The Storm

Cabo Pulmo 191117

It was hard to sleep in the hot and stuffy room so I got up to go on a pre-dawn walk but it was still sprinkling. I moved to the patio but the wind came up and drove the rain in after me. The forecast said it was going to rain the last three days of our trip. It was unseasonable weather. The rainy season usually ends in September and the storms ruined the ocean conditions. We were told it usually only rains 4 times every year and this was the 21st storm of 2019.

00:14 (3.5MiB)

A little after dawn the sun came out between a break in the clouds and we went on a short walk to see if the birds had come out. When a rain shower came towards us over the horizon we hurried back and Amanda decided to take out the compost.

That was the last I would see her that day. Apparently she ran into Sarah and Andrew on the road and they invited her to go touring a nearby botanical garden.

I took a nap and then put on a rash guard and went for a walk in the rain. I walked first to the end of the main street looking for any hiking trails into the mountains but the path just kind of petered out into the underbrush. I later learned some of the side paths which I took for private driveways actually led to some hiking trails and we did more walking on the last few days of the trip.

Returning from the main street I decided to walk down towards Arbolito beach in what was now pouring rain. I'd brought a plastic bag for my phone and it was warm enough it didn't matter I was soaked through. The waves and tide were high and the beach was deserted. I made it most of the way to Arbolito but turned back when my path would have required scrambling over some rocks above the high surf.

Back at the house I cooked some potatoes and had a snack. Amanda and Kayla got back a couple hours later. She said she'd seen a Xantu's hummingbird and they'd had a small snack with food grown in the garden.

We took a nap. There wasn't much else to do when it was raining except sleep and eat and try to get some reception on the small tv. Sarah and Andrew invited us over to dinner and we killed time until it was time to go.

It was still raining when it was time to leave so we took one of the big beach umbrellas and a headlamp. Kayla carried the beach umbrella like the flag girl in a parade and we huddled up close to stay dry. As we walked we had to step around puddles and places where the rain had washed out the road. The road that led to the beach was running like a shallow stream and the puddle that grew behind the berm of beach sand had broken through, carving a deep furrow on the path.

Sarah and Andrews rented house was off the Iguana road. It was a huge mansion with high ceilings in comparison to our beach house and it had a lacquered palm leaf roof. Sarah took us on a tour, showed us the five bedrooms, the enclosed patio and outdoor shower, and the crazy twenty foot high domed tower that held the shower.

All was not well in their rental. They had no water when they arrived and the owner promised to turn it on, and then, several hours later when they asked him again, said, "oh yeah I forgot". They bought a bunch of food but the power went out or was turned off and the fridge went lukewarm. The reason they were having this party was because they wanted to cook all their meat before it went bad. The palm frond roof leaked in several places, the outdoor shower was leaking somewhere behind the concrete wall, and as we sat around chatting before dinner, a few mice climbed in through the window and ran under the bed.

They poured a mescal for Amanda but this was quickly handed to me and she got a grapefruit based cocktail called a paloma instead. When we looked up palomas online and it was described as the most popular drink in Mexico.

It was pitch black on the hike back and water splashed up the back of our shorts as we marched in the huddled parade beneath Kayla's umbrella. Without my headlamp it would have been impossible and when I decided to go around the cattle guard instead of balancing on the narrow beams I temporarily stranded the other two in darkness.

Our trip back was delayed because Amanda insisted on stopping and picking up every toad we saw hopping across the road. She could not help herself. Afterwards she worried that there might be some toad disease and by handling every one she was inadvertently spreading the infection.

When we got back we found Joy and Karen watching a crime drama with Tom Cruise. They had the TV turned all the way up and the chairs set only a few feet away so they could hear it over the rain. Rian had taken some ibuprofen and gone to bed early.