Adios Means Hello

Leaving the warmth of Colima behind, our journey continued as we rode the ETN bus to Guadalajara.  On the loop road on the outskirts of the city the bus suddenly pulled to the side of the road and stopped, dust billowing forward on the busy highway.  The door to the driver’s compartment slid open and, being the closest to the door, I saw the driver appear with a strange look on his face.  He was saying something I could not understand.  I looked across the aisle at the woman sitting there and said to her, “I don’t speak Spanish.”  “He’s saying ‘Help.’”  I stood and looked at the driver who was certainly in stress then I turned to the bus full of people and said in my captain’s voice, “We need a doctor or nurse up here!”

A woman quickly approached. “I’m a nurse.” I got out of her way and she went forward into the driver’s compartment and talked to the driver who had a severe muscle spasm in his back.  She had him stand and lean against the wall and then manipulated his left arm while pushing on the muscles of his back.  His face showed pain.  Then she carefully led him outside the bus to walk him down the side of the road.  I went to the middle of the bus where there were some people I’d talked to earlier and explained that the driver was having some sort of health emergency.  A man nearby said, “I’m a doctor. I’ll see if I can be of some help.”, and joined the driver and nurse outside.  

I looked back at the people on the bus and they all sat in silence, just waiting patiently, staring straight ahead.  We could see the nurse outside giving the driver a pill, and him swallowing it down.  Hopefully this was not a heavy narcotic. Presently, the doctor, then the nurse, then the driver got back on the bus.  The driver kept his compartment door open so I could see him and we drove off to our next stop at the airport. 

  

I watched his feet so that I knew which petal was the brake and prepared myself to go for that petal if the driver passed out.  I had it all worked out how I’d push him aside with my body, go in with my left foot on the brake and grab the wheel.  Fortunately, none of my commando preparation was necessary.  The driver successfully negotiated the tight quarters at the airport, brought the rig to a halt, and discharged all but four of us passengers.  Would we get another driver?  Nope.  The driver talked to the personnel on the ground and didn’t seem to mention the incident to anyone. Then he came back onboard and drove us to our destination at the central bus station in San Pedro Telaquepaque.

I’m supposing he did not want to jeopardize his job standing by admitting that he had had a medical emergency.  As the coach used to say, “Just walk it off.”

Tuba is fermented coconut palm sap, sweetened with fruit and topped with peanuts

Carolina’s Airbnb was in the midst of construction but she had a nice clean room for us and we settled in with our luggage, retrieving the Pythagorean harp and our extra bag of winter clothing from their storage room.  Two days later, after some careful packing, and some nice walks around the neighborhoods, we set our alarm for 5:30 AM for our trip to the airport. We checked in with Carolina who promised to arrange an Uber for 6:00 AM. I awoke to the sound of a little beep, like a text notification on a cell phone.  Did I really hear something?  It’s still dark…  Is the alarm going to work?  Worried, I got up, found my headlamp and shined it on our digital alarm.  A blank face!  Batteries dead!

I like Tuba.

I checked the phone, which said 6:00 AM and read Carolina’s text asking, “Are you ready?”

To Connie, “We gotta get up.  It’s 6.”  She shot out of bed like a rocket and went into mama rescue mode, which means, she was moving fast.

I texted to Carolina, “Our alarm failed.  Ready in 10 minutes.”   She shoots back, “Perfect.”

No it’s not perfect. We overslept, the Uber is waiting, and we’ll be late getting to the airport.

Before you could say, “Telaquepaque” we pulled on our clothes over our PJs and started carrying bags downstairs.  Minutes later, Connie was forced to speak Spanish with the Uber driver without the benefit of caffeine.  Hair in tangles, we counted our bags, came up with the right number and rode the Uber through the dark and quiet streets to the Guadalajara International Airport. 

