So one of the things that Puerto Escondido is well-known for is its surf. There are several spots for really good surfing in the area. La Playa de Carrizzalillo, the beach that we look down on from our humble apartment, is great for beginners. Virtually all newbies start here. Then, after some practice or if the waves are super-small here, they start surfing at La Punta and Zicatela.
La Punta is a classic spot - beautiful waves, breaking from left to right; they come in a steady interval; and they can be really big. Not everyone surfs here. It can be big, technical, exhausting, and, oh, there are the rocks beneath the water.
Zicatela is next to La Punta, and it is known for often having huge, heavy, monster waves. Waves here are often big walls of water, without great form, and hard to surf. But when the waves are breaking well and the waves are big, the experts go out, often to get photos and videotape. Zicatela, I gather, can be very dangerous. Lots of water.
Needless to say, Jeremiah and Liesl started their lessons at Carrizalillo, right in our neighborhood. They did spend a couple of days when the waves were too small here at La Punta.
Below are a few shots of Jeremiah and Liesl at Carrizzalillo taken with my camera - not so good. And these are followed by some other shots taken by a friend who also happens to be a professional photographer.
J and L with board on beach.
J making a cut on a wave, trying to avoid the cliff nearby....
Waiting...
And below are some shots of Liesl and Jeremiah at La Punta - the Point - after they developed their skills a bit. These photos are much higher quality, taken by a friend that we met down here who happens to be a professional photographer... enjoy.
Jeremiah in the tube.
Liesl shooting down the face.
Jeremiah just before this huge wave crashed on him...
This weekend we left Puerto to explore nearby Chacahua
National Park, about 2 hours to the west, on the coast. Getting there required
several hours and multiple forms of transportation: on foot to the bus station,
on bus to the pueblo of Rio Grande, in taxi to the banks of the Chacahua Lagoon
– the heart of the national park, and then a 45-minute ride via motorboat (una
lancha) to the town of Chacahua, located on the coast where the lagoon connects
to the ocean.
Here is L and J in the back of a collectivo - a pickup truck with benches and a tarp-cover for the bed, where people climb aboard to ride from place to place for a fee. Part of the very good public transport system here in Mexico.
The view out of the back of the collectivo.
This is Carma - el capitan of our lancha - a very nice, spirited man.
This lagoon is warm, highly productive of fish, birds, and
other wildlife, and it is the largest of a network of lagoons that inhabit the
coast of southern Mexico. (we reviewed our trip to La Laguna de Manialtepec in
an earlier blog). Chacahua is the closest thing we have seen to a tropical paradise:
coconut trees, long sandy beaches, palm-roofed huts and homes, fresh fish, slow
service, and pretty much nothing that has to be done…
Fishermen, father and son, in the lagoon, next to mangrove forests.
A view of the village - this beach is used by sea turtles for nesting/laying eggs.
The view from our window where the lagoon connects to the Pacific Ocean.
Che Guevara has his supporters in Mexico, to be sure. As long as there is extreme poverty, there will be support for Che in Mexico.
The dock on the lagoon.
A Brown Pelican - they are all over Chacahua.
This is the view from inside the mosquito netting in our room. Of course the mosquito netting did nothing to stop the cockroaches, the no-see-ums, the beetles, and other assorted creepy-crawlies.
Elijo - the son of a local restaurant owner, he was 10 years old, charismatic, an amazing surfer, and capable of making fart sounds from all parts of his body. Here is an armpit version.
Here is the back-of-the-knee version.
Fishermen on the lagoon - this is an island filled with cormorants, frigates, and other birds.
A Great Egret in the lagoon.
The bird life here is amazing. This is home to hundreds of
different species of birds. During our three days/two nights based out
of
Chacahua nestled on the edge of the national park we saw ibises,
grackles,
woodpeckers, wood storks, herons, kingfishers, egrets, flycatchers,
terns,
gulls, pelicans, the magnificent frigate, magpie-jays, orioles,
vultures,
cormorants, hawks, swallows, sparrows, and probably a few others.
Magnificent Frigates roosting on an island in the lagoon.
Mangroves and great egrets.
The park apparently was created in the 1930s, when the owner
donated it to the government, sold it to the government, or had the government
take it from him during one of Mexico’s land reform episodes. Most of the lands
of Mexico were “claimed” (some - myself included - might say “stolen”) by the
Spanish Crown in the time of the conquistadores. Much of that land was then divvied up between the
conquistadores and their descendents.
