Huh. You’re still here. Wow, surprising. We left off around the 17th of December, and now I’m starting 2019’s beginning. And it starts with some rain.
Eventually, New Year’s Day rolled around. That time when you look back on how you failed last year’s resolution and shrug, look back on what you accomplished and also shrug, plan your new resolution and shrug. For our New Year’s Day, we drove for a long time to a place called Santa Rosalia.
My favorite thing to do it just sit and drive. Obviously I don’t drive – though I’m only less than a year from my learners permit – my parents do, and I put my music on and stare absently out of the window. Most people have something they love to do, some like movies, some like knitting, some like sketching and though I adore sketching and reading, I’m almost always listening to music. I won’t state what artists I love most, mostly because not everyone likes them and y’all don’t need to know. But I have hundreds of thousands of songs I jam to, and being in any mode of transport is the perfect opportunity usually to do that.
We explored the town’s little areas, mostly taking interest in Monsieur Eiffel’s metallic mission. It was a little disappointing, but then we went to Mulege, which really wasn’t. A funny little village with a peculiar vibe to it. This was 1st of January, 2019. We didn’t celebrate much.
Agua Verde
On the 7th, we left for Agua Verde, the cute anchorage I previously spoke about, for a couple nights. It was truly lovely to be back there, peaceful and content. The highlight of Agua Verde this time, was going up the mast which was both very fun, and very scary at the same time. The view was pretty neat and extremely dizzying.
We left shortly after this photo was taken, since the swell started picking up and we were fed up with rocking. We scooted over to Los Gatos. Weird name, since it translates to The Cats. Fine by me! However, this isn’t how most cruisers refer to it, it’s typically referred to as “MANUELLLLL!!!!” When we arrived in Los Gatos, the first thing we noticed was the most gorgeous, astounding “pink lava” rock formations oozing around the coast. The second thing was a small fishing panga. Then we saw a small figure hop onto the fishing panga and then speed off. We breathed a little easier, only to see him come returning, full throttle, back to us, where he bumps onto our boat and starts bombarding us in friendly Mexican.
My parents smile and laugh and chat with him in broken mex-Spanish and broken English. Manuel, whose name we now knew, offered us a bag. I was cooking at the time, but had I been allowed to say what popped into my head, it would’ve been a hearty “Parents, no.” But of course they opened the bag. Thank god the only thing in there was a collection of pretty, hand made needle works by Manuel’s wife Susannah. We purchased two, and gave Manuel a couple beers. To make an attempt at conversation, we gesture vainly to the sea and ask how the fishing is. Manuel nods and grins broadly, beaming up at us form his panga.
“Bueno! Si, si! Bien!” And we are temporarily proud of our español.
We wave him goodbye, and I cry out a nice “Adios mi amigo!” Only to hear him holler back a “No! No! Regreso!” And we freeze.
We figured out pretty quick what happened. He was going to get us fish. Dad doesn’t eat fish – I know, I know – and anyways, we won’t have a way of skinning it or cleaning it. But it was too late. Manuel’s sunny beam reached us before he did, grinning ear to ear, with two rock groupers in buckets behind him.
Five minutes later, we have two very annoyed fish glaring at us from a bucket and a very proud Manuel bartering over trade prices. We gave him the last of our cash, and two of our five beers. So we offer him another beer and he says no. We offer him a pitiful amount of cash and his eyes narrow and he says “NO. Mas dineros. Mas.” And we all exchanged a look of pain. Suddenly, he spied our gasolina and points frantically for that. Dad, quick on his feet, tells him the giant 5+ gallon tank is empty. So we give him our little gasoline tank for the dinghy and he empties it into his 50 horse power panga engine.
He waved and sped off into the deep blue. We dump out the cranky fish, they did manage to swim off. I’m pretty sure the larger of the two groupers rudely gestured at us, and the little one stuck out its tongue. A couple nights before we arrived back into La Paz, we relayed our story of Manual to Peter and Janet, who gasped and said “maNuEL?!” And told us their story. They had been alighted of their 5 gallon tank taken much to Peter’s annoyance. Of course they didn’t warn us of Manuel and his selling tactics. They said it was a very important “experience” and they couldn’t let us miss this “cultural encounter.”
Sure.