Coba

 Yes, this is where Logan spent most of his time... I'm sure in time this would become boring, can't imagine when that would be, but I'm told it would be.

I'm fine with living like this for awhile, a long while.

Thursday was our excursion day.  Our taxi driver, Alejandro Raul Chan Pacheco, picked us up promptly at 8 am and we headed in-land for a tour of Coba.

This is what most people come to do and see, climb the steps of Nohach Mul. 

This structure is the tallest in the Yucantan Peninsula at 138 feet tall.

At the top.

The white arrow is pointing to the round building called the observatory and in the far far distance is the lake, Macanxoc, which the ruins surrounds.  We walked almost all of Coba, although at one point we hired a taxi to take us back to a fork in the pathway.  The Taxi is really was a bike that had a seat for

two on the front of it.

 

A view looking down the steps.  No, I did not take this picture, I'm sure I would have tumbled down those steps if I had.  The rope in the middle of the steps is helpful in climbing up the steps, but not so in climbing down.  Most people scoot down on their bums, Logan grabbed my hand and I felt I was holding on pretty tight and we walked down the steps...ever so slowly.  At one point some girls who were scooting their way down asked me how I could be going down the steps without the rope, Logan told them he was my rope. One of the girls replied "AHHH, that is the most romantic thing I've heard", and so it is, he is my rope.  Love him.  I wanted to say to death, but honestly, that could have happened going down these steps.

Okay,  I have an issue with these Mayan ball courts.  We've seen three of them, similar look, two sloped slides, a ring in the top center, but they are all different in length, height, space between the sloped formations.  They say the Mayan's play a game of hip ball, shooting the ball through the ring at the top, the losing team being beheaded.  Really? 

I think it's the Mayan form of Blunko, and someone stands at the stop and drops a disk down the side or tosses it into the center ring.  Better yet, they tie a rope through the center ring and run back and forth for some unknown reason.

The backside of the ball court, or the consession stand. 

More of the ruins.   

Loved the pathway.  We arrived early enough the crowds weren't there yet and I'm happy I took this picture when I did, cause a short time later the crowds were forming and there were people everywhere.

I can't wait till someone comes up with some type of hologram that depicts what took place in everyday life while you're passing through an area.  They say Coba had 55,000 people in it.

This is the observatory which you can see the tip of from the top of Nohoch Mul.

Just a cool looking tree root.

We were in Coba three hours and hot and tired.  There are some nearby cenotes that are a relief from the heat.  This one you get to through a hole in the ground and descend...well a long ways down a stairway. They have it lit with lights so you can see the blue blue water. 

Our escort, Alejandro who watched over our things and took the blurry picture above standing near the entrance to the cenote.

I was fascinated by the huts these people live in.  I was noticing while driving out of the little town of Coba that it looks as if the goverment is putting in block housing for these people, they're stylish not just a concrete box.  And I remember on one of our Alltournative excursions they talked about some of the money raised going to the Mayan people to help build block houses so they had a place of protection from the hurricanes and storms.

But what was interesting is that next to every block house, was a house made of twigs, which appears where they preferred to live.  The twigs offer privacy yet let the breeze flow through, unlike the cinderblock houses that just heat up during the day. 

Today is our last full day here, the winds have calmed down finally

and the sea looks more inviting than ever.

Love the Caribbean

We took the customary walk down the beach, this time we stopped in at the Dreams Resort and walked around.  We don't have the gumption Kevin has, or we would have had breakfast while we were there.  After all it is an All-inclusive resort, would they have asked for ID?

Love these beaches.

Towards the afternoon the wind began to settle down and we went out snorkeling.  Ok, The only time I can remember seeing this much sea life was when we were in the Grand Caymans.  WOW!! the fish were abundant and everywhere you looked.

I have the underwater camera, but honestly with goggles on and it's small viewing thingy...I can't ever tell if I got a good shot or not, but some of these turned out fabulous.

Look at all those fishys.

 Then I turned the corner and look what I saw...  MY OH MY...wish I could call Logan over...

Found Logan, took a couple of tries before he saw the sea turtle.

Yea, that was worth it.  So Cool!

We've Arrive

Arrving at the airport at 6 am today, we were hopeful to get on the first flight of the day.  No such luck, this has seriously turned into the worst week and I'm talking days before we even left home.  Having a hard time holding back tears and learning just how much the airlines pawn you off to the next clerk, it boils down to if you made the mess yourself, or so they think you have, you get to lay in it and they just don't give a damn.

We were told our luggage was in Houston and couldn't leave without us.  Lie.

