauty that awaits you! Keep going. Follow the path to your right and go down the stairs. Now you are on a path that winds around the cliff with occasional soakings from the surf.

This is the most eastern part of all of Mexico. The hip thing to do is get there for sunrise, so you can say you were the first person in Mexico to see the sun rise. I wouldn’t know, because there’s no way I’m going anywhere that early :)

We cruised back slowly, mainly because we had the slowest golf cart on the island. We stopped at a marina and had lunch. We ordered chicken nachos and guacamole, which was delicious. Then this couple next to us gave us half a fish and two shrimp tacos because they’d accidentally over-ordered. I thought I was going to be sick, I ate so much! We stopped at a bar with a sign saying “Beer so cold it’ll make your teeth hurt.” It wasn’t even close to the truth. Pretty view though, with lots of resident iguanas.

We got to watch a construction project. It’s hard to imagine being able to get away with their safety standards in California. The building was going up over an existing palapa, so they left the palapa up to use as scaffolding. It really was ingenious.

As most of you know, I like to speed walk for exercise. I also like to do it as a way to explore my surroundings. I love being out in the morning while all the tourists are still sleeping (7:00 or 8:00). The houses all have their doors open wide to let in the cool breezes. Shop doors are being rolling up and trinkets set out on rickety tables. Porches are washed down with soapy water. And best of all it’s shady.

At the other end of the day is the beautiful sunsets. I've always wanted to have my sunset view unobstructed, but this time I found myself fascinated by the humans love of the sunset. it is fun to watch the spellbound people staring into the horizon. It is ritual as old as time.

I’ve been able to write almost every day and finally finished writing my current novel. This one is about a group of teens on a mission trip in Colombia getting kidnapped by a gang. They escape and run to the jungle. With the help of a few locals and the three adults who accompanied them, (Sean, Sport and Pastor Tim) they manage to survive. Of course catastrophe strikes, but they survive. Now it’s time to edit… sheesh, doesn’t it ever end?

So this is my final blog before we head home, though I may do one more for some extra stuff. I have to say, this is the first place I’ve been that I felt I could live.