Oh yeah!!! I've slept like a log and have woken up by myself. I love that feeling of waking up gently when you're ready to, rather because of the incessant chirping of the alarm on a weekday, or those times where you wake repeatedly while waiting for the alarm to go off, or on those days when the garbage truck or cars are in the street below my window and making just too much noise! While it is only 8AM, it's a treat from the normal 7AM, and despite being up late chatting, I feel reasonably refreshed. It's time to investigate my "romantic" bathroom – the outside one – as we're due to meet up for a 9AM breakfast.
Outside, it's not so cold, but not so warm either, and there is quite a steady breeze, so I'm rather hoping for plenty of the promised hot water, otherwise it might be just a little bit nippy…
The bathroom is an area of perhaps 4m by 5m with a bamboo screen (or similar) around it that is about 6 feet high (I can see over the top without too much trouble). There are a heap of plants growing in it and in the middle is a large umbrella-type thing. There is a toilet in the opposite corner to the shower, and a chair to put your stuff on, next to a hand basin and a mirror. The shower is in the corner in front of where you walk in and comprises a gas hot water heater on the wall behind it, some basic pipework rising out of that and up to a showerhead. One stands in a bowl-shaped arrangement, that with a little imagination, you might believe to be a giant clam shell. There's also lots of little artsy decorations around, with a sea-side theme to them of course – starfish and shells! It really is quite lovely, and hopefully one day, it'll make a bit of inspiration for something similar if I'm fortunate enough to have my own place again…
So, stripping down to the essentials, I step up to the clam shell and turn the hot water on. Hmmm. Three surprises. One is that the shower head is at the level of my shoulders – looks like I'll be stooping to wash my hair. The larger surprise, and somewhat more important, is that the gas hot water heater fails to spring to life when I turn on the tap. I can hear water moving through it, but there is the disappointing lack of a "woof" sound as the gas ignites… Third surprise – you might guess – is the rather insipid amount of water coming out of the shower head. Oh dear.
Closer inspection of the gas heater reveals the problem – no pilot light. I think back to my first arrival into my apartment and remember my struggles to light the pilot on my water heater, only to give up in disgust at not being able to do it, then finding out that it was an electric starter type. I search for signs of an electrical lead to the unit, but no, nothing there. There also seems to be evidence of flames being used in the front hole where the pilot light should be. Drat and bother.
I get dressed again and head back to my "romantic" cabin in search of matches. Matches now located, back to the bathroom. After five minutes of cursing and wondering how on earth it works, I finally luck onto the right combinations of button pushing and turning and having the match in the right place, and the pilot leaps into life. I think the instructions are saying to hold the button for 15 seconds, but just to be sure, I hold it for 30. As I let the button out, I'm holding my breath that it doesn't go out and I have to start again. Aaah, success, it's still going. He he he, now I'm cooking! I crank open the tap, listen to the water moving through the unit and yes, there's the "woof" as the heater leaps to life. The volume of water still isn't that great, but ooooh, here comes the hot water. I think I'll survive!
I strip off again, test the water, and my, it's hot! I slow the hot down and turn on the cold at the same time. Ooops, mistake number "lots"! The gas heater switches off, as not enough water is going through it. Bugger. I crank open the hot again, and it comes back on. Looks like I'll have to have the hot tap open fully and adjust things by the addition of cold water alone. In I get and begin the process of temperature adjustment. Drat and bother, it's gone out again, but this time, nothing that 5 minutes of working on can fix. The pilot is still going, so it isn't a lack of gas problem. In the end, I give up and resign myself to a cold shower – not so romantic!!!
To top of the experience, right in the middle of being soaped up and having a head full of shampoo, the door to the bathroom flies open and the owner is standing there. It's hard to imagine what he was thinking – my towel was flung over the door and the sound of the water running was reasonably obvious I'd have thought, but nonetheless, there he is. It takes him maybe a second or so to register that someone is there, or maybe it was enough of a perve to realise that the occupant wasn't so interesting, and he mumbled an apology, shut the door and wandered off!
Having eventually managed to wet myself enough to have rinsed off the soap, my "romantic" shower is over. The good thing about cold showers is that when you get out and get dry, everything seems relatively warm. My blood is flowing and I'm wide awake, that's for sure, although not exactly feeling the love that the morning SHOULD have delivered!
With the various travails of the morning, it's now just after 9AM and time for breakfast with the gang. I wander over to their cabin and knock gently! Looks pretty much like Claudia is the only one up, and even she is only just awake. We begin getting everything out and organised and eventually everyone is ready. The girls are cooking this morning and the whole breakfast is pretty darn good. A nice spread!
It's a leisurely affair, but eventually we're fed, cleaned up and ready to head off. The plan is to visit the orbicular granite just to the north of Caldera, then head back through Bahia Inglesa, down the coast to Huasco for lunch, then return in a leisurely manner, enjoying the flowers of the desierto florido. Having done most of the route on the motorbike, and it took a long time, I'm interested to see how we go for time – it seems a bit late to head off, but hey, what could go wrong? I'm sure it will be a lovely day, no matter what.
The orbicular granite is still spectacular (from a geological point of view), but the girls seem to enjoy it too. Before too long, our attentions are drawn by the rock pools along the beach and the platform that is covered by water at high tide, but is now reasonably exposed, with lots of stepping stones amongst the remaining water to walk over. There is an abundance of starfish and anemones (bright red) to see, and each new little discover we all make brings delighted little "Ooh, mire!" (look), or "Oooh, aqui!" (here). We also discover that the rocks are quite slippery, and fortunately, no-one manages to fall in and have wet shoes for the rest of the morning.
