"HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY- we love you!"

Happy Valentine's Day to each of you, family, friends and new aquaintances. We

love Peurto Morelos but not near as much as we love all of you!

Día de tarjeta del día de San Valentín feliz a cada uno de usted, de familia, de amigos y de nuevos aquaintances. Amamos Puerto Morelos pero no cerca tanto como amamos cada uno usted.

February 13, 2008 DAY 10!

The day started the same as any other with one exception – we spent the first hour of our morning walk picking up garbage off the street. So many people we have stopped to talk with since our first day here have loved Puerto Morelos but complained about the amount of garbage on the streets. We have shared their concerns and decided perhaps if we did a little bit of garbage pick up it would make a difference. At home everyone is litter conscious, it has been taught in our schools for years. Remember Arbor Day? The term is now “Spring Clean Up Week”. People adopt a portion of roadways and highways and we are recycle conscious. None of that is done here. The beaches and parks are kept clean but other than these areas locals just toss papers, bottles and cans. There are garbage cans in several locations on the street and they have regular garbage pick up however, what is not in the barrel gets left behind to be blown around in the wind. Several tourists stopped and thanked us for trying to make a difference; one lady clapped her hands as she drove by. You guessed it – no one offered to help but that isn’t why we did it – we wanted to make a difference and we have. It feels good to walk down he same section of street and not see the usual clutter.

It has been a very hot still day, we didn’t sit on the beach for long but we did some snorkeling. The water is very clear and the bottom is free of dead coral, this is because the reef has been declared a national park. They are very protective of the reef; you can not go diving or snorkeling on it without a guide. We are looking at going out on Sunday if the weather cooperates. Tuesday the winds were so strong they wouldn’t allow anyone out from the pier.

This afternoon we stopped at the Finca Café, here they roast and grind their own coffee which is shipped in from their family owned coffee plantation. The coffee is very good, deserts are out of this world and the waiter/dishwasher/coffee toaster/grinder – you name it is a hoot. His name is Rudy, he speaks English well and he is somewhat of an OCP (Obsessive Compulsive Personality) – Allan says it is something I can relate too – what does he mean by that do you think???

We went back later for dinner and met a young couple from Denver Colorado, they have a time share south of here and dropped in to PM to just look around. They want to have kids but aren’t ready to pass up the party life just yet. It is a major decision for young couples.

The cactus moon flowers were out again tonight – I will attach another picture because there were more blooms showing.

We dropped laundry off again today, it will be ready for pickup tomorrow – I am curious to see what we get this time – can hardly wait!

Podría estar en otras personas bajo desgaste mañana
Adiós para ahora,

Anne

PS – these little blurbs of Spanish can be translated to English at “translator.live.com”

February 13th, 2008

This is Rudy from the Finca Cafe, a visit to Puerto Morelos

would not be complete without a visit to the Finca and meeting him!

The infamous cofee roaster at Finca's

This is the army base in Puerto Morelos - it is inhabited by army personel; we often see them riding around in their trucks with machine guns mounted on the back. Our obvious question was "Why?" Well the answer is simple - this is a major drug channel from Columbia. The ships and high speed boats drop off drugs in the ocean which are picked up by fishermen and brought to shore where they are transported by land to the US. Who'da thought!

Sad to see these vacant buildings, Wilma did a lot of distruction here - Peurto Morelos was the worst place hit along his coast. Many people were unable to replace what they lost.

Here is the cactus moon flower tonight - lots more blooms. I found out these come in a variety of colours, yellow, pink, red too I believe -this one is white

This Market is in town every Wednesday from 7:30 in the morning until late afternoon.