A Day or Two in Barra de Navidad

If you were to Google Barra de Navidad you would find more information than you ever care to know about “Barra”.  You will find an aerial photo of a beautiful white beach that shows Melaque at the north end and Barra at the other and you will find that the area is populated by many hotels (posadas), bungalows and apartments for rent and extensive opportunities to dine out.  It’s a lovely place to spend some time.

It’s a rare day that we don’t leave the boat, traveling through the lagoon, past the fish pens and the community of Colimilla, pass by the elegant Grand Bay hotel, weave our way through the cut between a small island, past the canal opening that leads to private residences, steering around a rusting wreck and fishing boats to land our dinghy at the Sands Hotel.  If the dinghy isn’t up to the task or if we will be departing or arriving after dark, we may choose to ride the water taxi which is arranged by hailing “water taxi” on channel 23 on our VHF radio.

One day Michael and I rode in on the dinghy together.  It was my day for yoga, to catch up on internet things using the hotel WI-FI to upload photos to the blog, and a chance to take a cooling dip in the pool while Michael completed some projects on the boat.  Later, when I returned to Odessa by water taxi, I learned that the inflatable floor of the dinghy had sprung a leak while sitting at the Sands Hotel and that Michael had to travel back to the boat with no floor, more or less.  I don’t know how he made it back to the boat, it must have been like riding on a jelly fish. He has since then been working on repairing the leak and after two or three failed attempts (meaning it held long enough for a trip to the Sands only to fail again and another jelly fish ride back to the boat).  The “magic glue” arrived this week via special delivery by Bob and Sherry on Ponderosa from Puerto Vallarta.  The repair is in process and we should know in a couple of days if the glue will hold.

Another day we dinghied over to Colimilla to have lunch and explore the small community we pass every day.  In addition to owning the Fortina restaurant, Maria delivers water and beer and arranges propane refills to the boats in the lagoon.  After lunch and having scheduled water to be delivered the next day we took a walk along the avenue that winds through the golf course to the resort (we were going the other way).  Several buses offered us rides along the way, but we declined.  It was a hot and muggy afternoon and on our way back we decided to flag down one of the busses.  Imagine our surprise when the doors opened and we boarded the bus to be greeted by all sorts of hooting and hollering.  The bus appeared to be full of day workers on their way back to who knows where.  We worked our way to the back of the bus to the only empty seats, grinned at each other and wondered how we would tell the driver where we needed to get off.  About that time, one of the men asked us in English where we were going.  The only thing we knew to say was “Maria’s” and that did the job.

By the way, Sherry Custer on Ponderosa does an excellent job telling some of the ins and outs of cruising  in Mexico.  Click the link in the side bar and read her recent entry for an entertaining description.  I couldn't say it any better so why try?