Must Paradise come to an End?

5th Ave ~ Not your typical Mexican street.

Looking East from 5th Ave, Cozumel is in the distance.

Side street off of 5th Ave.

Another side street off of 5th Ave. Don't you love these buildings?

Logan coming after me to take the camera away.

It's been a great holiday, Montazuma's Revenge hasn't been so wonderful and have made us ready to head back to the states, where we can eat the food and drink the water and milk. We've come to the conclusion that Logan's illness and my set back these past few days comes from the milk we have been drinking. Next time just filtered water and Coca Cola Light, nothing else.


I wanted to take a last look at Playa, I figure it'll be over a year before we can return. From here we head to Houston, where the weather will never compare, but since two little girls have been asking for us to visit for sometime, (actually Halli ask for us to move next door). We are excited to see them and their new house.

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas to all, we've enjoyed a quite and relaxing day. It began with Logan serving fresh squeezed orange juice and ended with a Gringa Taco at one of the local eateries, the biggest excitment was when a bottle rocket landed on Logan's shoe. We wish you all had a great and enjoyable day. We've had a wonderful time here and look forward to coming back.

Mayan Jungle

The Merceds Unimoger. It can do flips and land on all fours.

Logan told me just pose and look good, cause I wasn't really helping.

Imagine yourself here. I did, but your not allowed to see the picture.

This is the first Cenote we swam in.


Guess who?

We went down into this cavern, way down it.

This is the entrance into the second Cenote.


That's the ladder and the only ray of light.

Siesta time!

The tours with AllTourNative are the best tours to take down here. They are always on Mayan land, with the proceeds from the souvenirs and pictures going directly to the Mayan people, the groups are kept small and separated from each other. Always an adventure.

This morning we started out at the beach, taking a walk through the area and looking a various plants and an open cenote. This particular cenote had an alligator living in it, that travels to the ocean through the underground water ways.

From there we kayaked out to a reef and snorkeled, what a great day it was for snorkeling, the sun was shining, the fish were abundant and I didn't swallow too much sea water. Logan and I did manage to tip over the kayak trying to turn it around and head in the right direction. (Is that our theme, always falling off of our rides? Maybe we won't take up ultralights).

From there we boarded the Mercedes Unimog for a ride that consisted of four wheeling on what felt like a complete vertical then complete horizontal slope over old coral and boulders, with the driver doing his darndest to make it as miserable as he could. Now we know why we had to sign the waiver of liability.

The best part of the trip was the cenotes. These are the coolest part of the trips down here. A cenote is a cavern with an underwater river running thought it. There are stalactite and stalagmite formations above and below this crystal clear water.

The first cenote had an open side cavern, and we swam inside the cavern following our guides light. Once deep inside, she showed up complete darkness, we couldn't see our hands in front of our face. When it came time to turn back the way we came, she told us that we could find the opening by looking for the bright blue water that is created when the sunlight hits the water. I could see the blue light when I was under the water, but when I looked out on top of the water, I couldn't see any light.

To enter the second cenote we had to climb down a ladder through a very small opening. Here the sun came through the one opening but lit the entire cavern.

Exhausted from it all we had a great Mayan lunch, a rest on the hammocks before heading to civilization in our Mercedes Unimogs for another thrill seeking ride, the driver being encouraged to be even more adventuresome with every scream of the women in the back. At one point he even backed the Unimog back up and did it again.

After freshening up and taking a little nap, we had Christmas Eve dinner at the Sur Restaurant. The place is buzzing with merriment and excitement of what Santa will bring us tonight.

Port Morelos

It's been along weekend, sitting around waiting for Logan to feel better. The weather has been beautiful, taking advantage of a bad situation I have been sunning myself on the deck and swimming in the pool. No, I'm not ready to head to the beach by myself, especially with all those european women there.

Logan and I set out for Port Morelos, a little fishing community between Cancun and Playa. Better known to the locals, but the resorts are coming. We walked to the main highway and flagged a transportation van, along the way found these couple of sites I wanted to share.

The first being the utility lineman, I thought Eric would appreciate their technique for pole climbing.

The second is the family riding down the main highway on their scooter. Helmet laws must only apply to the adults.

Our favorte restaurant in Port Morelos is the Halo Asian, just over Logan's left shoulder, they serve Chinese and Thai food, including Coconut ice cream and fried bananas.

Saturday, It's a Special Day

We had plans to do the Mayan Jungle Tour today, but Logan was feeling so bad last night, we called and rescheduled our tour for Monday. He's been pretty sick today and we have spent the day here in the Condo.

Thus I decided to attempt to put this blog together for all of you to keep track of us. About 2 pm Logan said he was hungry and since there wasn't any real food in the kitchen, I was sent out on my own. So the adventure begins....

