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Sunday, July 29, 2018

7.27.18 Back to La Bocana, El Salvador and The Exodus from Nica to El Salvador

My surf mojo was going through a crisis of consciousness.  I'd previously enjoyed lightly fettered access to a reliable and sometimes magical beachbreak.  All I'd had to do was grab my board and go.

Now I was thirty kilometers away, in a borrowed car (which I'd be parking out in the open).

Several factors had stymied my attempts to paddle out sooner.  Massive swell coupled with a brutally low tide was the first.  The swell models predicted a slow marching-down in size and I made plans to surf.

The gods had other plans for me.  That Saturday evening, I ordered a pizza and in my haste to meet the pizza guy I ran barefoot on these wet too-smooth stepping stones.  My index toe curled under the pad of my foot and was crushed into the sharp edge of the awaiting next stepping stone.  I thought for sure I'd broken it and cautiously canceled the next day's session.

On two occasions, massive thunderstorms and their accompanying rain derailed my plans.

And finally, on a very dark Friday morning, the stars aligned so I could presumably bring you this blog entry!

As previously alluded to, I was in a borrowed car.  I didn't know if the key had a chip so I couldn't risk getting it wet by taking it into the water with me.  This meant Punta Roca was out.  I realized if Chuleta was at the hotel I could surf La Bocana and it just so happened he'd spent the night there!

I was really surprised at just how many rocks I'd have to dance on to paddle out.  There was also a suspicious smell in the air as my toes hit the remarkably warm water.

I caught five waves.  I had a massive lull before I caught my last one, by far my best.   Since I hadn't caught anything in so long, I went on a questionable one as I was really late.  I got a massive amount of speed and hooted myself as I made eye contact with a local while adjusting my course so as not to hit him. I connected on the inside but I had no speed when  I tried to bonk off the oncoming section.

I took a lot of beatings out there as it was really shifty.  Unfortunately, though the waves were still big, they were mostly all drop.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~The Journey from Nica to El Salvador~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I got my wife and daughters out of there on June 18th.  They took a puddle jumper from right outside our development to Liberia, Costa Rica.  I tasked myself with getting our belongings (which had come down with us in Opie), Chucho and yours truly, out of Nicaragua.  My goal was mid-July.

I was reaching out to people, friends of friends, for ways to make it out.  I even dreamt up the possibility of going by boat.  That would have been M U C H preferable to the journey I undertook.

I reached out to Yasmil, who is the preferred shuttler of people in and around Hacienda Iguana through Facebook.  I had a big ask, I needed to charter a microbus (Toyota Hiace, pictured below) and have a driver take me across two international borders, and they had to drive back.  He said he didn't do that, but he knew of someone who did.

Enter Ariel, he said he would do this (I came to find out he had never done this, not a big deal) but he couldn't do it because of the tranques (roadblocks).  I understood his reluctance.  The dudes at the roadblocks were concerned with guns coming through because, though guns aren't illegal in Nica, they are HEAVILY restricted.  So if guns came in the population of that town could be sitting ducks.  How long would it take to unpack and search a FULL Hiace?  Hours.  This could be repeated as we weaved through towns.

He quoted me $550, which was very reasonable.  This included all permits and gas.  But the main issue was I had no idea as to when, or if, he would drive me because of the nebulous situation with the tranques.

I looked into chartering a small plane to take off from the little airport nearby and land at Ilopango, El Salvador's main airport up until Comalapa was put into service right around the time I was born.  There were two main issues with the plane route:

  1. They would only allow 850lbs, including Chucho and me.  No surfboards either, so I'd have to sell those in Nica.  The weight limit was a problem because it meant I'd have to store the remainder of our stuff.
  2. They wanted $3500!
I was slowly resigning myself to having to drop the dough on the plane.

But oh so interestingly, fate intervened....

I asked my neighbor Barry, from whom I'd been borrowing the bike, how he ended up renting the bike.  He told me his driver Agustín had rented it to him.  The name rang a bell.  It was the name of the driver we'd had during our very first trip to Nica in 2014.  I asked Barry some questions and confirmed it was the same guy.

He and I had gotten along really well in 2014.  I celebrated him daily upon our return back to Oceanside as his ringtone was set to the chorus of this classic.  I would sing the chorus and do the handclaps:



I got his contact info and reached out to him.  He claimed to remember me and said he would do the trip for $1100.  Bastard was trying to gouge me!  But the good news was I'd have someone who could conceivably take me to El Salvador, so at least I'd save more than $2K.

Then, the unthinkable happened: God smiled upon me!  Ariel wrote me on Facebook all pissed off that I'd been talking to other drivers.  I said, dude, you passed! He said, "Yeah, back then I did!".

Apparently Agustín had been bragging about the half-Gringo/half-Salvadorean he was ripping off and his hubris cost him and saved me!

