Allergies that were once rather rare… like being allergic to peanuts, are becoming much more common in America. One theory as to why it’s happening is that we’re too clean. That reducing our exposure to dirt, and bacteria, and yes… even peanuts (every new parent is cautioned not to give their children peanuts for their first three years), is compromising our ability to tolerate them.
In the nearly six months that we’ve been traveling through Mexico I’ve yet to see a warning sign. No guard rails on cliffs or waterfalls. No “swift current” warnings in rivers. No warnings not to swim near the top of a waterfall… like in Yosemite. Not even signs alerting us to the dangers of monkeys, or crocodiles, or jaguars. Nothing.
Yet somehow… without being informed of the dangers that surround them, the Mexican people survive. I’ve swum with them swim in oceans and rivers. I’ve hiked and climbed with them. I’ve watched as they negotiate difficult stretches of water and trail… and my observation is that they’re tuned in. They listen to what the scene is telling them and they have a sense of how to put themselves in the best spot.
I’ve also been witness to many Americans and Western Europeans negotiations of the wilds of Mexico. And my assessment is that most of them aren’t tuned in… not even close. Their first order of business isn’t to survey the scene and get a feel for the currents or the footing… it’s to look for the flags and the warnings and the guard rails… and if they don’t see them… well, they just assume all to be safe and completely drop their guard. Hence their really nasty habit of putting themselves in the worst spot.
100% Wild
And it’s gotten me to thinking that maybe our “developed” worlds aren’t only too clean… maybe they’re also too safe. Which seems to be resulting in something far more dangerous than allergies. It’s causing a really dangerous condition that I’m going to call a general dislocation from Ma Nature. This one can’t be cured with medication. If the electronics ever go dim… the western world is in for a real shocker.
Even though we’d never heard of it before we put our sights on the pueblo of Catemaco. It seemed to fit the profile that we’ve developed of a cool town to visit. Well off the beaten path. Small-ish… less than 20,000 inhabitants. Surrounded by nature… a large lake that feeds into a big river that feeds into even bigger waterfalls. All topped off by monkeys… and crocodiles, and unique local cuisine… togogolo ceviche. That’s ceviche made from snails folks. I mean… how can you not stop for a visit?
Lake Catemaco
The town sits just a couple hundred kilometers north of the Yucatan. We reckoned that we’d hang out for a few days then hook up with the Yucatan Peninsula, work our way around north to south, and exit into Belize. And then… on the very first day that were in town, my debit card was eaten by an ATM. So much for plans.
Shortening a long story… I don’t use credit cards, and contrary to the advice of many… my brother included, I own only one debit card. With that knowledge in hand you may be able to imagine the depths of my dismay as the machine took my card… blinked it’s screen a few times… shut down for a second… and then came back on line, offering it’s services to the next customer. All without giving me a prompt to enter my passcode… or having the decency to return my card.
It was Sunday evening in Catemaco. The store manger couldn’t help. Security couldn’t help. We called the number on the side of the ATM… no answer. All of this of course was compounded by the fact that there are probably only about three people in all of Catemaco who speak English… including me (needless to say the other two were nowhere in sight). My Spanish is pretty functional now but I still need to wander the field of a conversation and guess on a word… or three. And these were conversations where filling in the blanks wouldn’t do… I wanted to understand exactly what they were saying. After some word association games that no doubt tested their patience it became exactly clear that nothing was gonna happen until Monday.
Bright and early the next day I was at the store. They still couldn’t help. We called the number on the side of the machine again… they still wouldn’t answer. The store manager insisted that I need to go to the bank who owns the machine in the nearby town of San Andres… about thirty minutes away.
In San Andres we found out that the situation was hopeless. The bank licenses it’s services to a custodian who maintains the machines, and the absolute rule is that 100% of the cards kept by ATM machines are destroyed. Period. No exceptions. Not even if I’m there with my ID to retrieve the card when the custodian opens the machine.
