Mexico

Everything around me moving forward and backward, never the exact same as the time before, but my feet stay still.  My eyes are closed as my skin tingles while tiny salt flakes tickle my cheeks.  I’m slowly realizing that my picture of Mexico is not the only Mexico.  All growing up I pictured it as poverty and children running around half naked with dirty faces.  But in this Mexico my idea did not exist, I am in a tropical wonderland.                                                                           

  My husband and I had just arrived to this little secluded beach spot, very private and it had the aroma of coconut milk.  We parked our topless dune buggie on the side of the dirt road.  With my windblown hair I began walking into this tropical beach front.  The plants were all all linked to a tropical theme, set so they would grow in a design of a fish, hearts, stars, basically any shape that you can think of.  The dressing rooms set off to either side were painted with bright yellows and blues, purples and greens.  We were able to tell which was meant for whom by the creative idea of clothes lines painted on the doors with either male swimming trunks or a purple polka-dot bikini.  Everything made from boards and palm trees, the roof tops consisted of the palm leaves neatly twinned together and fastened tightly with fishing nets.

As I continued walking I reached what felt to my feet fluffy clouds; my pedicured toes were in heaven.  The sand was thin and smooth like sugar.  A palm tree shaded the sand where I was making it feel cool against my skin.  I sifted the grains of sand  between my toes then used them as a shovel to reach even cooler depths.  This part of the beach was cared for by a family of four, the parents and two children.  This was the way they made their living, treating the tourist likes kings and queens during their stay.  They provided Pina Colada’s in furry coconut shells, which you sipped through pink straws while nibbling on the fresh coconut right from the shell.  The coconut was milky and never before had I tasted something so naturally sweet, it was like my taste buds were lying on a beach being massaged with a coconut cream.  After I had  my fill of the coconut,  my husband and I start for the beach.  Half way there, and out of the corner of my eye, I see what appears as a sand pile move to the left.                                

 Taking a second look I’m able to recognize its not a sand pile but a white sand crab.  Sand crabs are very swift but more scared of you than you are of them.  I had to get a closer look as the little guy shook his way down into a tiny hole. Completely emerged under the sand, I thought for sure he was gone but then I saw two little eye balls pop out of the sand on their antennas.  Smart little crab, we decided to let the crab go before he got mad at us for staring.  We turned back in the direction for the beach and this time found or toes being covered by the cool ocean water.  The colors that I saw in front of me were teal and sea green.  As I’m debating on fully dipping myself in the water my husband takes if upon himself to hurry along the process, with a quick tug I’m completely drenched and up to my neck in the ocean.  We swam together making smooth motions to manuver our body’s through the water.  I can feel the current moving toward the beach as the waves curl against my skin.  Finally we stop going against the current and let it move us back in to dry land.  

    With the sun kissing our skin we walked along the water, every once in a while we’d stop to pick up a shell or just squeeze the wet sand between our toes.  We turned around to return to our dune buggie, but before leaving the water’s edge I just had to take a moment to truly enjoy this once in a life time scene.  I closed my eyes and felt the gentle breeze toss my hair around my shoulders, the ocean salt misted my face.  I could smell the ocean and the life it had living deep down under.  As the waves brought the water in and back out, my feet slowly sunk deeper and deeper into the sand.  Taking one last deep breath of the warm fresh air, I said goodbye to my tropical paradise.