Day 25: Progreso to Telchac Puerto

January 6, 2024

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It must have been the lovely fruit we got at Conkal. Half of it sat in the pannier and heated, until I ate it at supper time. From there it was a now familiar story. I woke up at 2:oo a.m. and realized "Oh oh". From there it was four hours of "running" the fruit back out at both ends. At 6:00 the alarm rang and Dodie chirped "Ok, up and at 'em. Let's go find some birds!". Yeah, right! But we did manage to get going.

I can certify that the toilets here work.

We made our way easily to the Malecon, which is the seaside walk. This begins in Progreso with the fishing pier, where boats are unloaded. It is a long structure from the 50's.

The Malecon is recently redeveloped, and was very well done. Now it it is a real focus of activity for the town.

We were excited to see lots of birds on the shore by the malecon. Here is a selection:

So many birds. See the 68/24025 Least Tern, flying to the right, and the Brown Pelicans

About half way along the malecon we have the relatively new Museum of the Meteorite. As with the Chicxulub dinosaur trail, they seem to focus on large dinosaur models. We have never found the museum open, so we don't know if inside they get into the geology and chemistry details of how it is known when and where an asteroid struck, and the evidence of its crater right now.

At the end of the Malecon are some attractive buildings, such as the so called Pastry Building, which was built around 1948 in an art deco style.

We left the town and headed out along the coastal road. The map above does not show it, but to our right was an extensive mangrove swamp. In that water we found an enormous gathering of different birds. Usually we are trying to spot individual elusive birds, in trees, but this was much different. Everybody was just gathered out there, and all over the place. A drawback in trying to photograph this was the sun, which by virtue of rising in the east, was directly in our faces. It was also extremely humid. The net effect is that many of our shots are quite misty or lacking sharp focus. But we are still thrilled with all that we saw.

It's almost like a zoo here! Brown pelicans, Great Egrets, Snowy Egret, Tern, White Pelican, Cormorant, ... in these two shots.

71/24030 American Avocet (non breeding). See the upturned bill.

73/24033 Immature White Ibis (are half brown)

We passed by Chicxulub Puerto, finding it very grubby looking in comparison to the glories of nature that were all around. It also seems a very low key sight, for the spot where the whole future of the earth changed.

Humans have been a bit busy since the asteroid. For example, here is a new market, affiliated we think with Super Aki. Dodie was able to stock up on foods to keep us going, in what we anticipate will be an area of not much supply, as we push on today and tomorrow toward Izamal.

Today is the actual Jan 6 - the day of the Three Kings - and in the Market we have a further example of the famous brioche. The product seems to be called a "rosca", which mean thread, but we'll translate that as "braid". 200 pesos for this, if you are into it.

There is a tremendous amount of condo construction all along the coast road, up to and into Telchac Puerto. Many of the buildings are huge concrete monoliths, and many of the construction sites seem abandoned, or if completed they seem unoccupied. Out here in the baking sun, none seems like the kind of place where we would want to live. Sealed in a concrete cell, supported by air conditioning and dependent on a car to reach "civilisation" does not sound like fun. The billboards, however, depict this as a tropical paradise.

Lots of small houses or condos that are lined up along the beach have some sort of identifying sign by the road and their driveway. This one was among the more innovative.

Tropical Mockingbird - a little different angle

They properly deem this the adventure mangrove route.

These towers have a bit of style. A three bedroom three bath condo in here seems to be about $600,000.

We came through here last year, but in the reverse direction. We recorded our distance from Izamal to Telchac Puerto at 91 km, but Dodie thinks she has found some shortcuts for this time. Remembering things backwards can be disorienting, and we found ourselves looking for that luxury marina where we ended up staying. We found it! and also the channel one should use to bring the yacht in.

The Grand Marina, the type of place where apparently we used to stay!

The channel to bring our yacht through. Just noting it for future reference!

Of more relevance to us this time around by the Grand Marina, were all the nearby water birds:

As we approached Telchac Puerto we found lots of condo construction. Some seemed abandoned, but at at least one, workers were buzzing around.

Telchac Puerto, like Sacalum, seemed a poor town to us. It lacks a church and it lacks any sizable store. But it is very tropical feeling, with what seems like coconut plantations, and any way lots of coconut palms all over.

Our place for today is down a sand or dirt street, setting us up with low expectations for what it might offer. It turned out to be a mixed bag. There is a small but nice pool, and lots of palms. But how about this one - the light switch plus an electrical outlet inside the shower stall.

Don't recommend charging your phone in here, or switching on the light to see what you are doing. Not with the shower running, anyway!

At least this faucet can produce a dribble of water. The bathroom sink has nothing.

Let's forget the faucets and go in the pool!

Today's ride: 45 km (28 miles)
Total: 1,035 km (643 miles)

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Bill ShaneyfeltIncredible array of birds! And those flamingos are the most colorful I have seen!
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10 months ago

Steve Miller/GrampiesTo Bill ShaneyfeltWe were quite overwhelmed by the numbers and diversity of the birds we saw today. What are those flamingos eating? It must be the right stuff because their colouration is so intense.
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10 months ago

Laurie Marczak600k for the concrete “paradise” seems pretty steep eh
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10 months ago

Steve Miller/GrampiesTo Laurie MarczakMight be 600000 mxn pesos, but anyway Paradise ain't cheap kiddo.
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10 months ago

Bill ShaneyfeltTo Steve Miller/GrampiesPink color is due to eating algae and shrimp which also eat it. The algae contain a carotenoid pigment. You may have noticed in other journals across desert areas how the salt lakes are often pink (like himalayan salt you can buy).

https://reidparkzoo.org/blog/what-makes-flamingos-pink/#:~:text=Flamingos%20and%20shrimp%20are%20actually,contribute%20to%20their%20fabulous%20pinkness.

See? I actually remember some of my 1969 Ornithology! Hardest part was selecting a good website as a source.
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10 months ago