Thursday 15th August
Today was a travel day so we spent the morning packing up before walking with our bags to the bus stop. We waited for about half anhour with a few other people about too, completely unsure of how long it would be. There isn't really such thing as a reliable time table for the public buses so we were just hoping something would turn up soon. We ended up chatting vaguely to a guy next to us who happened to be going to the same place as us, so after another short while waiting we decided to get a taxi all together. The taxi turned out to be a very run down car with rust and holes and all sorts, with a broken boot with cable ties to keep it shut. The driver came out of the car to help us untie the cables and he had a very twisted foot. We piled into the car with the guy we had spoken to and 2 local women, it was a tight squeeze. Liam was horrified to observe him use a screw driver to start the engine and away we went for another bit of experience and colour to our travels. A bumpy hot and sticky 20 minutes later we were dropped off, at which point we found a point in the road which seemed fairly likely to be another bus stop if only for two people waiting with bags.
We got chatting to them who happened to be American on a holiday. Unfortunately their bus just zoomed past and they missed it which was awful as nobody is sure how often they are running or anything. Luckily Liam and I managed to catch one where we needed to go and 20 minutes later we were being dropped off in flamingo.
Due to the last minute change of plan in destination the day before we had no reservation but luckily there was room at the place we found to be the cheapest place. The room was dingy and smells vaguely of smoke, but it's a decent size with an en suite so we were happy with it.
After settling in we took a look upstairs at the bar and restaurant which is pleasant, so we ordered food which was delicious before heading out to walk around and figure the place out a bit. We walked down a path for a while which came out at a dead end where we watched some big lizards and iguanas for a bit. Then we walked and found a beach which we walked up and down,watching the birds and other wildlife as we went. Liam had a go at cracking coconuts we came across open on rocks, all of which were manky and oozed manky brown gunk. I'm not sure we could survive as cast aways. Later on we wandered until we found somewhere to sit, which turned out to be somewhere called the monkey bar. It was part of a nice hotel but open to the public with a pool and bar. Luckily it was happy hour so we had a couple of vodkas whilst looking out over the sea waiting for the sun set. Unfortunately it never did show, turns out we were in the wrong angle which was impossible to tell really with it being overcast. The bar had hundreds of toy monkeys hanging from every possible place they could fit them, and we sat there for a while after it had got darker watching the lightning and listening to the thunder. The lightning and thunder in Central America just seems to be on a different level to anywhere we've been, the thunder cracks so loudly and sounds like its echoing all around the sky, and the lightning is so bright it lights everything up.
We had our dinner up in the bar of the hotel we stayed in, it's actually the cheapest place we could find but the food was nice so we were happy to just decide to have all our meals there. At some point we attracted the attention of a man who must have been about 70, white hair and beard and very drunk. He was sat with 2 other older men and 2 men in their 40s who looked like wrestler types. He was a very odd man, however I think a lot or that was due to him being extremely drunk. Turns out he was the previous owner and lived in the area for over 30 years. He told us a bunch of stuff, including how he was a drugged up hippy in his time and a sailor, and how he brought rock n roll to the area. I'm pretty sure he was high on something that night too. The story I liked the most was when we asked if he had ever scuba dived, and his reply was yes but only once. He had a friend who dived and leant him the gear, he decided to try it out himself in the deep end of the swimming pool but put too many weights on and got stuck at the bottom thinking he was going to die for a while. Made us chuckle despite its quite serious undertones!
Then his weird friends came over to join in, talking about odd things but generally seeming ok people. It got weird when one came over with a jar of gherkins and was really happy about them saying they were the best gherkins in the world, and made us eat one. I was worried for a bit that they were drugged gherkins as it was so random, turns out he was just high and really did want everybody to taste the best gherkins in the world.
A short while later when we escaped back to our room he was wandering around the hallway outside in just a towel, smoking something foul smelling. Safe to say we turned him down when he politely offered us some, to which he said that was good because drugs are bad.
Friday 16th August
I had a pleasant surprise waking up today to find Liam already awake before me which rarely happens. I had slept until 9 which also a rarity so was a nice feeling. The room stank of smoke though, probably due to the weirdo in the room next to us smoking. We headed up to find breakfast for around 10 hoping not to bump into any crazies, thankfully I think it was abit too early for them to surface.