I didn't give Ariel a hard time because I wanted to possibly salvage our deal, since he seemed to have renewed interest.  I said, "I'm willing to honor our deal if you can take me by July 15th".  He said "ok, I just need to have the bank sign off and my leaving the country with the Hiace (he still owed on it)".

We made tentative plans and then solidified them.  We would be departing around two am on July 10th.

In the interim, I got to surf somewhat.  I was able to squeeze seventeen sessions into twenty-one days.  Most of these were abridged due to Chucho being a pussy and yelping for me.  I also officially was cooking for myself for the first time in my life.  I enjoyed cooking so much that I lost almost twenty pounds in twenty days.  I would do one meal a day with a snack in the morning.  I weighed in at 147 lbs and some might say SMOKING HOT, if you're into the praying mantis look.

HNNNNNNNNNG 😋
 I had already been packing and repacking our stuff as some of the Colorado boxes were falling apart.  I moved everything to the main living room area so as to better organize everything.  I took some trips into Rivas (when I knew there'd be no roadblocks) to hit the vet with Chucho so he could be certified as being importation-worthy.


I had a really tough decision to make with the car.  I'd purchased it in January, it was a too-nice Toyota Prado, which was similar to the Lexus SUV.  I decided to buy that car because the alternatives were the Toyota Fortuner (about which I'd heard various bad things), and the Toyota Hilux (a pick-up with a rough ride that would have made Solani upchuck within ten minutes).

I tried to sell it for over a month.  I ended up getting lowballed by the husband of a female former pro surfer (her name rhymes with Bolly Heck).  He told me he "may be interested for $9K".  I wasn't going to sell it to him because the guy was a morph but Nica being what it was I got one other bite, total.  I'd resigned myself to the idea that I was either going to take a lowball offer or have to store it and pay out the ass in monthly storage fees.  This approach would also necessitate a trip back to Nica, in possibly an even worse situation, and staying for an undetermined amount of time until I sold it, not to mention the further expense of the trip back.

Then I got an idea.  I bought the car from a car lot in Managua.  I reached out to the guy and he said he could hold it in consignment and pay me when he sold it.  This was quite a fun decision to make.  Was I really about to trust a used car salesman, in a third-world country that was in the middle of a massive political destabilization?

The answer, when compared to the former option was a resounding yes.  But there were warning signs.  He was supposed to come down with a buddy to take it the week before I left.  He flaked both times.  Then he promised he would be there on Monday (I was scheduled to leave Tuesday, the tenth).  He never showed and this was adding massive stress to one of the most stressful situation I'd ever been through.  His solution? Have me meet him in Managua on or way up north.

I was pissed.  I didn't want to drive a nice car through Third World nastiness at two in the morning, but it was still the best option money- and hassle-wise.

So the night of the ninth, Ariel is supposed to show up before nine.  Nine comes and goes and I am steaming.  I'm calling him, WhatsApp'ing him and nothing. Finally at 940 he tells me he is in the complex.  He asks for a live location pin and I send it to him.

He arrives.  The plan was for him and his buddy to sleep here until two and leave in the morning, once we'd packed. He ended up showing up with two dudes. He asked upon our having met if we could just go now.  I'd told him of the arrangement with the car dealer and I had to shift that back, which I was able to do.  I still had little doubt he'd flake on me again, leaving me in the middle of Managua, on my way to El Salvador with a car that was not in my name (people in Nica who aren't residents keep the car in the seller's name and prove ownership with a bill of sale).  If he was going to flake again, I wouldn't be able to import the car into El Salvador as it was more than eight years old (I'd looked into what it would have taken to "alleviate" that situation in El Salvador and apparently it's damn near impossible to do unless you are connected).

The car dealer swore he would be there and we loaded things into the Hiace from three flights up starting at ten at night.  I told Ariel that I didn't think all the things would fit (he'd neglected to remove most of the seats, as per my request) inside but he thought they still would.  About a half-hour later, he realized his mistake and we had to reposition things.  There was a cramped seat-and-a-quarter for the dog and me to suffer.  We stuffed ourselves in, the two guys up front, and thankfully, one guy driving the Prado behind us, and headed off into the night just before midnight.  My last view of Hacienda Iguana was enshrouded in darkness.

Ariel's cousin was driving, the third guy was invited because he'd made the trip before and knew the proper route.  We weren't on the road an hour before we hit our first snag.  We got pulled over.  I was really tired and apathetic about it; I just hoped they didn't ask to search the car.  My blood boiled in anger when it was found out the guy who was driving the Hiace DIDN'T HAVE HIS LICENSE!  After the guy was apologizing to Ariel he reasoned he'd left it in his car.  He ended up paying a bribe of less than $4 for us to be let go.
 
 
The monument to Hugo Chavez, arguably the godfather of the destruction of Venezuela (Pic from Twitter)


We hit Managua, my first time seeing it in the dark.  Near the disgustingly gaudy monument to Hugo Chavez, who at the time of its construction was giving so much money to Nicaragua, we saw what the boys identified as a transexual prostitute.

