Articles Tagged ‘flamingos’
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Long Weekend in Merida
Monday, April 14th, 2008The whole Yucatan was boiling so I grabbed a fairly inexpensive room ($24) with a/c at Santa Lucia Hostal. There is only one or two private rooms and the rest are dorms. Young Rafael runs the place almost completely solo and is very helpful. When I got there the private room was being “cleaned” so I stowed my bags in a locker and walked down calle 60. Full of panuchos and wine and 2 hammocks richer, I returned to hostal. yeah, I thought in turkey I learned not to shop after wine but I guess that lesson needs to be fresh. The very aggressive cleaning of my room was complete and I was ready for a siesta.
The next day I took a tour to celestun, directly west of merida on the gulf coast. There are 4 places on the gulf coast of the Yucatan between which flocks of flamingos migrate. Near celestun, and in other spots along the coast, the network of aquifers releases fresh water into the gulf. there is no surface water like rivers or lakes in the Yucatan peninsula – only a vast system of aquifers that occasionally collapse and create cenotes, crystal clear pools and caves of water. Really beautiful.
So lots of people traipse out to the mangrove groves near celestun to gaze at the flamingos. It reminded me a bit of the African safari I took. When there was something good to see, inevitably several land cruisers would get wind and you’d sit in the vehicle gazing at a lion along with 4 other vehicles filled with safarians. Kinda like a reverse zoo with humans in land-cruiser-cages and lions running free. Anyhoo – we floated with several other boats at the edge of the flocks of flamingos and took pics ☺. I missed the flock-of-thousands by a week or so but there were several hundred at least. Enough to get some nice pics. The typical celestun tour includes a few other stops nearby. The beach in celestun is pretty.
One of the more interesting things about this tour is that I was on it with a family of Mennonites on holiday from Chihuahua. The men spoke Spanish but the women spoke only an archaic form of german, which must mean they are cloistered on their farm. Merida, it turns out, is a popular spot for vacationing Mennonites who live in MX. They do it frugally, fully covered and without much obvious mirth.
The weekends in merida are festive – with live music and dance performances in several parks. streets close down and booths go up and cafes downtown set up tables in the streets. It’s worth a visit. But by Sunday I’d tired of the aggressive touts and of being hit-on by what seemed like every man in town. It was really strange, but the strangeness wore off and in the end it was only annoying. Not to mention…….
Santa lucia hostel, despite the valiant efforts of Rafael, has a wicked bedbug problem. Then I knew what that “extra-special” cleaning was for ☺. This goes on my list of “lessons learned”. So I decided on Monday to head to vallodolid, a town I’d visited during a previous Christmas vacation with amy, bri, and mary. We all liked it a lot. It’s still charming and laid back. There are a few things to do in town but mostly I’m just enjoying a more laid back place while I make sure I didn’t bring any stow-away bedbugs with me. Everything is being dissembled and double checked.
I also need to plan my trip to isla holbox, which will happen Thursday. The FINAL week of my vacation will then commence. Can you believe it? I don’t think there are good internet facilities on holbox so I likely won’t blog. I can catch up when I’m home and give some closing thoughts ☺. My goal the final week is to totally check-out and prepare myself for re-immersion.
Despite some mixed feelings about that re-immersion I am very much looking forward to seeing my family and friends and hanging out in the apartment I love, with it’s view of lake merritt. I look forward to cooking (!) and walking to stores in grand lake. I need to cut back on my salbute consumption here and save room for that burger. Then I’ll also find a place in Oakland with cochinita salbutes so I can have either (but sparingly).
Peggy Rehm