Eat, Drink, Sail, Repent!

We called ourselves the “Haightful Eight.” We thought “Hateful Eight” might suggest a far more darkly sinister and angrier mood than was so clearly the case with our lighthearted group. No, this group would be far too merry, too mirthful to be bothered by any negative vibe. We thought “Haightful” more reflective of a  euphoric era, one now laced with unending gallons of wine, beer and rum if not certain leafy herbs of days gone by. Together, we would walk, dine, drink, swim, dance and laugh our way down the Croatian coast. Our vehicle? The 50 foot catamaran, the “Indian Summer” which somehow I kept referring to as the “Endless Summer.” No harm there.

To assist us in our journey, the wonderful Sanja (“Sah-nyah”) and, at the helm, Ivan (“E-vahn”). The former served as an amazing jack-of-all-trades: cook, adviser, guide, Croatian language instructor, and occasional disc jockey. Ivan, the steady hand at the helm, would perform his duties as easily and without fanfare as one might open a wine bottle, if I may use that as an analogy. Our group?  Eight friends associated by random streams of shared personal histories some dating back forty years and, in one case, more than sixty years. We gathered from California, Montana, Colorado, New York, and South Carolina. What a fabulous blend!

We would sail the azure blue waters of the Adriatic from Brac to Hvar to Korcula and other destinations which, I must confess, at this moment, I simply cannot remotely recall. On a daily basis we would stop at a variety of locations and experience the beaches of Croatia. And, what about them, these beaches? They are singularly beautiful, but, if I may say so, lacking in one meaningful way. It seems Croatia was near the back of the line when they passed out sand. What we have instead is a spectrum of rocky beaches some of which boast stones as smooth as a baby’s bottom and others clearly designed by the Marquis de Sade. None that we encountered were especially foot friendly. But, we didn't care.

At these beach stops, we would simply jump off the boat, take off in any direction, sometimes aiming for the shoreline, sometimes not. If we did reach the shoreline, we would mostly sit (gingerly) on the rocks, gaze out at the sea, drink in the secluded beauty, and decide which smooth stones were worthy souvenirs. We would agree to disagree whether the waters of the Adriatic were “bracing” or “refreshing” or “chilling,” but we could all agree the waters were crystal clear and “invigorating.”

One of our stops was Hvar. We would toodle around the island but finally make landfall at Hvar Town. I felt a special connection to this place because it was a decade ago that I visited this place with Jesse and Alex. At that time, we hiked up to the fortress overlooking the small city so that we got a rapturous panoramic view of the city below and the shimmering sea beyond. I remember thinking, as I looked out over the ramparts, that it was like looking at the gates of heaven and I always wanted to return here. Sanja had advised us that over the intervening years, Hvar had become quite the tourist destination.  She referred to it as the St. Tropez of Croatia. And, indeed, the place had become quite trafficked and blanketed by one cool cafe after another serving smartly dressed men and women. But, I didn’t care.  We hiked up to the fortress where I put on my headphones to listen to Per Byhring’s “Mr. Wednesday,” a tune that resonates with me like no other. Staring out at the sea and listening to this tune had been an ambition of mine for years. My bucket list is now a tad shorter.

I cannot let our Hvar visit pass without one more story line. When I was here with the boys long ago we happened upon a restaurant that featured what we all thought were the best mussels on planet earth. Mussels perfectly cooked in a broth rich in tomato, garlic and enough spicy heat to make it interesting. Perfect for being soaked up by a crusty bread. Here I was ten years later standing outside the very same restaurant. And, did I go in to re-create that epochal culinary experience? No, I did not. Why, you ask. Truth be told, Sanja and Ivan were about to pick us up and serve us lunch featuring a spaghetti carbonara with lobster crafted by Sanja. When we advised the boys that I had passed up this shot at mussel heaven, they were aghast. What? You travel thousands of miles and go to a place you are likely never to revisit and you pass up the best mussels ever created? Are you mad? Ahhh, I will never live this one down, and I will graciously accept the criticism that has not yet ceased to be piled upon me. (P.S., the carbonara was awesome.)