The conversation went like this:
"That's the kind you pick up, bang, and then "she" says, 'My turn!'".
I added, "And then "she" still charges you full price!".

They loved that comment.

We pulled into a gas station in the middle of Managua at two in the morning and shockingly the car dealer showed up in his own Prado not two minutes later.  I filled out some paperwork, eerily giving him power of attorney.  He forgot one thing and had to go back.  The guys who were driving me were quietly freaking out, looking at every passing car as they came through every minute or so.  A week earlier, there had been a government-sponsored shooting at a different Puma gas station a few kilometers away.  I would have been gnarled out if I hadn't been so tired.  I was physically drained but also mentally so; after weeks of worrying as to how I was going to pull this off.

I felt better after the Prado had gone with Perreira (the car dealer) even though I had no clue as to my legal recourse if he reneged and screwed me over.  He offered to have us have breakfast at his resort within a couple of miles of the border.  It was a place for middle class families to stay and I wasn't really sure if there was a market for it, being so far north.

I tried to sleep, but I didn't.  It was a rough ride and I was squished in.  The guys up front were gnarled out.  There was a small commotion in the cabin when they said they saw a guy with his face covered with an AK-47 resting on his shoulder, aimed at the sky.  I didn't see him and I was not really caring, just wanting to get out of Nica ASAP.

We stopped at this gas station in the middle of nowhere to fill up at about 4AM. I got out to stretch my legs and snapped this picture.  A street dog and a senior citizen security guard armed with only a machete looked on.
 
Nicaragua, frustratingly, operates exclusively on metes and bounds as a way of giving directions (turn left at the ceiba tree, right at the purple church, etc).  We weren't sure if we were at the right place and considered shining it completely in favor of getting a start on the border to Honduras.  We eventually found it and we had breakfast and coffee.

This handsome guy kept yelling at us that this was the correct gate


Perreira Resort: The trees lining the perimeter are from India.  They're relatively new to Central America and are supposed to keep mosquitoes away (probs bullshit because I got lit up by them while there).
 
We got back on the road and began the nightmare that was the border crossing.  I got my passport stamped as having left Nicaragua and then asked about the dog.  I was told to take him to the Animal Export branch.  Chucho and I walked there.  The guy in there was gruff and said I had to take him to the main office so they could fill out his exportation paperwork.  He motioned to his right and I said, "How far a walk is it?".  He said it was a few kilometers and I could take a taxi.  I was bumming.

The dog and I got into a cab and I was charged double for him, which pissed me off but I was too tired to fight the extra sub-dollar difference.  I was dropped off at this seemingly abandoned parking area with a bunch of truck trailers chilling.  I asked multiple people, all but one giving me bad directions and got into the office just as it opened.

I told the woman there what I needed and she said OK.  She then went on her phone for forty minutes.  This is not hyperbole.  I prodded a couple of times and she said she was getting to it.  I wanted to go off on her but I figured that would likely do more harm than good.  If she refused to deal with me I could conceivably be stuck there, unable to get Chucho out of the country (legally).  Eventually her hot texting convo cooled down and she asked me for the bank receipt.

What bank receipt?

She said I had to pay $1.80 or so to the bank.  I said, "where's the bank?" and she replied, "At the border".

My exhaustion didn't mask my lividity.  I asked, as calmly as possible, if there was ANYTHING else I needed from the border area before I came back.  The lady looked at me and shook her head no.  I walked out without making a scene.  Nicaraguans, during my time in their country, are without question the most apathetic people I've ever met.  Nicaraguan government workers would have aced AP Apathy.

I went back to the road with Chucho and waited for a cab.  It was at this point that he decided he'd had enough and laid in the dirt.  I coaxed him back onto the road but he wasn't having it.  I couldn't tell if it was the hot asphalt despite it still being relatively early in the morning or maybe he'd stepped in some broken glass.

It took a miserable twenty-five or so minutes for a cab to take a chance on Chucho and me.   The cab stopped and I had to lift my him into the cab.  He dropped me off a solid quarter-mile from where I needed to be so he would be higher up in the rotation to pick people up.  I straight up carried this awkward nearly-sixty-pound black fur coated load the whole way, taking a couple of rests during which I removed my backpack to further "take a load off".

I found the Hiace; they'd completed the vehicle importation paperwork and were ready to roll.  I left Chucho with them in the shade as I waited in the bank line for about a half-hour.  The good news there was that it was air-conditioned, something I was sorely in need of due to our death march.

I went and got the dog, then carried him back to the taxi area.  Along the way, I heard Nicas snickering about the Gringo carrying his dog everywhere.  I was getting sadder and sadder about Chucho's health.  I'd seen him give up on walks before but his hips were all screwy when I plopped him down.  He was kind of doing the stance bitches do when they urinate.  Dog bitches.

