Last few days In Mexico

Tuesday 13th July 2021
I’m feeling good and there’s lots of cloud cover today, so the temperature should be lower. A perfect day for replacing the outlet pipes on the toilet!
I need a whole day for this job as so many things can be a problem. There are three hoses, one from the toilet to the Y-Valve, this determines if the waste goes to the holding tank, or out of the boat. From the Y-Valve a hose goes high to the Anti-Syphon fitting, this stops water flowing back from the sea into the toilet, and another hose from the Anti Syphon to the through hull which goes out of the boat. I have pumped lots of water through the system and disinfectant, so it’s not a bad job really, however the hoses are badly clogged with Calcium deposits. It takes about 4 hours to replace the pipes, and I make quite a mess, in the head and also in the cockpit where I’m chopping up the hose. Eventually I get to hose the boat down, then I hose myself down. I’m expecting the system to work much better now, but in fact I can’t really tell much difference.

Calcium deposits inside the hose.

Wednesday
I’m now starting to tidy up the boat and start packing for the trip home next week.

Maria visits most days but doesn’t stay long.

Thursday
I check the bilge pumps today and find one of them has stopped working, the big one for emergencies only. It turns out to be a break in the wiring hanging down into the bilge. This area is pretty hostile with oil, sea water and engine fumes all hanging around. It takes me a few hours to fix, and I completely cover myself in oil.

Friday
I’m finally able to book my covid PCR test, websites in Mexico aren’t really designed for foreigners, or for Chrome it would seem. Stick with firefox or better still Safari if you want the clever javascript to work.
In the evening Arturo and I head off for some Fish Tacos and for me to test out my Spanish a bit more.
After Tacos we walk up to the ice cream shop, and buy some Trolebuses, They have a grand display of famous Mexicans on the wall and Arturo persuades me to ask the owner for permission to take a photograph, so I try with “Puedo tomar una fotografía, por favor?”. The owner very happily agrees and then kicks off a conversation with Arturo who he recognises from a year ago when Arturo first visited the store.

Checkout those Sombreros!, Arturo points out which ones were revolutionaries.

Saturday
I wake up at 3am with toothache, the same place I had before, where the dentist said I needed root canal treatment. Since one of the fleet here died from covid, presumed to have been caught from his dentist, I’m going to wait until I’m home for treatment, so for now I’m having Codine/Ibuprofen and antibiotics to keep the pain down.

Sunday
My tooth is up and down pain wise, but I decide to head out to the Magote for a swim today. It’s been rather hot here, 36c+ ish most days, and the last few days, rather humid. However when Arturo arrives, around 3pm, the sky has gone black. Perhaps Tropical storm Guillermo is sending the clouds over, but as the sky darkens, the temp drops a little and squalls start to pass by. Guillerm is passing us way to the south and heading out west. by the time we can see blue sky again, it’s time for dinner so we head off to Restauante El Zarape.

