More Added To Lock Down

Life in Guatemala lock down gets more crazy. From what I can understand the Coronavirus is not slowing down in Guatemala. Now all flights in or out of Guatemala are on hold. Over a three day weekends going on now. No private cars on the roads. No bicycles. You are to stay at home for 3 days. Nothing open. No walking around. There are no buses, cabs or tuc tucs. This coming week grocery stores will be allowed to open only 3 days and little stores and vegetable stand can open 4 days this week but only from 9am in the morning to 1pm in the afternoon. People will be allowed to go to work only 4 days this week and will have to walk or ride bicycles being home by 5pm in the afternoon. River traffic is limited to accentual movement only. Pam and I have lived through a lot of problems we have had no control over. In our early day of marriage we were told we were running out of oil and every one needed to cut back and learn to live small with always, the treat of the Russia nuking us all at any minute. We lived and made it through the truck strikes of the 1970s driving trucks with the 55 miles per hour speed limit on the interstates and 45MPH every where else. Where trucks would get in great convoys and try to run in the safety of being in a large group to protect each other from our on police. For any of you that were there I’m sure you remember the 19 percent interest rates to buy anything. We were in site of the twin towers in New York city setting on our boat watching it all happen on 9-11-2001. With us traveling as we do, we were on the Gulf Coast for the oil well blow-out. In New Orleans for the after math of Katrina with the political madness of the media and of course the real problem of the flood in the city. We have been in numerous Hurricanes. We were there on our boat in the last hurricane to hit Belize and where we were there was damage but not like what you saw on the news. If a building is very poorly built, falling down and is taking out by a hurricane it now becomes a great loss. With all we have seen in our life the media I truly believe can not get any worse. How can we see where this is all going. My granddaddy would say just look around you and you may see some of the truth. This won’t work here and all we can do is wait. We have not had any trouble getting Caribbean food so far. Chicken and eggs are plentiful. We don’t even try to eat the beef anymore. Produce has been okay and ice is available. It’s hot here this time of year and most people with boats have made it out leaving their boats stored somewhere. We made it in about the time the virus hit to work on our boat and didn’t see this coming. The heat is our biggest problem. The marina dog has puppies and we have baby ducks running around here.

The police are enforcing social distance as much as they can and at the bank there is no way to get another bike parked any where near the bank.

Everyone has to stay 6 feet apart.

More bikes across the street.

If your in Central America and want to entertainer your kids, find something to celebrate and let them go at a pinata with a stick.

Happy Birthday time

If we have learned any thing in life it ‘s complaining is natural. Life goes on and we are safe here waiting to see what happens next.???

Lock Down

Setting on the bow of our boat with it 105 degree in the shade dealing with this lock down here in Guatemala.

It’s hard not to see this as what it is. Maybe just a little hard. It’s the moving freely around and seeing things that makes cruisers on boats happy. There is nothing moving here. Every one is just setting on their boat and waiting. Maybe wishing a little we could fly back to the US and get out of this heat. Flying back can be done but it’s really very hard and at what cost. We are far from being rich and too close the way I see it to being poor. There is very little in the bank by the end of the month. Setting there I looked up and saw a frigate bird flying really high above us. For a moment I didn’t feel so sorry for myself being here. Frigate birds look like something left over from the dinosaur age and there big. It’s the stop and smell the roses thing I guess. It may sound silly but I have been doing that all my life. When things are getting side ways sometimes just stopping and looking around at what you have helps. For years Pam and I dreamed of living on a boat. Maybe some day sailing around the world. We are not going to sail around the world old as we are now but we have accomplished part of the dream and have been living on our boat for years now. Having sailed a little for sure or maybe we have sailed a lot. This too is in how you look at it. We have two passports full of stamps. We are eating well enough for being in the Caribbean. In town there is a little women just a little over 4 feet tall that sells a little produce on a table maybe four feet wide. She is small and her business is really small. If she sees me and if she has things I like she starts jumping and waving like a little girl. Smiling like crazy with no front teeth. This week she was jumping, waving and had okra. Round tomatoes or okra are a treat for us down here. You can buy red plums here this time of year but never know if you can eat them. It’s best to buy just a few and try them before you buy a bag to take home. On the hot streets you can buy pig skins cooked fresh sometimes and they’re better than what you can buy in the stores. Mangoes are in and everywhere. Pick up trucks are over loaded and it seems like you are missing out if you don’t like mangoes and take bags home.

I have tried them but they don’t do anything for me. In restaurants you can get mango juices with a meal. There is no set down restaurants open here now with this lock down but when you can. You can almost always get water melon juice with your beans and rice and everything comes with beans and rice. If you’re having a bad day you can always find flowers, year round. Some that are blooming now you can smell from a long way off.

Jesus Lizard

Bugs are interesting to watch and if you are a bug person you would not like the Jesus lizards here. They move in sprints and no bug is faster. One minute there is a bug moving along just doing its thing and then its gone. Jesus lizards now doing there bow up and down. Then they’re off walking on water. Here is something that usually makes my day a little better and it’s something I talk about two often I guess. It’s little Dumpling our little old and fat dink. We don’t have a modern go fast rubber dink like most cruisers do.

Taking on supplies

Going to town or to the grocery store in little Dumpling makes my day better. Living on a boat with no car. Living on a river where we are now. Riding along slowly looking at the river and mountains off in the distance. Always kids playing in the water. Some in dug-out canoes. Always boats doing their thing around us. Dumpling is one of the few things we own that make me glad we take time to stop and smell the roses. As Micheal Jackson’s mother told him when he was in so much trouble. “This too will past.” I think tomorrow we will take little Dumpling down river to get a boat part. This lock down is manageable. Maybe we are doing just fine and life is good. It’s just in how you look at it.