We got back in a cab and made it to the main office.  There I waited another forty minutes, but this time the supervisor was there.  He helped Ms. Incompetent fill out the form.  I watched helplessly as they pecked individually at the keys.

Waiting at the Animal Export Office after an all-nighter with a lame dog: One of the most miserable experiences of my life.  Shout-out to Missed-It-Mike for the Hale'Iwa T-shirt


Eventually they bid us adieu.  Another twenty minutes passed until a cab took us.  This guy parked a little closer but wouldn't go further, claiming he wasn't allowed any closer in his cab.  I carried Chucho all the way to the gruff guy at the Animal Export shack, he stamped my paperwork and more than five hours later, we were granted access into Honduras.
 
Nicaragua, the land of vibrant colors but muted personalities... Immigration Building


I was relieved to be back in the car but really sad about Chucho.  I was wondering if I was just going to have to put him down the day after we made it to El Salvador.  Five-plus hours later we left the border area and officially entered Honduras.  I apologized to the guys for having made them wait for so long as we waited in line on foot to be granted legal access into the city.

Chucho refused my attempts at giving him water.  This was unfathomable to me given how hot he'd been at the border and for so long.  My fearing of the worst solidified.

We only lasted about two hours total in the entirety of Honduras.  We were pulled over once by a soldier in a beret.  He was really nice, asked us a few questions, and had a great sense of humor.  We passed the hotel at which Chucho and I stayed on the way down.  Honduras in general seems like such a bummer, or at least during that section of road.

We arrived at the border to El Salvador and I geared up for more bullshit.  Not sure what the guys did or said but this time they just x-rayed the Hiace with Chucho inside and we were done within an hour.  Yes, we exited Honduras and entered El Salvador in that span of time!  It didn't cross my mind that we'd crossed Chucho into El Salvador illegally until weeks later...

I got pulled into questioning and the guy was doing a full-court press on me.  He kept asking why I had so many Salvadorean stamps in my passport.  The first time he asked, I said, "I am a Salvadorean citizen with a DUI (Salvadorean Universal Document of Identification, needed for just about everything including voting).  He kept pestering me, he uttered various versions of  "What are you doing entering and leaving El Salvador so many times?".  Since I'd already told him I was a citizen and that didn't do squat, I told him I had family there and visited them/came down for a wedding/came down to surf.  After an umpteenth iteration of the above question, I'd had it.

Site of the interrogation

I raised my voice and said, "I am a citizen of El Salvador and I have a DUI.  What is the problem?!?  Is there a legal limit on how many times I can visit a country of which I am a citizen?".

Apparently he hadn't heard me initially when I'd mentioned my dual citizenship.  He softened up and let me go.  He said next time to just tell him I was a citizen right away.  I said ok, obviously not worth mentioning I had.

Waiting for the Hiace to be cleared by Customs.  We sat down here and I bought the boys some bubbly (Cokes) to celebrate our final passage. 
 
We mounted up when the Hiace was cleared.  The dog was still refusing water, though he did partake in maybe five capfuls total when I insisted.  I sat back in my seat, dog at my feet, and admired the San Miguel sunset as tears streamed down my face behind my sunglasses.

Working our way to Tecla
 
I asked Chucho to please make it to my birthday.  I could tell his hips were bothering him even as he laid down on the floor of the Hiace.  We went through a couple of towns I'd never visited.  Night fell and we stopped for gas again.  Ariel asked me to front him partial payment as he didn't have the cash for gas.  I obliged and we got back on the road.

I asked Ariel to let me tether my phone to his, just so I could connect and let my wife know I'd made it.  It took him over an hour to grant my request, but eventually I was able to message her.

Eventually, we made our way to our destination, Santa Tecla.  I'd made a reservation at a self-storage facility and we emptied the vast majority of the Hiace at the facility, as we'd discussed.  I guided them to my uncle's (formerly my mother's) house, paid them the remainder of $640 (the extra was a tip) and sent them on their way.

I carried Chucho in and plopped him on the bed.  I'd been awake for over forty-two hours, but it still took me a while to pass out.

I was eventually paid a little under $13K for the Prado in two wire transfers. Chucho has made it nearly three-and-a-half months past my birthday, with only two shot regimens for his arthritic hips

Monday, July 9, 2018

7.9.18 Nica Swan Song at Playa Colorado

Our last Iguana sunrise, taken from our balcony on the third floor of the Golf Condos

The doggo and I beat feet to the beach.  He took his time sniffing stuff, getting one last inhalation of the path to the water.  I let him dally on the sand when I paddled out.

It wasn't too crowded.  I think a lot of people were lulled by the late arrival of this swell.  According to magicseaweed we were to get a pulse in the morning with constant reinforcers all day with the swell peaking today.  Yesterday was a complete bust.  I waited until the afternoon to go and it was so gutless I didn't bother to paddle out at the swell magnet that is Panga Drops.  

