Last night, at Happy Hour, I was asking people who had moved around on the coast, about RV Parks they had stayed in and would recommend. A surprising (to me, at least) fact emerged. American RV'ers have essentially stopped coming to Mexico. Things are slow right now, but I attributed it to it being early in the season. Apparently this park used to be almost all American RV'ers, where as now, they are the exception; the large majority are Canadian. A woman who had been down to Acapulco last year said that while they were able to find the physical location of RV Parks mentioned in Church's "Traveler's Guide To Mexican Camping", many were abandoned. As an example, a popular park in Acapulco with 300 sites had 20 rigs. Consensus on the causes were the recession of 2008 (which had much more of an impact in the US than in Canada) and the War on Drugs. While there was violence in some areas, the US government convinced their population that Mexico itself was unsafe for travel. Couple this with the US requirement for a passport to get back into the US (only 20% of Americans hold passports) and the reluctance of Americans to enter Mexico sans firearms, and the net result is the death of many, many RV Parks.
Nancy and I drove about Rincon, looking for the 8 RV Parks mentioned in Church' camping book. Again, it being early in the season, it was hard to tell if parks were closed or just not yet open. There was only one park we would stay in, and only if you wanted to be part of the busy Rincon beach scene. (See following pictures) We are very happy with La Penita RV Park, out of town, natural vegetation, views, and space to move about.
La Penita dock area
We continued our ride south of Rincon, to Los Ayala, to explore. On the road around the point, we got a look back at the busy beach of Rincon De Guayabitos.
This afternoon I was invited to go down to the free Spay & Neuter Vet Clinic in Guaybitos. I went with Marion who has been volunteering for many years. It takes place in the home of an american millionaire so the place is large and has amazing grounds, etc. It was extremely busy, this being the third day of 4 days for a total of 199 animals so far. Many belong to Mexicans who don't own car's so volunteers pick up and drop off the animals again. There were several dogs and cats for adoption including a cat with an amputation. Let's just say I barely got out of there without more animals. There were more than enough volunteers (including 4 Canadian vets) so we did not end up working. I did however make a decent donation, the money goes towards the medication. There will be another clinic in March.
Volunteers load animals to return them to their Mexican homes
Also discovered an avocado tree dropping avocados near the beach today.
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