Chacala in November

Another lovely day in Chacala. Light about 5:55am and dark at about 5:45pm. Sunny and clear.

Six “yachties” in Chacala Bay this morning, and one motor home and a camper from the US. Some Mexican and non-Mexican tourists . Maybe six or eight gringos. Today a couple from Michegan (can’t remember how to spell it) returned to their two year old house here, planning to stay for five months or so. Another American also returned to her rental a few days ago. Another couple planning to stay for the winter at their home in the Chacala Marina arrived two or three weeks ago.

Most of the vacation-type rental reservations seem to start about the 12 or 13th of December. Watched the new cement patio floor go down at Aurora and Beto’s right-hand side downstairs rental. Looks great. Beto and Noe’s helper, Javier, worked all afternoon into the dark (in fact they are still working now, at 6:30) mixing cement by hand for Noe to spread.

Visited with Trini today and she showed me plans for the new Kinder addition, to be added to the current building. Trini said it looks like a couple of Rotary groups, one from Omaha, are planning to fund the construction and do some finishing work on the project when they arrive. I am not sure how definite the project is, but it sounds great.

The whole play area at the Kinder looks very nice. A huge improvement from a couple of years ago. The parents of the Kinder students are very involved this year in making improvements and doing maintenance.

It you are coming down, you might consider bringing some classroom materials for the Kinder, or a little cash. You can just drop things by the Kinder 9am-noon weekdays, while class is in session. It is right beyond the church, a small building covered with murals and a big playtoy, provided from Rotarians, in the school yard. The Kinder is separate from the Bibliotecha, so anything you bring for the Kinder should go directly there. I hope that makes sense.

Al the construction projects around town are progressing rapidly. I have the impression everyone has a Christmas deadline in mind.

I was told today that a “volunteer” is at Mar de jade working on the problematic sewage system. Anyway, I hope he succeeds in reducing the smell and run-off. Aparently they expect the construction to continue through the Christmas guest session, with guests in attendence. It's a little hard to picture how that will work out.

A writer for Lonely Planet was in town last month, and stayed at Casa Pacifica one night. I remember a few years ago a different Lonely Planet writer stayed at Mar de Jade, and the whole Chacala entry that year was about Mar de Jade. It was like the town itself hardly existed. I don’t think that will happen this year, because the guy was in town for several days and was looking around quite a bit.

There are also realtors floating around town. Rod (also from the US) and a realtor in Sayulita is opening an office (Ayala Realty?) here in Chacala. And this morning I talked with a gringo named Roger who initially told me he was a a local, whose realty office is also in Sayulita. He was meeting with an eijido official and Jesus, who owns an eijido lot between Casa Pacifica and the house where I house-sat this summer. Jesus has told me before he wants to sell his lot, so it will be interesting to see what happens next.

I was recently told that there are no regulations or laws and registrations required to sell real estate in Mexico. Attorneys/notarys do the actual land transfers and help to establish bank trusts for land near the ocean.

I guess it’s always interesting in life to see what’s going to happen next.

Feel free to look at this website about Chacala.