Monday
Up early for a PCR test as required by HM Gov back home. It’s not a lot of fun. I had no idea what it feels like to have a 1 foot long cotton button shoved up my nostril and into my frontal lobes. I’m glad that’s over, but I think I have two more tests waiting for me in a box wending its way to Liverpool.
My neighbour returns, they are a 60ft Sailboat, with a dinghy almost as big as Sister Midnight. All very flash. I usually keep my distance from these ships as they are generally on charter to rich folks and the crew run around like crazy servants. However in reality, the crew and skipper are generally nice people, and this proved to be the case again. When they were reversing into the slip, the dockhand lost the stern line and the wind blew the boat onto me. The skipper was on the case and avoided a crash, but not before he saw a concerned Collister rushing to the side with a fender in hand. Once docked he came around to apologise and ask if he had done any damage. He also wanted to know if I had a barbecue gas bottle as the had run out of gas and his guests were waiting for dinner to be cooked, freshly caught Marlin I believe. I lent him a big bottle of gas and he went away happy. Later he returned with the gas, and a plate of fine food he had cooked for me. He is Mexican but said in his best English/American “Thanks you saved my ass there”, which in all honesty is a little over the top for my English sensibilities. Still it’s nice to help a neighbour out, and he will be here during the hurricane season, and has offered to keep an eye on the boat for me as well as Arturo.
Today I have also booked my two AZ Vaccine shots in the UK, the UK does not recognise the Chinese Sinovac yet, so in order to spend my evenings/early mornings raving in the sweaty clubs of liverpool, I will need to have the UK Vaccine passport. Now having two shots of Sinovac, followed by two shots of AZ will either kill me or make me bullet proof. I need to do a little research, but I expect it will be more of the latter.
This reminds me of a little cryptology story I heard. With most symmetric encryptions, you run the algorithm with the secret key on the data to get the encrypted result. You basically repeat the operation to decrypt. However some people had encrypted several documents individually, then added them into a bundle and encrypted the bundle, which accidently decrypted the original. Thinking a double encryption was better when in fact it was the total opposite. I’m no expert, but I’m hoping vaccines are different. I will do my homework.

The following is an extract from the English language Mexican newspaper “The Mexican news daily” and it always surprises me what a diverse country Mexico is.

‘Vaccination is such a vexed issue in some Sierra communities, such as the Mayan town of San Juan Chamula, that if an outsider even mentions it to residents, he runs the risk of being detained, led to the town square by a rope placed around his neck and fined 100 to 200 pesos (US $5-$10), the newspaper Milenio reported.
Neighboring Chamula is the municipality of Zinacantán, where vaccination against a disease that has claimed the lives of more than 200,000 Mexicans is equally unpopular.
“Everyone agreed not to allow vaccination,” said local artisan Juana Bárbara Vázquez, explaining that people believed that many deaths have been caused by inoculation against Covid-19. “They’re scared,” the 46-year-old told Milenio.
“The truth is I’m not going to get vaccinated either. I think I’m fine as I am because everything is calm here in town, thanks to God nothing has happened to us,” Vázquez said.
She said that most people believe that pox – a traditional corn-based spirit commonly fermented in people’s homes – will protect them from Covid because it’s considered an infallible remedy for all ills.’

So if I wasn’t on the wagon, I could try some of this Pox.

The wind generator blades came in.

Sunset at the weekend.

The Vaquita is a dolphin of which only ten are estimated to exist, and they are only found here in the Northern part of the Sea of Cortez.
They are being caught as Bycatch in the massive illegal gill nets put out to catch Totoaba. Totoaba are only found here as well, but are not yet extinct. These fish are very important to the Chinese as they can make their penises grow and help them live forever and ward off evil spirits. I made that bit up, but it’s roughly right. They only use the bladder from the fish, and one bladder can fetch $10,000.

The Vaquita, about to go extinct

Of course with such prices on offer, the fisherman, and it is claimed their cartel backers have bought big expensive fishing boats and outboards, spent a lot on nets and are not going to let the government or NGOs like Sea Shepherd get in their way. There have been battles between the fishermen and the Navy over the last few years, as these fish and their grounds are protected, but the fishermen need the cash. Petrol bombs have been thrown at the Navy and Sea shepherd ships. More info here
This week the Mexican government announced they are removing the protected areas the fish inhabit and so have basically given in to the mob.
A very sad day, The Vaquita will be lost to this planet very quickly and the Totoaba not long after.
The fish farm Arturo works on is actually all about Totoaba, its ambition was to provide a less damaging supply of fish, but also a percentage of their fish are released into the sea to keep stock levels up. Their cages are well offshore and they claim to be very environmentally safe. But I suspect all fish farms say that.

So this will be my last blog from Mexico until September. I might put a note up to describe the process of repatriating during Covid, but I don’t thing I have much to contribute until Autumn when Kathy and I return and will head off out, back into the sea before the water cools too much.

Paul Collister.