Sunday, April 6, 2008

saving daylight

Mystery solved with the whole time thing: Mexico changes the clocks today, spring forward and all that. I've been so confused, since all maps show us in the Central time zone but we were 2 hours behind NY. Now the world is right again, one hour behind.

I could've titled this post wildlife day, because it's been great that way. After breakfast we loaded our gear in the car and went back to the shipwreck spot we found yesterday. On the way, as we passed a huge mangrove field, an enormous flock of birds flew up in response to our car and we saw roseate spoonbills among them. White versions and white herons, plus the gorgeous pink ones. We'd heard about them at dinner last night but we weren't expecting to see them. It was very cool. Of all the days NOT to have our camera!! I tracked down this picture on the web:

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On the way back, guess what was crossing the road? A tapir. An honest to goodness tapir. They look like they're surely related to pigs, right? Their closest relatives are horses and rhinoceroses. I know. You'd never guess that. Again, no camera (and thanks, wikipedia, for the photo):

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And in between, we snorkeled. The weather was absolutely, positively perfect. Warm but not scorching, a small breeze but not a wind, and relatively clear water in so many shades of blue. Turquoise, and aqua, and teal, and pale pale blue, and navy, and greenish. We saw more than a dozen kinds of fish, orange ones and blue ones with yellow tails and plate-shaped blue ones, and a black one that looked like a big angel fish and striped ones and a big red one with a bug eye. A sargeant major. Little brilliant yellow ones with a black dot, and some soft yellow orange ones with no decoration. Fish that looked like gravel. A reddish-brown one with a weirdly shaped belly. A wide variety of striped fish, vertical and horizontal versions. We saw a large ray with a big head, and we saw it swim away, flapping its wings. A passle of pelicans - big ones - sitting on the wrecked ship, looking all shy with their big old beaks lowered against their chests. Little sand lizards on the beach. Needle fish in the shallows, swimming fast in formation.

Since we don't have an underwater camera, we quickly found images of a few of the fish we saw today:


It was so much fun, snorkeling side by side, seeing the beautiful fish and spending this lovely day together. At the water's edge, the water was sometimes in these little pools. Some were cold and some were really warm, so we spent some time just playing in a warm one before we left.

We're both bright (and hot) pink, but I know how this will turn out. Marc will develop a deep tan, and I'll peel and return to my whiteness. The white girl's burden, I suppose.

Here are a few more photos Marc took on his walk this morning.

Keep away - is that a little devil?
And oh the irony. No tirar basura means no littering.
SO Mexico.
Hurricane sale, you could probably buy this pretty cheaply.
Frigate birds flying overhead like the Nazgul.

Really, so much fun. The days are long and relaxing, who could ask for more of a vacation....

1 comment:

shellieb. said...

WOW!What incredible photos. As an artist I'm totally blown away by the beautiful blues contrasted by pure white. Muchos gracias!!!