The weekend didn’t actually seem very eventful in the moment, but in retrospect, it’s clear to me that we’ve experienced a full-fledged apocalyptic event, “featuring” disasters, pestilence and a requisite number of equestrians.
1. Earthquakes.
It all began with earthquakes; two of them on Saturday morning. The first is said to have happened around 5 AM as we were sleeping, the second around 9 AM just as I was having coffee and writing my previous post. I didn’t notice a thing. We haven’t heard any reports on the size of the tremors but I’m assuming it was quite a minor one. Nevertheless, many people who are from here, including our neighbours and Maestra Clara, told us they clearly felt the movement and saw their buildings shake. Unfortunately, I have no photos of the earthquake so here’s one of Angie and me today, on a patio by the Santiago dock, just to prove that we’re unscathed.
2. Plagues
Next came a plague of tiny flies that invaded the house on Saturday evening and has shown no desire to leave. They are small and noiseless and don’t bite, but they are swarming our lights and dropping on our food and books and, occasionally, flying into our noses. As far as plagues go, it’s a mild one but a plague nevertheless and plagues are not pleasant. Tonight we’re going to fumigate.
3. Four horsemen
The final apocalyptic event was the four horsemen. On Sunday we went riding at the Finca Xetuc, a nearby dude ranch, where we were partnered up with horses (“older” ones for Angie and me) and then taken for a trail ride up into the cloud forest.
Accompanying us was a couple from Colorado, making for a total of four horsepeople, plus a guide, whom I’ve decided not to include in the count because it ruins the symbolism.
It was an interesting excursion. We rode through forests and coffee fields and up steep inclines where the horses climbed up through narrow gullies that would be hard for a human to walk. Up at the top we had a view of farmed slopes down to the lake on one side and forest down to the Pacific Ocean on the other, we were told, but since it was obstructed by clouds we couldn’t see. Hence the misty picture.
After riding back down, we rested our lower selves in soft chairs in the Finca and were served a delicious meal by our host and raconteur named Jim. Jim and Nancy are Americans nearing their 80s who have been here for 30+ years. They live in a house hewn out of the mountainside, complete with underground bunker and animal park and mayan antiquity museum and playboy-like bedrooms and they offer horseriding packages and then regale you with a gourmet meal and stories, many of which are believable. I would have taken a photo of the house but didn’t know where to begin and so I just didn’t.