Back Up Poo Lizard Smuglers

Down to our favorite surf haunt, Wilderness, aptly named for its location; at the end of a the most arcane of roads at which point you find yourself appropriatly in the midst of Puerto Rican wilderness.  Minus the fact that you are or on the airport runway aproach path which has full sized comercial jets passing a few hundred feet overhead.  Minorly alarming but you get used to it.   The waves where throat high but so were the rice, beans, chicken, potato salad, coalslaw and papaya juice we'd just scarfed, as such a little RnD was necessary, rest and digestion that is.   Mieandering to our daily shade, 'hey check that out, a boat washed up on the rocks, ha must have been a fishing boat that floated off its morig, kind of odd seing as yesterday was the smalled surf and the least wind in a month, hum...be right back, gunna pee in the jungle.' 'Come check this boat out!  It is constructed of 2x6"s and sheetrock screws.' Woo wierd boat you're right!  2x6 framing with the worst grade 1 inch pine planking i've ever seen all held haphazardly together with ungalvizined sheet rock screws.  Puerto Rican fisherman must not put much value on their lives, i'd bet those screws would rust out in a  matter of days; something don't add up.   Four wheelin', many a Puerto Rican's most beloved past time.  Come the weekend come the demons.  Trailers filled with every sort of four weeling machine you can think of.  Ones for 6 people, ones with cromed everything, custom exhaust, monster truck tires, air horns, police sirens, weelie bars, front break lockout so you can do endless burnouts, muffler disconnect for quarter mile radius croud deffening.  If you can think of it, it probably already exists.   So...out in the water when a normal looking four weeler with a helmet clad rider and more suspiciously quiet exhause comes cruzing down the goat track we figured something must be up!  This became poiantly more apparent when he got a bit closer and we could see his full camo machine, army fatigues, blacked helmet and bullet proof vest, 'someting tells me this isn't your average drunk suicidal red neck Puerto Rican rev-monger! One bike, two bike, one truck, two truck, two men, four men, six men, eight men, gun men, rubber gloved men, camera men and sniffer dog too.  The boat was certaintly getting its 10 seconds of fame!  Things were becoming a bit clearer; dat ain't no washed up Puerto Rican fishing boat, built with sheetrock screws for a reson i'd say, a purpos built one voyage vessel.  I wonder if they were smuggling drugs? I very well might be the only surfer on the planet torterued with this affliction but when ever i get to a surfspot and there are waves, 'i gotta poo!'  No exception!  It doesn't matter that i didn't have to go before seeing the waves, it doesn't matter that i just visited the jon 10 minutes before getting there.  Maybe excitement makes my body excrete intestine lubing juices, i don't know but there is no denying it.  Sometimes I try to ignoor the urge but usually  it just can not be ignoored.  Frequently i find myself ducking into the woods before a surf.  At this preticular location, Wilderness, it has been happening so frequently that i've now staked out my own secret poo spot with a secret poo hole digging rock hidden at the beginning of my path.  I'd prefer not to poo in the woods if avoidable, not in the least because i dislike pooing in the woods, infact i love pooing in the woods, sometimes i poo in our yard back home just for fun, but because once i see there are good waves i just want to get out there and surf, not screw around out in the woods trying to dig holes with a rock.   A couple weeks ago, before I'd staked out my secret poo spot, i chose to ignoor the urge to poo.   After an hour out there in the surf i could no longer concentrate on the waves, all i could think about was not pooing myself.  All of a sudden it became apparent that i had T-45 seconds to 'blast out'.  You can paddle pretty far in 45 seconds but not all the way to shore with enough time to ditch the board and dash into the woods.  I only had one choice, get as far down current of the other surfers as i could in the time I had left and do an aqua poo.  Ahh...Not actually all together that unpleaset of an experience, almost enjoyable really.  Strange salt water burning sensation but that went away quite quickly. So this preticular day, before getting in the ocean, I visited secret spot and what did i find?...My private space had been invaded...What the f'...all my poos had been dug up had totally vanished, only a few tattered pieces of toilet paper (biodegradable of course) remained.  Who the?...What the?...Where's my poo gone?...I've never encountered a poo theif before!  Aaa Haa!  Closer inspection revealed the culpret, surrounding my secred spot where lizard tracks everywhere, apperently my poo had been eaten.  How Lovely!! "You're going to get in trouble!   You're going to get in trouble!" chanted Mango while we bobed around in the ocean waitin for another wave.  "You took evidence from a crime sceen and sniffer dogs gunna find where you put it and then they're gunna arrest you!"  Come to think of it, I had picked up a bunch of rubbish from around the boat, two stroke engine oil quarts and Malta India bottles.  "Yah but I didn't know it was a crime sceen."  "Sniffer dog doesn't care!  He's going to get you the instant you get out of the water!"  "Shit!" A couple hours later, arms turned to rubber, we got out of the ocean.  Sniffie didn't even take notice.  Crazy wife, always trying to get me in trouble!  The investigators were still combing the boat for evidence and sniffie and his men were out snif sampling the surrounding jungle.  Quite certain I would not actually be arrested if i fessed up about removing vital evidence from a crime sceen before they figured it out themselves i walked off in their direction.  Only as i started approching sniffie got a sent and they all headed the other direction.  Not wanting to make a sceen and break out into an all out run i followed at a moderate saunter.  Then they were around the corner and out of sight.  "Excuse me!"  I hollered, thinking it might be even wierder if i continued into the woods following them.  Rounding the bend, sniffie had found something... Sniffie had come across the secret rock i use for digging my poo holes and was giving it a very serious investigation.  Ahhh?...There, flashed before my eyes, i could see the future.  In a few steps sniffie was going to connect poo rock to me, unable to speak he'd yap to the gun toting investigators that i was poo rocks owner, confused, they would think I was the drug smuggler trying to sneek up on them and then right there i would be arrested and thrown in jail.  "F' me!" i thought "avoid approaching sniffie at all costs!" "Yes" came the reply to my holler.  "Ohh...um...hello...just wanted...ahhh...to let you...ahh...know...um...that well...ahh..yes...over there..."  "Sir, are you ok?"  (shit now they are suspicious)  Taking a few steps back, "I found some bottles near the boat, thought they might be important."  Just then sniffie leaves the rock, spins a 360....  "Nah, but thanks."  The gun toters replied.  And then you wouldn't believe it, sniffie locks onto my secret poo spot trail and pulls the men off with him.  "K, see ya", i casually turn take a few steps and then book it. The End... Turns out the boat was indeed a smuggling boat, but not for drugs like we had initally thought sniffie was after, but people.  We were later told by locals that sometime up to one hundred Hatians (i think that may had been an exaduration) will cram into boats like the one we'd sceen in an attempt to cross from the Dom. Republic to Puerto Rico.  We were also told that suposidly if they make it they can simply present themselves to border patroll and they are granted refugee status, though this by no means explains why sniffie and his men would have been hunting them down.  Humm... Love Mantis and Mango

