Mon 4 Feb 2008
Day 147 Santiparc Beach, Baja California, Mexico
Pat and Drake had made friends with an Israeli couple that were cycling south; we passed them 2 days before and they came over to have a go on the kayaks. I was mooching around the van, gluing flapping parts and spraying WD40 on rusty bits and messing up Sheena bed in the back in the process. I had to have a bit of a tidy though, it was messed up. Its simpler for her though since all her stuff is concentrated in one backpack and my gear is stowed all over the place. The wind was blowing around, on and off, strong then soft, making it cold out of the sun and then too hot in it. It didn’t know what it was doing. We said we would give them a lift into town when they came back and figured they would be about an hour but they were gone ages! The wind was blowing right out from the beach though so they had a nasty headwind to overcome to make it back and we were just getting more worried when they rounded the headland and came into view. They were cycling around the world, I’m guessing a little breeze wouldn’t tax them too much…
We formed up the convoy and went into town, it was high time for me to do my laundry so I dropped it off and met the 3 others at a local taco place for some great cheap food, which was generously covered by Pat. Its a good job I eat fish now as the fish taco places are all over and cheap and delicious. I had some shrimp ones and they give you a case full of salad and condiments to drape over them. Really good stuff. I dropped Sheena at the Internet cafe and then went looking for a tire place to fix my flat. The only place I found couldn’t repair it and didn’t have any spares, I would have to find another solution as the spare was useless and also meant my insurance was currently worthless. The tire guy suggested a place 20km south of town and didn’t mention anywhere else nearby so I thought his was the only show in town… Across the road I filled up our containers and the solar shower as the campsite was ‘dry’, they only had long drop toilets and the hot showers were $3 each in the morning. Still, at $7 a night it was nice, there were only a few people on our section of the beach, the only slightly annoying thing was the irregular stream of Mexicans driving up and attempting to sell us all manner of tourist tat. I wanted a hammock but after asking for some of their prices on stuff decided I would be better off in a shop where I could walk away if I didn’t like the haggling. Besides I was on holiday and didn’t want people constantly offering me things which I almost certainly didn’t need.
| I took a quick swim before the sun went down and earned a beer from Drake in the process, he didn’t think I had it in me, and neither did I. I just remembered the warm solar shower waiting for me up on the beach. We walked over to see how the Israelis plan of cooking up the hundreds of clams was working out. Pat was determined to get completely shit faced and was drinking a $2 bottle of tequlia which smelt lethal. |  |
We loaded up on beer and walked across the bay to the other side, pausing to take a drink at Ana’s Restaurant on the way. Pat is sweet on the girl who works there and after drinking the gasoline/tequila above was knocking back the normal stuff like water.
Brett, Jack, Drake and Sheena.
The Israelis neighbours had found a huge stack of driftwood somewhere and were planning on burning it until 3am. They also had 72(!) beers to get through before heading back to the US and we had to give them a hand!
It didn’t look like the Scallops were going to be cooked but something started to happen in the ‘kitchen’ but it was decided we were too many people for only a big bucket of scallops and we should go and eat at the Restaurant.
Seafood is weird!
We gave Pat a chance to flirt with his girl and he proceeded to order a *load* of food. I felt kind of uncomfortable and admitted I had forgotten my wallet…. So had Sheena…. So had Drake…. Pat just said ‘Its ok, Im on vacation!!’ before ordering everyone beers and shot after shot of tequila for himself…
The Campers Pats fav barmaid.
We were making real racket and it didn’t look like we were going to make it back to the party, but everyone else seemed to be having a good time regardless. We paid and got up to leave but then started talking to a group of American, Canadian and Australian Couples and then we were trapped for another hour. Drake was trying to charm the ladies and we thought at one point he was going to get into a fight when he split off one guys wife for a more private chat. We retreated to the bar for another final drink and we realised the big group had gone and Drake was no where to be found. We were about to head back to our camp site to see if he was there and finally he responded to our cries of his name. He was in a 80 year old widows RV and couldn’t escape. His gratitude was written all over his face and we headed back to the party to find everyone still there and the wood pile only halfway down.
I can’t believe I let Pat drive us all home. :p
