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:


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):

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....

weather

What you have to understand when you look at the scenery photos is that last year, Hurricane Dean came in and completely destroyed this whole part of the Yucatan coastline. Its eye passed over Mahuhual, which is 25km from here. The cabanas were destroyed, the trees were destroyed, everything, twisted wreckage or dead. It was the 2nd most powerful hurricane to hit the Yucatan since they've been keeping records, apparently.


It makes for some eerie landscapes. The sunset photo in the previous post looks like something from Apocalypse Now -- at least that's what I thought when I took the picture. It was devastating for the region; they'd just built a huge pier for cruise ships (destroyed). They'd just done a major renovation project on Mahuhual so it was cruise-ship-people friendly (i.e., mostly bars, restaurants, and tchotchke shops) - all destroyed.

This morning after breakfast we drove into Mahuhual to look for a new face mask to replace Marc's, since the strap was about to tear in half. It was like a ghost town, very very sad. They're rebuilding, and it is great looking for what it is. Photos to come. Still, it's very sad.

I'm feeling a little like Quasimodo, who went mad with the bells (the bells! the bells! the bells!), but for me it's the wind. It never stops blowing. Marcia said the winter has been very windy; today it's been ~23 miles per hour without stopping for even a second. It blows on my face all night, which makes my hair tickle my face and wakes me up. It blows in every corner of our cabana, when we're trying to get some sun on the beach, when we're doing any damn thing. Growing up in Texas, I'm used to the wind. But still. Good grief.

We went snorkeling again this afternoon, but the winds were so high the water was choppy with big waves so I came back to the shore after just 5 minutes or so. Marc continued on, snorkel trooper that he is, and had a nice look around. More starfish, more red and yellow and blue fish. I watched nervously from my chair on the beach, watching his red snorkel tip.

For lunch we had salbutes, which were amazingly wonderful. That's the pattern; breakfasts are very nice, lunches are amazingly wonderful (yesterday was chicken enchiladas in a homemade mole sauce that was so subtle and delicious), dinners are meh. Last night? Spaghetti with chicken or shrimp in the marinara sauce. Every day I forget to take my camera to lunch with me; tomorrow I hope I remember.

salbutes

Having a simply wonderful time. Sun and good food, relaxing and reading, wandering around together, walking on the beach. Really good times.