ALL INCLUSIVE!!

Oh yeah - Jeff and I lived it up Spring Break 2009 style for our last few nights in Latin America.  We stayed at an All Inclusive resort in Cancun and had a great time (even though we're not the best at taking advantage of all of the all inclusiveness - we tried!).  It was still great and a nice way to finish off the first leg of our trip. 

 

Way too many lizards in Cancun - and I'm not talking small ones - I'm talking 3 foot long big boys who just sit there on the sidewalk while you walk.  When you finally see them at 10 feet away and squeal like a scared piggy (not that I did the, but I did) they just slither on under the sidewalk so now you can't even see them but you know they are there.  Creepy!!  None on the resort, thank goodness.

 

After those two fantastic days we flew to Florida and are helping Jeff's friends Jake and Karin get ready for their wedding tomorrow.  First things first - we went to Chipoodles last night right after getting in and yes - it is still the most glorious of burritos.  Don't say "how can you say that when you were just in Mexico having authentic food" because it's different.  Chipoodles isn't about Mexican food.  Chipoodles is about the yumminess that is Chipoo-poo.  Plain and deliciously simple. 

 

I heart America and am glad to be back but also excited about our next adventure to South America.  First, however, we must visit with some friends in Florida and then part ways - Me to Arizona&Vegas and Jeff to Puerto Rico.  After that we'll meet up in Peru and start again.  Wish me luck in Vegas - I'm not exactly the stay out late type.

Cenote of SACRIFICE!!

We´re still in Merida and took a trip yesterday to the nearby Chichen Itza! The most visited Mayan ruins in Central America. And yes, there were thousands of people there - blah. Lots of hippies too because this is the Equinox time which is when the shadow on the main temple creates the body portion of the snake which connects to the head at the foot of the stairs. Very interesting. Actually it was neat looking but not worth all the clapping and rushing forward the New Age people kept doing - it´s just a nifty shadow.

But the site itself was amazing. It´s a younger site than the others we´ve visited like Tikal and Copan so the carvings are still preserved and we could actually make out a lot of them. They are big on skulls here - walls upon walls of them. They also have the Cenote of Sacrifice! AH!!! It´s a cenote (not one I would swim in like the last time) where they dredged it and found a bunch of sacrificial remains. Gross.

They also had a really nice ball court where the Maya used to play whatever that ball game is (this one is different from the other sites as the hoops are too small to fit a ball through just using your hips). But they did show a carving of a ball with a skull in it and archaeologists believe they may have actually used rubber balls with skulls in them. COOL. Just like that one movie Mystery Men. Except way cooler. Of course, like Anna said, archaeologists just make stuff up so who knows. Hahahaha, I keeed. Kind of.

Tomorrow we´re really hitting up Uxmal (ooosh mall). Unlike last time we were in Merida when we got lazy and decided not to - we´re really going there this time. You´ll see!

Tortugas!

Jeff and I went diving together today for the first time - SO FUN!  Actually, our instructor mentioned that we sure looked like we were having a good time together and I'm not sure if she was chiding us or not.  We did silly things like underwater kiss and cupcake and tried to use sign language to communicate but mostly just swam around like goons.  We got to see a bunch of sea turtles!  They were beautiful and big.  We also saw some big old grouper fish (just really big fish) and supposedly an eel but the current was whisking me along too fast for me to stop and see that one.

 

What I really wanted was a harpoon gun.  Just in case - you know?  What if sharks attacked?  One of the instructors (the not fun one) cut her finger right before we got in the water.  Thanks alot - why don't you bleed everywhere and attrack predators!?  See?  She was not fun.  But if I had a harpoon gun then all would be well.  No one seems to sell them here but I'll keep trying.  It would go nicely with my machete - if I ever get one of those either.

 

So we haven't had a lot to update about since we've been just relaxing, going to the beach and reading a lot.  I'm all different shades of pale right now from extremely pale to really pale to almost pigmented - and I'm working on evening it all out.  A few fun things we have encountered on our relaxing days are:

 

1. The best idea for dishes EVER.  They wrap the dishes (at oh so awesome restaurants) in plastic bags - like mini trash bags - that way your food doesn't actually touch the plate and presto!  No dishes to be done.  Genius.  Or genious as some would say.  You know who you are.

 

2. Starbucks.  It's great for many reasons (the obvouis being that it's yummy and has chai tea - mmmm) but also because they have soap in the bathrooms and the Xcelorator!  That is the coolest freaking hand drying device on the PLANET.  I'm easily amused.

 

3. Store clerks.  Or really, the guys trying to get you to come into their tiny booths/shops/tiendas.  Some are funny - like when they say "i have what you neeeeeed", "almost free", "no cover charge today" and "duuuude".  But some are just plain obnoxious and rude - one of which I almost pummeled yesterday but Jeff held me back as I glared at him and he said "yeah - you!"  Oh a harpoon gun would be nice.

 

4.  Pizza and Champagne.  Is that not a combination to die for?  This restaurant posts ads everywhere but for a while all I could find was the promise of said pizza and champagne and no address.  But we finally found it and oh yes - it was glorious.

 

Tonight we are off to a restaurant called "Karen's" which is sure to be the best food in town.  For the next few days I'm going to focus all my efforts on figuring out how to have the best darn St. Patty's Day while down here.  I don't know what they do to celebrate it here but I'm sure going to find out.  I'll need to buy something green to wear for starters.  Hooray for shopping!

 

 

DiveMaster KO

Ok, I'm not a divemaster - but I am now certified as an Open Water Scuba Diver. FUN! I've gotten to see a barracuda, a blow fish, and a HUGE sting ray. My instructor didn't see him at first and I let out a little underwater yelp and then the thing went gliding away. Neat but I like it better when I see them on the discovery channel and there's no chance I'll get Steve Irwined.

I also had to do an awesome swim test where I went out into the ocean and was supposed to swim back and forth between two ropes that lead out into the ocean. It didn't work so hot because in my swimming from the first to the second I didn't notice that I overshot the second one by FAR and just kept swimming. Took me a while to figure it out and by the time I did I was exhausted and thought I'd fail at the swim test - but it turns out I did more than needed so I'm good to go.

We're in Playa del Carmen and Jeff and I are going to do a fun dive together in a few days when his cold is gone. For now, I'm working on getting pigment and I treated myself to a DQ Blizzard (oh yeah they have that!) for passing my scuba exam. Go me. I'm tempted to get an underwater camera to capture all the fishies and us diving, but it probably wouldn't work as well as Banana's camera did in Merida and certainly not in the dark depths we'll be going to. Oh well, surface pics are fun too.

They sell loads of Luchador masks here which makes me think of Nacho Libre. Love it. They also seem to only sell one size fits all outfits for women. I'm not sure why people say America is so tubby - people here are packing on the pounds, just in shorter stature. But maybe when they say "America" they mean all of it. McDonald's is a bargain deal here. Value meals are like 2 bucks - not that we would know anything about that (double cheese burger Wednesdays, mmmmm).

It's not our fault. We can't go outside much in the hot heat during the hours where my fragile skin will likely melt right off of me so we've become quite the mall rats and go see movies when it's too hot out. We do a lot of walking to find these malls (even though everyone seems to want us to take taxis to them - and I thought WE were the lazy ones) and other interesting places and luckily I haven't gotten burnt to a crisp yet! Hooray!

I like it here but I'm not sure how long we'll stay. They have funny places like a smoothy place called Fruti Yogurth - and I have a few challenges (given to me by Pau) that I must accomplish before we move on. Wish me luck! I'll keep you posted on how I do.