This was it: our first long stay. We got to really settle into a feeling of home after Don & Sheila left –– it was striking how draining it could be to be guests in other people’s houses for 2 months straight, and how much better it felt to even be the hosts of the household again. But our alone time didn’t last long, nor was it uneventful –– the water was out for a week after Don & Sheila left! We filled up a garbage pail of water and survived on sponge baths and paper plates. It wasn’t too bad at all.
The morning of April 15, we decided to go out kayaking down the street from our house. We thought we would just get in the water and leisurely see the Malecon from another angle, but on our way out some blessed man waved us down and told us there were dolphins! Here! Now!
Screw the Malecon! We see it everyday! We switched course and almost immediately found dolphins –– pods of them surrounding us, sometimes floating with their bellies up, and not shying away from our kayaks like they might from a motorised boat. At some point all we would hear was the puff sound of their blowholes as they surfaced, all around us. It was amazing and one of the best marine wildlife experiences we both had.
David & Hannah also arrived on April 15 and visited for a week!
David & Hannah & WW went surfing at Cerritos beach, and got to walk around Todos Santos for a day. Jonny stayed home with food poisoning 🙁 –– later on as Jonny was feeling better, we also went to Mezcaleria Los Miserables and had a wonderful experience trying the surprisingly diverse world of mezcals. A highlight was a mezcal that smells somehow exactly like green jalapeño Cheetos (La Remilgosa Verde). We have loved seeing David & Hannah so much recently!
WW’s first time at Todos Santos! It’s a lovely little town.
Strong contender for best sunset.
W I have to admit, this stretch of time was still a pretty big mental health struggle. It’s hard not to feel like I’m always being a downer when I have my little ~emotional section~ in these blog posts. But I’ll still continue to be honest, because it’s my life, not just a highlight reel. I had quite a few down days, and I think the instability of life, and work, and lack of support system all compounded together.
But still. We did find beauty in the everyday. I worked my way through a yoga program, went for early morning walks most days, and fell in love with hummingbirds! A single male Costa’s hummingbird with a bright purple collar staked his territory on our front garden for a few days. We named him Reggie.
Jonny’s first time diving in 9 years! Of course he made some friends!
J After my parents left I feel like we entered “work” mode a bit more. It’s easy to fall into the hum-drum routine of work, eat, sleep even in a beautiful place like La Paz. I felt like it was in this time period that I realized I had to push myself to get out of the house and do stuff more. Both WW and I moved our schedule around so that we could get outside in the morning before it got too hot, and made it our mission to discover new street food spots!
I also went scuba diving for the first time in 9 years! I was a bit nervous because I forgot so much of my training, but I studied a bit and it was totally fine! I did two dives, one at the sea lion colony on Espiritu Santu and one on at a small coral reef on the southern part of the same island. The younger sea lions were very playful, and seemingly curious about our equipment. They would often come up from above or behind us and surprise us! It was simultaneously amazing and a little bit scary, haha! I made some friends: Diego and Kalina (see picture). In the video you can see me on the left, Kalina with the sea lion and our dive master Shin on the right.
Krystina arrived on April 30 and stayed for 3 weeks!
It was wonderful having some slow, relaxed friend time – turns out we made for pretty great roommates. We were very grateful to have such a treasured friend around.
Kyna arrived just in time – we went sailing on Jonny’s new friend Kalina (and Coy)’s sailboat a couple of days later. It was a pretty slow, non-windy day, but we had a wonderful time regardless. It was the first time on a sailboat for all of us, and I think non-exciting was a good introduction. We took them out to Taquería Los Prietos and gelato after as a thank you 😉
Our first beach day was a little unsuccessful. We drove to Todos Santos with the aim of seeing Playa Las Palmas, but it was closed. We went to Cerritos, but it was chilly and rainy (!!).
Our second beach day was more successful. We went snorkeling at Playa Los Muertitos, and saw some wonderful coral and tropical fishes. WW finally got comfortable with snorkeling in the calmer waters.
J Time flew by while Kyna was visiting, and before we knew it we were almost at the point where we had 4 more friends coming to visit us from Montreal (Charlotte, Yuta, Julien and Taylor). In a rare spontaneous decision, I decided to go on another dive trip, but this time in one of the “best diving locations in North America”: Cabo Pulmo. It was a bit of a long drive alone, but it was so so worth it!
I was put on a boat with a bunch of dudes who wanted to see sharks, so we did 2 dives that Bull Sharks frequent. The first dive was a tad uneventful, and I had some mask-fogging issues that made visibility hard. But the second dive was life changing!! There’s a legendary photo of a school of fish from Cabo Pulmo — which, like most diving photos, seemed larger than life and probably super rare. I never expected this, but I think it accurately captures the magic of that second dive. It was a shipwreck dive, and the visibility was much better – we saw 4 Bull Sharks (who were super chill and not scary at all), many beautiful multi-coloured fish, and best of all some huge schools of yellow tail snappers. At one point, our dive master instructed us to kneel in the sand and be still, then the school of fish came much closer and surrounded us in a tornado of fish. There must have been 10s of thousands of them, as I could see fish in all directions and the depth of the tornado was impossible to see through. It is a moment I will never forget! Unfortunately, I ran the battery down on the go pro at this point, so I only have a very brief 5 second video of us approaching the school of fish. It doesn’t quite capture the magic I experienced, but it’s something!
Jonny drove back from Cabo Pulmo on May 13th and later that day the first of the rest of our friends arrived to kick off an exciting week of friend hangs, which deserves a whole post of its own!
We also posted some more photos & videos here.
