Oh Mexico
part four
Stepping inside, our eyes adjusting to the dim light, we looked around. It was a small room with a kitchen area and a shower stall with a toilet adjoining.
The water supply came from a cistern on the roof, which meant the water was cold in the morning and mildly warm in the evening after a day in the sun. We discovered that showers were more comfortable in the early evening.
There was no furniture—no chairs, no couch—and most distressing of all, no beds.
“Not to worry,” our hosts assured us. “We will get you two hammocks.”
Sure enough, they left and returned shortly with two hammocks made of some sort of hemp rope. Now, I’ve never slept in a hammock before. These weren’t the kind you might find in your friend’s backyard, strung between two trees with steel rods at each end that keep the hammock in the shape of a rope cot. These hammocks had a rope at the middle of each end, and when you lay in them, they envelop you in something like a banana peel.
Our first night was difficult, to say the least. To complicate matters further, we weren’t given any blankets, and while the days were warm to hot, the nights were fairly cold. The next day, we found a shop and bought a few blankets, which helped.
We also learned quickly that the best way to sleep in these hammocks was to lay across them, using your feet at one end and your head at the other to keep the hammock stretched out, so you didn’t end up rolled up like a human burrito.
Adjustment is the name of the game in these situations.