Small amounts of these lands have been returned to the descendents of
the original owners, but these reforms have never gotten too far, and the
legacy of the Spanish Crown’s activities from 500 years ago live on today. But
I diverge…
Chacahua is a small village located on an expanse of coast
between Puerto Escondido and Acapulco with a significant population of people
of African origin. In addition to enslaving the Maya/Mexica/Zapotecs/Mixteca/etc,
the Spanish brought thousands of African slaves, especially to this coast. Many
Africans escaped their oppressors hundreds of years ago, and disappeared into
the wild coast of Mexico, established their own communities based on hunting,
gathering, fishing, etc.
A young Chacahuan.
We have been told that the Indians and the Africans never
got along well. The Spanish mistreated both peoples, and the Africans
mistreated the Indians. As a result, the self-liberated Africans established
their own communities, and did not interact much with the indigenous Mexicans.
Today, all along the coast, there is the very notable presence of people of
African descent – including very dark skin and tightly curled hair. I saw one
fisherman on the lagoon with dredlocks to his waist, in a country with very few
people of African descent elsewhere.
Another legacy of the Spanish presence in Mexico...
This national park is also home to a native crocodile – one
that grows as long as 7 meters! On our boat ride to Chacahua, we stopped at the
croc hatchery that is working to rebuild croc populations in the lagoon, to
eliminate an introduced variety from elsewhere in Mexico, and spur research and
public education.
Welcome to the Cocodrilo Hatchery.
Los Cocodrilos.
We learned in a rather sudden manner that crocs can leave the
lagoon and migrate to other lagoons on the coast, or simply spend time in
saltwater in order to explore, fish, etc. On our last evening, I was on the
shore, splitting my attention between the water (where A, L, and J were playing
in shallow but wild waters), and the sand (where a group of locals were playing
soccer). Suddenly, everyone on the shore is shouting, pointing to the water,
and gathering on the water’s edge. I finally figured out that a croc had been
spotted cruising the shallow water. A, L, and J got the message from a 12 year old surfer who had been hanging around them showing his mastery of the surf board in wild waves. They thought he had been called in to dinner as he paddled quickly by them and in plain English said "get out of the water there is a crocodile" they all came
running back to dry land. Together we spotted the croc, reported by others to
be three meters in length. It swam right through the very same waters where A, L, and J had
been playing just moments before!
Crocs can run on land for short spurts 20 kph, and swim 40
kph. It looked a lot like a fast moving log moving through swells, whitewater,
and waves. Truth be told, there are no reports of crocs attacking people on the
coast that we heard about.
But still!
One more thing about Chacahua. It is also a big destination for surfers.
There is a really nice break that starts far offshore near the mouth of the lagoon
and runs sometimes what must be nearly a half mile down the beach. At the end
of their ride, surfers exit the water, walk back up the beach, jump back in the
water, and do it all over again.
Here are a few shots of L and J and J doing a lot of nothing on shore.
Liesl under sand, and plenty of sand fleas.
J's view of the beach one day at low tide...
...and his view at high tide.
Lucky for J, he can hold his breathe a looooong time.
A loyal sister, trying without success, to save her up-to-the-armpits brother.
It turns out that just sleeping in Mexico is not for the faint of heart. It has taken us a good couple of months to figure out how to get a decent night sleep. The obstacles are many: heat, bugs, and then the various other creatures that may and do wander in...
So we have come to Puerto during 'peak heat'. Through April and May, the temperatures here - and the humidity - have steadily increased. It does not cool down at night. At first, the heat wasn't so bad, but it has recently gotten to the point where it can keep you up at night. Everyone (I mean everyone, not just us) is anxiously waiting for the rains to finally come, to cool things off. It is so hot here that even the locals are complaining (which makes us gringos feel a lot better about ourselves).
At first all the options seemed bad - sleep completely covered by a light rayon or polyester sheet (to protect yourself from the bugs) and become an increasingly sticky, sweaty, uncomfortable mess as the night progresses; or sleep sheetless, and serve yourself up as a buffet for the mosquitoes and whatever other insects are hatched, hungry and nearby.
Mummy-Boy.
And Mummy-girl.
What to do? Bug spray (only the healthy, safe, all-natural kind which we brought and now is gone) became a bedtime ritual. But that only addressed (partially at best) the bugs. If the bites, buzzing, and itching didn't wake you at night, the itching and scratching drove you crazy all day.
As the heat increased, sleep decreased - making the mid-day siesta that much more entising.
