The Saga of Daniel and Larry

 

When I found out that there was a manatee sanctuary in Chetumal, about 30 minutes from where I was staying in Bacalar, I was understandably excited. It turns out that, even though I never made it to the sanctuary, the experience was better than I could have imagined. Let me explain.

My first day in Bacalar, I had a lot of back and neck pain so I got a massage. My massage therapist turned out to be a lovely Salvadorian woman who had lived in Mexico for the last ten years or so and we had a ton in common. We had so much fun chatting that we decide to get breakfast the next day. When I told her I wanted to go to Chetumal the following day to see the manatees, she offered to go with me.

Well. It turns out that the sanctuary was not for manatees. It was for MANATEE. One. Un solo manatí. More on that later. His name, the internet said, was Danny, and he may or may not come out to see you. For some reason, this was even better. A trip to a sanctuary with ONE manatee, and only a 50% chance of seeing him? Count me in. My new friend agreed.

We got a late start to Chetumal for a variety of reasons, including a partial taxi strike. The receptionist at my hotel told us that she had heard the manatee sanctuary was closed, and she was really sorry, but maybe it was still open? We decided to go anyway because now going to a manatee sanctuary that only had one manatee who may or may not show up, a sanctuary that now may or may not be closed… that’s a good adventure.

We took a taxi to the colectivo station (shared taxis) and a colectivo to Chetumal. The driver told us that the sanctuary was closed and he didn’t know why, but that sometimes you could see manatees near the malecón (a word I only knew in Spanish until just now when I looked it up - it means “esplanade”). Then we took another taxi to the malecón.

We casually asked if that taxi driver knew about the manatee sanctuary and WOW did he know about the manatee sanctuary. He confirmed that it was closed but launched into its history. There was one manatee, named Daniel. At this point, it struck me as funny that the manatee was named Daniel (apparently the internet was wrong) and I said so. He sighed deeply, in the way that frustrated parents or teachers do when a child interrupts them. He waited for me to finish and picked up where he was, without acknowledging my comment.

He said that Daniel had been found as an infant manatee, with his umbilical cord still attached and no sign of his mother. A marine biologist wanted to raise him and built the sanctuary for him. At this point my friend mumbled to me that it’s not a sanctuary if it only has one manatee and the taxi driver sighed again. We were doing all we could to not giggle because we were clearly being treated like annoying school kids.

 

The taxista continued with his story. Daniel was raised in the sanctuary and bonded with the scientist. However, when young manatees reach a certain age, they want to find other young manatees, if you know what I mean. So there was a problem because manatees are large and heavy and strong (although very gentle and lazy). I can’t remember if the females were trying to get into the sanctuary or if Daniel was trying to get out but they finally decided to put a chip in Daniel and set him free.

 

At this point I couldn’t help saying again, in delight, “Un manatí con el nombre de Daniel!” Because I was just so tickled that his name was Daniel. I think the taxista just sighed again. My friend said that he was thinking: "EXCUSE ME, I am TRYING to tell you a serious story, this is NOT a joke," but was too polite to do anything other than pause pointedly.

 

So Daniel is free and is possibly a father of little manatees (the taxista didn't know that for sure), and comes back from time to time, to say hi and get some snacks. There is no more sanctuary because there was only ONE manatee and you can't have a sanctuary without a single manatees. But we might be able to see some manatees around the malecón.

 

We said thanks and thought we were done when he said, "But you know about Larry, right?"

 

Larry?

 

Larry, el cocodrilo.

 

Amazing. Now there's Larry, the crocodile.

 

Again, the taxista was super serious and said that if we couldn't see manatees, we could see Larry the crocodile, he's right around the malecon, and he likes to come to the edge because people throw marquesitas* for him to eat. He waits for them with his big crocodile mouth open. At this point, we had arrived and we got out.

 

We saw two fishermen at the malecon, who were basically the Odd Couple of pescadores. One was short, round, and dark-skinned, and the other was tall, skinny, and blue-eyed. The first one was named Gaspar and he was very chatty; his friend never told us his name or talked much. We asked Gaspar if we could see manatees from the malecon and he said not at this time of day; the water was too warm. We asked about Larry and he said:

"Ya no existe Larry." (Larry's not around any more)

My friend didn't think I had heard and quickly shushed him because she didn't want me to be sad! (It was very sweet) But I had heard and asked for more details. Apparently Larry had died recently and, Gaspar said, it was because he had had his mouth open to catch a marquesita someone had thrown at him and a puffer fish entered his mouth right at the moment when he was closing his mouth and poisoned him.

We were a little heartbroken. We had *just* found out that Larry existed five minutes ago and now he was dead! My friend told the fishermen this and asked them not to play with our emotions.

Well, Gaspar told us, Larry isn't around but... his son is! And he pointed out where we could see Larry Junior! I asked about the mother of Larry Junior and he just shrugged and said there were no female crocodiles around, and was done with us.

Wondering how there could be a Larry Junior without a mother, we walked over to the spot that Gaspar had pointed out, where a nice young man who was selling sweets told us that it was NOT the spot, and pointed us further down the malecon.

THERE, we met the most interesting guy of the night. We met Don Jorge, a paletero (guy with a paleta cart) who told us that no, of course Larry didn't have a son. How ridiculous! Yes, Larry had died, but he didn't have a son. The new crocodile was his BROTHER. Of course.

Then he said that there had also been a female crocodile that was Larry's sister. THEN he said, well, you know, crocodiles don't commit incest. We kind of laughed and he said that crocodiles don't commit incest, just like most people, especially Christian people. HOWEVER, in FRANCE, they do. Did you know that in France, it doesn't matter if you're siblings or father and daughter, or what? It's all accepted, all sorts of incest. But not with crocodiles.

 

We were trying SO HARD at this point to keep straight faces because he was very serious and we actually did want to know more about Larry. We bought some paletas and asked him more. We asked where the female crocodile was and he said no, no one's really seen her. So maybe the whole story about the sister was to have a commentary on French people.

 

Anyway, he said that people had noticed that sometimes Larry brought the marquesitas to a little cave nearby where there was a smaller crocodile, his brother, and shared them. 

 

At this point my friend pointed out that it's pretty hard to know if a crocodile is related to another crocodile and he ignored her and kept going. He confirmed that Larry had died, probably from accidentally eating a puffer fish, and that he had gotten a Christian burial in the cemetary, with a parade and the entire town turning out to see the burial and bring flowers.

 

"Todo Chetumal hizo una fila para enterrar a Larry y poner flores a su tumba."

 

(All of Chetumal lined up to see Larry buried and to put flowers on his grave).

 

He assured us over and over that this was true. Then he tried to get us to accept Jesus Christ, even though we had both told him we were Christians, and my friend tried to politely get us out of the conversation about five times before we walked away.

 

We saw the amazing sunset on the edge of Mexico (border with Belize) and got in yet another taxi to go home. We asked this taxista about Larry's burial and he said of course Larry wasn't buried, some scientists took his body to study because there's still a lot we don't know about crocodiles and they wanted to know how he died. We never did find out.

 

Anyway, that is the saga of Daniel and Larry. We didn't get to actually see either animal but we sure had fun trying.

 

*marquesitas are an amazing snack that seem to only be on the Yucatan peninsula. They are like a cross between a crepe and a waffle cone... made like a crepe but rolled up and harden to be crunchy and taste like a waffle cone. The traditional filling is banana, cajeta (caramel from goat milk) and edam cheese of all things, but you can get it with a variety of fillings.