Tecolutla

13 June

Yeah Spurs Game 4!  We watched the whole game in Spanish at a bar while each having one  pina colada!

It was OK sleeping last night with the fan going and the windows open, not cool but tolerable.  This morning we walked down to the local lighthouse and Harbor Master building.  There were several Mexican fire trees and the square was busy with breakfast taco carts and fruit vendors.  I’m gun shy on bananas because the first (and only batch to date) had bugs on it, so now I’m waging chemical warfare on tiny fruit flies.  From here on out everything either gets a vinegar or Clorox bath.  So far we’ve been doing well on our water use.  Yesterday we bought 30 gallons from the local water guy who filled our tank with purified water, five-gallon jugs, one at a time.

At 9:30 we headed to Zamora, for a tour of Gaya Vanilla farm.  The Gaya family has been growing certified organic vanilla for 5 generations.  Vanilla is in the orchid family, and the vines have to be at least 2-3 years old for their first bean and bloom.  The bean pod has the bloom on the end of the bean pod, so the bean is only picked after pod has bloomed. The plants bloom in May and get harvested by hand in December, so the tour was a lot of pointed out this is where we do the bean sizing, processing, drying etc without actually seeing anything.  Roger’s vanilla cherry and my tequila vanilla ice cream were very good.  Gaya exports to San Antonio for USA distribution.

 This afternoon we took an hour and a half boat ride on the Rio Tecolutla.  The river flows into the Gulf of Mexico.  The guy driving the boat said that the river is a beautiful green during the dry season, but right now we’re in the wet season inland so there’s a lot of brown runoff.  The river has a one foot tidal range with the saltwater tidal flow below the fresh water outgoing current.  Our boat driver didn’t speak English, so Sandra was at the mercy of our translation.  There were a lot of words I didn’t know, because he was talking about plants or birds, with which I’m not even well versed in English.  We did see two different kinds of orchids, but were at a distance that the pictures didn’t do them justice.  The flowers were best viewed through binoculars.  We passed a local fishing village that had a huge fire tree.  And there were several pelicans posing for the picture as well.

Tomorrow we’re headed south and west to begin our transit of the Istmo (Isthmus) de Tehuantepec.  If all goes according to Norm’s plans we’ll be staying in a PEMEX gas station.  Oh boy!  However Norm says there’s a laundry lady at the PEMEX , so hopefully we’ll be able to get some clothes washed and there’s a hot shower house.  Such simple pleasures promised.  The next day we should reach the Pacific Coast of Mexico.