Whales and Sea Turtles

Yelapa is a Hill Town

Tonight (January 28, 2011), Norwegian Steam is anchored very peacefully in Bahia Chamela (19 degrees 35.09 minutes north, 105 degrees 7.892 minutes west), after an overnight voyage from Banderas Bay.  Last night we anchored in Yelapa, a small indentation in the south side of Banderas,  but found the four foot high swells anything but peaceful and decided to start the 89 nautical mile journey to Chamela immediately.  Yelapa is a fascinating place, and we had intended to stay longer.  According to the excellent Pacific Mexico, A Cruiser's Guidebook, by Breeding and Bansmer, all land is owned collectively in Yelapa based on a grant to a group of indigenous people in the year 1581 by King Phillip II of Spain.  Yelapa has a small beach, with the usual collection pangas (large, high-powered, all-purpose skiffs) and palapa (thatch roofed) restaurants.  What really makes it special, however, is that it is a hill town, with tiny winding streets, mostly too narrow for automobiles, which require goods to be carried by horse and mule.  A creek runs down through the village, and higher up there are two waterfalls.  We viewed one of these on the same day that Sally finally saw a whale.

Whale sightings have now become common-place.  We have seen two distinct species and possibly more.  One type is very long and we think could be fin whales, although a number of other whales have a somewhat similar appearance, including the blue whale.  The other is definitely the humpback.  Today we were very close to a pod of them as they blew and breached.  Later we saw some more of them continually pounding the water with their tails for several minutes.

We have also solved a little mystery involving what seemed to be either the remains of dead seals or some kind of large net float.  Today we saw several up close, and they are neither dead nor inanimate.  They are sea turtles.

We arrived in Chamela about three in the afternoon, and after anchoring, we inflated the dinghy and headed for shore.  Sally and Amy wore bathing suits under their clothing.  I had no intention of swimming but, knowing a dunking was very possible, I had donned shorts.  We placed cameras, money and clothing in a dry bag.  Nearly to the beach, we were upset and needed to jump into the water and drag the dinghy up the beach.  Fortunately, we had left the outboard back at the mother ship.  Since they were already wet, Sally and Amy decided to go swimming right then and there, while I strolled down the beach to select a palapa restaurant.  I chose the third one because there were two young gringo guys sitting there and I thought I might get some information about the wonders of Chamela from them.  After ordering a beer, fish tacos and guacamole, I started a conversation.  They told me they lived on the other side of the bay and that they were doing marine research.  They noted that they were actually being paid to live in such a warm and beautiful place.  Sensing a slight imperfection of accent in their otherwise perfect American, I asked where they were from.  Norway, it turns out, and there are fifty Norwegians in all living in the bay and working on the research project.  I then asked them the question that I now ask all young Norwegians that I meet: "Do you like pickled herring?"

A bit of background.  As far as I know, all Scandinavian Americans love pickled herring, and until 20 years ago, I had assumed that their love for this delicacy was genetic.  In 1991, we spent a week at Disney World, in Florida, including a day at the Epcot Center, which includes a number of internationally themed restaurants surrounding a lagoon.  One of these is a Norwegian restaurant, where I had dined on two previous occasions.  The waiters and waitresses in this restaurant are young Norwegians, boys and girls who have been awarded the privilege of a year in Florida.  There must have been two dozen varieties of pickled herring.  Those with simple wine, vinegar, onion and juniper berries, those with cream sauce, mustard sauce and so on.  I asked the blond and bronzed surfer who was our waiter which of the pickled herrings he would recommend.  The answer was a shock.  "If I were to eat pickled herring, I would choose that one.  But I do not eat pickled herring."  Two years ago a family of relatives from Norway visited us in Seattle.  I asked the same question.  Not only did they not eat pickled herring, they did not like seafood.

So the answer to the question posed to two young Norwegians on the beach at Bahia de Chamela was not a complete surprise.  Only a reinforcement of my growing recognition that Norway is no longer what it once was.  One of the two, he who is blond and bronzed, had already mentioned that he had lived a year in Florida.  As I related the Epcot Center saga, he got a strange look on his face, and said he had worked a year in that same restaurant.  No, not the same guy.  This fellow would be too young.  Just the same race.  What a pity.  Pickled Herring is almost as good as fresh yellow tail with mustard sauce and it keeps a good deal longer.

On our way back out to the boat, we found it completely impossible to get through the surf with oars and three people in the dinghy.  Three times, we would almost clear a breaking swell, get turned around, and surf back towards the beach, finally being overturned.   In fact, a lot of fun!   Finally, Sally and Amy got back into the water, pushed the dinghy through the surf break and swam back to the boat, while I rowed her back.

Tonight Sally is preparing the pasta she had planned to serve in Yelapa, but could not because of the erratic rolling at anchor in ocean swells.

Finally a taste of the irony of the modern wired world.  During the ten days we spent in the modern marina at La Cruz on Banderas Bay the WIFI was pathetic.  So bad, that one of my posts to this blog had to be made via marine single side-band radio.  In this remote bay, we are enjoying an open WIFI access point with much better response and through-put than the marina was able to provide.