Adventures In The Sand

Nicole and I read an article about Punta Sal.  It sounded lovely and we decided we would take the girls.  The article said it was very easy to get there if you had your own vehicle.   I guess all articles do not tell the truth.  And, omit important details like needing four wheel drive.

Nicole had located a place with Dr Peppers so we stopped there first.  There was only one Dr Pepper left. 

We were following directions, seeing beautiful scenery, and having a great time.  Nicole even commented, "for a dirt road this is not bad at all."  One would think we would learn not to make these kinds of statements.  Even when the dirt road turned to sand, it was packed sand.  We were creeping along, laughing and talking, with the windows down.  I needed to take pictures, you know.

Then all of a sudden, we came upon some soft sand and we went no further.  I got out of the car to assess the situation.  Haley got out, too.  The right rear tire was completely buried in sand. 

I was wearing a skirt.  I got on my knees and begin to dig out with a teeny tiny sand toy, not much bigger than a serving spoon.  Haley got down beside me and started digging with her hands.  Unfortunately, or fortunately, as the case might be, Nicole did not capture this Kodak moment. 

Haley and I unburied the tire and Nicole was able to back up a little, but not enough to get us going forward again.  Some ladies had been watching us for a while.  After we got the tire unburied, they brought 2 boards and put them in right of the front tires.  They and I all pushed the car and we were out of the sand. 

We drove a few hundred yards and asked some men how far we had to go to get where we wanted  to be.  They said 15 minutes.  I have heard "15 minutes" in this country before.  Rarely, is it just 15 minutes.  They also said we would need four wheel drive.  And, then we would have to park and take a boat.

Nicole drove forward for about 2 minutes.  And, we saw another soft sand pit and beyond that more and more soft sand.  We turned around.  We got to the first soft sand, she drove real fast and we made it through.

We then found a place to park the car on some firmly packed sand and got out and played. 

It was not exactly what we started out to do, but we still had a great time this morning.