Guaymas/San Carlos

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Taken By TelCel

Well, I encountered my first WATCH OUT in Mexico. Glad it cost me ‘only’ 400 pesos.

This morning, I ran out of bandwidth after using less than 1GB’s worth.  As it turns out, when you buy the 3GB internet plan, you need to send a text to activate said plan. I was paying a hefty per MB price!

When I was at the office Monday and had paid I asked if I had anything else to do and they said no. I am convinced that there was no language barrier issue. The person just couldn’t be bothered to tell the foreigner that she needed to send a text message.

I went back to the Guaymas TelCel office on the way out of town today and wasn’t able to get an English speaker. I argued my case in Spanish and was told that I was being very clear, but too bad, so sad. The woman who had served me on Monday even admitted that she didn’t tell me about the text I had to send and that if I had more questions I should have gotten back in line to speak to a general inquiries person! This is the same woman who very clearly told me I had done everything and was good to go!

I know that bureaucracy in Mexico is maddening to foreigners, but this takes the cake! I was very patient on Monday, waiting in all their lines and speaking their language and I got taken, plain and simple! I am so not impressed and frankly disgusted by my welcome to Mexico by such a large corporation.

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Fun At the Beach

I asked the desk clerk at the motel if he could recommend a beach. He said that for a first time person who doesn’t know the lay of the land, my best bet was Playa Algodones (Cotton Beach) by the Soggy Peso (lol) bar. Just follow the main road for ages until I see the signs for the Soggy Peso on my left.

Following the main road was fine until I didn’t realise that I needed to take the curve to the right and ended up in a hotel parking lot. I turned around and found myself going the wrong way down the road. No one honked. Everyone just stopped patiently while a nice man got me turned around and, I think, assured me that I’m not an idiot, everyone new to the area does this, and there needs to be better signage!

Back on the main road, I drove for a long time following the shoreline, the water getting bluer and bluer by the kilometre. I finally saw a sign that said Playa Algodones that way, down a dirt road, so I figured the Soggy Peso would be close by. I was right. I just had to go up the road a bit until I could do a U-turn.

There was a gatehouse at the entrance to the road to the bar, but the windows were shut and the gate arm was up. I drove a short distance down a very rutty dirt road, following the one or two signs indicating that the Soggy Peso was thataway and finally made my way there! I parked in front, changed into my flip flops, and went to investigate the beach.

It was beautiful, lovely sand with seashells ending in bright blue water, and almost deserted! I was hungry and went up to the Soggy Peso to ask if they were open. Yup. I ordered a piña colada, but they were out of pineapple, so I went with a margarita. I took one sip and almost fell over in my chair, it was that potent! The food menu was tiny. I wanted something more substantial than chips and salsa, so I ordered their shrimp quesadilla.

The two servers chatted with me while I was there and that was a real test of my language skills! Personal conversation is so much harder than business transactions, which can be fairly scripted in advance. I muddled through and got a few corrections, which I did not mind in the least! One of the boys said that he has Canadian friends who refuse to learn a word of Spanish, so he was surprised that I voluntarily studied the language.

The quesadilla was absolutely wonderful! It was full of cheese and plump shrimp and mild peppers, with plenty of guacamole and a very mildly hot red sauce to spread over it. I got the giggles about halfway through the meal, my sign that I was imbibing a particularly potent drink and shouldn’t plan to drive for a while! One of the boys even joked about how much tequila they put in their margaritas. *hiccup*

When I was done, I said that I would head down to the beach and use one of their chairs and umbrellas to sit for a bit, then go swim. One of the boys said something and I only caught ‘peligroso’ and ‘guerra.’ From the context, I extrapolated that he was warning me about man o’ war jelly fish. I just did some research and it looks like I was right!

The water was cool and there was a nasty wind blowing, so I didn’t play in the water long. But I definitely did enough strokes and got my head wet to say that I have finally had a proper swim in the Pacific Ocean!

I wish I had know that there would be these lovely lounge chairs and umbrellas as I would have brought a book or magazine. I still managed to wile away a couple of hours lying and walking in the sun.

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Tracking Hurricane Vance

After checking weather reports and speaking to RVers headed for Mazatlan, I have decided to renew the room in San Carlos for tonight and push on to Los Mochis tomorrow, where I will likely be truck camping, arriving in Mazatlan on Thursday. That’s the plan at least unless I hear to do otherwise from people on the ground there. The biggest question mark is if the road to Isla is passable or not.

The RVers I spoke to are experienced in Mexico, know the road between here and Mazatlan, know their RVing capabilities, and have had experience reading these kinds of forecasts. They are all deciding to wait this extra day and will do the drive straight to Mazatlan tomorrow! Wow! They say it’s a 10-hour drive for them pulling, but they are allowing themselves another two hours for weather and will leave around 5AM! I will probably leave here noonish to get to Los Mochis dinnertimeish. If I do end up truck camping, I won’t want to have to spend a whole afternoon and evening at a truck stop!

The clerk at the office gave me directions to a nearby beach. Can you believe that I have never swam in the Pacific Ocean?! I need to find some sun screen and flip flops and am kicking myself for forgetting my beach hat! I’ll have to see if I can find an inexpensive one here.

I also asked the office manager about the best coffee in town and he told me to go to the Oxxo! I found that my cup today was even better than yesterday’s. It always takes a bit of time for my taste buds to adjust to a new coffee and decide if they like it or not.

