The little castaway Iza who captured the hearts of thousands

Iza and Eileen

This is a love story, about a helpless little creature who began life with the odds stacked against her, and has not just once, but twice defied fate and survived.

When islanders first became aware of her plight, it was as one of the four raft puppies found in November 2016 by a group of island fishermen. Discovered floating miles from land south-east of Isla Mujeres, the fishermen are convinced the raft originated from Cuba. 

 

When the men noticed the large raft drifting aimlessly on the Caribbean Sea, they could see something on board but couldn’t quite make out the shape of the thing. They decided to investigate as they were concerned there might be unconscious, dehydrated Cuban refugees on board. What they found was a scrawny dog.

Mama Chica - November

Pulling their boat alongside, they lifted the dog from the raft, and then, as almost an afterthought, inspected a pile of rags heaped on the makeshift boat. Hiding from the sun’s blistering heat were four badly dehydrated and sunburnt puppies, two males and two females. 

The men named the bone-thin mother Mama Chica and took the entire family to their fishing co-operative on Isla Mujeres.

One of the puppies - November

One of the fishermen knew Eileen and Doug Regn, caring islanders involved with HALO (Helping Animals Living Overseas), an animal rescue organization. The man gave Mama Chica to Eileen to nurse back to health. Once Eileen saw the condition of the mother, she went to the co-op to investigate the health of the puppies. After a lengthy discussion in a mish-mash of English and Spanish, the fishermen agreed to give her all of the animals.

Getting a bath and some loving - November

Mama Chica and her babies were taken to the HALO-funded Clinica Veterinaria de Isla Mujeres, where Dr. Delfino Guevara and soon-to-be-certified DVM Rossely Gonzalez gave them extensive checkups. Then it took several months to get the little family healthy. Eileen had to be careful how much medication she gave the fragile creatures. Besides dehydration, starvation, ticks, fleas, and sunburnt skin, they were infested with worms in intestinal colonies so huge the masses looked like baseballs when the dogs expelled the parasites.

Recent photo Dory - Lisa W. 

As a nod to their seagoing adventure, the babies were given “sea names” of Nemo, Sebastian, Dory, and Ariel. When their health improved, the babies and their mama were adopted by new families. Dory went to Washington State, Nemo, Sebastian went to Minnesota, Mama Chica went to Cape Cod, and the last one, Ariel, now re-named Iza, was scheduled to go to her new home in Denver.

And then life threw the little girl another fastball, knocking her down yet again.

Her adoptive family, Jason and Kelly Cooke, plus their two boys, wanted to get to know her a little before she made the transition to her new country, new home, and new people. 

The night before departure, they attempted to take her for a walk in the area of Isla 33 condos. She panicked, slipped out of her harness, and frantically raced away.

Devastated, the Cooke family searched the neighbourhood, then called Eileen and Doug, who joined the search. Heavy-hearted, they flew back to Denver the next day, without their newest family member.

Reward poster for Iza 

In the meantime, Eileen went into battle mode. She offered a reward for the dog, plastering advertisements and photos around the island. She posted the information on every possible Facebook group. She investigated over thirty sightings of similar dogs seen at diverse locations on the island. 

All similar in appearance, just not the right dog, not Iza. 

The family in Denver contacted her frequently, asking for news, offering moral support.

 Baby Ariel/Iza in November

As the weeks wore on, Eileen persisted in her hunt for the puppy. “It’s an island, for heaven’s sake. She has to be somewhere on Isla Mujeres.”

Then, recently, late one afternoon, Monica MacPherson happened to be driving to her vacation home at the southern end of the island. She messaged Eileen that she had seen a similar dog near the Aguakan wastewater treatment plant on the eastern side of the island. Eileen waited until dusk and went to investigate.

A brown dog shot past, running flat out, then ducking back under the thick undergrowth. Eileen showed her poster to the older man, who is the live-in security for a property near the Aguakan plant.

“Si,” He agreed, demonstrating with his fingers that the dog’s ears often stood up tall, like those of a deer.

Security man who helped Iza 

Eileen nodded enthusiastically, “Yes, yes. Iza.” Using her hands to mimic Iza’s large ears. In the past few weeks, the man had left the dog a bit of food, so he was certain it was her.