Having spent a lot longer than planned, it's now the better part of mid-day and time to get a wriggle on if we're going to get to Huasco at a reasonable hour for lunch. Off we go, south along the coast. The day is reasonably grey, and not necessarily the best for taking photo's, but the coastline here is still quite pretty in the gloom. We arrive at Puerto Viejo without fuss, but there is a bit of excitement as there are multiple road options. I haven't been here before, but decide that I'll be a bit confident and say that the road to the right is the correct one. Worst case, we end up in Puerto Viejo town, at which point I'll recognise the way out, but as it turns out, we end up in the right place – on top of the little cliff overlooking the town. Turning left, we head away from the coast and towards the main coast road (P.V. is on a little spur road). The intersection is also where I saw my first part of the desierto florido, with masses of white flowers. Here's hoping they are still out.
We get to the point where "my" white flowers were, and lo and behold, nothing but purple flowers. Very beautiful and very different. Looks like the plants flower at different times to avoid competing with each other. We can't help but stop and wander amongst them taking more photos. These are the first decent lot of flowers that the girls have seen and they seem to be finding the whole thing just fascinating. It seems like the boys have an eye on the clock, and before too long, we're back in the car and hurtling to the south. The change in flowers from last time I was here is startling – nothing but white previously, and now virtually nothing but purple!
We find ourselves repeatedly stopping for flower and scenery photos, which is completely against the original plan of blasting down to Huasco and wandering back in a leisurely manner. Looks like we'll be doing the opposite. No big deal from the food point of view – I'm still stuffed from breakfast.
The rest of the journey to Huasco is the same – blast along for a bit, then be overwhelmed by the need for more photo's of flowers and/or scenery, so another stop. We're all particularly delighted (I think) by the little surprises in terms of colours of flowers. The red ones brought us to a screeching (nearly) halt, followed by a u-turn to go back and see what that little flash of colour was all about. My favourite little memory, although it could have been ugly, was Victor bending down to smell one of the cactus flowers, forgetting about and not seeing the 10 cm spines that stick up all around the flowers. He remembered just in time, and just as I started to lunge towards him to stop him. It was a moment to set my heart pumping and the adrenaline flowing, as a face full of spines might not be such a good look, particularly one in the eye!
We eventually roll into Huasco at about 3.30pm (or so) and go in search of somewhere for lunch. My two previous visits mean I'm classified as the expert, which I demonstrate at the first opportunity by missing the turnoff that we want. Victor recovers the situation nicely and before too long, I can point out the restaurant I want to go to. We manage to park directly in front and head in. My favourite waiter is again on duty, and he shows no sign whatsoever of recognition of me. Fair enough I guess – I'm sure he sees plenty of 195cm gringo's though the restaurant every week and that we all tend to look alike…
We're seated, orders taken, food delivered, and we tuck in. Quality seems pretty good again, and everyone is happy. We make a late choice to add some empanadas to the order, and everyone is rather surprised at the size of the ones that turn up. Huge, in comparison to normal, which of course leaves us wondering as to the wisdom of all the rest of the food we've ordered. As it turns out, it's not a problem. We manage to crunch our way through pretty much all of it, but are feeling so stuffed afterwards that we're in desperate need of a walk.
It's only a short stroll down to the jetty. The water is again crystal clear, the sun is now out, and it's all pretty delightful. There are an enormous number of pelicans around, taking up most of the available rocks alongside the jetty. There's a bit of a crowd, and it takes a few moments before our attention is drawn to the water and we can see what the others are looking at. There's a seal playing around (showing off, by the look of his actions) and being fed by a guy throwing morsels out to him. One foolish sea gull who dares to try and pick up the morsel is extremely fortunate to escape with a fright, as the seal spotted it coming in and sped towards the scrap, perhaps hoping to end up with the bird? It was extraordinary how fast the seal could accelerate and move through the water – incredible!
We were also treated to a very bold pelican investigating the tourists and searching for a few tasty bits and pieces, perhaps even from any exposed bits of the tourists! Despite it eyeballing me from a metre away, it didn't try and eat me or my camera, nor Andrea and Alma who were cowering behind me and oohing and aahing at the same time. After we wandered off to look at other things, the pelican got a bit more brave and headed on down to see whether he could pinch anything from the guy feeding the seal. Unfortunately for the pelican, he did manage to get something but didn't take off quickly enough. They guy seemed intent on getting his scrap back from the stomach of the pelican, which wasn't the most beautiful sight and although the crowd was mightily entertained, it seemed un-necessarily cruel to me, so I left. The others seemed ready to leave at about the same time, and we found ourselves at the car, ready to go.
The trip back to Bahia Inglesa was pretty much a carbon copy of the way down (perhaps slightly less stops), with the exception of a detour to the pueblo of Totoral. Victor had worked in the area in the past and was keen to show us the "cotton trees". Of course, none of us believed that cotton grew on trees – my memory is that it grows on bushes. Nonetheless, there we were in Totoral, looking up at the large trees with clumps of cotton hanging from them. Extraordinary!
We rolled into Bahia Inglesa just after dark, having watched the sun setting below the horizon from the car, parked on the edge of the road. Just beautiful.
Dinner is a self-prepared effort tonight – perfect after a long day. We chat into the night, and eventually I retire to my "romantic" cabin, ready for another night of uninterrupted sleep, free from traffic and the barking of the dogs…
A
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