Back on the Indian Summer the party continued as we sailed between islands. Hours would pass as we read, swam, chatted, stared at the beauty of it all, ate and drank. And, what would we talk about? Well, we would delve into the momentous issues of the day of course like, what’s the difference between a mule, a donkey and a burro? If only males can be jackasses, would a female be a “jill ass” or a “jackie ass?” Sometimes we would delve intensely into the riveting and earthshaking ramifications of a Brad and Angelina break up. And, then sometimes it seemed the group might add to the list of nicknames for me. At varying times I was referred to as Rasputin (even though I disavowed any physical resemblance) or T.C. (trans century) for my alleged simultaneous resemblance to Rasputin, Marco Polo, and Einstein. Or, sometimes it was merely Yeff.

In the evenings, we would go ashore to find ourselves some dinner, often following Sanja's recommendations.  One such evening, we were in Trpanj, not far from Dubrovnik.  (Yeah, Trpanj is spelled correctly, I promise.  Just another funny example of this vowel deprived language!)  In a town of 871 people, it was not terribly hard to find a place called the "Tuna Beach Bar."  Here, we enjoyed epically good tuna sashimi and carpaccio among other fresh morsels.  What followed was a spontaneous eruption of dancing joined in by our whole group.  I mean, we held nothing back.  It was fabulously enthusiastic if a bit spastic, but since there were literally no other people at the Tuna Beach Bar I can't say we fell prey to embarrassment.  Michael Jackson, the Stones, the Pointer Sisters and other icons led the way with Sanja excelling as disc jockey.  Since we were the only patrons at the place, we sometimes asked the manager if he wanted to  close it down for the night.  He would shrug and tell us he was obliged to  keep  the place open until 2 a.m. anyway.  Good to know!

Poor Sanja. She was so earnest in her efforts to teach us some of the rudiments of the Croatian language. But, seriously, how does one try to learn such things when vowels appear about as often as sand does on Croatian beaches? Take the days of the week, for example. How about Monday, Wednesday and Thursday, to name three. What we have is: Ponedjeljak, Srijeda, and Cetvrtak. And, let’s not forget Sunday: Nedjelja. Really? In this vowel starved universe we were severely challenged. But, Sanja persevered and occasionally would connect with our less than graceful attempts at compliance. Sadly, whether it was Sanja’s howls of laughter or ours that accompanied these tutorials, we made little progress.

Upon arriving at the boat at the outset of our journey, Randy surprised us all with a gift of t-shirts to commemorate the occasion. On them, it said, “Eat, Drink, Sail, Repeat.” A few days in when we were threatening to consume about 15% of the world’s wine reserves, Randy suggested a slight revision: “Eat, Drink, Sail, Repent.”

He knew what he was talking about.

Jungle Rules

We were in search of a wilderness -- something wild, remote, dense and warm. Something far away from TVs, a spa, and swim up bars. And so we headed east from Quito by car, the five of us (Jesse and Laura, Maggie, Lily and me) with Jesse behind the wheel. We headed down into lush valleys, and then up the next layer of the cloud enshrouded Andes, and down again. We progressed over nice highways to bumpy roads and, finally, several hours later, to a turn off that looked like a rough hewn parking lot on the edge of a river. We pulled in and almost immediately were spotted by someone knowing our need to complete our journey. He pointed us to a covered canoe that would take us the rest of the way. We loaded our stuff onto the canoe and headed down the river yet further into the wilderness, finally arriving at our destination: The Anaconda Lodge.

Arriving at the lodge, we meet Francisco, the owner. Francisco is a story teller, and a good one. He is of Chilean descent, his father once the Chilean ambassador to England, and himself a former director of a major Spanish bank doing business in Chile. Some years ago when the economy crashed in Chile, and the banks along with it, Francisco and his wife made a command decision to journey in the opposite direction in almost every respect. They came to the Amazon basin and took over the site of what had once been the only lodge in this region. It once boasted visits by President Ford and later President Carter. But, when Francisco arrived, the place was crumbling and in disarray and in need of a complete reconstruction. Now, a much smaller lodge, the Anaconda has about 14 bungalow type units and accommodates fewer than thirty guests. When we arrived, however, Francisco tells us that we are the only guests! We are led to our rooms which have no air conditioning, no TVs, no phones, and no glass in the windows. And, a hammock. Perfect.