Eileen returned carrying Iza’s dog dish, her favourite foods, and a blanket that smelled like her litter mates. Eileen also brought along two of her own dogs that Iza was comfortable with, letting them pee in various areas so that the little dog could catch their scent.

One evening, she sighted the dog and called her. The dog stopped, looked back, and then ran. Another evening, Daniel, an employee at the Aguakan station, managed to snap a couple of photos with his phone. Yes, it was definitely Iza.

Brother Nemo

Determined that she was going to entice the dog to come to her, Eileen dressed in thick jeans, a long-sleeved shirt as protection against nighttime invasion of mosquitoes. She wouldn’t use insect repellent, worried that Iza wouldn’t be able to catch her scent. She rubbed cooked chicken on her hands and set a food dish beside the gate of Aguakan. In the corner of her eye, she noticed a dark shape crawling on her stomach towards the front of the golf cart.

“Iza,” Eileen called softly, and the dog launched herself into Eileen’s arms, crying and whimpering. Iza squirmed and spun ecstatically. It was a struggle for Eileen to hold the dog. She managed to get a lead around Iza’s neck and set off home with the relieved pooch excitedly snuggling in her lap as she drove.

Brother Sebastian

It had been a long six weeks for Eileen and Iza since the pooch had panicked and run, a very long and stressful six weeks. At the house, Iza barged into the yard, charging through the gate to greet her housemates, Eileen and Doug’s collection of rescue dogs, all with their own interesting life stories. 

Iza is a kisser. She kissed every dog and the two humans many times to express her gratitude and happiness.

You would think that this would be the end of Iza’s story, but there are more and hopefully happier adventures ahead for her. Her adoptive family, Jason and Kelly Cooke, are overjoyed that she has been found. It will be a few months before Iza can fly to Denver, but her new family is eagerly waiting for her arrival.

And as for Eileen, she says it is heart-wrenching to let any of the rescue dogs go.

Saying goodbye to Mama Chica 

When she took Iza’s mom, Mama Chica, to the airport, their protracted goodbye in the cargo area had all the staff in tears. Mama Chica wrapped her paws around Eileen’s neck, hugging her close. 

Eileen said the dog was making a humming sound that jolted her heart with sadness. “I just can’t keep every dog we help. There is a seemingly endless number of pooches who need our assistance and love.”

Eileen’s eyes were bright with tears, her voice thick with emotion. “Iza will be well-loved by her new forever-family. I have to let her go on to her next adventure.”

It’s a true love story.

Hasta Luego 

Lynda, Lawrie, Sparky, and Max

Isla Mujeres Mystery series

We hit a blog milestone this week!

Notes from Paradise 500,000 page views!   

Thanks to all our faithful readers, we hit a half-million page views on our blog this week!  Woohoo! 

It is amazing how a weekly email that we started sending to twelve people in 2009 has grown to a weekly blog with anywhere from four to eight thousand readers a week. (Some articles interest people more than others.)

June 2009, we started writing weekly emails

When we started in June of 2009, it was to keep family members up to date on our newest adventure, our life in Mexico. The email list grew as family members asked if they could add their friends, and then those people wanted to add their friends. By September of 2011, the email list had grown to 500 names.

When our neighbour started her blog, Isla Mujeres News, a translation of local news in June of 2011, she suggested that we switch over from a weekly email to a blog. 

July 2014 Sunset cool down for islanders

So we did, we created a blog page.  However, many of our readers objected, saying they didn’t want to search the internet to find the articles. They enjoyed having a personal copy sent to their inbox. From September 2011 to June 2014, we posted the weekly blog and also sent it via email to our readers. It was a lot more work, but it kept everyone happy and interested.

Then in 2014, Google labelled our emails as that dreaded word – spam.  They shut down our list, refusing to deliver the weekly articles to our readers. By our estimation, we had sent out around seventy-five thousand individual emails over the five years, but never to anyone who hadn’t asked to be included in the list.  

Great Horned Owl who rode in ambulance

In the meantime, we also created two more blogs targeted to specific stories that interested us: European Adventure and Animals and Other Family Members. As you can probably guess by the titles, these are not Isla Mujeres-based stories, one being about our travels in Europe and the other funny stories about pets and wild creatures we have befriended. 

About eighteen months ago, Tony Richardson, editor of the popular online Mexico News Daily, started re-posting our blog articles. 