Gun man

> --'CRACK!' A deafening shock wave shatters the still afternoon silence. Instantly we are both face down in the sharp thigh high grass. "What the fuck was that? Holly shit that guy leaning out the window right there just fired his riffle! Lets get the f out of here!" Army crawling we sneak back into the thick wall of jungle from which we've just emerged, snap to our feet and book it. Not that there is any need as the jungle is so thick there is no way the gun man would have any bloody idea where we've gone but the adrenaline is pumping so run we do. Back through the spiky vines, past the thorny trees and over the rust barbed wire Rachael previously cut herself on, to the edge of the ravine we'd just scaled and where I'd said," good thing we arnt gunna have to decend this thing, might be impossible!" --

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> On our 22nd day in paradise it happened, (no the swell didn't die), i rolled out of bed, my sholders sounding like unoiled wwll tank treads, and feeling the same way, i declaired," TODAY WE ARE RESTING!" With no voiced opposition the declaration was ratified and we promptly fell right back to sleep. Yes!

> Only after some food and caffeen, what were we to do? I was totally fine with a rest day from surfing but not a rest day from adventure! Every idea we came up with had to be shot down simply because they all involved driving, and getting in the car on a rest day just seemed wrong. Hum?... That didn't leave many options, snorkeling or walking and there was to much swell for snorkeling so all we had left was walking. We'd already walked west...we'd already walked east...we wernt walking north unless Mosis showed up but we hadn't walked south. And, well, that was for the obvious reason as south of us there was one small road to cross and then untamed jungle, and from the looks of it about half mile or so back the jungle went vertical, up an imposing band of cliffs which were topped with a string of million dollar mansions.

> "Rachael, grab your flipflops, we're going south; in hindsight I'm not sure why we did not bother to consider trading our flipflops for some real foot wear, maybe simply because we hadn't unpacked them yet, but we didn't.

> "Ha, this is going to be easy, look I've already found us a track!"

> "Some track huzzie, more like a dump!"

> "What's that? Oh, yah, a fridge with its shell torn off leaving exposed yellow foam insulation. Eww, a decomposing trash bag filled with baby dipers! Yuck!" Microwave, printer, bags of leaves, an old phone, tv used for target practice, cans, the springs of an incenerated bed.

> "I'm sure glad we didn't go to the waterfall, or the caves, or the worlds largest radio telescope, or snorkeling, or god forbid layed on the beach and read our books!"

