This morning Tash and I got up at 6am to wish Chelsea goodbye. We then hurriedly went back to bed. This was the first morning of the whole trip that we'd gotten to "sleep in". We checked out of our three bed and took a taxi to Flutterby, the hostel we had spent some time at the day before. Tash and I booked a two bed cabin and then indulged in Sunday brunch.
After, we headed out for our paddle board tour. Tash and I thought we had enough time to make it to our meeting spot but ended up being rerouted through the Uvita National Park which added a considerable amount of time to our trek. We both had bags and were huffing and puffing through the wet sand and blazing sun. Did I mention Tash had had a bloody mary at breakfast and I hadn't? She was way more relaxed about this situation than I was. She's three times my height yet I was yards ahead of her. I had to keep turning back and urging her forward. #littlepeopleproblems
I was so incredibly worried that we were going to miss our tour that by the time we got there we were in shambles. And to make matters worse, when we showed up at the hut, no one was there. Greatttt. Now what? All that running for nothing? Slowly but surely a little man, Tico, came 'round the corner. He explained that our "group" was having lunch and that it would be a little while before we left, but we were free to wait in the restaurant. While Tash shot me daggers-- guess we didn't need to speedwalk 35 minutes--, we cooled off under the fans at the bar. Not enough however, because we still both had to peel ourselves out of the leather chairs when it was finally time to go.
I should have picked up on the foreshadowing, because I could never in my wildest dreams imagine what the rest of the day had in store for us.
Tash and I were grouped together with 13 teenage girls. As we left the restaurant, we watched the girls get on an air conditioned bus while Tash and I crawled in the back of the pickup hutch that stored the paddle boards with the four guides from the tour company.
We drove a little over half an hour to a secluded area and unloaded the boards. The girls then arrived and we all got in the water and onto our boards. The tour started off beautifully-- the water was calm and the mangrove trees were on all sides of us. We entered a clearing and it looked like open water for miles. We paddled alongside it and then found ourselves winding back into the mangroves. However, because we visited during rainy season, the water levels were extremely high. We had to sit, and in some areas lay on our boards to get under the low hanging trees. We had to put our paddles across our laps and just try to float through. The girls were having a hell of a time with this and up ahead all I kept hearing was shrieking and crying-- we were floating in a line one by one and could only see the person directly in front of us because of all of the twisting and turning. It came through the grapevine though that someone had fallen off her board. How? How was it even possible that she had fallen off while we were in a sitting position? All I knew was that now we were stopped because she was crying and didn't want to keep going. Tash and I exchanged looks but what could we do? So we sat back relaxed and reveled in the shrieks. We got up and moving again and after a relatively long stint through the trees the water opened up a bit again. This time however, we were in a much smaller area. I was doing quite well with my paddle and felt like I had a handle on the manuevering of the board, when all of a sudden the teen queens' bus driver came barreling toward me. He was throwing his arms up and exclaiming "I can't stop! I can't stop!" He stepped backward on his board which sent the nose of it straight into mine. I wobbled from foot to foot waving both arms awkwardly as I tried to regain my balance while my board shot backward. Luckily for me there was a large tree branch behind me that my board caught on. The jerk sent me stepping back but only for a second and by some grace of god I managed to stay on my board. The bus driver however, was not nearly as graceful and ended up diving forward as he fell- sort of a last ditch effort if you will. He grabbed my hand but faltered and fell straight into the water. I again, somehow, by the grace of god, managed to stay on my board. Now though, I was stuck in the tree branches and had to get one of the guides to come help me out. Luckily though, I was deemed worthy of help. The guides took one look at the poor shmuck driving the bus and put him straight in their canoe- he had lost his paddle privileges for the day. But onward we went and soon we were stuck in quite the predicament. There were downed trees across our path so each of us, in a single file line, had to get off of our boards and into the water, undo our leg strap, pass the board over the branches, crawl over the branches, sit back on our board and reattach our leg strap. Our guides had to get everyone over, so while this took place the group of us who had already gone were waiting in the still water ahead. The only problem? We were soaked and sitting in a swamp and it was feeding time for the mosquitoes. They were everywhere. And there was no swatting them. After making it a bit farther down the swamp our guide realized that our path was blocked yet again but this time in a much worse way. HhMm.. what now? Where were we going to go? Back the way we came, that's where! Our guide had us all backtrack so now what was supposed to be a 3 hour leisurely paddle through the mangroves was turning into a 6 hour haul from hell. Not only was it starting to get dark, but we could see off in the distance that a storm was coming. My energy was completely drained. I was paddling and paddling and paddling some more but my board wasn't even moving. I was drifting further and further behind so I tried laying on my board and paddling with my hands- no use. I tried sitting and paddling with my paddle- yet again, no use. I literally couldn't move myself ahead, even though I was paddling with all of my might. Tash and one of our guides found this rather humorous, so floated along next to me as I struggled to keep up. Finally, laboriously, after what felt like an eternity, the shore was in sight. I was so happy I leapt from my board to land. My arms and legs were exhausted and I couldn't wait to get going... going to the bathroom that was. After six hours of activity my little self needed to use the toilet, and now. However, instead of using a toilet, I watched the teen queens get on their air conditioned bus and drive away, leaving Tash and I with our four guides, the pickup hatch and a million paddle boards. The guys had to load up the truck before we could head out. Then, we still had a half hour drive back to the meeting point. So, now, not only did I have bug bites all over my back, arms and legs, but I had them on my ass as well. #whenmothernaturecalls
Boy was I ready to get in that truck. We made it in the back just in time for it to start pouring rain. The windows fogged up and the sweaty men, Tash and myself all crowded in. Finally, we were on the road. We convinced the guys to drop us at our hostel instead of at the meeting point. #onewinfortheday
I pulled some leftovers out of the fridge in our hostel kitchen and slumped over one of the tables while shoveling them into my mouth. Imagine my surprise when one of the guys working the desk at the hostel came over to tell me that I had a phone call. That's right. a call. for me. on the hostel phone. what in the?
It was Tico. He felt so badly about what had happened that he offered Tash and I free surfing lessons for the next morning. As exhausted as we were, since our surf sesh with Chelsea had been a bust, we decided to go for it. Which meant there was no other option that night except going straight to bed. Woof. What. A. Day.
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