With that hope erased we clearly needed a new course of action. I had a few thousand pesos on me, and the owner of our campground was fine with letting us slide until I got a new card… so, the situation wasn’t critical. But when I discovered via my bank that even an expedited card would take a minimum of seven business days to arrive… well, let’s just say that I knew we’d have to come up with some bridge funding… as they say in the Silicon Valley.
Gene’s wonderful Villa Tepetapan
There are plenty of folks who think we’re nuts for taking this adventure… there’s even been a family member… or two, who’ve been downright disruptive. It’s funny how some are so sure that they know what’s best for others. This is happily not the case with my brother. Oh… he for sure thinks I’m crazy… but he’s used to it. Over the last few years we’ve been through a lot together… burying our father… dealing with our Mom’s catastrophic stroke and her ensuing needs for extraordinary care… that continue to this day, and it’s forged a really great and supportive multi-dimensional relationship. He’s also the most organized and best base camp manager on earth! We really couldn’t have this adventure without him. My only complaint is that we can’t do it together.
So when I texted my predicament to him I knew that it was all he could do to not reply with an “I told you that you needed two cards… DUH”. But drawing upon what must have been a reservoir of great restraint on his part… he didn’t. He wired us a couple hundred bucks… and that gave us plenty of breathing room.
About a week later Fed Ex pulled in with my new card. Thinking that our ordeal was complete I may have been guilty of an act of some premature celebration. Because… you see… there was a twist in the plot. It was great to hold that card. But… it’s worthless until it’s activated. A simple task in the states … you simply call in on the number that they have in your file. But calling on that number internationally added zeros and ones… essentially making it not the number on file for you. I tried their international activation line… three times, no dice. Our base camp had the unmitigated gall to go on vacation. We were on our own.
It took us two days and more than ten calls to the bank (which are not toll free from Mexico)… to come up with a scheme where I changed my main number on file to a friends in the states… she called, activated my card, set the PIN, and then I changed the main number on file back to mine. Thank you Jan Bugge!
I then walked to a bank ATM… one with a card slider (that didn’t suck my precious new card into it’s rusty innards) and successfully withdrew some dinero. The ordeal was now officially complete. Celebration ensued.
Back at camp we pulled out the maps to take a look at our next leg… and then we heard about Earl. The storm was still a few days out but it was projected to become a hurricane and it’s anticipated path was exactly where we were headed. Sitting and waiting… again.
Two days later Earl’s official “cone” (projected path) was published by NOAA. Earl was going to land in Belize, turn slight right, grind it’s way through the Yucatan, and head directly for us. Time to hide. But a couple of conversations with Gene, the owner of our campamento, a really nice, unassuming guy who hails from the American Midwest (and is English speaker #2 in Catemaco) convinced us that where we were was exactly where we needed to be. About twenty-five miles from the ocean, with a little altitude, the protection of some mountains, and well outside of the flood plain. Satisfied that we held the better ground, we dug in and prepared to battle Earl.
Ironically, Earl was scheduled to meet us on Kaila’s eighth birthday. We postponed the cake and pinata for a day or two. Gene graciously offered us the use of his BBQ and we decided to make use of the excellent supply of beef in Catemaco for the purposes of hamburgers… American style. And so we made quite the day of it. BBQing, eating, talking, and playing cards with Gene and our new friend Rich protected by the large covered patio at the camp. Earl came and went… delivering an amazing fourteen inches of rain in twenty-four hours. But the mountains and trees protected us from the winds that did much damage elsewhere in Veracruz.
Rain
Rain…
And More Rain
All of which means that the ATM eating my card initiated a series of events that resulted in us weathering tropical storm Earl in likely a much better place than would have otherwise been possible had we stuck to our original plan. Reason number 250 why I don’t like planning.