On the way back from the office, a lady carrying a bucket stopped me. I looked inside the bucket and saw shrimp. I said no thank you and she was surprised and crestfallen. I explained that my room doesn’t have a kitchen and she went, ‘Ah! Okay!’ and left with no hard feelings. 🙂

I just received an email from my neighbours Caroline and Charles advising me that they just had a major windstorm that took half the shingles off another neighbour’s roof! This storm shifted the tarp I used to cover my RV, leaving my roof exposed. That must have been some storm seeing as we had super, super high winds before I left and my second attempt at tarping didn’t even budge in those winds! Being the wonderful folk that they are, C&C resecured the tarp for me and now I know it will be okay for the whole winter! I’m glad that I don’t have to worry about home. And, yes, I miss home. 🙂 I’m really looking forward to being settled in the apartment and getting back into my routine and feeling like I’m ‘home’ again. Vagabonding is tiring! 😀

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Pampered

This afternoon, I Googled ‘manicure San Carlos MX’ and found a place I could locate, being near the Froggy’s bar and right next to the post office. I walked down to that area and looked at each building until I saw one with the word estética barely visible through the cover of trees. I would have looked for the word esthétique in French, so I knew I’d found the salon!

If the post office was indeed next door, there was absolutely no sign for it. I did see a man with a shirt that said ‘correos’ (post/mail) on it come out the door, so I guess the locals know where to go to mail something!

I went into the salon and asked if they had time for a manicure. A lady thought about it and said yes, 130 pesos. OUCH! But I was there and getting pretty desperate to trim my talons so I took a seat to wait.

When I worked for the government and was still a nail biter, I got gel sets done as often as I could afford to so that my hands would look nice. But since hitting the road, the only manicure I’ve treated myself to was in Nuevo Progreso in February of last year, and it was just a basic one, no fake nails. I’m hoping to regularly get such manicures regularly this winter since I won’t be doing any manual labour.

It was eventually my turn and I sat at the manicure table, gratified to see the lady sanitize all the equipment. The building was full of local ladies getting worked on, which told me this wasn’t a gringo priced place and that I probably couldn’t have done much better price-wise in the area.

The lady had a look at my nails and asked if I wanted them cut. Yes, please! She took off a bit and I asked for more. The second time was the perfect length. She then filed and buffed them, cleaned up the cuticles, and, my favourite part, gave me a forearm and hand massage. I didn’t want any colour on the nails so that the manicure will last longer, but I did accept clear polish.

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I’ve always had ugly sausagy hands and it was even worse when the nails were a mess. I’m happy with how my digits look now that the ends aren’t all gnawed to hell!

From the salon, I went further into town to the Ley, a grocery store, to get something to munch on tonight, picking up cheese (I have crackers), yoghurt, and pistachios, plus a banana for tomorrow morning. I was grateful for the translation app on my phone as it helped me navigate the yoghurt offerings. Arándanos are blueberries! They didn’t have raspberry (frambuesa, which I didn’t know but would have recognized as it’s so close to the French framboise), so I went with strawberry (fresa, which I definitely knew).

I don’t know yet if I’ll be traveling tomorrow. I’m waiting for my landlady to call me back and give me an idea of what the weather is like on the ground. Contessa is concerned that the road to Stone Island might be impassable after the heavy rain. I would prefer to hang out here than to proceed to Los Mochis and be stuck waiting there, simply because San Carlos is now familiar and feels safe. I’m not feeling super adventurous right now. 🙂

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Another Lunch Overlooking the Sea of Cortes

When I returned to the motel, I discovered the maid had done up my room. I had forgotten to ask for no service, as I always do because I have expensive computer equipment and don’t want the maids to see it. I wasn’t especially concerned here, though, since I hadn’t unpacked everything I unpack when I’m working. I was just mortified that I didn’t have a tip ready for the maid. Thankfully, she was just two doors down, so after a quick Google search (yay for my own super fast connection!) to find out how much I should give her, I caught her attention, thanked her for the service, and gave her a 10 peso coin. She was surprised and the thank you I got made me feel a lot better about my gaffe.

Then, I went back to Los Arbolitos, where I had the taco last night. This time, I climbed the stairs to the deck. The view wasn’t as good as at Charly’s Rock, but I could at least see the ocean!

I asked for a Pacifico beer and they didn’t have any so I said ‘alguno lager’ (which I’m hoping means any lager) instead of listening to a long spiel about their beer offerings. The server seemed confident in his understanding of my request and returned with a Dos Equis, which was perfect! He asked if I wanted a glass and I said yes, so he returned with a frosty mug, as well as salsa, chips, and lime. I squeezed a quarter of lime into my beer and settled in to peruse the menu… and eat chips. Today I got the weird salsa from last night that I can’t even describe other than it being pretty tasty, plus your more standard pico de gallo, which I preferred. Cilantro is definitely growing on me, yay!

I was amused that the menu was partially translated into English and am pretty sure that the untranslated stuff is food the gringo population doesn’t tend to order. I’d done a lot of walking around today on just a granola bar and found myself, to my surprise, drawn to the pasta section. My eyes rested on pesto fettuccine with shrimp and octopus and my decision was made.

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The meal was really delicious! It had tons of octopus and shrimp as well as diced bell peppers, spinach, and Parmesan cheese. I couldn’t believe that the dish also came with garlic bread. They sure eat carb heavy here!

I asked for the bill and the server was surprised, asking if I was sure I didn’t want dessert. Nope! I might go back to Thrifty’s for an ice cream later, though. 🙂

The server was working another table with, I’m afraid, ugly Americans. They refused to speak any Spanish at all, even just to say thank you, and actually berated the waiter for greeting them in Spanish, saying, “This is a tourist area. You should speak English to us.” So sad. 🙁