#60 / 2005 Tour 3: Scary Things

SCARY THINGS

#60


For all the time I've been her I have to admit I haven't spent any time in the ocean. I don't know how the subject came up, but the very first night I bellied up to Rick's bar there was a long protracted conversation about sea snakes.

Sea snakes and fresh water snakes alike, when they matae, congregate into these huge balls of mulitple dozens. They churn up the water spinning and writhing in one big orgy ball with the males spurting semen over the whole mass in order to impregnate the females. I know it's true I saw it on the Discovery channel!

When Josie confirmed she had seen sea snakes herself saying, "They're much more afraid of you."

Well, that wasn't enough to appease me. I have been stung by jelly fish and atacked by red ants while visiting various seashores, so my heart just wasn't in it. I am perfectly happy to sit by the water, under a palm tree, sipping on a fresh cocoanut, and reading a good book.

There is another beach around here called La Ropa I believe where they say you can encounter alligators. I went nowhere  near there. Even back at the villa, I saw an iguana big as something from a pet shop crawling up the bathroom screen window.

Before we came on the trip I thought I would have to prepare myself to see a lot of big cockroaches and rats, but that hasn't happened. In Nashville, Memphis, and New Orleans I have seen big rats running down the city sidewalks. I haven't seen even one rat, or mouse for that matter, on the streets, but I have seen a lot of hungry-looking cats.

In the hotels, even the very best ones, we will be walking down a long hall and out of the corner of my eye I will see something that looks like an electric current sparking on the wall. It's golden little chameleons, iguanas, something like that. They scatter so quickly that they look like electric lights flashing on the wall.  Once again, harmless I'm sure, but I don't want to touch them.

At the magnificent world-class Barra de Navidad restort, Joe and I were strolling on the grounds one evening. We were well away from the busy lobby where a long cobblestone driveway to the main entrance of the resort has been hacked out of a jungle.

I glanced up and said, " Oh look, Joe, there's a kitty cat," as I advanced towards it. But on closer examination that was no "puddy cat." The tail was a little too long. This creature was a little too big. It turned and scampered back toward the tall palm trees and dense bushes up the hill.

Even though there was a well-manicured lawn with quaint street lights and sidewalks, it was all a little too misty and dark up there for me. It looked too much like the "Island of Dr. Moreau" up there and my natural instinct was too cringe, thinking just how many more of THEM were up there? They moved a lot like monkeys with these long arms, ready enough to reach out and grab at me as I walked on the sidewalk I feared.  Those things could have been lemurs or some other kind of small primate creature, I don't know, haven't seen anything like them before or since.