Shopping, birding and dining in ZLO

We’re back for one more week~!

Above: Our weekly coffees at the La Comer Grocery. $112 ($130 with tip, $6 US)

We no sooner got back to good old Manzanillo than we had to restock the fridge for our final week here and top off the Peso stash.

So we hopped on the #1 Bus and headed to our grocery, La Comer. The route goes through Santiago, a suburb of Manzanillo, a beautiful little city with great local restaurants, a Saturday market, and its own nice indoor market where you can get anything, as well as lots of fresh produce, fish, meat, fresh tortillas, you name it.

The local restaurants feature (drum roll) Fish! Yes this is the seafood capital of the Pacific Coast, home of a tuna cannery. Typical fish of the days here are mahi mahi (dorado (my favorite!)), tuna (much better than you’re thinking), sea bass (incredible), and half a dozen other fish that are mouthwateringly tender.

Truthfully I had a bit of a problem with the altitude in SMA. It feels so good to get back to sea level and the oxygen-rich air here along the beautiful blue pacific.

Speaking of Pacific Blue, that’s the name of the BW’s favorite little dress shop in the mall where the La Comer grocery store is located.

It’s a great little air conditioned mall, with lots of shops, restaurants, and several ice cream shops.

An ice cream is de regueure after shopping.

The grocery is really first class, easily topping many stores in the States in quality and quantity.

The selection is broad, the produce is fresh and the prices are a third less than in the states.

Once we get the produce it’s time for a rest.

Here’s when we grab some latte‘s and cappuccinos. If you order the Mexcla deluxe you get two nice little pastries.

Just a few more pics:

These fish are fresh! Or you can go to the fish market in Santiago! One of our waiters in SMA is from here. He was shocked we had even heard of Manzanillo His father runs a fish market in Santiago!

You can get anything here you want, from big screen TV‘s, hardware, software, furniture, clothing, a washing machine, all the essentials.

Oh yes, and

Motorcycles, of course.

We picked up some pesos from the Scotia Bank ATM (our bank, PNC, reimburses the $115 peso fee), crossed the busy street and jumped on Bus #1 back to Club Santiago. (13 pesos per person this year).

So we’ve got a week to go here. I got in a couple of walks, including one to the Lagoon. The most interesting were the Semipalmated Plovers. I’m sure they’ve been here all along but I’m finally getting to some of the species that have fewer birds on the sandbar. Here’s my birding list at the lagoon:

• Magnificent Frigate birds

• 1 Great Egret

• 2 Little Blue herons

• 2 Reddish Egrets -one of which fought off the frigate birds to keep his catch

• Snowy Egrets, -one of which hunted by vibrating his foot on the creek bed

• 50 Brown Pelicans

• 50 neotropical cormorants

• Whimbrels

• Many Elegant terns, with their spear=like red-orange bills.

• Laughing gulls with their bright eye and black heads

• Long billed dowitchers

• Semipalmated plovers

I may ask my grandson to post a few videos on the YouTube channel of some of the birds I recorded today. I’ll put up a link in a future post.

One amazing thing (a first for me) is that I saw a Great Kiskadee, which is a fly catcher, diving for fish! Here’s a six second video.

I checked it out on line and it’s true, they do!

We ended the day at our favorite restaurant, Oasis, enjoying fresh dorado under the stars and a half moon overhead, serenaded by Puccini arias and the gentle rhythm of the surf.

As I mentioned, we’re wrapping up our last week here in ZLO, cutting it a few weeks short so I can attend a dedication ceremony in Dinglestown PA and tour some historical sights. It should be very interesting and I am very much looking forwards to sharing with you.

It’s going to be a busy year from here on out as well, with three weeks in Kauai, getting the boat ready for a competitive year of sailing, opening up the cottage, then taking 7, yes SEVEN teenagers and their parents to Greece!

We’ll be flying back through England and plan to check out Bath and London, before returning home for the Tartan Ten Championship sailed out of our home club this year on Lake Erie. It will be my first so hoping to have a great time with my sailing buddies.

Then after enjoying the perfect Michigan Fall weather, we’ll be doing a Christmas Market Viking Cruise on the Rhine.

But these last few days we’ll be soaking up nature here along the beautiful Mexican Pacific, focused on the present and searching for the beauty.

Welcome new subscribers, and thanks to all for traveling along!