I drove the Altima, my status symbol, and not only is it a comfy, attractive car, it also gets great gas mileage. Heidi, who I concocted the trip with, parked at my place and we went and picked up Amy and Betty, who live in the lower east portion of the Valley of the Sun and we headed out on a sunny, warm Friday evening.
We were busy yukking it up and generally being silly en route and right after we turned off of I-10 to start the southward journey to the border, Amy piped up and declared that she forgot her passport! In order for Americans to get back into their own country from Mexico these days, you need to show a passport. I think we would have been able to pull it off on the return trip as Amy is a tall, willowy blonde and could in no way be really mistaken for being Mexican, at least not in the stereotypical sense. But you never know if you get Lieutenant Neidermeier at the border who would detain us indefinitely until proof of Amy's citizenship came forth. So we decided to err on the safe side and went back for the passport. After all, we were only 1 hour into the journey and that meant an hour dive back and another hour to get back to this point. 3 hours down the toilet, but hey, we were on vacation. The only real concern was getting to the border before midnight because after that, Mexico is closed for the evening.
But we made it and without incident.
I had made the hotel reservation and after taking the underside of my car out on a vicious speed bump in the hotel's drive through guest offloading area, I went inside to check in. I had neglected to call my bank and inform them of my travel plans and I had just gotten back from a Caribbean vacation on Grand Cayman, now I'm trying to use the card in Mexico. To the bank, it looked shady and the card was declined. In a way I was happy that my bank was looking after me as well as covering their ass in avoiding refunding my money if some low life slime ticket had appropriated my debit card, but then I had, like, no money. So I went back out to the car and told the girls that we couldn't check in with my card and so Heidi stepped up and put the room charges on her card and we would reimburse her. I would call my bank in the morning and straighten it out.
We went to our room which was really very nice. they are beginning to realize that the gringo money can be very handy and so luxury resorts are popping up all alone the coastline in Baja. There were two queen beds and a safe to lock up our passports. I brought a box 'o Sangria and we partied for a couple of hours before hitting the hay.
The next morning was perfect. I was looking out at the quiet beach and all of a sudden a motor boat towing some sort of inflatable water sled came rushing up to the beach from the open ocean. I was perplexed as to what manner of watercraft that was and was later informed that it was a "banana boat". They are towed behind motor boats as a thrill ride for tourists, or anyone with $5. This particular "banana boat" was shaped like a killer whale. It did not take long for vendors with tents, tables and various and sundry crap to sell turned up on the beach. Our own pool deck was off limits, thankfully, and it was nicely appointed with cabanas, lounge chairs, a swim up bar in one of the pools, everything a gringo could want.
We dressed and went down to breakfast at the hotel dining room buffet. Heidi and Betty took the first round and were gone for the better part of an hour fetching food. After a while Amy and I began to wonder what happened to them. Did they get caught in an unusually long line, or captured somehow by local white slave traders and are now somewhere in Morocco addicted to drugs? I got up and went to see. Waking up in Morocco addicted to drugs would be a welcome relief for me considering the stress I've been under from work lately, so I decided no matter what it was, it was all good. It turned out that the self-serve buffet offerings were strange Mexican items that were not a usual breakfast for Americans, and Heidi and Betty were not interested. There was an omelet line and that's where they were. They were pretty much up next for their order so it wasn't much longer. Amy and I opted for the weird food as we could eat it right then. I cannot tell you what I ate, but it wasn't too bad.
After that we staked out a cabana and parked there for the day. Betty and I had the lofty adventurous idea of snorkeling off the beach and so we had our SCUBA fins, boots, masks and snorkels with us. We decided not to enter off the beach where it had become very crowded with vendors, suckers for the vendors, food wagons, Mangoes on a stick, people renting jet skis and of course, the banana boat operators. We walked down the side of the hotel for a while along a wall that provided a barrier to the pool deck and the ocean. We scrambled down the rocks, suited up and splashed.
Absolutely nothing to see.
I don't know what I was thinking, there is no reef there. It's just sandy bottom all the way out to Baja California. I mean, this was the Sea of Cortez. I have scuba dived it many times, there is cool stuff down there. I've not seen but heard stories of whale sharks, and hammerheads, giant Humboldt squid that will kill and eat anything, including fishermen and scuba divers. I have a friend who caught one once and said it was like reeling in a parachute. But I wasn't really expecting the Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau, just maybe a couple of colorful fish, maybe a little ray. But not only could I not see anything, but I could not see anything! I saw Betty. She saw me. I was taking a new mask out for its maiden swim and thought it was completely fogged, but it wasn't. There was just so much silt kicked up from the goings-on from the beach, that there was total absence of anything to look at save sandy water and my snorkel buddy.
We paddled around out there for a while as it was relaxing to get away from the riff-raff nearer the shore, then we went to shore, carrying our fins with our masks around our necks and me in a shorty wet suit. We looked like weird diver people emerging from the deep. Creatures from the Sandy Lagoon. We went back to the cabana and enjoyed the scenery for a while. Amy, in a moment of giddiness, thought she was going to be able to take a nap in the cabana. Almost as soon as we got to the cabana, the music started. I'm not talking about soothing poolside cool jazz with a humming light saxophone and relaxing xylophone melodies, but loud, and I mean really loud, Mexican music. That coupled with the hoards of screaming kids in the pool made for not the most restful environment.
