This post is the first of four posts about our trip to Mexico. FOUR?? Yes, four. I took a lot of pictures, okay? And it was so much fun so I have a lot to say... aka a lot I'd like to remember about the trip.
It all started almost a year ago when Todd went on a trip to Vancouver for a conference. His flight was supposed to land a few hours before he could check into his hotel and he had no plans of what to do during that time. So when they started asking people to give up their seats Todd figured why not, I'm in no hurry. Why do they over-book flights anyway? I don't get it. So yeah he waited a bit and eventually they got desperate, offered a lot of Delta dollars, and he gave up his seat. I don't remember what the amount was but that was around 10am. 10pm rolled around and his new flight still hadn't left. Ya seriously. Those darn airplanes that have to work right in order to fly. By the end Todd walked away with 1400 Delta dollars to use in the next year. It wasn't hard at all for us to decide to use the dollars to go on a trip for our fifth anniversary. We hadn't done a big trip alone together since our honeymoon so while I was nervous to leave the boys but I am glad we did. It was a great trip. It was a wonderful trip. All aspects of it.
The morning after Todd graduated we packed up our bags (yes, those backpacks were all we took) and we drove to Jerome where the boys would be spending the week. We celebrated Calvin's birthday and headed to Boise to fly out at the back-side crack of dawn the next morning. Our flight left at 5:30am. They recommend being to the airport two hours before an international flight. So we woke up at 2:45am, got to the airport at 3:30am, and sat around until the airport woke up at about 4:30am. Wah wah.
Our flights were great though. Zero hold ups. The flight from Minneapolis to Cancun was close to empty. And it was freezing. I shoulda asked for like ten of those red blankets... I'm sure they could have rounded up 150 of them considering how empty the flight was haha.
We arrived in great time and once we gave up looking for a cheap way to get to our hotel we forked over way too many pesos for a ride. Luckily we later figured out the cheap transportation systems. But yeah that first ride was a doozy. Our first hotel was in downtown Cancun and was nothing to wave a stick at (did I use that phrase right, Todd?) haha. But they were the only ones who folded our towel into a swan so that's something. We got checked in, tried hard not to fall asleep due to waking up far too early, and we headed over to Market 28. We thought it would be a market with food and fruit stands--I really wanted a mango--but it was actually just a tourist trap. Tons and tons of tiny shops with souvenirs. Don't get me wrong, it was still a fun experience. We got a few things but got tired of being hassled after a while and headed back for dinner.
We were definitely nervous to eat our first meal... before we dug in Todd said, "This could be the end of us." Haha seriously though. We did not want to get sick on our first day! We read that we needed to ask the waiters every time if they use bottled water in the drinks and stuff. We learned very quickly that of course they do! They eat and drink this stuff too! I don't know about the street vendors but if you're eating at a restaurant you can pretty much guarantee that they use bottled water. A way you can tell is if your drink comes out at room temperature. It seemed like most places didn't bother refrigerating their bottled water. Anyway. We stopped being so paranoid and stayed away from the sketchy street vendors and we were totally fine.
So yeah our first meal was tacos and horchata at Los Arcos. A classic. It was way tasty and set the bar pretty high for the rest of the trip. I couldn't believe it when the food just kept getting better and better.
I'm as white as my horchata. Ha.
And that was our first day. Day uno if you will.
Check out these links to read about the rest of our trip!
Tulum
Chichen Itza
Hotel Zone, Cancun
No comments:
Post a Comment