Day Eight - Celestún

To start the morning bus ride on our way to Celestún , Jacques appropriately played “America the Beautiful.” Today is the Fourth of July and we celebrated with an American festivity – going to la playa (the beach). The town of Celestún is located on the northwestern part of the Yucatan peninsula, directly on the Gulf of Mexico (but no, 3-311, the oil spill did not reach this part of the Gulf of Mexico…I checked for you!).

When we arrived at the beach, Jacques hired three boats to take our group out into the Gulf. We hopped in at the water’s edge and made our way along the coast, watching the world pass us by! Our goal was to see hundreds of flamingos in their local habitat, but as a result of Hurricane Alex, the pink beauties were nowhere to be found. :-/  However, one highlight of our boat ride was the chance to see (and for me to capture on film), a pelican grabbing its afternoon meal!  Hehe....Fish gotta swim, birds gotta eat! ("Finding Nemo" reference). While our boat ride away from the beach was calm, we weren’t met with such tolerable seas on the way back. My stomach started to churn, so I traded my seat in the back for Jacques’ in the front…but unlucky for him (sorrrryy!!), as the boat hit the waves, those in the back got drenched from head to toe. I came off the boat a tad damp, but a few of my sea-mates were water-logged. We tried to dry off in the sun and then sat down for a yummy meal of fried crab-cakes…not like the Maryland crab cakes I’m used to back in the states, but delicious nonetheless! To go with my meal, I enjoyed the juice of a freshly picked coconut! They made a hole in the side, stuck a straw in, and I devoured it within minutes! Yum yum!

On our bus ride home, Jacques stopped the bus for a photo opportunity, and came back with pitahaya, the fruit of a cactus. It has a pink exterior and is white with black seeds inside. It tasted like a kiwi, only a bit more solid. It was juicy and sweet! According to Jacques, the particular cactus that produces the pitahaya takes two years to start giving fruit and the pitahaya takes about a month to ripen. I’d definitely look for those again!

Once we got back, Alex (Jacques’ assistant) and I made our way to a mini-mall only a few blocks away from the hotel that had a store that was a cross between Macy’s, Target, and Wal-mart, called Sanborn’s. It was exciting to see the many things this store had, like magazines, DVDs, CDs, toiletries, children’s games, perfumes, candy, etc., etc., etc.! I bought a copy of National Geographic Kids in Spanish for my students to compare to the same edition in English, and I also tried a Chocolate-Coconut candy bar that tasted 10 times better than Mounds! Fue muy delicioso! Tomorrow we head to Campeche and I might swim in a sinkhole. I’m not too sure because it seems that I’ve got the sweetest blood of us all…I currently have about 15 mosquito bites (thank goodness for Cortisone cream and Malaria pills!). Well, until next time that I have steady Internet…adios!