Heidi and I decided we would take a banana boat ride. Betty had done this before and her advice was "To just hang on". I thought, how hard could that be? So we each took $5 with us and went to the beach. By now there were two banana boat operators (hereinafter to be referred to as whale boat drivers as the sleds were colored and shaped like killer whales). We waited by the spot where one of the operator docked and there seemed to be a lot of kids awaiting a ride. We looked around and saw the other one coming to shore and rather than wait, we went over to that one. The guy who was taking the money looked a few pence short of a quid, missing many teeth and completely devoid of an understanding of English other than to say "Five" and "Want to ride Shamu?" Pronounced "Chamu". Of course we want to ride Shamu, who wouldn't?
I found out I wouldn't after the ride, but I am getting ahead of my story.
We hopped on the whale boat and waited for about 10 minutes for them to find more passengers. They managed to get a young couple and they sat in front of us on the sled. Then before you knew it we were off. I began screaming my lungs out right away. For some reason I was petrified. He went so fast and I felt so helpless and it frightened me beyond words. I don't really know why. I have dived to 120' in barracuda infested waters, been hopelessly lost in the wilderness and had to drink untreated creek water, been to Peru. You would think this would be nothing. But I was in absolute sheer terror. The ride went on for what seemed like hours. He flung us around a point and down by the area where we would be dining that night, then circled around to come back. Hanging on wasn't as easy as it sounded. At one point the girl in front of me fell into the middle and he stopped to let her get situated again. I was hyperventilating and shaking uncontrollably. Heidi then realized my screams were in sheer terror and not in fun. We got back to the shore and I couldn't get off that thing fast enough.
I walked back to the cabana and announced to the others that I just crapped my pants. For some reason they all thought this was funny. I guess the idea of being unceremoniously flung out into the open ocean is appealing to them. Whatever, I was never going to do that again. Fuck.
Betty and I decided it was toddy time and we went to the swim up bar for some libation. As fate would have it there was a drunk American there, surprise surprise, and his level of inebriation was off the charts. He offered to buy our drinks, we refused. Then Amy came by and he fell in love with her. He then produced a wad of folding money from his pocket and flung it into the pool. I grabbed one of the 5's and handed it to the bartender , motioned to the drunk guy and said, "Que pendejo". The bartender got a kick out of that. This gringa can swear in Spanish.
After a while, drunk man was escorted out of there after refusing to pay his bar tab. He tried to charge it to his room, but I don't think he actually had a room at that hotel. Some others joined us in the swim up bar and they found a $10 floating around. Drunk man could have paid his tab if he hadn't tossed all his money into the pool.
We asked the barman where a good place to go have dinner was and he told us about a restaurant in the seafood district or somewhere "downtown" called La Palapa. I think that mean umbrella. He told us to look for a huge palapa atop the building. So we took a cab and told him we wanted to go to La Palapa.
When we got out of the cab at La Palapa, there was what we thought was the Maitre 'D waiting outside with a menu. He was dressed nicely in a clean Aloha shirt and he asked if we were dining with them this evening. We said yes and he escorted us to a table. Then he sat down with us. We still thought he was a host of some sort so we yukked it up and made jokes up until he asked us to buy him a drink. We all sort of looked at each other with a "What the F***" expression and it occurred to us them that he was a local scamster looking for freebies. So we caved and bought him a drink. He originally asked for a beer and when it came to him ordering he took a rum and coke. Then he sat there for the longest time trying to talk Betty into going to the disco with him that night, I'm sure all on her dime. After a while everyone was looking down at the table and I was giving Taco Head my best "Get lost, Friendo" look. Finally he got it and left. He later ordered a meal and asked the waiter to ask us if he could put it on our tab. I think all at once we said "No!".
We looked around in the shops after that at all the vulgar t-shirts, cheap jewelry, and general crap you would find ultimately in a garage sale. We wandered over to a huge statue they have in the town square called El Camaronero. It's a man riding atop a huge shrimp. So, we took it that Camaronero meant "Shrimp Rider", like a Caballero is a horseman. Some weeks later upon speaking with a Latin American friend, I was informed that a Camaronero is a guy who catches shrimp. Like a Shrimperman. That blew it. I liked the idea of Shrimp Rider much better, because it was so completely preposterous it was hilarious.
After an hour or so of browsing the market and being duly offended by the vulgar t shirts we decided it was time to go back to the hotel. Then came the task of finding a cab to get us back there. We wandered for a while until we found a corner where a lot of taxis drove by and we flagged one down.
The next day we had a decent breakfast and a look around locally by the hotel, then headed back stateside.
The WhaleRider (aka The ScubaJedi)
1 comment:
Ahh yes, the bananna boat. I've had the non-pleasure myself one time down there with my ex husband. I ended up flying up and totally beaning him in the face with my tail bone. I then fell off. I hated it and never want to do that again.
:)
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