 There was way more energy in the water noticeable upon my first southward gaze into the Pacific.

I caught a left pretty quickly and got covered up completely, too completely.  I kicked my board in front of me to lessen the chances of trauma.

I immediately began getting attacked by the baby jellyfish, including a particularly painful string of them wrapping around my forearm.  It felt as though a low voltage charge had coursed through my extremity.  Painful, but not as bad as the Pangas "Just Get Welts" sesh a couple of months ago.

A light squall showered us and a rainbow formed.  I gazed at it while two surfers were particularly close to one another framed by the rainbow and thought what a cute gay surfers couple's pic that would make. 

I caught a right that lined up ok.  Had I not been dropping in blind from the wind and the glare I might have noticed it was going to tube.  I pumped and snapstalled but did so too high/late and as I crouched down I got pitched.

My last wave was a really late small right.  I had paralysis of analysis and ended up crabgrabbing as the wave unloaded its Napoleonic fury on my head.

The dog had been barking it up for a while and I had stuff I needed to button up so I went in.

I spent the rest of the day finishing up the packing and waiting for what would likely be a bitch of a time.

The Last Picture of me in Nicaragua, likely ever!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

We moved to Nicaragua because at the time of planning it checked so many of our boxes
  1. Warm water and good surf within walking distance
  2. Decent school with US accreditation nearby
  3. Established community with little kids running around
  4. Relatively cheap
  5. Safe. From October 2015 (when I started planning the move) to April 2018 it was considered the safest country in Central America by far (yes including Costa Rica, which is dealing with a terrible rise in crime and corruption) 
  6. Striking distance to US
The school thing turned out to be a bust as we got insider info while here that it wasn't up to snuff.  So even if this political strife hadn't happened Raquel had decreed we would stay here through Lucia's first grade year at the latest.

Point Five is the biggest catalyst for the move, obviously.  If we were staying now the next few months would be the time to put money down on a lot or home.  We pulled out of our lot purchase and ended up eating the deposit (though we are supposed to get half of it back...).

Everything else was pretty sweet.  The waves weren't as good as I'd hoped, meaning the close-out/too-fast-too-make situation didn't sort itself out for as much of the season I was here.

Ironically, had the political issue not ignited I'm pretty sure the crowds might have turned me off and possibly away (as they did in California). 

The biggest bummer about being here, and one of which we were aware before the move, was getting supplies.  Each trip to the grocery store was a three-hour endeavor pre-roadblocks.  Roundtrip driving alone was 100 minutes and waiting in line was twenty on a decent day.  Going to Managua for (Pricesmart, VERY similar to Costco) shopping and to get our investment property check was a seven-hour grind.  I insisted on doing both Rivas and Managua trips on my own because our youngest has a penchant for puking when in a car for more than a half-hour.  I got it down so I would only have to go to Rivas every twenty or so days and Managua every forty-ish days.

So we move on from the Nica dream to our next station in life, El Salvador.  8065 days will have elapsed since I left El Salvador as a full-time resident to return as one.  I have been back to visit nineteen times in the interim, so I have a feeling as to what to expect.

A few of the differences between El Salvador and Nicaragua:

  • In El Salvador, we will live in the San Salvador metro area (I consider Santa Tecla to be part of it because of the sprawl).  Everything will be more convenient (hospital, grocery stores, doctors, schools; hell I'll even be able to go to a full gym again) with one tiny exception:  The beach will be a little less than an hour away. 
  • This convenience comes at a price.  Where we had been living for the last eight months was in very rural Nicaragua.  We will be in very urban surroundings of San Salvador.  Nicaragua has six times the land area and fewer people total than El Salvador. 
  • When it comes to infrastructure, we will be in the lap of luxury relative to Nica.  The power and internet will go out much less often and the roads are actually asphalted and maintained there.
  • The biggest bummer we'll encounter is the muro-to-muro lifestyle.  Everyone there lives behind walls and you go from your set of walls to others'.  We can mitigate this somewhat by living in a complex with a bunch of kids so we'll see how that works out.
  • Surf-wise, there will be a lot more variety than here (point breaks galore, beach breaks, rivermouths and so on all bigger than in Nica for some reason) but with no offshore it's pretty much an early morning only situation.  The nice thing is they're doubling the capacity of the road to the beach so no more chewing on diesel exhaust on the way back up the hill.
  • We'll have blood relatives there and the can of worms that goes with that... 😆  I also have life-long friends I've known, in some cases, since preschool.
  • No more worrying about obtaining residency!  I am a full citizen with all of the benefits that entails and can stay as long as I'd like.  Here in Nica we had to leave every ninety days to get our passports stamped with new visas.  In ES, I'll have to get the girls legal but that will be a lot easier than having to get the four of us residency.
In CA, I was burned out on working but I must say I'm getting the bug to start producing hard again.  Once Chucho dies we will likely be leaving El Salvador unless we fall in love with it.