Fans - in Mexico, most houses are outfitted with fans - for heat and bugs. So we started keeping the ceiling fans on high all night, and literally re-positioned the beds to be directly underneath them. This helped, but was not enough for Amy, so she brought in the 'big guns' - high speed, portable floor fans that - at their highest setting - sound similar to a jet engine. And it turned out, she wouldn't have it any other way. Ceiling fan on high, jet engine, on chair, on high, bedside. With this, Amy could sleep. (And we know Amy needs her sleep : )
But these tactics ignore those dangers that are undeterred by things like jet engines - like scorpions, land crabs, giant moths, iguanas, geckos (their barking is our early morning alarm clock), and of course the famous 'la cucaracha' and a variety of other large, crawling and flying creatures that we don't have names for - all of which apparently take the view the very Mexican view that "mi casa es su casa."
Two of these land crabs (they live underground all year and then emerge when trigger by the thunder - the beginning of the rainy season) moved in recently. Not huge, probably 6 inches from pincer to pincer. Very fast. Everything here is very fast.
The smallest scorpion bit Jeremiah on the arm, and then scurried (again, very quickly) to neck and head. I don't know what hurt Jeremiah more: the scorpion sting, or Joseph's frantic pounding all over Jeremiah's upper body in a effort crush the poisonous little beast. Jeremiah survived both bite and beating, and has earned yet another new nickname - Scorpion Boy. These are the three that we have killed so far. For the Bogaards, sharing space with wild animals is not, it turns out, extended to scorpions.
This is a moth. It's wingspan is over 6 inches. It was flying around our patio one afternoon. At first, I could not decide whether it was a bird or a bat.
This is a photo Amy took of a tarantula. OK, so she found this six miles from our house, but who knows...
Late yesterday afternoon, we jumped in the back of a collectivo (a pickup truck with a canvas roof over the back) and rode 10 minutes west of town, jumped out at the road to La Playa Delfin (Dolphin Beach) and walked 2km to the Tortuga Camp on the beach where some dedicated souls - families, individuals, have worked for six month stays every year to care for the sea turtles - protecting the adults when they haul themselves up on the beach to lay their eggs, and then to care for the eggs once they are laid so that they are not poached or damaged. (people here have eaten turtles and their eggs for many generations; bad habits are hard to break..."they" that the eggs are an aphrodisiac (more hollow marketing, to be sure).
Actually, today, most people are NOT hunting and eating turtles/eggs, but a few remain, and the tortuga guardians are doing everything they can to protect the sea turtles and rebuild their populations - many of which are endanger of extinction.
These turtles below are golfinos, one of the more secure populations. This year, on this stretch of beach, just 18 "laud tortugas" landed and laid eggs - these are the gi-normous-up-to-800-pound-leatherbacks. Amy had previously been to this site in hopes of volunteering and released the first hatch of leatherbacks this season.
Anyways, we hiked out to the beach, chatted for a 1/2 hour with the guardian, who is also a dad and husband (with his family there) and then released these tiny, fragile creatures that had hatched the same day into the roaring surf and immense ocean. Like salmon, survival to adulthood and reproduction is quite low. It was a quiet, beautiful, moving, humble 'liberacion de tortugas'.
We were joined by a few tourism companies that brought clients out to witness this rite of nature as well. Everyone was quite friendly and moved by the evening.
Scrolling to the bottom, there is a short movie of our family's return trip to the highway - the guardian volunteered his 13-year old son to drive us all, at the same time, on their 4 wheel drive ATV.
Here is the camp - very simple, low budget. The people here are really committed to this work. Always beautiful thing to see. (The photo of the family-caretakers didn't come out well...)
These are the organizations with whom this shoe-string operation is partnering.
Jeremiah and Liesl are greeting all the tortugas, hatched today, before we send them off to the ocean.
There were probably two hundred hatchlings that we released. We are coming to the end of the their season, so their numbers are dropping. Some nights, there are apparently many hundreds. The caretaker described a beach an hour to the east where, at their peak, thousands of turtles arrive nightly. Lots of traffic coming and going...
They keep the nests together - these are all the brothers and sisters from a single nest.
Liesl and tortuga (Liesl is the big one with the green t-shirt)
After the turtles lay their eggs, the guardians, who are roaming the beach all night, carefully dig up the eggs and re-bury them at camp. Gestation in the ground ranges from 45-60 days. They hatch together, emerge from the sand, and head toward the ocean. Here, at camp, they are collected and released together in the evening, to decreased predation and increase survival.
There were about 20 visitors this evening - families, couples, etc. The guy in the foreground was a really nice Puerto Rican who was visiting Mexico.
The Bogaards liberating these tiny creatures.
Adios (this word is a contraction of two words - a (to) and dios (god). This surely seems the appropriate farewell - into roaring surf and an immense ocean.
this is a shot of our ride to back to the highway - L and J on the front rack. A and J on the back rack.
Here is a short movie, sideways, of our ride to the highway. The 13-y-o boy was more than happy to drive us.
