Playa Blanca

PLAYA BLANCA

I got a phone call on Saturday night from UK Rob, the nurse with MSF (Doctors Without Borders) with a quick idea of escaping the city and heading to the beach. Of course I couldn’t pass up the opportunity of salt, sand and sun. We made tentative plans for Sunday to head to Arboletas—a volcanic beach about an hour west of Monteria.

We were to meet at the bus station, also the central place to find a shared taxi going anywhere at 9:30, but I showed up about 10 minutes earlier, to my own demise. As soon as I jumped out of my cab, I was surrounded by drivers, hawking their transportation and boasting about their cars that could take me anywhere I wanted fast-fast. I inquired with a few, but being surrounded by more than 5 all talking at the same time at break-neck speeds in Spanish was too much to handle on a caffeine less stomach. I called Rob to inform him that I would be hanging out at a nearby café to wait for his arrival. We needed to team up on this one.

He arrived and we got our game plan straight. Working with MSF, he is required to follow a few more precautions, and we needed to take a white public service shared taxi, but without the shared passengers. We changed our destination from Arboletas to Playa Blanca due to the wind conditions, and the chop that would no doubt be at Arboletas. He started haggling with a few of the hawkers when one of the taxi drivers had recognized me from before. We started talking and while Rob was haggling with one driver saying that 160,000 pesos was way too much, my ‘friend’ from previous taxi services simply stated 100,000 pesos. We agreed and off we went. Jorge, got into the driver’s seat, buckled up and casually looked over his shoulder to ask, “So where are we going?” We all had a good laugh. We could have been going further away and he would have been screwed at the set price of 100,000 pesos.

Off we went and arrived at Playa Blanca in just over an hour to find white sand, palm trees and little black kids playing in the Caribbean surf. It was a slice of heaven, but an even bigger slice when compared to Monteria. It felt so good to be out of the city—to have sandy feet and salt-kissed lips and feel the cool ocean breeze in the baking sun.

We hung the hammock, spread the sarong and towel, and created our own little camp to settle in for the day. Jorge the driver would be back in 6 hours.

Within a few minutes the beach hypermart started forming. First it was shrimp cocktails and then mangos. Rob turned down both, but I adore the hard mango with salt and lemon and couldn’t pass up the 25 cent gloriousness. I scarfed it down and then decided it was time for a swim. We were bobbing up and down in the sea, feeling the coolness at our feet, and the warm sea around the rest of our bodies when I let out the most horrendous girlish scream followed by a string of profanities. A jelly fish had wrapped its tentacles around my waist and stung me good. I darted out of the water to the mango boy and called him back for some lemon. I rubbed the lemon all over the red welts that formed instantly and was soothed. It also helped that the beer hawker made his impeccably timed approach. It was just before noon and the first very cold ‘cervesita’ was cracked. A cheers to ‘this is the life’ was made and we sucked up the water-like ale with the ambience of the beach. More beers, more conversation, swings in the hammock, dips in the sea, snacks along the beach—you do have to admit it is the life…but if only we didn’t have to go back to Monteria.

The Monday to Friday teaching gig grinds me down and wears me out. I dread Mondays more here than I have ever dreaded Mondays back home or in any other country. But I will be honest, what gets me through the week is the countdown until I am back at the beach. If only there was some way I could permanently stay at the beach…any ideas?