We are soon introduced to Cesar, our guide. Cesar is a native of Anaconda Island which boasts maybe 400 people. Francisco describes Cesar as an encyclopedia wearing boots. He knows everything about the local flora and fauna in addition to the local culture and history. We have barely unpacked when Cesar leads us into the jungle for an amazing three hour walk. The vegetation is dense here. Very dense. If you step off the rocky, dirt path you cannot venture more than a few steps without being consumed by a wall of vegetation. And, Cesar opens our eyes to things only moments earlier we could not have imagined. He shows us plants and trees, some of which you can touch, others to stay away from. We learn of the leaves of which trees we can eat (like the delicious leaf from which cinnamon is made) and those that would kill us. We learn how each plant or tree figures into the lifestyle of locals and which figure into the various rituals of the local shaman throughout history. Cesar speaks to us in Spanish with Jesse and Laura very ably serving as translators.

Cesar leads us to a home carved out of the jungle. We visit with the family that lives there. The house is up on stilts and is very rudimentary: no windows, just open air. Two impossibly cute, barefooted kids give us a cautious eye, but almost immediately resume their prancing around the house. The young boy swings wildly on a hammock; his sister almost bouncing off the walls with an over-brimming energy. We sat on a wood bench and were treated to a drink made from fermented yucca and sweet potato. Not exactly a mojito, but dripping with authenticity. And, then we are treated to some freshly made chocolate served on a leaf.

But, before entering this home, Cesar introduces us to the art of using a blow gun, not something that we folks tend to have had much experience with. There is a target, a wooden carving of an owl sitting atop a tall stick, that will be the focus of our efforts. Let me make an observation first on the use of a blow gun. First, the wooden flute-like tube is incredibly long – like about 8 feet. Picking that thing up and trying to balance it while focusing on a distant target is quite the challenge, one that I cannot say I marveled at. And, it's heavy. I felt it was a moral victory just to lift it and aim it in the general direction of the owl. Beyond that, there is the challenge of managing the dart. Cesar prepares them and tucks them behind his ear. He stresses to us the absolute importance of breathing in through our noses when preparing to shoot lest we inadvertently suck the dart down our throats! Good to know. He smilingly tells us that if any of us hit the target we will be treated to a free drink back at the lodge. Two hits would get us a dinner and drink, and three hits would earn us a drink, dinner and dessert.

(By now, Cesar, who spoke Spanish with a much greater mastery than his English, decides to give us nicknames which would make it easier for him to remember us over the next few days that we would spend with him. Somehow, while we believe Cesar meant to call me Juan, it became muddled in the translation, and I became “Iguana,” not Juan. The name stuck.)

Lifting that eight foot long blow gun was like lifting a midget telephone pole. Very hard to keep balanced and steady and not drooping. And, as I said, for god's sake don't forget to breathe through your nose. And then, blow hard!! At first, all of us missed with Lily making a credible attempt at sounding either like she was playing the trumpet or farting. In subsequent attempts, Jesse, Lily and Maggie would actually hit the target. Iguana, on the other hand, was a bust.

And so our days would go. Sometimes it would be hikes with Cesar up incredibly steep hills through jungle so thick the notion of getting lost was no longer an abstraction. At times, we would be serenaded by the chaotic screechings of tamarind monkeys apparently arguing over who was getting which insects (or, so Cesar theorized). At other times, we would swat at both real and imaginary bugs who apparently found us to be a tasty novelty. Once, we stopped for a respite and Cesar, using a local plant sap, painted ceremonial warrior faces on each of us that, astonishingly, did not make us look even a tad bit more fierce.

And, then there was the tubing down the river. We were told to bring our swimsuits with us, so when our canoe came ashore Cesar indicated this would be our changing area. We looked around. Uh, where does one change exactly? No, no – no cabanas here, just a rocky beach and a shrub or two. When in Rome.....

But, the ride downstream was epic. Riding the currents and occasional rapids, it would have been a serious challenge to wipe the smiles off our faces. “Steering” the tubes was, at times, a challenge, but we all ended up where we were supposed to. The rumors of crocodiles and snakes in the local waters quickly evaporated. And, that was a good thing.

Back to the lodge for lunch and more stories from Francisco. And a nap.

Yes!