When I was living there, I couldn't wait to get out.  This was pre-internet, pre-driver's license, pre-surfing, so my entertainment options were extremely limited.  I was also in a dysfunctional situation at home which was a constant bummer and the pervading vibe was emotional instability.

Conclusion to the Opie chronicles

The van I drove down was nicknamed Opie due to its license plate having OP as the first two letters.  I bought it and drove Chucho and a fair amount of stuff down from Colorado, with the intention of giving it away (because it was too old to be imported).

I asked around on the expat groups and the first person to respond was a woman from Dallas who does a lot of charitable work in Astillero (where some people take pangas to surf up north).

Your Faithful Surf Blogger and Da Astillero Boyz in November


I received a message this morning saying how much the van has helped the community as well as a pic of Opie in action!

"I want to share with you how much this van is helping many in the community. The baseball team has been able to transport the team 2 weeks in a row! Olinyer takes care of it and the surf team has used it to feed the elderly in nursing homes etc. we are very grateful thank you and your wife for this gift."

Friday, July 6, 2018

7.6.18 Smaller at Playa Close-outs-rad-though

The wind was blustering and it made for a bad combo with the smaller waves.  Smaller waves, generally speaking, have a tighter window during which you can catch waves and getting hung up on the lip robs you of the already low percentage you have to make these poorly angled waves.

I caught three waves.

On my first, a left, I pearled on a pump.  While I didn't get hung up on the lip at takeoff I managed to put myself in that position and my nose went pearl diving.

I was in position for a juicy right.  I got hung up on the lip and airdropped.  While I was airborne, I saw a dark local grom bail and leave his board out (I presume he feared I would smash into him as it was tight).  He needn't had worried, I stomped it and for my reward I was presented with a section folding over in front of me cutting me off from the rest of the wave.  To boot, the guy who'd last given me a ride in his golf cart had gone and had reaped the best section of the wave.

Chucho was being good on the sand, only barking when people came in from the surf.

I got another left. I made it around the initial cascade of a section but what lay before me beyond that was too fat.  I managed some pumps and a half-hearted bonk but that was it.

The dog was really running around now so I went in to chill with him hoping the drop in tide would make it get better.  We messed around on the beach for about a half-hour and it got even worse.  I told myself if the crowd count got to a -3 (meaning three more surfers left the water than entered it in a specific span of time) I would paddle out again.  It peaked at a -1 and we bailed.

Thursday, July 5, 2018

7.5.18 Close-Out Kristallmorgen at Playa Colorado

I lucked into having my neighbor Barry watch the dog AND he let me ride the bike he's renting.

I pulled up to PC and there was a set detonating.  It was big and beautiful looking, but as a surfer it was ugly.  I could picture getting hung up on the lip as the wind's invisible hand denied you descent while the liquid guillotine of the toothy curtain rained terror from above.

There were about ten guys concentrated at the main peak.  I chose to be a little on the inside, to score some of the ones that might swing wide.  I'd had a bitch of a time paddling out.  My timing fairy dust from the previous paddle-out had worn off and my timing fairy dust dealer was out to collect with a vengeance.  To add to the beatings, the boardshorts my in-laws gave me, 31 in waist, were falling partway off of me thanks to my unofficial fasting which began when my lady bid me adieu. We're apart geographically, but we're still together together (I think, though I am reluctant to check my IM).

I caught two quick waves both close-outs.  I had a shot at several more with more open faces, but there was a dude in priority each time.  On one instance, I watched the guy paddle his ass off, pop up, and go over the handlebars. 

He came up, paddled towards me and said, "the wind". 

I told him, "I know.  You have to put your weight all the way on the gas and then the lip holds you up and over you go.  It's happened to me before and it will probably happen to me again, this session.".

He took me by surprise and said, "Thanks man".

Long story short, I didn't get the chance to endo.  I eventually took a close-out in as surf and crowd conditions deteriorated.

But before that happened...

A guy who went to high school not far from the condo where this very surf blog was founded is known around here as an a-hole.  I've only surfed with him twice as far as I know.  He thinks he's local and he's claimed in the past that the house in which he lives is his when his parents built it and he manages it.  He has on many occasions dropped in on people and then harassed them when they confront him, on some occasions threatening to call the cops when they ask him to go to the sand for a chat.

I knew he was out because he was shouting as a set approach; something unintelligible, I couldn't quite make it out.  Within ten minutes of my having noticed him I saw him take off on a wave with a rider (who'd had priority) already on it, then proceed to loop around him.  The guy who'd had priority understandably was spooked as he had no idea a close call had been imminent.

The aggressor in question paddled back out and words were exchanged.  The Argentinean guy (if my accent detection skills are still up to snuff) let him have it. Believe me, he couldn't have held back much more than he did considering a direction change could have put both riders' bodies in jeopardy.