We finished up Kaila’s birthday with a really nice dinner at La Ola. We tilted more than a few Negra Modelo’s… capping Kaila at two. I know it was her Birthday but hey… someone’s gotta drive home. And then we commenced to whacking the crap out of a pig pinata stuffed with several local treats… excluding snails, that Kaila ultimately retrieved by decapitating senor pig with a mighty and well directed blow.
Happiness is…
If you’re headed to southern Mexico and Catemaco isn’t on your short list… you may want to reconsider. For those of you who are camping or in an RV or wanting to rent an apartment for a week or two we highly recommend Gene’s place… Villa Tepetapan. He’s a great guy and his campamento is really nice. You camp on a big grassy field. It’s walking distance to town… and the bathrooms even have toilet seats. Yes, he has wifi too… good wifi, but aren’t you headed to Mex to get away from that crap?
As I said earlier… if you’ve got some Spanish skills you’ll find them highly useful here. There’s very little English spoken in town so they won’t be able to help you out much. And even if you’re speaking Spanish… your accent is probably going to throw them off a bit (I know mine did). So if you know you’re on to the right word keep pecking away at the pronunciation until you see the lightbulb come on over their head.
La Ola is a really good restaurant… probably the best restaurant in town, but it’s a bit on the pricey side by Mexican standards ($8-$10 US per meal). We also recommend Paulina’s… directly across from the backside of the church. Good traditional food from the region. Very reasonably priced ($3-$5 US per meal). We ate here often.
Less than thirty minutes north of Catemaco is the Salto de Eyipantla waterfall. If you’ve seen the movie Apocolypto then you’ve seen the falls. Some dudes dive off of them in the movie and it’s pretty awesome scene… even more impressive when you see the falls in person. The locals promised us that people can… and do dive from the falls… and survive. But the falls are more than fifty meters…. so personally, I’m doubting it. Expect to pay someone twenty pesos to watch your car while you’re there (they’ll wash it for twenty more). Ten pesos per person to see the falls. And buy a couple of beers while your in town… they’re only twenty pesos a whack and the people need it. And please remember when you’re haggling for the best price… which is mandatory, you’re talking in pesos here. Even a discrepancy of fifty pesos is only around $2.50 US, and trust me… no ones getting rich.
A few miles to the west is the Gulf of Mexico. Just about thirty miles west of Catemaco you’ll encounter a large lagoon that leads to the coast… at it’s head is a small village. I’m sure that these directions seem a little vague but there’s only one road that goes west from Catemaco, and just past the village the road becomes absolutely impossible to drive. So it’s hard not to find. If you’re staying at Gene’s he’ll give you a few mile markers. Otherwise ask around Catemaco… everyone knows of it. There are guides in this village who offer very cool boat tours of the rivers and lagoon and then take you over to a beach on the Gulf of Mexico for about 600 – 700 pesos ($32-$35 US) for the entire day. There’s a restaurant on the beach that makes great shrimp empanadas and if you buy your guide a beer… or two, he’ll happily wait while you take a swim in the gulf and frolic on the beach to your hearts content.
Back in the village there’s a sort of community swimmin’ hole in an offshoot of the river. They’ve built a landing and a slide and this is where the locals congregate using the cool waters of river and the shade of the mangroves to duck the heat of the day. It’s all very pirates of the caribbean like. Quite the experience. The guide to ask for here is Mateo… he’s fantastic! Expect to pay someone a few pesos for watching your car here too.
The Coolest Swimmin’ Hole We’ve Ever Seen
Catemaco has two very well stocked grocery stores. The carniceria’s are excellent. Rotisserie chickens are two for $110 downtown (that’s two chickens for less than six bucks… for sure it costs more than six bucks to raise one chicken… so maybe this explains the general state of the economy). Several local bakeries make a delicious assortment of sweet breads. The downtown mercado has a good supply of produce daily. And then there’s the snail ceviche… yep, I tried it… and survived… so far. It tasted like chicken.