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From the zoo we crept south on an unpaved road, ending up at a place called Gales Point, a long spit of land sticking into a saltwater lagoon. The land along the way was pretty dry, and reminded me of pictures you see of the African Steppes. I could imagine wildebeasts and giraffes out there. The Gales Point peninsula is about a hundred feet wide and a mile long. The pot holed dirt road weaves its way between the one ragged row of houses and the water out to the tip, where there is a nice, clean, pricey resort.
The resort manager wasn't too enamoured with trailer trash like us, particularly since we didn't want to buy three meals a day to go with our parking place. James, a nice young local, told us his uncle had a place a bit further uptown and would love to have us park there for the night.
We were met at the start of town by crazy Ronald -- crack head, thief, dancer, and con artist -- a rastafarian who gives rastafarians a bad reputation. Fortunately, we also met some others. We met Boombay, a well known drum maker; Craig bought a drum from him. His drum has a goatskin head, a coconut palm body, and steel rings to tighten the head. The rings are tensioned using rope from Guatemala. The skin is put on wet, hair out, and folded over the first ring, then pinched with the second one. We also met Emmet, a drummer known around the country.
Carol and I went out at sunset to look for Manatees with James. He took us out in his canoe to a spot where they are known to congregate, apparently because the water is cooler there from a spring or something. We didn't see any, but saw a nice sunset.
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