Half asleep, we contemplated our next challenge.  I’d been worrying about how to get all of our oversize and overweight baggage onto the Volaris plane to San Antonio.  We’d had problems on the Interjet airline flights with overweight carry-on luggage.  For this flight home we were bringing even more weight in the form of a big conch shell, more books, clothing, and a big Pythagorean harp.   An attendant, roaming the mezzanine looking for confused travelers,  checked our papers and noted that we didn’t have boarding passes printed.  I pointed out the harp and all the Fragile stickers.  She scooted us over to the “special needs” line.  There we met Juan, smiling Juan, our savior.  He arrived to his shift and opened his station just when we arrived at the head of the line.  “Good Morning.”  …English, a good sign.  I lugged our heavy bag onto the scale; half a kilogram under the limit.  We pointed to the harp while hiding the accordion behind us, using the art of distraction.  “It’s fragile. It can’t go under the plane.”  Juan looked very serious, checked his computer, then his face brightened.  “No problem.”

Holy Cow, he’s going to let us carry that big thing onto the plane, along with the oversize ukulele case, the overweight accordion stuffed into a carry-on bag, and our two “personal” bags stuffed to the gills?  No argument here.  He pointed out that we could go print our boarding passes at a nearby kiosk for free or pay him 200 pesos each for him to print them out at the counter.  I looked across the rapidly filling concourse at a sea of people and choose the former.   At this point, our Mexico money had begun the transformation to being funny money, colorful but not legal tender in Texas.  Let’s just pay the man.

Julian had plenty of room for us

Before Juan could call us back we rushed our five carry-on bags toward the security checkpoint where we filled up the conveyor belt with all our stuff, got ourselves xray’d, struggled our cabin ready possessions down a quarter mile of hallways and found ourselves in a towering atrium filled with brightly colored breakfast opportunities. 

 

There we had our most expensive meal in Mexico.  Later, at gate 23B we got in the wrong line, were corrected with a smile, and ushered into a bus that took us out to the plane, where we climbed the stairs with a couple of dozen other passengers.  Ah Ha! That’s why Juan was so unconcerned.  Look at all those empty seats.  There was plenty of excess overhead space.   Our seats were at the emergency exits and I was so very pleased with the extra leg room and being able to cross my legs comfortably for once. We settled back in our seats, holding hands with smiles on our faces. 

Our most expensive meal in Mexico

Our fifty days in Mexico this winter started with a month long, simple stay in a small town and ended with a flurry of activity as we flew, bussed, and taxied to the coast in pursuit of some quality sea and beach time. We’ve seen ten different destinations, three flights, six long distance bus rides, and twelve taxis.  Our housing averaged $19 USD per night, which is a good number.  But somehow we managed to spend another $58 USD per day on food, wine, airline tickets, bus tickets, car rentals, taxis, musical instruments, clothing, gifts, and tips.  Most notability, we had fun and we wandered where we wanted, opening ourselves up to last minute changes and interesting opportunities.

We had three things to accomplish.  One: we escaped the cold and wet of an Olympia winter.  Two: we celebrated Connie’s 60^th birthday in a setting of her choice.  Three: we explored various possibilities for winter snowbird living.  I have to say that the central highland of Mexico is not a place I’d want to settle down in.  The air quality and the population density proved to be a challenge for us as we tend to enjoy quiet, nature filled spaces.  Two things we grow tired of are barking dogs and church bells.

The coast has much cleaner air and wonderful scenery.  However, the cost of living is higher than inland.  While the small towns on the coast are fun for a while, the tourism gets to us pretty quickly.  We found ourselves looking for restaurants and hotels not populated by large, white English speaking persons from Canada and the U.S.   There is nothing so jarring as being assaulted by a booming, male white voice rattling on about nothing of importance, while seated near you in the palapa restaurant.

And so we’ve gone full circle, realizing that the Pacific coastal cruising life that we pursued eight years ago truly was the perfect blend of nature, quiet, climate, adventure, and people.  While coastal cruising, we had plenty of interactions with the local population without living in close, constant contact.  Again, barking dogs and church bells get old fast.  When at the anchorage or marina, the gringo ex-pats are there when you want friendships but you can always retreat to the boat for peace and quiet.  When we get the itch for a change of scene, it’s easy to up anchor and move on to yet another clear blue water, sandy beach, salty air, wild life filled destination.

A new plan has formed.  We’ll probably take a road trip next month from Arizona down to San Carlos, Sonora, Mexico to look at a boat.  There are sailboats a plenty down there, left behind as older cruisers decide to take their lives back to land.  Our journey continues.