First Morning in Mexico

 
From my journal, November 11, 2013
I woke this morning about 3am to the cheerful sound of reggae music and chirping frogs, my ill-chosen cell phone alarm. Bad enough at the best of times, at 3am, it was, well, alarming. We'd gone to bed late after several last minute phone calls. We don't have cell service in Mexico and we wanted to take the opportunity to talk to our families directly. I talked to my mom last. We've always been close, and beyond her words, I savored the sound of her, the primal voice in my life, until far too late at night. I went to sleep feeling a little bit sad and fighting a lot of pre-trip jitters.
Meira got up to make sure Bryan didn't go back to sleep, and after we were both sure he was firmly awake, she crawled into his warm spot in bed with me. I heard him make a cup of coffee, smelled his early morning fried-egg sandwich, and stayed awake through all the clanking above my head as he pulled up the anchor. I made sure he was back, safe in the cockpit and tethered in, then cuddled down into my pillow for a few more hours of rest.
I woke about 7 to a beautiful sunny day. I called up, “Are we in Mexico yet?” Bryan left the autopilot steering and came to greet me. “Welcome to Mexico!”
He still had plenty of energy, so I took my time getting up. Somehow, most of my stress had evaporated overnight. I made a cup of tea and fried up an english muffin for breakfast. The kettle and a cast iron skillet live on our stove top, held in place by a pair of vice grips on the stainless bars.
I stepped up into the companionway for a peek. The Coronado Islands rose brown and bare to the west, and the buildings of Tijuana glittered underneath the morning sun. Behind the city, the mountains of Baja traced a row of beginners cursive on the sky—rmnvm. An empty line trailed hopefully behind the boat, the silvery lure jumping out of the wake occasionally. The slightest of breezes pockmarked the sea in patches, here a collection of ripples, there a glassy pond suspended in the blue.