LuckyFam: St. Patrick's Day

Patrick's Day started out with a surf trip to Chacala. The girls and Rowan went off to school as usual. Rory, Ron, Martin, Sergio, and I headed off to Chacala to go surfing. I won't lie, I was slightly unsure about the whole trip. What I knew about Chacala was.........you drove an hour north to the port and rented a ponga to take you to the surf break. The ponga driver dropped you and your surf board in the water and came back two hours later. It was unclear as to whether or not you could get ashore.

Rory was so stoked! He had spent the past week with his right arm in a sling. His elbow had been bothering him off and on since Christmas, but not so much that it stopped him from surfing, skimboarding swimming, boogie boarding, rip stick, futbol, ect. But over the past couple of weeks, he began to loose range of motion and it seemed time to check it out.

We found a great orthopedic surgeon in PV. He is German, speaks very good English and even better Spanish. His office is in an extremely nice 20 bed hospital in PV. After an xray, he discovered a non-displaced fracture on Rory's right elbow. The good news is that with time it will heal just fine, bad news was that he had to take it easy for three weeks.

After a week in a sling and another orthopedic consult from home, Rory was cleared to surf, as long as he wore his sling the rest of the time. We have fashioned a hard splint out of PVC pipe and foam shelf liner for other water activities and sports.

So the trip to Chacala was on!

The little town of Chacala is fairly small but very quaint. There were a few sailboats anchored in the cove and the marina has a harbor master.

This is the extent of the harbor. Mostly pongas and the majority of them used for fishing.

Once the boards were loaded we boarded a ponga and we were off. It took about 15 minutes to get to the surf spot.

Along the shoreline, we past some pretty amazing homes.

This one overlooked the harbor.

Honestly, the homes seem somewhat out of place next to the simple little town. Apparently, it is quite an exclusive community with a beach club, tennnis courts, and a private sand beach.

Once the ponga rounded the corner to the next cove, it was an entirely different feel.

Our ponga captain took us right into the beach and dropped us off with our boards and backpacks. We were greeted by Juan the nearly toothless older caretaker of the jungle beach. He lives there with his three dogs, and sleeps under the palapa .

Sergio, our surf guide and friend, gave us all the tips about the break (which you can see in the background) and we paddled out. Lucky for me, the water was warm and glassy and the waves were small and gentle. I did a ton of paddling and caught one wave, but I surfed Chacala. Everyone had fun, Ron, Rory and Martin caught waves and Sergio showed us all how it was done. At one point, he lost his hat while riding a wave. Without missing a beat, he caught the next wave and as soon as he saw his hat float by, he scooped it up, put it back on his head and never came off the wave.

Did I mention that he took 4th in the Men's Longboard competition the weekend before?

After a couple of hours, we paddled back into the beach and Juan fixed us cocos (green coconuts opened with a machete, you drink the water, and then snack on the coconut). The ponga captian took us back to the port and we hoped in the car and headed back to Sayulita.

The second half of St Patrick's Day was just as exciting.

Our Irish impishness got the best of us and we headed to Bucerias to check out the green beer!

The Shamrock was having a block party with Corned Beef and Cabbage, Guiness, green beer, green jello shots and all the green fun they could come up with.

There has a huge trampoline fun house and......