Selected, Inspected and Neglected

Estero Jaltepeque, El Salvador

Yesterday, Wednesday,  we got a bit of a surprise - a call, via VHF, from the manager of the resort to tell us that two gentlemen were here from immigration, eager to talk to us.  What, we wondered, could this possibly mean?

We launched the dinghy and motored quickly over to the marina, where we had a long meeting with the immigration officials, doing an "investigation" into our case.  After taking copious notes, they insisted that they had to see the boat and the alleged broken part, along with an invoice for its replacement.  As luck would have it, we were experiencing some unusually strong winds in the estuary at this moment.  Undaunted, I loaded them into our tiny dinghy for the wet and wild ride to Sine Timore (Susanne wisely stayed high and dry at the resort's bar).  These guys were extremely excited with the trip up the estuary and were constantly taking pictures and videos with their cameras - I don't think they knew such a great place existed in their country.

Once on the boat, they took pictures of the old water pump (fortunately I had not yet thrown it out) and the invoice for the new pump, then spent the rest of the time posing for pictures on the bowsprit.  All in all, they were very nice about the whole thing, but this whole affair is getting a little silly now.

After we made the return trip to the marina, they had us sign the lengthy forms they had been filling out, and took our pictures, with the boats in the marina as a backdrop.  They assured us that all of this is just normal procedure for a tourist visa extension and that we should be able to pick up our passports about 3 working days after they submit their paperwork tomorrow (on Thursday).  This would mean the earliest we will see our passports will be next Monday.  The resort manager has assured us that he will call them to make sure they are ready before we bother making the trip into the city.

As regards the weather, we have been experiencing some brisk mid-day winds here in the estuary for the last few days, just the edge of the infamous Papagayo winds that are blowing further south, over Lake Nicaragua, this time of year.  These winds are the next big challenge for us along this coast and right now, they seem to be blowing quite strong every day.

Maybe our being delayed here is not the worst thing that could be happening to us right now.