It’s Monday here in the sunny town of…..what? Hay!! Where’d the sun go and what’s with this blanket of clouds. And the temps have dropped about 15 degrees. It’s almost like I’m back in Seattle. Normally we have big poofy clouds or low gray ones that drop some rain and then go, but these clouds are not what I’m used to (not that I take myself as an instant Zihua aficionado or something). What gives.
Tropical Storm Andres, the first named storm for the Pacific’s hurricane season, gives. Actually, it doesn’t give much about us, but it is about 120 miles off shore and heading North by Northwest. At one point, according to the news, it hit hurricane speeds but died back down. No matter, it sure didn’t stop 
Sabrina and I from lazing about the condo until noon. Dan came over and let me know what was going on with the weather and then suggested we head over to Ixtapa, about 15km to the north.
The drive over was good and the cab driver even stopped at one point so I could get a photo of Ixtapa in all its dark and gloomy glory. It wasn’t Ixtapa’s fault, it was just the weather. Our driver then promptly backed down an offramp to head us in the right direction. Ahhhh….Mexico. Did I mention we always travel in cabs the size of Chevy Chevettes? 
Sabrina usually sits on Lucia’s lap and when it’s really hot everyone sticks together.
Coming in to Ixtapa I noticed just how clean the town was, even with all the wind blown stuff around. It really looks like a nice place, fixed up for the tourists. The cabbie dropped us off at the public beach access point and double checked to make sure we wanted to go to the beach (we’re sure he was questioning why gringos would want to go to the beach when there were storm warnings). 
Reaching the beach down something of an alley way, we were met with wind whipped sand right in the face. OUCH!! We spent enough time looking around to say we had seen enough and headed out of the wind.
Then the rain started. Gadzooks!! Wind, rain, flying camels. It was horrible. Not really (especially the camels). It WAS rainy and windy but it was slightly warm. It’s not like the rain in Seattle (duh) and was fun to brave for a while. We. Were. Soaked. 
As we were about to walk into Senor Frogs a charismatic gentleman from the restaurant next door, Heaven & Hell, waved us inside. It was more open and inviting than Senor Frogs anyway. And as this is both the low season, swine flu season and hurricane season, the place was empty. We effectively doubled the occupancy in the joint, with the other half being people who worked there.
It was a good lunch and Sabrina ate up all the shrimp (camarones) she had, plus a lot of chips. The waiter was a hoot as we were obviously his only fare for the day (two other people did come in at one point, but that was it). The food at Heaven & Hell was very yummy and nicely presented, at least by my standards. The rain came and went and I got a recording of it at one 
point for your listening pleasure. rain-at-heaven-and-hell By the time we went to leave, it was coming again and we ditched into a cab for the ride home. Not much to see or do in Ixtapa in a storm, I always say.
That was reallythe highlights of the day. Sabrina and I hung out, hit the pool again and then went over to the Cronins’ for a while. I think. I’m not sure because my brain is pretty sun friend about now. I remember more wind and rain and it being really cool. Our normal evening lightning show was preempted by the passing storm. Sigh. Here’s another audio clip of pounding surf and night sounds in between cloud bursts. sounds-of-the-night
Tomorrow’s entry: Big waves and too much sun.