It was already very hot by the time we were having breakfast and we were walking to the beach at 11. We had 2 or 3 hours just spending time on the beach, some moments were sunny, others overcast and others spitting with rain. Regardless of what it was doing it was hot all the while so we were fine. We commented on how few people were around which seemed odd, it was just us and what seemed like a family of locals but other than that we didn't really think much of it.
We headed back in and just as we reached the hotel it started raining so we had timed it very well. We spent a while showering and cooling down before heading upstairs for something to eat and drink. Jean and gherkin man were up there but it wasn't late enough in the day for them to be drunk ( despite the fact they were drinking) so it was fairly uneventful.
Before deciding if we would move on the next day or not we decided to go out and explore more roads. Off we went with our raincoats on due to the rain but by the time we had been out for 5 minutes it had all but stopped. We came across a beautiful beach with quite a few people on it even though it was gone 5pm...must be the actual beach! We thought it was pretty funny that we'd been sat on some rubbish random patch of sand for the day unaware the nice one was round the corner. It made our decision for us that we would stay for the next day too so we could spend time on it. There is nothing else left to do along the coast other than see the coast so we might as well do it here.
We walked all the way down the beach which took a while, the sand is wonderful and the sea very blue with nice waves and the las catalinas islands in the distance. We saw 3 very odd fish dotted across the beach whilst we walked, they reminded me of puffer fish but I dont know what they really were. They were very odd to look at and we wondered what could possibly killed them as there was no sign of damage to any of them.
It started to rain again do we headed back, looking in a souvenir shop on the way past which was very expensive as is most stuff around here.
We thought to try and book onto some diving now that we had decided to stay, unfortunately they weren't able to do the Sunday and we felt a bit too rushed for Saturday. Especially as liam was planning on watching the football on the tv in the morning so he would miss it. Also my left ear still isn't quite right and Liam didn't want me damaging it. It's a bit sad we wont be doing it as it looks really good but Liam is right I can't afford to hurt my ear and we can't afford to pay for diving if I can't complete it properly! Maybe in Mexico.
Saturday 17th and Sunday 18th August.
Nothing much to write about these days. Both days it was just after 10 before we made it out after breakfast and getting ready. We went to the nicer beach which we loved, it's just the perfect beach really. The sand is soft and perfect with the occasional crabs and shelled things moving around in the sand. There are shoals of fish you see from shore occasionally and we even saw what we thought was either a pod of dolphins or a pod of whales but we couldn't tell. The water is just a wonderful temperature, not too warm not too cold. Refreshing but not shockingly so. And the surf is just great, with big waves rolling in and washing up gently on the shore. We enjoy watching the wildlife around, particularly the big birds that I suppose are sort of like pelicans which fly so so close to the water kind of riding the waves. Sometimes they dive in head first and you see them coming out with fish. Liam went in the sea on one day with his goggles and saw shoals of fish and rays. I went in another day to experience the big waves which was very fun. With it being rainy season it's sort of odd weather, every day we get a bit of sun for maybe 2 or 3 hours before it rains. It sort of rains a little bit through the sunny patches but that's nice and refreshing and you can stay put in it. But once it hits about 1 it generally gets worse, the storm clouds roll in, the thunder starts ( which is very loud and makes us jump a lot) and the lightning begins. That's about the time we make our way inside for the afternoon or go for a walk with the rain coats on.
One evening we were walking back from the shop out of town when we saw the most amazing colours in the sky and the sun. We had seen it once before when in the car but first time when we were just outside. The colours were like nothing we had seen, the sun was so big and such a bright orange it hurt your eyes to look at it even as it was just lowering out of sight. It was great watching it as we walked back but despite trying to hurry a bit we had more or less missed the finale with the camera by the time we got to the beach. We wanted to do it the next day but unfortunately it was more overcast again so it didn't do it the same.
We saw the weirdos a couple more times, the one who used to own the bar is there getting drunk by 2pm every single day. The gherkin man had a massive argument with his wife outside our room which kept Liam awake until 1.30 in the morning one night. Despite those little oddities it was a nice couple of days.