I had to walk to Wal-Mart (I still don't like Wal-mart) because I only had a $20 USD on me, too much to give to the taxi driver. I had a general idea where it was and headed in that direction. But just a block from my destination I decided to take a right hand turn and walked another five blocks before resorting to trying to get someone to understand me and guide me to back the direction I had just come from where I saw the Wal-Mart store just down a block.

Upon arriving at Wal-Mart, I had to search for a cart and found them down on the parking level, upon retrieving one you took it up the escalator ramp. Inside I proceeded down the isles amongst the hord of shoppers, many being from Europe and the States all filling up their carts for their holiday stay. I slowly went from isle to isle, looking mostly at the pictures on the packaging trying to find what I was looking for, I did pretty good, except I wasn't sure whether or not I picked up Cinnamon or Cayenne Pepper, Logan said I did pick up Cinnamon. At the bakery I had to stop and observe what others were doing; you pick up a tray and tongs, proceed to place what you'd like on the tray and then take the tray to the counter, where they wrapped them for you, place a label on the bag for check out. I wanted to get some meat, but thought better of this and I will wait for Logan to get better.

At the check out the girl tried to use my ATM card as a VISA and it wouldn't go through, I was hoping for cash for a taxi ride home, but she didn't understand, so I had pull out the credit card and pay with that. Fortunately for me, the Italian gal behind spoke english and directed me to an ATM, where I was able to get Pesos for my ride home.

(It's important to learn a couple three languages. At the Xcaret, we waited for the shuttle with an Italian couple, they didn't speak English, but he spoke Spanish, and with that connection we were able to converse).

All that took me only a mere 2 1/2 hours. Tomorrow is Sunday and we were hoping to attend church down here, but that's all depends on whether or not Logan is feeling better.

Merida

Our view from the 5th floor, overlooking the Presidential Hotel.






A look at a upper middle class home.
There are many large and beautiful estates located in the city,
but few are restored to their grandure.

We thought Eric might appreciate the series of power lines found on this corner. These poles are made of concrete,
I doubt those spiked shoes of yours will be of benefit here,
not to mention the lack of safety we've seen here.


This street is typical of most of the city.

After Chichen Itza, we boarded another bus to the White City of Merida. I was feeling like the 20 year olds that travel from place to place staying in hostels. Okay, I won't go quite that far, but we did have our back packs and were on a fairly lose schedule. We arrived in Merida about 7pm, the bus station had a great information counter where all us free wanders went for information on places to spend the night. Our taxi driver took us to the best place in town, the Fiesta Americana. It was a beautiful hotel in the center of the city.

The following morning Logan informed me he didn't feel all the great, so instead of venturing out on foot, we took the city's double decker tour bus, which drove you slowly through the best parts of the city, and speedily through the parts they hope you don't remember. Ahhh, but those are the areas with the most character and with camera in hand, I took a fair share of pictures.

After the conculsion of the tour, we decided we best head back to Playa. Logan was beginning to feel worse and had no desire to walk around. Thank goodness we did, when we arrived at the the bus station the place was so crowded, it took us a hour to get our tickets, and we got the last two seats that were together on the 3:40 departure, for a five hour direct non-stop trip to Playa. The bus ride came to and end at the terminal that was just a few blocks from the Condo, so it was a short walk home for me, although Logan would of opted to take the taxi.

Chichen Itza

At the great Pyramid ~ They don't allow you up the steps any longer.

A view of the Great Pyramid from behind the Observatory
At the top of the Observatory stairway
Logan proving he can still run up stairs.

The Temple of a Thousand Pillars.




Yes, they did play Tic-Tac-Toe

Thursday, we packed out over night things and walked twenty minutes to the bus terminal for our ride to Chichen Itza. After buying the ticket they informed us we had to go to the "other" terminal, which was just a few blocks from our Condo.

Chichen Itza is quite large. We thought we had seen it all, while studying the model of the area, we found an entire section we had missed. They said that more than 50,000 people lived in this area at that time.

Xcaret

Public Entrance?
Entrance to the Extravaganza Show

This is their depiction of a game called Fire Ball.

The "old" men dance was my favorite dance. The dancers had on masks of old men, dancing around with canes, bent over. At the conclusion they bowed and took of their sombreros, showing a scarf covering their heads, on que, they removed the scarf and the masks, showing that they truely are "old" men.

Wednesday, we took the bus to Xcaret; as a warning, the bus drivers don't annouce when they've arrived somewhere. When he pulled in it didn't look like a main entrance and a half dozen Mexican's got off, but no one else did. We made the mistaken assumtion that this was the employee entrance and remained on the bus. After another 45 minutes, we pulled into Xel-Ha's main entrance and found out we were on our own to get back to Xcaret. There we waited at the tunnel for a shuttle. Though Xcaret has a lot to offer, most of it is man made and not the natural settings you'd expect. For two old folks, I would recommend going the half-day, after three, lounging by the beach and staying for the show, which was excellent.