The long and short of it is, from what I could gather from one party's bad Spanish, is that the aggressor accused the Argentinean of backpaddling him (if it happened, and I doubt it did because of the relative distance between the two when the Argentinean stood up).  He then said this was HIS wave.  The Argentinean said this is the ocean, which teaches us all humility and your arrogance will do you no good (it was getting harder to hear as they were paddling away).  The Argentinean reached out for a handshake to which the aggressor reluctantly obliged.

The aggressor then paddled in a ways.  I made eye contact with him about five minutes later and couldn't help but smirk (I tried not to).  Some say it is this smirk which intimidated him into paddling in for the sesh...

Overall, it was a waste of having had a dogsitter since I've caught more waves when Chucho's been on the sand.

The swell was good-sized but the conditions (an unfortunate combo of too much wind and poor swell angle for the bathymetry) conspired against us having a good session out thar.

Wednesday, July 4, 2018

7.4.18 Clean and Good-Sized Playa Wyoming

Yesterday's experiments having been a bust, Chucho and I set off for the beach.  I had a grumbling in my belly after a couple of morning movements and I was all of a sudden feeling weak and hungry.  Once we got to the sand, I wasn't motivated to paddle out and I felt as though my mojo had been sapped.

I unleashed the beast, feeling optimistic about his ticking bark bomb lasting a bit longer thanks to a couple of doggos on the beach.

There were some massive ones breaking.  It looked like Pipeline on some sets.  Unmakeable Pipeline, but it resembled Pipeline nonetheless.

I snuck out in between sets and was sitting away from the ravenous pack.

I only caught three memorable waves.  The first was a left which I thought might barrel but didn't really.  I went up and did a snap on it but ate it.

The next wave I caught pretty late and I got hung up on the lip.  I stomped the airdrop down, leaned way back on my tailpad and got a short cover-up.  It let me out and I was a little off-balance.  My trailing arm hit the lip on the way out.  I turned and obliterated the oncoming section.  I celebrated by falling onto my back before my fins could reconnect.

I caught another quick left and got in the barrel.  I contorted myself as small as I could get and just couldn't squeeze in there.

Tuesday, July 3, 2018

7.3.18 Passing up a Pelican Paddle-Out at PC

The cleaning ladies' schedule has been retooled and they're now coming a day earlier than usual.  Everything is upside down in the tourism biz here due to the budding revolution to which I've alluded in past posts...

I left the doggo in their care and told them to leave him in the condo with only the screen door closed.  I told them I'd be responsible for any damage.

I ran most of the way down to the beach and when I got there I realized it'd grown, just as the forecasts had predicted. It was about double-overhead on the sets.

Some waves looked perfect but when they had a rider with whom one could judge makeability, you could tell they were just teases.

There was  a massive pelican standing on the beach facing inland, with one wing semi-splayed.  It looked like something was wrong with it.  I thought it might have been a sign to paddle out there but I bailed on it for a chance at bigger waves.

I had a bit of an angle on a smaller one and this Japanese lady sized me up and decided to go about fifteen feet down the line.  I leaned way back upon seeing this and somehow managed to put my buttcheek on my fin, thankfully only gingerly.  I was literally and figuratively butthurt she did that but not worth exchanging words.

I was in position for this burly left.  I had a little bit of an edge on the corner, but it looked grisly just past that.  I went only because this older guy was staring me down and I thought he would just go on any wave on which I paddled after that.
 
The drop was an insane rush on my 5'11".  It took everything I had to bottom turn into the pit and apparently in my enthusiasm/terror I put too much weight on my front foot and I literally tail-slid longboard style as the massive lip j u s t tapped me on the back of the head.  BUMMER.  I would have had a sick view even though the thing wasn't going to let me out.

I had something I don't think I've ever had happen in my surf career.  This good-sized left came and this Brazilian dreadlocked guy on my inside was paddling.  I said, "Dale!" (most Brazilians speak a little Spanish, or so I've read).  He pulled back and I made some noise and went myself. I dropped down into the pit and got barreled but the reason I told him to go is it was a disgusting closeout and I paid the price.
The aforementioned Brazilian looked a lot like the lead singer of P.O.D.

All-in-all I saw two guys make tubes.  One was in the absolutely perfect spot and the other guy was just a barrel maestro with his pumping in the pit.

I happened to hitch a ride with a friend in his golf cart and when I got to the pool area of our complex Chucho was there with our former neighbors, who are leaving Nicaragua for their native Colombia.

7.3.18 Kooking it Up at Playa Colorado


Today was quite the entanglement for the Golf Condo Gangsta Clique.  My neighbors, Barry and Bob (not a gay couple, or at least I don't THINK they are!) are staying in my same complex were out there with me, not on purpose.

