Mainland Mexico

Yesterday we motored along the coast all day looking for surf, a random old lady with a 20 something year old Norwegian kid on a sailboat came up to us in a harbor. She asked if the kid could hitch a ride with us south about 75 miles. They were looking for a fellow sailor who had left with them five days ago, but strangely disappeared the second night out. He seemed like a nice kid so we agreed to take him south in search of the lost sailor. We decided to depart from the harbor that night to try to get to a surf spot by the following morning.
The night passed un eventfully and by morning we randomly came across a beach nestled in between tall rocky cliffs covered in lush green foliage. Down the center of the beach a dried riverbed wound its way to the beach. Lining its sides a multitude of swaying green palms trees seemed to beckon us closer.
When we pulled in to investigate we noticed that there were surfers out and the waves were really good. Basically, overhead, crystal blue barrels. The surf spots name turned out the be Las Brusas, or the witches, Kinda freaky. We surfed until our arms almost fell off, then headed back to the boat for a triple-decker prosciutto sandwich.

Once our meal had digested we headed for a good over night harbor 2 hours south. Once there, we launched the dingy, loaded it up with cold beer, guitars and cameras for the mission ahead.
The bay is called Tenacatica, where a really amazing river winds through dense mangrove swamp. We took the dingy into the river mouth and navigated through the 3 miles of winding river cloaked it mangroves, which created a natural tunnel that shaded us from the tropical sun.


As we neared the end of the river a small town can be found where we discovered a weekend fiesta was winding down. Buses were pulling in and one nearly missed our little dog Debo. The buses were being loaded up to ferry the throngs of Mexicans back to their inland habitations and work commencing the following day.

We pulled up a chair in one of the many beach side restaurants. After ordering whole coconuts we sat back to enjoy the scene while sipping the cool juice with long pink straws. As the evening progressed the once thronging beach and restaurant became eerily silent as we found ourselves to be the sole customers left, besides one drunk Mexican. His forlorn ambitions culminated in an attempt to dance with anyone who was unlucky enough to pass his general vicinity.

By the time we had finished our delicious meal that totaled 5 dollars each it was quite dark. We donned our headlamps and headed back to the riverbank. A Long the way we discovered the reasoning behind the many smoldering fires the seemed to only create billowing plumes of smoke. Mosquito madness! We ran as fast as we could to the dingy and launched it into the now pitch Dark River.



Navigating through the maze, now with the sole aid of a headlamp became the game of hit and miss. After a bit I honed my methods and we pushed on through the night. About 45 minutes in we notice fire fly s were all about the place. Bats then began swooping in and gobbling them up. It was a quite a feeding frenzy. We then rounded a bend and Kim let out a yell.
Right in front of us a small crocodile was idly swimming in pursuit of a little panicked frog. We shone our light on the 1-foot long reptile. He didn't even mind our watchful gaze.

Over the next 30 mins we wound our way through the now alive jungle, where the once silent mangroves now seemed alive with all sorts of creatures emitting screeches and whistles. We finally reached the river mouth and then punched our way through the 2 foots surf, after some careful timing.
Once back to the boat I quickly fell into a deep and much needed sleep.