We were told we were number on the stand by list and as those people got seat or didn't check in we'd move up the list. Lie.

First of all,  Houston is way too busy of an airport, when we were attempting to check in and standing in the line for 1 1/2 hours, the clerks were too few, they kept leaving their post, luggage was piling up everywhere and the conveyor belt wasn't working so they were transporting it by carts, people that needed assistance were not helped in a timely manner causing further back up in the line. 

And we learned that if the airline caused someone to be delayed, such as mechanical failure those people were bumped to the front of the stand by list no matter what.  If they over booked, which it seems the overbooked every flight by 20 or more people, you were 2nd on the list.  If you missed a connection, you were 3rd on the list and as I realized that this morning I began to think we would never leave Houston.  As we watched the 10:25 flight on the marquee, it showed 6 available seats, which means 6 people didn't check in before the hour mark of departure and Logan and I were 5 & 6 on the stand by list, but we had been on the stand by list  the longest.  I watched as each of the four names ahead of us were given seat assignments, then my name went up with a seat assignment and as luck would have it, because "if you have no bad luck you have no luck at all" two people came up to the check in counter and it looked like they were going to bump us.  Remember those tears, they were somewhat visable when I talked to the people in the check in counter.  I didn't get bumped, but Logan still didn't have a seat, I heard them ask the couple that one seat was open, did they want to split or not, they said no, HALLELUJAH!!! and Logan and I were on that plane and one of us was in first class.   But had that couple said yes, most likely I would have given up my seat and they would have been on the plane instead. 

When we arrive, I immediately when to the baggage claim center and there was our luggage, I didn't even stop at the baggage carousel.  So do you think it was on the same plane as us?  Noooo it wasn't, pretty sure it arrived yesterday, so much for their telling us it can't leave without us.  So we got bumped because of the hour mark, but the luggage didn't, yet from what I am told the luggage is the reason they have the one hour deadline.  I think it has more to do with allowing those overbooked ticket holders a chance to get on to the plane without having to give out vouchers and apologies, it's easier to tell the idiot who didn't check-in before the hour cut off time, too bad for you and oh yea -  good luck getting a seat.  I was a bit irritated at the number of times we were told "Hey it's Spring Break, you should know better" - so to Continental - "Hey, it's Spring Break and you should know better than to be short staffed"

So we've arrived, with a big lesson learned.  Always pre-check in the night before!!! And arrive two hours early.  If you can't pre-check in you must arrive four hours early.  

The weather's nice, not perfect, hoping for calmer winds tomorrow, and we've got our own personal taxi - escort - chauffer for Thursday.  He will arrive at 8 am and drive us to Coba and to some Cenote's an all day excusion for a mear $80. He took us from the bus station to our cottage, to the store, waited and back home again, $25.  Why would anyone rent a car down here?

I'm loving the sound of the surf...gonna go to sleep now and get some much needed rest, why is traveling so tiring, even when you're just sitting around.   BTW - the FB post - Terminal E is for international flights - the numbers represent each gate we tried to get a flight at on Saturday.  Exhausting and Exhausted!!  Good night.

The Best part of our Vacation -

We started our vacation with a two day lay over in Houston and the family gathered together and spent  a day at the zoo.  We've arrived and look at all those toddlers and strollers. 

The first order of business is a stop to at the Restrooms.

The fishes - we loved all the fish.

They have a clear tunnel the kiddos can climb through and view the fish all around them.  Of course it makes for a great photo op for the grandmas.

This little monkey came and sat down at the window to show off her treat.  Oh, were talking the chimpanzee, not Halli.

While the girls were on the merry go round, JJ took a front row seat ...look at that line up of strollers.

The Elephants

The Giraffes, well one giraffe sitting down.

JJ had fun with grandpa Logan.  Logan managed to get a hold of  JJ's hand in his mouth and he made sure it didn't get close to his mouth again. In rretaliation, JJ found grandpa's ear and bit down on it.

Happy Ashlyn.

And LeNea has grown up over night, she was running all over the playground and loving it.

Here we sit at the Houston Airport Holiday Inn hotel because we "checked in" too late and have been placed on standby.  I am seriously frustrated and really hating Continental and will think really hard about ever taking them again.  We are going to attempt to get on the first flight out tomorrow.  The ticket clerk told us to think positive, it's Sunday, people get drunk and can't get up and moving in the morning and then Logan pointed out, that it's daylight savings time....and they have to have checked in no less than one hour before the flight leaves to get a boarding ticket.  59 minutes will bump you to standby.  So we're praying hard for drunks and daylight savings.