> Lucky for me the trash heap dried up and our surroundings began to resemble real jungle, complete with everything a proper jungle should have, including a seemingly outrageous number of vines, of the large, small, thick, skinny, prickley, spikey, and stingy variety. We wern't simply walking, more like someone from one of those Matt Damon heist films thats released dryice smoke so that they can see all the red lazer beams they have to contort themselves around to succesfilly snatch the jewles. Over, under, around, through, snag, ouch, wait for rescue,as people with long hair seem to get caught more often then those with shorter hair.

> Lookie, lookie here. Another path, or do i mean...road. Hum, that is odd, seemingly growing from nowhere we are on PR widest and smoothest, doubble yellow lined freeway. Keep right wouldnt want to encounter any oncomming traphic. Not much debate, its a lot easier then tromping in the jungle so we follow. How bizare, it goes for a few hundred meters and then ends as abruptly as it began, only it dumps us into a field of chest high jungle grass. Seems like the road was part of some development that never got off the 'vine' and our field is clear cut jungle housing plots that never got built on.

> The grass is alarming to walk on, its substructure is so intertwined that it can support our weight and gives the sensation of walking on a squishy cloud except that you never really know when there might be a cloud void and sometimes your legs just disapear. 'So glad we're not wearing shoes!'

> Wild bananas and papayas, yum yum! Now a meir hundred feet from where the jungle goes vertical and then with out warning the cloud density begins to exponentially decrease with proximity to the cliff. All four legs vanish and the only thing keeping us from dropping right through is our crotches, 'i knew my huge crotch would prove useful one of these days!' We've discovered where they piled the clearcut jungle, directly underfoot. Parting the grasses and peiring down we can see voids large enough for genuine Hudenie disapearing acts, zouzers! On all fours the going is much easier.

> Now for the up and up, beer cans and cement blocks are testimate to the explorers who have braved this nasty ravine before us. OUCH! Flipflops provide little protection from the tangle of rusty barbed wire Rachael has just discovered.

> Slip, skid, grab, pull, slide, crouch, duck, yank, bob, wieve, tumble, horizontal, we made it, no rock climbing moves necessary, that wasnt so bad. There is daylight beaming through the dense jungle just ahead.

> Miraculously we managed to pop out in one of the empty fields surrounded by ceo second homes, how lucky, the view is spectular, the going is easy, none of the homes even appear occupied, we have got full run of the place. Over, under, around and through barbed wire fences, past an old PR man tending his crops who looks up long enough to say 'buena', and past another young man calling his cows to change fields. Back on some side streets we clock up 5.37 miles, of course i brought a gps, haha, before we bump into our surf buddy who offers us a ride home, we graciously accept, thanks Edwin.

> Bakery time!

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> Later over lunch upon discribing where we'd just ventured our waitress exclaimed," i know just where you were, i live right by there, you are lucky that guy wasnt home, he has threatned trespassers in the past, nasty man!"

> So where does the alledged gun man sceen come into play you ask? Haha, actually it doesn't...that was a bit of parallel universe hypothetical extrapolation bullshit! But if you read this far then the gun man scene served its purpose, make a surf bums life sound a bit more thrilling.

> Love Mantis and Mango

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Chickens

Strange Handwriting

Sales pitch

Sales pitch! Want a tan? Wana swim? Want to relax? Want to surf? Eant a different culture thats not to different? Want the jungle? Want to explore caves? Want good food? Want to try out your spanish? Want amazing bakery cheese pasteries? Want to be salty? Want the heatt? Want the sun? Want your spanish hair to go blonde? Want to waide waist deep in a protected cove drinking a beer while watching the surfers? Want to listen. To salsa? Want to stay ten feet from the ocean? Wamt to make it come true? Then get your ass to Puerto rico! It's close.  It's cheep tp get here.  Three twenty bucks from Boston. No u cant stay with us but there are empty aptz in the same complex. Plus we know others near by. Dont live vicariously through us. Come live vicariously through yourself. Call in sick for a week. We are here until march thirty. Everyday is 82 and sunny. Everyday the waves are great. Our place even vame with a huge deep fryer. What the hell are you waiting for. Get your ass down here and we will cook you up some mofongo.
Love mantis and mango.

Dia numero uno

Electric hot water off. Furnace down to fourty f. Lock front door. Zurfboards under aems. Walk downtown. Shiver in our sandles and summer atire. Hop on bus. Boston. Smile real big. Check surfboards for free. Tortous night flivht. Smooth landing. Puertoricans cheer and clap. Charlie var rental. UnlOck front door. YES. Sleep to sound of pounding surf. Wake at two pm. Hot hot hot. Fifty spf everywhere. Doubble overhead. Nervious. One goes surfing. One uses better judgement. Turtles. Reaf. Sun. Heat. Spanish. Waves. Waves. Big waves. Safe on shore. Stock shelves. Tacos. Rum. Read. Sleep
Sorry bout spelling. Typing on a smart phone is a b.
Love mantis and mango