In his publication, our stories are reaching a wider audience, some having been shared thousands of times. Pretty heady stuff for two amateur scribblers. 

Insider's Guide to the Best of Mexico - FREE!

Several of our articles have been included in two online anthologies: Insider’s Guide to The Best of Mexico and the second Insider’s Guide. 

The collection of feel-good stories about Mexico is the brain-child of well-known novelist Carmen Amato. Check her Amazon page for a complete listing of her works. Our current favourites are the police procedurals featuring Detective Emilia Cruz in Acapulco. 

July 2014, Diego and I toasting arrival of books

In between the weekly blog articles, island friend Diego Medina and I created a bilingual book for children, The Adventures of Thomas the Cat / Las Aventuras de Tomas el Gato. Diego and I won a silver award at the International Latino Book Awards in Los Angeles for best bilingual picture book. The sequel is underway. The Adventures of Thomas the Cat

But wait, there’s more!  In 2016, I wrote and self-published my first novel, Treasure Isla. Treasure Isla is a fun beach read, an adventure set on Isla Mujeres. The e-book sales on Amazon are doing well, prompting me to write the sequel, Trouble Isla. Trouble Isla will be launched in late August of this year.

Treasure Isla and soon Trouble Isla

All of this creativity started with a weekly email to a few friends and family members. We have discovered we like to paint pictures with words. 

Most of all, we like to entertain people and provide a bit of information mixed in with light humor. 

Thank you all again for your interest in our offbeat stories. 

Cheers 

Lynda, Lawrie, and Sparky

Isla Mujeres Mystery series

An Indiana-Jones-trip to the cenotes and pyramids of the Yucatan

Las Tres Chicas, swimming in a cenote

Swimming in a cenote is similar to starring in an Indiana Jones movie. Slippery stone stairs lead to a dark cavern filled with crystal clear water.

The Tarzan-style vines, the roots of above-ground plants, hang from the ceiling of the cavern. The slow drip of minerals forms stalactites, their whimsical shapes reaching for the water below. An occasional bat flitters past in the dim light. Dozens of swallows nest in the underground crevices, zipping underground via a hole in the earth above. Exquisite and eerie.

Ek Balam pyramid and surrounding structures

Last week, I posted a question on my Facebook page, asking for recommendations for a tour company for a day trip to the Ek Balam pyramid and a swim in the cenotes. The response was immediate and varied. Many recommended either William Gonzalez or Patricio Astudillo. 

We dithered, but in the end, we went with William because a number of our close friends had taken his tours and really enjoyed the experience. In years past, when we owned a car, we frequently drove our visitors to the pyramids. Currently, our only form of transport is a golf cart, and that just isn’t fast enough, nor legal, for a two-hour drive on a four-lane highway. Two great-nieces, Lauren, Ellen, plus their good friend Amber, who has become a great-niece via friendship, and I decided to go. We left Lawrie and Sparky at home to enjoy some peaceful guy time.

Heading out on our adventure

We caught the seven-thirty UltraMar passenger boat from Isla Mujeres to Puerto Juarez on the mainland, and met up with Manuel, who was our tour guide for the day. Settled into a comfortable seven-passenger van, we headed towards Valladolid and the less busy pyramid of Ek Balam. Lawrie and I have enjoyed several visits to the large pyramid of Chichen Itza, but it has become so crowded that it is difficult to get good photographs without including several hundred strangers grinning inanely at their selfie sticks.

Ek Balam, the Black Jaguar, is located thirty-five kilometers north-east of Chichen Itza, in the municipality of Temozón. The road turns off the toll highway #180, a few kilometers from the City of Valladolid, in the direction of Tizimin. Tizimin is well-known for handmade tropical wood furniture.  

Royal Palace at Ek Balam 106 steps up

The road between Cancun and Valladolid is straight, boring, and the flat vista is blocked by thick undergrowth. The secondary road is more interesting but populated by hundreds of topes, speed bumps, in the numerous villages, increasing the drive to three hours instead of two. It’s a good time to let someone else do the driving, so you can doze in the warm sunlight or chat with your travel companions.

By ten in the morning, we were at the pyramid. The entrance fee is 193.00 pesos for foreigners, but lucky me, I have an INAPAM card telling the world that I am old and a local. My entrance fee was 0 pesos. You do have to produce proof of residency, such as an electrical bill or water bill in your own name, and proof of age, to obtain this Mexico senior’s card from your municipality. For Lawrie and me, the savings are helpful. 

