Tuesday
We started the day with long e-mail messages home. Then across the street to the coffee place where we ate our own fruit and barra pan (bread with ham/cheese/jalapeñas baked inside). We met Michelle and were headed to the beach when we met Hortensia. She’s the sweetest lady. When Lydia had been to Isla Mujeres before, Hortensia had made her a couple of swimsuit cover-up dresses from those sarongs that everybody wears, for 85 pesos each. About $13 CDN. I picked out a couple of colours and away she went…. Measuring me, ripping fabric, and going to town on her sewing machine. It was great fun to watch, and within 10 minutes I had a new dress. Lyd ordered one too, and we told her we’d be back for all 3 at the end of the afternoon.
We lazed about all afternoon. Funny how addicting doing nothing can become. On the way home I stopped to pick up my dress (and have them both lengthened a couple of inches) and talked with Hortensia’s daughter Rachel for about a half an hour almost totally in Spanish. She’s 21 and studying in Cancun to become a lawyer. She was sure interested when I showed her a picture of Jeff (.
The three of us (Sue, Lyd & Michelle) decided to eat out tonight. We craved fish, and without a kitchen it’s a little difficult to cook one up. So, we headed to Las Balcone Arriba (or something like that). Michelle started out with a strawberry daiquiri that was big enough to swim in. Lyd and I had Coronas. Lyd had fish soup, I had red snapper. Michelle had shrimp & fish shishkabobs. Mine, with 2 beers, came to 100 pesos ($15 CDN).
On the way home we bought ready-made margaritas (Lyd & Michelle). Mine was just the lime mix, and some peanuts, and headed for the terrace, where we sat around till about 10:00 listening to Michelle’s adventures around the world. (Saudi Arabia, and a trip to India where she got a parasite that started eating her from the inside out). She was ‘out of it’ and doesn’t remember anything for a week. She had to be air-lifted out. She really didn’t totally get over it for 5 years. And she’s still travelling!!
Today is Wednesday, I think.
I decided to start the day with a walk. It seems every time we go out, we go a different direction, so I’m still trying to get my bearings. An American gentleman approached me, and asked if I spoke Spanish. He needed help at the pharmacy, so off we went. Well, it turned out that his wife needed medication for cystitis, or cystosis, or something – a urinary tract infection! Well, I don’t know THOSE words! ( We were able to communicate the general vicinity of the infection, but couldn’t quite narrow in on it. She gave us some vaginal stuff, but that wasn’t right. Anyway, we left. I went to the nearby hospital and he went off looking for a doctor. Five minutes later I saw him walking away from the drugstore with a bag, so I guess he (and his wife) were happy. (
I came back, and Lyd was gone. No note. I left again and she whistled me down at the coffee place on the corner. We headed off to an internet place. As it turns out those 2 long messages I sent didn’t go. They got deleted somehow I think. And the second part of the last one got sent to Adolfo (my Spanish teacher). Ooops, won’t he be surprised!
Lyd and I decided to go for a walk along the coastline. Out past the airstrip to Las Brisas, a house she and Dwayne had rented the first time they were here 2 years ago. They’re constructing a walkway all along the edge of the ocean. It’s going to be really nice when it’s done. As it is now, it’s Mexico after all, it looks like a trash heap in one area, rubble and rock all pushed aside in another, and paradise right next door. We had quite the walking tour, and it was really quite fun. We caught a cab back into town, because it is getting really hot!
We packed a lunch and headed for the beach where Michelle was already. It’s kind of a weird day. It’s very, very hot, but there seems to be a storm brewing on the horizon. I think I burned my back though. Lyd stayed in the water too long, and has burned her face. Her foot cracked right below the ball of her foot, and is very painful, and her ankles are swollen. Her arthritis is kicking in every time she climbs the stairs. Ain’t it fun getting older!
We decided to take the 6 peso bus ride around the island. It doesn’t actually go all the way, just over to another area. Very interesting little jaunt. Oh yeah, I had to take a picture of This! We saw this huge gaping hole in the sidewalk, a sinkhole really, about 6 feet deep with water in the bottom. Right in the middle of the sidewalk. To mark the "Danger" there was a stick with a plastic shopping bag tied to it! Go figure. It IS Mexico!
On the way home, we grabbed some ceviche and salsa & chips to go. Drinking Crystal Light tonight.