Manzanillo and back

This trip to Manzanillo was planned in the summer of last year when Doug and Crystal Winger told us, at their summer campsite, "Oh we winter in Manzanillo, that's not far from Puerrto Vallarta - just down the road" Well 270kms and four hours of travelling we arrived at the Winger's place.

Driving the Hwy 200 is no Pacific Coast Highway driving experience but not boring. The first hour South is in the mountains and is very windy as one climbs and drops following the original trail, levelling out  after one hundred kms we then moved through the agricultural heartelnad of Jalisco State and into Colima State.Passing through dusty towns and villages that have suffered the effects of urbanisation in the larger centres and the local stores and ventures have closed and whats's left appear to be not viable - just rundown and existing. With only two large Towns between start and finish we saw a lot of cultivated fields - mango trees, bananas and maybe tomatoes and peppers.

Arriving at Manzanill we entered the Town from the North, the touristy area and travelled around the bay to the South where Doug and Crystal's condo was located. This is in the middle of this huge Bay, the arc of which is probably thirty kms. The beaches at the North and the working port at the South end. Old Town or "Centro" is at the South and hasn't been modernised - it is cheaper to infill the open land between the boroughs than touch old town. The condo is in a complex of eighteen and D&C are the only occupants at the moment, it will be filled and rowdy at Easter time when the Mexican owners come in for the festival. Welcomed with open arms we settle in and decide to be entertained by the "tour" Everyone who gets friends from out of town wants to show off their sights/sites and we set off to see them. After an impressive drive around the richer homes pegged to the cliffs of the Bay we end up in a scruffy backwater compound that is the "Iguana Sanctuary". A local man has taken it upon himself to turn his property, that lines the main river, into an Iguana Sanctuary. We were not told if the iguanas lived here before he did but he tells us that there are now five hundred of these beasts living in the trees and buildings that make up his patch. Only seeing a couple on the ground, we questioned the numbers, but were told that it is too cold and they were up in the trees to catch the sun - and they were. As we drove along the river, on the way out, we could see iguana trees - trees thick with iguanas on the hhigher branches just sun-bathing, a strange but magnificent sight.

The drive back showed us the old town and its present state of busy decay, so familiar to older downtown urban centres. Busy, functional and very charming to a visitor's eye. Doug, who had adopted the Mexico way, very fast, was proud of the present expansion plans for the industrial port of Manzanillo. Governments of all levels has made the Port expansion a keystone of local economic development with National implications. "This will be the largest Port on the Pacific Coast when finished." Doug states. Finally he shows us a row of houses, in a better part of the residential area nearer downtown and tells us that "This is where I thought we might move to next, we want to live with the Mexicans!"

Twenty four hours later we parted company and thanked them profusely for the abundant hospitality, which far exceeded our expectations - thank you Doug and Crystal.

Arriving back in PV, the journey had none  of the minor drama of the trip South, when we had to wait for a while when the road was blocked due to the recovery of a tanker truck that had rolled off the road, burned out and the driver was killed. Also seeing one of the roaming cows, some Mexican farmers turn out their cows to graze on the roadside, laying dead in the gutter. Just a couple of sights that one sees on the roads. But then checking the internet that night it was noticed that an eighty car pile-up had ocurred on the 401 just West of Port Hope. Bad drivers everywhere!

Being away two days we fhought that would have been enough time  to have the internet installed, after all TelMex had said "within the next two days Senor" - wrong. Checking with our ever-present but not efficient rental agent, she agreed that TelMex had not been in and when checking further she said the same thing, "Within two days. But if you offer a tip I can get a technician now." Yep within twenty minutes Miguel had arrived and discovered what i suspected - ther was no internet feed on the line. As Miguel packed up and tried to explain, he finished with the same old refrain - "Manana (tomorrow)" But having been told about the free feed from a nearby Dental Clinic, which has an open network, we did get to check email later that night.

This entry, and the previous ones will be uploaded when the internet comes to the condo - perhaps Manana.