Chacala Morning

The mornings on the Chacala beach are some of my favorites times in my whole life. I usually get up a few minutes before the sun starts shining out on the water, and the sunlight gradually creeps toward me, sitting at my table watching the ocean waves. Some of the waves are very big right now, and you can see right thru them just before they crash. The fish are easy to see thru the water as the wave peaks, especially at sunset, when the sun light comes right thru the waves.

I usually walk down on the beach first thing, and the only foot prints are mine. I carry a bag to pick up the plastic litter, which is the worst on Sunday evening and Monday morning, after families from Guadalajara spends their day on the Chacala beach. Yesterday a family spent the day under one of the palapas near mine. I noticed they were throwing trash all around, and was not surprised when they pulled out leaving several bags of crap all over. Esperanza and her son Ginko and I picked it up in just a few minutes. It was interesting to see how nothing seems to faze Esperanza. She is sort of a buddha, always watching, never seeming to judge. Of course, I really have no idea what is going on in her head. That's maybe a good thing.

Her family kind of swirls around her all day long. This area where I am camping has four family homes right near each other. The grandparent's home is kind of separate and I don't see them over here very often, but Esperanza and her husband, and six of their eight kids are all living here. Two kids are currently at university, and come home off and on, and two of the sons are married, with two kids each, and one wife with another child on the way. The two married sons live within 15 feet of the family house, and people are going in and out and back and forth all day long.

When I am cooking or reading in my hammock or drawing at my table, or fixing up my campsite I see lots of things I haven't noticed before. Like how intricate the fishing nets the men weave are. They tie the ropes between the trees around the place, and then weave the actual netting with what looks like plastic fishing line. And they cutting down coconuts, anda couple of the boys surf many evenings and some mornings. And Esparanza does laundry for various tourists, including me. She does my sheets and towels and white tee shirts for 50 cents US$ an item. I do everything else myself. It's too hard to wash sheets and towels in a bucket, and she gets my tee shirts whiter than white, which I like.

They clean the campsites, pickup trash, pump the water for the toilets and showers up into a water tank set up high enough to make some water pressure. They keep the toilets really clean, which I appreciate. Today, after I finish writing this in Las Varas, I am going to buy my own personal toilet seat. I can't wait. They don{t have very many toilet seats in the public facilities around Chacala. I don't know why that is.

They are six little kids currently in this family area, Carlos, six, Markito, about 2, Jasmine, about two, Paulina about 7 and her brother about 5 and the new baby, three week.
They play around and keep busy all day, doing this and that. But they never go near the water, the ocean. And they come over and visit me, which I love.