The guy with the unlikeable face is back.
This time he had a reserved spot, on the other side of the park where the large rigs are meant to go. Their dogs still out of control, running after each other, kicking up dust, running into everyone’s camp spots and if their doors are open going inside and making themselves at home. I’m sure if they could they would open the fridge and make themselves a sandwich.
I’m determined to be neighborly this time, and stopped by for the usual where you from, where you going chit chat.
He’s a retired park ranger from Arizona.
Everything was going fine until I mentioned that we sold our house in Los Angeles to which he replied, “congratulations on getting out of that awful place.”
I guess his face didn’t lie.
With all of the dust getting kicked up, it was time to wash the dogo, which like many dogos hide whenever the shampoo and towel are retrieved, yet seem to enjoy getting washed.
We’ve been cooped up working in the trailer for nearly a week and haven’t really explored the area, so Lisa wanted to take this Sunday to walk around town to scope it out.
Having been the one to run errands over the past week, I had to convince Lisa that walking wasn’t much of an option for us.
El Sargento is a one road beach town, where there isn’t really a commercial center that you can go walk around in, instead all of the stores and restaurants are scattered along this 7 mile stretch offset a half mile from the shore. Our RV park, is a mile inland and uphill from the main road, up a dusty residential street, and a gauntlet of stray and yard dogs.
We took the car instead, and it was a good thing too. Being a Sunday afternoon, the entire “town” was shut down. Restaurants and street vendors boarded up, absolutely nothing open except one store with a Mexican and Canadian flag flying above it.
Though he didn’t reveal his nationality, I’m pretty sure that the shop owner wasn’t from the Northlands, and the Canadian flag was a stroke of brilliant marketing intended to draw them into the store like flies to honey.
I think it worked, as the store was abuzz.
It had everything we needed, and things we didn’t think we did until they were forced into our mouths by a very insistent shop owner, who would open every single cooler as we passed by it, and say what was in it and ask us if we wanted some.
“Fresas?, No?, Arandos? No? Lechuga? No?”
He opened up a salted garlic chili pepitas so good, that upon trying it would have been criminal if they didn’t end up in the basket. It took some effort not to clear him out.
He did this routine as we filled our basked all the way to the register.
There, he insisted Lisa spoke in Spanish with him, but not in an indignant “you’re in my country” kind of way, rather in a way of a proud teacher who wants the best from his students.
“Como estas?” he asked. Then he said, “you say, todo bien. Now you say it”.
So Lisa would say “todo bien” and he would beam warmly, asking her to say the next part of the transaction in Spanish.
We left the store with our spirits buoyed by the warmth of that shop keeper, as he moved on to his next victims.
Ready to keep exploring the edges of our surroundings, we continued to drive South to see how far we could go along the beach. La Ventana is the sister town to El Sargento. It hugs the Southern side of the bay, with a beach that goes all the way to a lighthouse at the tip of Punta Arena.
It is more residential than commercial, with new construction of extensive beach side compounds creating new haphazard roads, enabling even more new construction.
Following Google maps’ definition of roads proved once again a fool’s errand, and we had to turn around several times to prevent getting stuck in sand.
After several attempts of finding passable roads, and some off roading, eventually beyond all residences, we found the entrance to the beach.
This beach was much more secluded than the crowded beaches of El Sargento to the North, from where most people launch.
Presumably if you end up on this beach, then it was likely not on purpose, and you are there as a result of some sort of crash, equipment failure, or equipment loss.
Having landed here, you then make the 5 mile walk of shame back up the beach to El Sargento, dragging with you whatever equipment you have left, hoping that the rest of it washes ashore and is posted on the local Facebook group to be reclaimed.
As the day concluded and we got back to the RV park, the skies were once again emblazoned with a sunset that demanded an audience plied with sundowners on the terrace.
Who are we to refuse such demands?
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