I had an epiphany yesterday.  Chucho was sleeping and I was able to sneak downstairs.  He didn't even notice I was gone, so how could he be butthurt?

I figured, what if I bailed on him and left him in the condo, but left the condo door open in case he wanted out?  If he did, he would find a friendly party and he'd have his collar on so he'd likely find his way back to me.  Worst-case scenario is he gets hit by a car and then we have the option of moving back to the States... 😇

I did so and hoofed it down to PC.  It was a solid size on the sets, about head-and-a-half.

My first wave was a close-out, but I was jamming on it so I was game.  I pumped twice, then tucked down and got barreled.  I had a sick view and then I had trouble seeing anything that wasn't water because the barrel just kept running and running



I caught a wave and I had Bob about thirty feet in front of me.  I made eye contact with him and analyzed my options.  I ended up hesitating as he was just in front of me (at about one o-clock).  I decided to do my damnedest to avoid landing on him and catapulted off my board using my hands.  When I came up I checked on him to ensure I hadn't impaled him and he was worried about me.

Barry caught a sick one and he was somewhat close to me after I paddled back out from my abortion of a wave.   I screamed at him to GO! GO! as I duckdove.  He managed one turn on a really fast wave before it reached its final phase.

I caught a screamer of my own later in the session, but it was a third the size of Barry's (wave).

I also had a wave under which I duckdove which hit me so hard I saw stars.

When I got back I was excited to see what the Chucho experiment had wrought.  I saw the condo building and thought it was good that it was still standing.  I turned the corner towards the entrance and noticed Chucho's trademark poop and thought "Uh oh".  I got to my door and it was closed.  I found out later the cleaning ladies had ushered and sequestered him back upstairs.  Luckily there was no damage, as in 2015 he tore our rental in CO up after years of having been ok being left alone.

Monday, July 2, 2018

7.2.18 Onshore and Nasty at Wyoming then Colorado

Another day without the girls in Nica means another day with Chucho patrolling the sand. 

I paddled out near Idaho so as to keep him as far from the Beach Club as possible.  There were two groms out and we took turns pulling back from close-outs. 

My number eventually came up in the rotation and I redeemed it on a racy left.  I stomped down, then quickly back up so as to give myself a 1% chance of making it.  I managed to overdo it and pearl on a pump™.

I drifted down as it sucked where we were and saw a mirage of a right cylinder off, probably too fast for me to make it, but I decided it couldn't be much worse than here and so I paddled the thirty or so strokes to await its next of kin.

I split my time between waving at Chucho to keep him from going bonkers and watching the waves.  The dog seemed to grasp it was in fact I who was waving by his posture and attention.  He still barked some.  I went in and we walked up the beach where a sick left would break every eight or so minutes.

Sure enough I lucked into a nice one and pumped a few times, then did an off-the-lip off the close-out section.  I claimed it was I made eye contact for Chucho, hoping he would appreciate the maneuver.  He looked ready for me to go in and so I did after another abridged adventure.

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DO NOT ATTEMPT to read if you're just a casual.
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I happened to look back and I've surfed every July 2nd of every year since the inception of this blog and not counting the massive sabbatical during which I lived in Colorado.

Sunday, July 1, 2018

7.1.18 Surfus Interruptus/Deja Vu at Playa Wyoming

It was Sunday and I didn't have anyone to watch the dog.  So we hoofed it to the beach.  I posted him just outside of Casa Colorados with no leash on, since he doesn't seem to freak that way as readily.

I paddled and perched and looked back.  His defining ears were aimed squarely at me from the wet sand, his lower legs in the water.  Within minutes he was distracted by a surfer exiting the water and went up to investigate. My theory is he thinks it's me every time he sees a guy walking out of the water.

The crowd was mellower than in recent days' past but so was the surf.

I got really barrelled on this smaller left.  I saw it about to heave so I levitated and then stomped down for a massive acceleration.  I tucked down, closer to the wall than normal, and enjoyed the view as my body became entombed in a watery grave.  It was a close-out but I will take it.

I watched and Chucho was getting dangerously close to the Beach Club, where dogs are banned.  I pictured a jack-booted guard giving him the heave-ho with a healthy kick to the ribs and made plans to exit.

I caught a right and hit it really well.  There was no wave left after that so I belly-boarded in on the whitewater.

I went and got him and tied him up.  I paddled back out and within seconds of my having perched he started barking.

I caught another, smaller barrel which also closed out.  I also caught a smaller right but it was really frothy and I had a bitch of a time controlling my board through two mediocre hits on it.

People were craning their heads to pinpoint the whereabouts of their ear rapist.  I went in on a close-out and belly-boarded towards him.  He was relieved to see me.  I think what he does when he is tied up is he sees surfers going in and walking away from him and he thinks it's me abandoning him.

As we walked back he walked purposefully and wouldn't look back.  He was actually tugging on his leash to head home but we've made up.