Some Like it Hot

Greetings from Chixculub in the state of Yucatan!
You´re understandably asking yourself, "Where the heck is that?!" If you think of Mexico as a mirror image "J", the Yucatan peninsula is the end of the upswing of the letter J. The right side, the Caribbean side, of the peninsula is the state of Quintana Roo and the home of such famous resorts as Cancun. The left side, fronting the Gulf of Mexico, is the state of Yucatan. The capital of Yucatan is Merida. If you take a bus ride one hour north of Merida, you come to Progreso, which is a port town. Chixculub is a pueblo, even smaller than Quincy, a few miles east of Progreso. It consists of upscale houses on the beach, one next to the other for several miles.
Last Saturday, I woke up in the mountains of Chiapas at well over 6000 feet. It was chilly, as it is every morning. When I landed in Merida, at sea level, it was sunny and hot. The first thing I noticed was the smell. It´s a smell that greets you when you step off the plane into any tropical climate: a mixture of heat, humidity, vegetation, and I don´t know what else. There I was with a long sleeved shirt, long pants, warm socks and hiking shoes. It was about 90 degrees. Today it´s 91, and predicted to be 96 tomorrow. I was very proud of myself, backpack and all, in catching the local bus from the airport into town, transferring to the correct bus to Progreso, taking the colectivo to Chixculub.
My friends, A and M, have rented a house on the beach with another couple. It has 4 very large bedrooms. The room for me is on the second floor and looks out onto the beach and ocean. The house, like all the others, is only about 50 feet from the high water line. At night it cools down to about 70. I have a ceiling fan in the room and wide open windows. It´s wonderful to fall asleep to the sound of the waves on the beach. Fortunately, there is a gentle to brisk breeze coming in off the water which makes the temperature feel cooler.
The Gulf of Mexico is shallow. You can walk for hundreds of meters out into the water and it´s still only up to your waist or chest. As a result, the water is relatively warm (for me, that´s GREAT!). The downside is that the water stirs up all the dirt at the bottom and the color of the water is grayish. At the high water line, there are mounds of shells. You have to crunch your way over this mound of shells to get to the water. The shells extend for miles in both directons. There are fishing boats, sort of flat bottom pongas, pulled up on the beach.
The Canadians have discovered this part of Mexico. In a sense, at the risk of sounding too negative, this place is like a poor man´s Cancun. Another way of describing it is this is where Mexico meets the beach. If you walk one block away from the nice beach houses, you encounter the ramshackle shacks, concrete block houses with re-bar sticking up, Jaime´s "mini super-market," dogs sleeping in the middle of the dirt street, and all the other typical hallmarks of a fairly poor Mexican pueblo. At night, the pueblo absolutely comes alive and is downright fun; more about that later. Well, it´s time to break off from this and go in the water. Hasta luego!