Moving Forward, Looking Back / Beach is no winter hallucination

It was a perfect day for a walk on the beach -- warm and sunny -- but then again, it's warm and sunny every day. The water sparkled under the sun. Beyond the sandbar where hundreds of gulls sunned themselves, a squadron of pelicans glided in elegant formation, their wing tips just inches above the water. In the distance a pod of dolphins swam along, showing their sleek bodies and dorsal fins as they broke through the surface and dipped under again. Nearby, an egret waited patiently at the edge of a tidepool for a fish to take a fatal wrong turn. A few shrimp boats set their nets on the horizon.

No, I wasn't hallucinating on Jennings Beach. What follows is a dispatch from Puerto Peñasco, Mexico, or Rocky Point, as it's also known in English. It's where Southwest desert-dwellers go to the beach.

Getting there is a little more involved than going to the beach in Fairfield, but there are advantages. It's a 200-mile trip from Tucson, but think of it as going to Cape Cod, only with Interstate 95 cleared for your personal use. Once you head west on Ajo Way, you will encounter only an occasional vehicle, even including the Border Patrol SUVs.

The scenery is a little different, too. It's hard to imagine a landscape more unlike New England. The immense expanse of desert is populated mainly by saguaro and cholla cactus, stubby mesquite and palo verde trees, and desert scrub. Near and far, the desert gives way to stark, craggy mountains that reinforce the sensation of being in a huge, remote area. The desert palette seems drab to newcomers, but its subtlety soon grows on you. This year, there were dabs of green ground cover thanks to recent winter rains, hinting that the spring blooming of cacti and wildflowers will be above average.

After a stop in Why, Ariz., (population 100) for some gas and a terrific red chile burrito, the road turns south through Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument to the border (a no-stress crossing, but bring your passport or you won't be allowed back to the U.S.). It's an hour more to Puerto Peñasco on the northern coast of the Sea of Cortez through the most arid terrain in North America. In these parts, four inches of rain in a year is a lot.

Although Spanish missionaries were in the region by the late 1600s, Puerto Peñasco was nothing more than a remote camping ground for itinerant fisherman until the 1920s, when an enterprising Arizonan named John Stone dug a well, built a hotel, and set up flights from Arizona for Americans to drink and gamble legally. No less a personage than Al Capone is said to have made a visit. The irascible Stone ultimately left town in a huff, but not before he burned down the hotel and blew up the well. But Puerto Peñasco lived on as a center of commercial fishing. Adventurous Americans started building homes here in the 1960s. Recent efforts to further develop tourism were stalled by the economic downturn in the U.S., but the dream lives on.

Puerto Peñasco is no Provincetown, and it's no Puerto Vallarta. There's little that's "charming" about it, at least in the conventional sense, and any "resort" vibe is in the background. Despite recent improvements, it's shabby and dusty, and many of the streets are still unpaved and unmarked. There is visible poverty among its 60,000 inhabitants. The architecture is largely utilitarian, with only tantalizing hints of Mexican style. Don't bother looking for a Starbucks. But in addition to the delightful winter weather, it's colorful, inordinately friendly and fully functional. Meat and produce rivals, and often exceeds, U.S. standards. The humbly-appointed restaurants (no cloth napkins, ever) offer amazing food adventures. And of course, there's the beach -- miles of it, superior to any on Long Island Sound.

In January, the Sea of Cortez is a little too cold for my taste, but some people will swim or take out kayaks. Puerto Peñasco's beaches face almost due south, so the sun traces an unobstructed daily arc from east to west. From the same spot, you can take in beautiful sunrises and sunsets over the water. The low level of ambient light allows for spectacular night skies.

The shoreline never ceases to fascinate. Over 200 species of birds live here or pass through, as well as the aforementioned dolphins, occasional sea lions, and rare whales. At low tide, coquina (compacted shells) reefs and tide pools are exposed for exploration, as are smooth expanses of sandbars perfect for beach bocci.

We're working on our Spanish, and moving to the daily rhythm of Mexican life. Yes, there are parts of Mexico that are dangerous, but this is not one of them. We have never felt unsafe here. There are minor inconveniences, but there's always mañana to tackle them.

Ron Blumenfeld is a Fairfield writer and retired pediatrician. His "Moving Forward, Looking Back" appears every other Wednesday. He can be reached at: rblumen2@gmail.com