Inside Ek Balam, we hired a local guide to show us around. José was born in a nearby village, and his first language is Mayan, but he also speaks Spanish and English. 

  

Jose taking pics of my travel partners 

Our guide was well-informed and interesting, telling us the history of each structure and the meaning of the various glyphs. 

I envied the ease with which José climbed the one hundred and six stairs to the top of the Royal Palace, and then nonchalantly strolled back to ground level while everyone else baby-stepped their way down the steep pyramid. 

It’s a combination of vertigo and the insecurity of flip-flops on narrow, slanted steps that makes the descent more challenging.   

  

The tourist photo!

Next stop was the Samula and the nearby X’kekén cenotes in the town of Dzitnup. The cenotes are part of an underground river system that flows under the limestone base of the Yucatan Peninsula. Over time, bits of the ground above have been worn away by rainstorms, animals, or humans, creating entrance holes to the subterranean fantasy world.

In the aquamarine water, small black fish laze; a type of catfish, perhaps? Others nibble at our feet. They remind me of the fish imported from Turkey, used for pedicures in some of the upscale Cancun hotels. Hopefully, no one would be foolish enough to populate the pristine Caribbean waters with another imported species of fish, creating a local ecological problem like the venomous Indo-Pacific lionfish. 

Doctorfish doing pedi

The little fish didn’t bite, but it was an odd feeling to have so many small mouths scouring my skin.

As for the cenotes, the entrance fee for each one is 59.00 pesos for visitors, and half of that for people with an INAPAM card. 

Some locations sell a two-day pass that covers all of the locations, but for us, two in one afternoon was sufficient. We spent about an hour and a half lazing around in the water before meeting up with our driver, Manuel.

Restaurante el Atrio del Mayab

By now it was one in the afternoon, and we were starving. Manuel suggested that we have lunch in Valladolid at the Restaurante el Atrio del Mayab. Wow!  

Beautiful setting right off the square in centro, near the cathedral, and diagonally across from one of our favourite hotels in Valladolid, the El Mesón del Marqués. The food was delicious, the cerveza cold, and the service excellent.

On the drive home, our group was strangely quiet as our heads lolled against the vehicle windows. Full of good food and feeling sleepy, we hardly talked until we were at the UltraMar terminal, headed back to Isla Mujeres.

Hasta Luego, Lynda

Isla Mujeres Mystery series

Murder and mayhem. Revenge and romance. 

Grab your copy today! 

A little help for our furry friends!

Sparky at Clinica Veterinaria de Isla Mujeres

Pets occasionally need a visit to a doctor, or as Thomas the Cat would say, the cat-doctor. 

Sparky, our almost-famous, island low-rider, recently needed a few tests to diagnose his health issues. We took him to Clinica Veterinaria de Isla Mujeres, where Delfino Guevara, DVM, and soon-to-be-certified DVM Rossely Gonzalez expertly performed a chest x-ray and blood tests. The last time Sparky needed tests, we battled with a car ferry ride to Cancun and back. Staying on the island for his tests was much less stressful for everyone.

Sparky about to be X-rayed.  What do I do now?

For analysis of blood samples, Clinica Veterinaria currently uses a laboratory in Centro. There is a fundraising campaign for a blood chemistry analyzer that will obtain results quickly and cheaply for the clinic. Part of the fundraiser includes the memory tile project, displayed on the entrance wall of the hospital. It is one of those things that we have passed time and again, briefly glanced at, but not really noticed.

  

Artist, Julie Goth, Thomas the Cat's tile

The project was started by well-known islanders, Tony and Mim Gallagher, as a means to raise a little extra money for the animal hospital. 

They kicked off the program by generously purchasing six hand-painted tiles with the names of their grandchildren. The kids get a giggle out of stopping at the clinic to check on their tiles every time they visit the island. 

Julie Goth and Déanne Gray

It wasn’t until recently, when two of our nearby neighbours and close friends, Julie Goth and Déanne Gray, became involved with the project, that we really paid attention. Julie Goth created a beautiful image for our mutual friends, Chuck and Marcy Watt, in celebration of their Isla fur-baby, Sombra. Déanne Gray, on the other hand, actively promotes the fundraiser, organizing the placement of the tiles and collecting the money. To order a memory tile, please private message Déanne Gray (Day) on Facebook.

