Installment 3

Chapter 1
Calle Sin Salida
Behold, I will do a new thing; now it shall spring forth; shall ye not know it? I will even make a way in the wilderness, and rivers in the desert.Isaiah

Calle Sin Salida. It was a green sign high on a utility pole at a corner where one cobblestone street met another. The plaque was framed in orange stephanotis that dripped from the electric lines like tropical icicles. Calle Sin Salida—not the name of the street itself, but rather a warning: “Street without an exit.” In English, dead end.

Below that plaque there was another, printed with the actual name: Calle Golondrinas. My husband and I had been wandering through a neighborhood of bird names for streets—Pelicanos, Gaviotas, Pavo Real, Colibri: Pelicans, Seagulls, Peacocks, Hummingbirds. I’d looked them up as we went along.

This street was Golondrinas: “Swallows Street.” I knew that because we lived at the time near California’s San Juan Capistrano, famous for its swallows and its Spanish heritage. No translation needed for us on this one. The words were neatly centered above another line of printing: “La Islita Pizza” and a local telephone number. Big cities in the States have corporate sponsors for their stadiums. Rural Mexico has sponsors for their street signs.

My husband gripped the steering wheel more firmly and downshifted. Driving over cobblestones isn’t conducive to conversation, and this particular street was teeth-jarringly picturesque.

“Let’s see how close we can get to the beach,” Larry ventured. “I’ll bet this road leads right to it.”

Not a bad bet, as shortly after the entrance to the street, we crossed a little bridge and caught a glimpse of the waves and sand beyond. We took our time, taking in the houses, the gardens, and the glimpses of bright beckoning blue between them.

My surf-loving husband was on a quest to see how close to the ocean he could find a house. I was along for the ride of what I was sure was pure folly. We had spent ten days of a two-week vacation exploring the Nayarit coast north of Puerto Vallarta, playing lookie-loo with real estate agents from Sayulita north to La Peñita. We were halfway serious about buying a second home, mostly dreaming and what-if-ing. It was February 2006, and we were mostly just tired, glad to be away from the electric atmosphere of coastal Southern California. We were worn out from work that had become repetitive, and the mental tension of an election-year America polarized into opposing factions. Half of our friends were too despondent to talk; the other half, too excited and gung-ho not to stop.

What an amazing change of pace we’d found 1,500 miles south on the Pacific Coast of mainland Mexico. “Changes in latitude, changes in attitude,” as the song goes. Much further back in my life I’d had a brief career—six years worth—selling houses in that frenetic market north of the border. Your reputation and livelihood depended on getting back to people, the sooner the better, striking while the buyers were hot and the sellers were willing to move. Not the case in this place. We’d been trying to connect with someone—anyone—who could show us property in Guayabitos. It never happened. Left to our own devices we cruised around, assessing not only the houses to which we did manage to gain access, but our own prospects for the future. We both felt physically and mentally spent, not dead yet, but barely living. We sensed rather than knew that we’d reached a major turning point in our lives. We were ready for a change, open to it. We just didn’t know what it would look like.

“There’s the beach,” Larry announced.

We had reached the end of the road and stopped in the cul-de-sac. We were facing north, and to the left of us stretched the deep blue Pacific, embraced by the long sandy arms that defined Jaltemba Bay. Smack in the middle of the bay sat a small island that looked like half an over-sized hairy coconut. Straight beyond our windshield lay a stretch of flowing water, the river dividing Rincón de Guayabitos from La Peñita. Here it entered the bay between two rock groins that stretched out into the water providing a passage for fishing boats. At the end of the groin on our side of the river, facing down the waves, there was a cross. But more than a cross. Is that a shrine of some sort? I wondered, making a mental note to check it out later.

Directly in front of us, across the river were buildings. From a cantina we could hear the plaintive aaay pobre corazón music. There was what looked like a small apartment house with a palapa shade structure on top. Broadleaf guayaba trees lined a rock embankment, their deep green reflected in the water. Guayabitos was the diminutive form of the tree, or its fruit, for which the town was named. There were also palms, more shaggy fringed palapas, and ruffles of red tile roofs. If there had been a bridge, we could have crossed to what looked like an extension of this cobblestone street. Ah, but it was Calle Sin Salida. The end of the road. There was no access from here to there. The village across the water was just far enough away to be mysterious and quaint.

To our right, we peered past a hedge of brilliant bougainvillea and took in the white plaster walls of what looked to be a large home. It had a scroll of an iron gate in front of a courtyard. The red tiled roof that slanted slightly down towards us was not a faraway ruffle. We were close enough to see its tip-tilty planes, topped with a big white dome pierced with clerestory windows. Rising above the dome was an honest-to-gosh cupola. I couldn’t tell if the house had one story, two, three, or maybe a mixture of them all. The structure was set back from the street but at an elevation that, from where we were in the car, I could see a man sitting on what looked like a front porch or balcony. He was having a cup of coffee, looking out at the ocean—and at us. He waved. I waved back, and he rose, starting down the broad brick staircase that led from the front entrance of the house to the curvy iron gate.

“I think he’s coming out to talk to us!” I said.

Larry turned the car around and headed out of the cul-de-sac, stopping so the man could lean against the driver’s side. He indeed wanted to talk.

Leaning into the window of the small rental car, he got right to the point: “You folks wanna buy a house? This one’s for sale.” He pointed to a small sign on the front gate, which I now remembered catching a glimpse of as we’d passed. We’d been too enthralled with the view before us to take much notice.

“Hmmmm. Maybe.” Larry was non-committal. We’d been around the area. We knew the prices. This house looked way out of our league.

The guy named a price. We were right. Definitely more than we wanted to spend for a second home. I said so.

Not to be put off, he asked, “Where you folks from?”

“California,” I responded. “San Clemente.”

“Us, too!” He waved toward the house, indicating someone else inside, and reeled off an address. It was about two miles from where we were currently living in the States. “Left about sixteen years ago. Own your home there?”

I knew what was happening. We were being pre-qualified, but it was gentle, friendly. I had the feeling we were in the hands of a master. We talked about San Clemente and its neighboring towns of Dana Point and San Juan Capistrano, living near water, when was the best time of year, when was it lousy. Ultimately—who could resist his invitation “come on in and have a look”? No longer was he “a guy.” He was Jim.

© 2010 by Susan J. Cobb. All rights reserved.

Editors Note: We plan to publish an instalment of Virgin Territory periodically for the next year and a half. If you cannot wait that long you can always buy the book from the publisher’s web site here. For even more information visit Susan’s web site.