El Tecuan

   A view from El Tecuan


Membrillo is the Spanish word for quince. Along the way to the coast, a man by the side of the road sold us plastic bags full of sliced membrillo, sprinkled with ground chilli. Then, adding sour to sour, he squeezed a whole lime into each bag. Further along, there was a woman selling iguanas. She had a five or six of them hanging on a string, from their noses.

Perhaps we did go through a red light. Though I think it was orange. A policeman was waiting, and stopped us. I quickly paid the bribe and we drove on.

We stayed for a few days at The Pink Posada. The Pink Posada was a small hotel recommended in a self published guidebook Tere had found in Guadalajara. We had stayed there before.

The Pink Posada was not a luxurious hotel like Las Hadas. There were few staff around after breakfast. Drinks were based on an honour payment system. You would take your beer or Coke from the cooler, then leave the cap in one pot and the money in another. The veranda was nicely decorated. with bits and bobs: driftwood, wrought iron, pots and carpets. You had the place to yourself, almost. From the pool and veranda you could see the cargo ships making their way into the port of Manzanillo.

I began to teach John and, then Carmen (who were called Chicks and Girly), to swim at the Pink Posada. Eve was a a baby and so we took turns to hold her while she floated between our arms.

When John was four, I dared him to jump off the bridge into the water, and he would. Splash! Catching him. And he would do it again and again. Now it was Carmen's turn and I dared her and she was just as brave and jumped into the water trustingly, enjoying the leap and then it was easy for her too.

After a few days at the Posada we drove up the coast to see if we could see a bit more and stay at another hotel called El Tecuan.

What is the translation of matorral? It is the dense vegetation that begins near the coast. Coconut trees and bushes of every kind, birds, snakes and insects. It can be a fearsome place to people who land on a shore and want to walk inland. It is something for them to slash at with knives and machtetes.

During the drive Tere told us how she was no longer fearless in the water, though she still loved the sea. She swam out when she was younger and couldn't swim back; the backdraught prevented her from reaching the shore. Juan, her younger brother, organised the rescue. He got hold of a rope, and while the family all held the rope he jumped in to the sea to save Teresa, and the family dragged them both back to land.

We missed the sign to El Tecuan because it was partially hidden, and drove on past for another 40 minutes before we realised our mistake and turned round. Then Dad did see the sign and we turned left down into the driveway.

The matorral had grown up to the edge of the tarred road, which had no markings on it. Perhaps it was the expectation that the hotel would appear round the next bend, but time dragged a little. 15 minutes later we were still driving along at a fair clip, looking for road signs.

After a while, the wide, pock-marked tarmac turned into a narrower road. The potholes got bigger, turning into proper holes. We had to slow the car down and crawl into and then out of them. Several times the road climbed steeply and because it was covered in loose pebbles the car slipped backwards.

Of course we had all thought of going back after the first ten minutes, but we didn't because it would have seemed like a wasted effort. There was also the hope of a meal or a drink. The atmosphere in the car was tense. We were no longer cruising alongside the matorral, but heading right into it.

Finally, we saw the hotel. It was built on the top of a rise. It was painted white and had thickly thatched roofs.

We got out of the car and went inside and at first we thought it was abandoned. However, after a while a man came out dressed in the hotel uniform and offered to show us around. We never saw anyone else. The hotel was built on a rocky outcrop, so to get from one set of rooms to another you had to cross little bridges, and beneath the bridges were steep drops of about twenty metres.

The central wooden slats were missing from one of the bridges and we had to hop across, one by one, holding the children. Teresa said.

'It's too dangerous to stay here. We can't stay here.'

Mom was fascinated. She seemed absorbed, taking it in. But Dad said, 'I can't stay here. My father was a hotelier, I know what this means. I know what happens to run down hotels and I don't like it.'

The tennis court was set deep into rock, bougainvillea growing out and trailing down the sides. You had to climb down five or six sets of black granite stairs in order to reach the court. The net was up, and from above it looked it as if it needed tightening. 

The hotel employee asked us if we would like something to eat and we said we would and so he took us to the restaurant.

The restaurant was large and a little dusty. The ceiling was low and the windows had partially fogged up. The edges of the windows were covered in green mould, but on one side, on the rocks through the glass, you could see five or six large iguanas; scaly and green, with patches of blue-grey and ridged backs. There was no cook. Our host went into the kitchen and started preparing what we had asked for.

Because the windows were fogged the view from the windows was difficult at first to take in. The sea went from left to right, sweeping across the horizon. The hotel was built on a slope and the slope was steep and the land between the hotel and the sea spread outwards thickly until the heads of the palms became so small blended into the green distance. There must have been paths down to the far away beach, but if there were, they were not visible.

We stepped out of the restaurant to look at the iguanas and to get a clearer view. Mom said. 'This is astonishing. I'd like to stay here.' But dad refused, and unsettled by the road, the missing slats in the bridge, the iguanas seen through greening glass, I agreed. All that, put me off, that and the sight of the working runway for light aircraft near the beach, which we had seen from the restaurant.