Final days in Mexico

I'm finally getting around to posting about the tail end of our honeymoon in Mexico. In my last post, I ended before writing about Xel-Ha the Cultural Water Park, a.k.a. Tourist trap. Here- we planned on spending the afternoon snorkeling. That lasted about 5 minutes. Between the confusing life jackets, suffocating face mask, and snorkel that caused me to gag, we abandoned all hope of enjoying this activity and instead spent our time wandering aimlessly around the crowded park just praying for the time for our departure to draw nearer. We got stuck walking behind an annoying hippie who wouldn't shut up about the Grotto at the Playboy mansion. Who knows why....

Lastly, we attempted to relax on the isle of hammocks, but I quickly learned that I have the balance of a drunken fisherman as the hammock not-so-kindly spilled me out. When we finally got on the bus, we ended up in horrendous traffic due to construction. While Brian dozed off, I watched all the locals walk in the dark on the side of the highway and construction workers labor in the dark with nothing more than some cones lit up with tiny bulbs on the inside. This would definitely not occur in the U.S.- OSHA would throw a fit.


On Friday, our last full day, we spent the somewhat overcast day lounging around, but in the evening, a hotel shuttle took us into the fishing town of Puerto Morales where we ate dinner at a real Mexican restaurant and shopped for gifts. We ate at a place called Posada Amor and I had this yummy chicken enchilada thingy and Brian had chicken fajitas. When the waitress brought out our chips and salsa, we dug into the pico (Mexican salsa in this region is chunky and very unlike the saucy salsa that we get in Mexican restaurants here in the States). We wrongly assumed that the red chunks were tomatoes, when in fact they were extremely hot habanero peppers. Brian loved it and sweat with his meal.

Saturday morning we woke up and sadly began to pack. It was good to get home, but depressing to get on the plane and head to our layover in Chicago where the temperatures were in the 30s as opposed to the 80 degree weather we left hours earlier.

Over the next couple of weeks, we would ocassionaly catch a whiff of sunscreen from our laundered clothes and it was the most depressing feeling to know we were back in Tennessee, working the daily grind, and facing cold, wintery months ahead.

Mayan Riviera Honeymoon- Part 1

So I'm pretty depressed to be sitting in my unkempt house surrounded by gray clouds and cold weather after spending a whole week in beautiful, sunny Mexico. Brian and I traveled to a seaside town called Puerto Morelos (located just south of Cancun) where we stayed at the all-inclusive Excellence Riviera Cancun. Upon arrival, we were greeted with a glass of champagne and then led to our room where two towels shaped like swans surrounded by rose petals awaited us on our bed. The room was amazing- jacuzzi tub, marble floors, balcony looking out over the turquoise ocean.... but the hotel pools and grounds were really the crown jewel of this resort. A total of six meandering pools, along with botanical gardens served as our playground for the week.



We spent the first day recovering from our day of flying by lounging around the pool and beach. Food and drinks were gratis since we were at an all-inclusive, so there was a frozen umbrella drink in my hands at nearly all times. I especially liked a drink called the Miami Vice- it was a mixture of strawberry daquiri and pina colada. Tasted like heaven. Brian enjoyed them too as evidenced by the following photo:


Day Two consisted of more lounging in the sun followed by an afternoon of zip-lining, mountain biking, and cenote (cave filled with water) swimming. Zip-lining through the Mexican jungle was really exhilarating and at one point, a guide let me flip upside down and spun me around as I zipped from tree to tree. After the hour long zip-line tour, we hopped on mountain bikes and rode a mile over to a cenote where we were able to zip-line and then drop into a cave filled with water. If you look closely, you can see me in the photo below right before I drop into the water.


Once we mountain biked back, they served us a dinner of chicken, rice, and beans and then we went back to the hotel and cleaned up. Later that night, we ate at one of the six restaurants located at the resort. It was an Asian fusion restaurant called Spice and all meals ended with dessert. The packing on of the pounds begins.....

I'll write about the second part of my trip in my next post.