Sasha says... Seabreeze, Snorkeling, Sailing, Sunburns, and Salutations

Being the awful Colocha that i am, this is my eighth and final week in Central American, but my first post on this here blog...
Caye Caulker is the Caribbean Island oasis that we landed on. We were greeted by Bobby who didn't have to convince us too hard to stay at his guest house, because we were immediately wooed by his bicycle, which was sin handle bars, retrofitted with the steering wheel of a retired EZ-GO. (two of my favorite things; ingenuity and bicycles)
Caye Caulker is a limestone coral island about 20 miles off the coast of Belize City. Quite small, the island was split in half in 1981 during a hurricane. One of the halves is full of Creole, Rastafarian and Garifuna islanders, accompanied by sunburnt Europeans on Holiday, biking and lulling about dive shops, open air restaurants with swings swinging to the bar, and lying in hammocks over the water. Typically the other side of the island, (which is being held onto as a nature preserve) is reached by a 30 second boat ride. It is not advisable to swim because of the very very strong current that would turn the couple hundred meter journey it into a 9 minute swim. Elisa and i were unaware (of course) and swam it unknowingly. (I did twice when i thought that Elisa was stuck on the other island at sunset, crawling with giant crabs, iguanas, lizards doing pushups and little birds). Turns out a lot of people go to Caye Caulker after Tikal, so there were a lot of familiar faces on the little island. Including our favorite lanky German couple that I toured Tikal with while I kept losing Elisa and Ari.
My newest addiction and wonderfully simple altered state is snorkeling. One moment, i am in the harsh sun, traversing the choppy waves crashing on the coral reef, and with a simple downward tilt of the head, my breathing becomes intentional, my body feels light and i can see the underworld clearly, things move slowly and with beautiful grace. Who would have known that there was a world full of millions of creatures, colors, textures and methods of exploration where my feet were treading a moment ago.
Much cooler and a whole lot weirder than outer space.
After returning from a day trip snorkeling with Manatees and stingrays, we discovered that we could take a sailboat down the coast for three days, snorkeling all the way.
Upon boarding the little green yellow and black sail boat, everyones shoes were put into a black garbage bag and and seen for three days. Two Italian men, two lads and one gal from Holland, a British couple, a Dutch couple, Tyl and Laura (our German Friends who we didn't have to push very hard to join us) and the tres coloches all squished into the hull as we departed in the rain. The crew sailed us off into the cloudy abyss as we all sweated and stared at each other. After ten minutes the skies cleared up and the ocean was our oyster.
We stopped a few times a day to pull in the line to bring in a fish or to snorkel , then ate sandwiches and cookies soggy from our salty hand. Rasta Mon and Jakob (the first mates) taught us how to spear fish for our dinner, and Captain Ramsey taught us how to steer the boat to the sounds of bob marley and Jack Johnson. All three of the crew were cousins from the town of Hopkins and Santa Monica, CA, but each persons story of how they were related was different.
The first night we arrived on an island no bigger then two acres. We pitched our homes for the night then snorkeled to the reef right from our front door of our tents until the sun went down, the rum punch stared flowing and the campfire lit... the island was ours.
Ari turned out to be quite the little pirate, sailing the boat in her bikini and black bandana, catching then (when we arrived the next evening at our next island) gutting the biggest Baracuda of the day. We celebrated Ari´s new found piratedom and our last night all together by drumming, dancing a hula hooping with some islanders on Tobacso Caye, one who had fashioned a drum out of a turtle shell. We tried to undersatnd the Creole that they spoke over the sound of the waves gently rolling up to the bar.
After a beautiful sunrise, followed by an encounter with a horrifying and GIGANTIC moray eel in the reef we continued on our way. Everyone on the boat was crispy tan by now and Elisa has come down with a strage condition only to be described as Puffy Lower Lip Syndrom.
That afternoon the inevitable happened... we arrived in Placencia and dumped the garbage bag of shoes on the dock. Ari and the rest put their shoes on their tan-line-less feet while Elisa and I tucked our rucksacks back into the hull. Elisa and I would sail back to Caye Caulker while the rest slept in placencia or hopped another boat to the next oceanside destination
In true lovers fashion, Ari waved and blew kisses goodbye from the end of a rickety wooden peer, green skirt blowing in the wind. We laughed and waved and joked as we sailed into the sunset. But as Ari´s little silhouette became smaller and smaller, the lump,made up of knowing that something beautiful and irreplicable had just ended, sank into my throat. Elisa and I didn't say anything, because there was only one things to say, and we both knew it. ¨damn I'm gonna miss that girl¨... so we hung our feet over the side of the ship, sat real close and let our tears mix with the salty ocean spray.
Sailing back with the boat meant a free ride north, no need to hire a hostel for the night, and guaranteed lanky wild dreams of the floor of the hull. We kept whoever was on shift company, watching the impossible amount of stars in the sky, learning about the people of Saint Vincent island mixing with the arriving Africans who never made it to slavery, tricking the European settlers, and canoeing to the mainland to become the Garinagu, And the story of our captains missing toe, And explanations of why the plankton glow at night. When we grew tired, we found our beds on the floor of the hull, being hazily woken throughout then night by rain, hollering and scurrying when the captain yelled for Rasta Mon and Jakob to wake up and help him, sails crashing on the dock, violent sloshing side to side, the announcement that we were half way there and out of fuel for the motor...
It was in all honestly one of my favorite nights thus far in my life.
With sadness, and excited wonder; ordering our first meals for just two in Mexico, we wonder what adventure Ari is having.
We are not ust over the Border in Chetumal, the Capital of Quintana Roo which is unfrequented by tourists.Within hours of arriving we find ourselves on a local radio show, and planning a 5am rising the next morning to ride bicycles with a group from the local college to a nearby Mayan ruin. After riding a few hours to the Ruin, and playing a scavenger hunt in the park, we drank gatorade and ate fiberey cookies. On the way back, I lost the handle bars from my bike, but not to worry, thanks to the ingenuity of some folks in a pickup truck and a man with a toolbox, i was back in shipshape to end the ride and catch up Elisa and the rest.
We are turning into starfish in the afternoons to escape the heat. And woke up before the sun again this morning for early mass, complete with guitar that is almost tuned, simple drumming and xmas light decorated Jesus.