Bonnie Hamilton, Eileen Regn help the animals

If you are on the island, you can either pay at the clinic or arrange to pay Julie Goth, Eileen Regn, or Déanne Gray, or pay online through Helping Animals Living Overseas (HALO). The minimum donation is 750 pesos or $50 USD, and goes to helping island animals.

Please remember to add a note that your donation is for a memory tile, and include photos and personal details of the person or pet you wish to honor. www.helpinganimalslivingoverseas.org/donate

Cover illustration by Diego Medina

We recently purchased two: one for our seventeen-year-old Thomas the Cat, who succumbed to kidney disease last April, and the other for Princess Chica, another true-life character featured in my children’s book, The Adventures of Thomas the Cat. 

Chica passed away in 2014. Her tile will be mounted on the wall adjacent to her best friend, Thomas. 

Princess Chica and her best friend Thomas

And in case you didn’t know, both Day Gray and full-time islander Bonnie Hamilton are the legendary cat-trap-ladies. Every week, they voluntarily trap feral cats to be spayed or neutered at the clinic. Day has extended an open invitation for us to share the experience. However, she has mentioned on occasion that her clothes are quite odoriferous by the end of the evening’s festivities, giving us a reason to be otherwise occupied.

Delfino and Rossely, blood tests for Sparky

Funded by HALO (Helping Animals Living Overseas), Clinica Veterinaria’s current location is across the street from the original clinic. The new structure was purpose-built about three years ago to house the animal hospital, pet adoption centre, and cat sanctuary. We asked one of the founder members of HALO, Kit Lilly, for background information. Her answer was so detailed and well-written, we decided to include it, as is, in this blog post.

~

The new clinic before signage and murals

From Kit Lilly:

“HALO (Helping Animals Living Overseas) was formed in October 2013 as a US 501c3. HALO’s mission is to support select projects outside of the US that benefit animals. The first project that HALO chose was the construction of the new animal hospital and adoption center in Isla Mujeres. In addition to the new building, the project added a small adoption area at the front of the building, a cat sanctuary on the land behind the clinic, and equipment such as stainless steel cages for hospitalized animals and an X-ray machine. The project included providing ongoing operating support to help offset losses generated by the fact that much of the clinic's caseload is caring for homeless animals. The clinic rates are below market rates for vet services.  The rates are intentionally set this way because many of the island families cannot afford market-rate care for their animals, and the clinic did not want animals to go without care. 

The clinic entrance, today.

All of the initial founders of HALO had been to Isla Mujeres (several of us are property owners, and all are repeat visitors) and admired the work of Clinica Chipie and its staff.  

The founders wanted to be able to help improve the clinic facilities, provide a safe space for the “clinic cats”, and have a space to feature adoptable pets.  

Mural by Barbara Siebenlist

They recognized the clinic as a valuable resource for the island, both for the quality of its care and also because it is the only 24/7 emergency care for animals on the island. It was also recognized that because of the free and subsidized care provided by the clinic, ongoing outside operating support would be necessary. 

HALO was essentially formed concurrently with selecting this project as its first. After learning more about the mission of Clinica Chipie and examining its financial statements, it became clear that Clinica Chipie was in all forms except legally a non-profit. We suggested that Delfino consider converting his existing business from a traditional Mexican corporation to an Association Civil, a Mexican nonprofit. He applied to the government to convert it and was successful. 

Thomas the Cat, illustration Diego Medina

HALO raised funds for the construction of the new clinic building, and it was completed in the fall of 2014. HALO continues to provide operating support and hopes to fund the purchase of a blood chemistry analyzer to facilitate diagnosis later this year. HALO continues to raise funds for operating support.  The sale of the hand-painted tiles to honor a loved one (human or animal) is one way people can donate and enables them to have a physical connection to the island.”

~

Sombra sharing a hug with her best friend 

If you have a friend, family member, or beloved pet you would like to honor, you will be helping out the island cats and dogs, plus keeping alive the memory of a special person or pet.  

Or in the case of Tony and Mim Gallagher, giving the grandkids a giggle when they visit the clinic and can see their names on the wall.

Hasta luego, Lynda, Lawrie, and Sparky

Isla Mujeres Mystery series

Grab your copy today!