Darwin's Hustle

We all know about Charles Darwin, don't we? You know – the Emperor of Evolution, the Grand Master of Natural Selection. We have been led to believe all these years that Charlie was a most serious sort, an academician of the greatest rectitude. But, I have another theory. I think Charlie was bored. He lusted for something a bit more exciting than the medicine he was studying, probably bullied into that by his physician father. So, Charlie dabbled in natural history a little and then hoodwinked Captain Robert Fitzroy into believing that he was a “naturalist,” all so he could hop aboard the H.M.S. Beagle for a five year fling around the globe. Who can blame him, right? And so the twenty-two year old went on the trip of a lifetime. A Spring break without end, you might say!

And, what did he find? Darwin would experience much, but it is the Galapagos Islands where he left his immortal mark. Here, in an island group of 13, roughly 600 miles off the western borders of Ecuador, smack dab on the equator, Charlie made history. As we approached the islands from the air, the Galapagos seemed so inconsequential. Just tiny brownish droplets of land so small against the Pacific you had to remind yourself that these droplets were not weightless floating things but rather the protrusion of mountains and volcanoes anchored to the bottom of the sea. And, at least the islands we saw from the air were mostly brown dotted with touches of green with slender threads of sandy beaches rimming the islands. This would not be the jungle exploding with green vegetation of a thousand sorts, but largely a semi-arid, cactus-dotted environment.

Upon arrival, our bags were closely examined to assure local officials that we were not carrying with us any alien plant or animal life that might threaten the fragile ecosystem we were about to explore. This theme would emerge time and time again as we learned of the lengths to which the locals strived to protect the local environment. No doubt the motivation for this was driven in part by the paramount need of the locals to protect their only viable source of income – tourism -- but there was no questioning the sincerity of their effort as they advised us constantly of the things we needed to be mindful of to protect the flora and fauna from potential threats to their well being. Even our plane was generously sprayed, including the overhead luggage bins, to further these objectives.

We found our way to our catamaran, our intrepid group of seven (Alex and Katie, Jesse and Laura, Maggie, and Lily and me) and were introduced to our guide, Oswaldo (who, for some strange reason, I kept thinking in the early hours was named Pablo. My bad.) We would join about eight others from Australia, England, Japan, and the U.S. and together we would begin our exploration.

And, what an eye opener! We were advised to never touch the animals which I took as perhaps a bit of over cautiousness. But, soon enough we would see that was not the case. Our daily routine was generally to do two walking tours around the various islands and two snorkeling adventures. What we discovered was that the animals of the Galapagos have NO fear of human kind. None. There were moments when I was sorely tempted to reach down and touch that blue footed boobie or that sea lion or that pelican or marine iguana or that giant tortoise. But, I didn't. None of us did. (Speaking of blue footed boobies, by the way, please forgive me if I tell you that it was just too tempting to say from time to time, “wow, that's a nice set of boobies over there!”) Since natural instincts, I would think, would give these animals some trepidation at human presence, I have to think it was because of the consistent and firm instruction to visitors over many years now not to touch the animals that this fearlessness has become so imbedded in these creatures.

Nowhere was this characteristic more amiably on display, and wonderfully so, than in the water. For sure, the multitudes of brightly colored fish kept their distance; apparently they hadn't gotten the memo. But, the sea lions....oh my goodness! These guys, especially the young ones, were more than just idly curious about us. They wanted to play! One morning, for example, while casually snorkeling in the shallows alongside a stone jetty, minding my own business, a young sea lion spotted us and swam straight at us, no doubt to personally introduce himself. He would swim right up to my mask, looking me straight in the eye. If sea lions could smile, this fellow would have one ear to ear. Without any effort, he swam within an inch or two of my face and then, in a most coquettish way, would flip himself upside down and spiral away. Moments later he would return, this time with his mouth wide open – no doubt laughing – and come within a couple of inches of my wiggling fingers. You know, the kind of wiggling of fingers one might do when talking to a six month old baby. I'm not sure whether he was playing tag, or keep away, or whatever, but this young dude was having a great time. And, so was I.

And, so it went. A wonderful flowing mix of interactions with people, both familiar and unfamiliar, and daily encounters with animals who, clearly, were on a first name basis with us. The Galapagos were a wonderful discovery for us. And, I have to say, Charlie Darwin may have bamboozled Captain Fitzroy, but I admire his chutzpah.

As Mary, Katie's mom would say, “carpe friggin' diem!”