Mexico!

So the last year has brought a lot of changes to our house. The arrival of Emerson has changed our relationship a little bit. Gone are the nights where just the two of us hang out and relax together or head out to do something alone. Yes, we do have great friends and family that babysit for us so that we can have date nights but things are different. Now I'm not saying this is all bad - or that we didn't see this coming.

Then the last 6 months have been a whirlwind of activity. Work is crazy, we're taking care of Emerson and the house and working on other projects. Finally in January I told Robert I wanted to go away together. To our special place - Mexico. It's where we went when we got engaged, for our honeymoon, and our last romantic getaway before I got pregnant. I told him this would be the perfect way to celebrate our first year as parents, would help us reconnect with some much needed adult time, help me celebrate reaching my goal of nursing for a year (yes!) and be a great way to relax. It didn't take much convincing to get him to agree.

Now, where to go? We decided we wanted to go to the Riviera Maya again. It's just more tropical feeling than Puerto Vallarta. My friend Megan's mom is a travel agent so we called her and she gave us some options. We could stay where we usually stay which we found out is a 4 apple rating out of 6 on Apple Vacations' criteria scale. She also priced out a few more resorts for us. Then she told us about the 6 Apple Square Deal. With this package you choose your region (in our case, Riviera Maya), pay a fixed price for your air fare, transportation to and from the resort and your all-inclusive resort expenses. But here's the catch, you don't know where you're staying until you check in at the airport and you cannot change your resort. Sounds crazy right? Except you are guaranteed a resort that falls in their 6 apple category - these are their nicest resorts! Our minds were made up when we found out the Square Deal would be $500 cheaper than if we went to our regular place. I guess this way Apple can send people where they need to in order to meet contracts obligations with the resorts. And since Apple owns Dreams and Secrets you tend to be sent to these resorts which we had heard were great. We never do things like this - we're planners as all of you know - so it seemed fun and exciting.

We checked in at the airport on Sunday, April 11th and found out we were staying at the Dreams Puerto Aventuras resort. We met another couple at the airport that had also signed up for the Square Deal and was assigned to the Dreams Puerto Aventuras too. We had a great flight and were transported to the resort. When we got to our room there was a Happy Anniversary banner on the door. Apparently our travel agent had called ahead and this was the angle she played. We had been upgraded to a suite with a private Jacuzzi on our balcony. There were rose petals on the bed and champagne was chilling. The room was beautiful, the bathroom was luxurious and the bed was super comfortable (all the beds we've had in Mexico in the past were like sleeping on boards). The resort isn't as sprawling and opulent as some of the other resorts but it is still very nice. It has a different feel because it's within this little town of Puerto Aventuras. It's right next to a marina, surrounded by condos and within walking distance to some shops. Near the shops we could also watch dolphins and see sea lions. That being said, it was still very nice and cozy. There were six restaurants and we ate at each one. The food was good and we didn't need reservations for dinner.

We spent most of our time lounging by the pool - drinking, reading, drinking, relaxing. Unfortunately it did rain every day around 2 pm and usually didn't stop. This is unusual since their rainy season doesn't start until June but they are supposed to have a really bad hurricane season this year. A tour guide said people are getting nervous because it's so rainy so early. Even with the rain we had a good time. We weren't at work, doing chores around the house or taking care of anybody or anything. We got to have alone time together and catch up on sleep. When it was rainy we would hang out in our Jacuzzi, read or play cards - all while drinking of course.

Wednesday we took a tour to Chichen Itza. It was an all day affair. The tour bus picked us up at about 8 in the morning and we stopped at a couple more resorts to pick up other guests. It was a very nice tour, they provided fruit, juice, coffee and pastries on the trip there. While we rode, our tour guides spoke to us about the region and the cultures. He explained to us that the only people who used to be in this area were locals who would harvest the sap from the local trees to send off to the Wrigley Corporation to make chicle, or gum for those that don't hablo espanol. He also explained to us how there are actually over 40 different regional dialects within the country of Mexico, and he taught us a couple of Mayan phrases. He went on to explain about the transformation of the region towards tourism and how that has helped bring more resources to the region. It was all very interesting. He went on to explain the reality behind the "2012 doomsday" Mayan prophecies. He explained that it is not a dooms day - end of the world kind of deal, but merely a transition from the end of the calendar to the start of the calendar again. He likened it to a really big New Years celebration. He saw it as an opportunity for people to start anew with faith, intellect, love, science, or whatever you might be into. Definitely not the end of the world. Whew. As we approached Chichen Itza (not chicken pizza) we stopped for a few minutes to stretch our legs at a nearby shopping center where you could shop using a credit card if you needed to since most of the vendors at the site were a cash only business. Back onto the bus and only a couple more miles to the site. We spent about 2 hours there, on a guided tour for the first hour and then we had about an hour for unguided portion. It was spectacular. Our guide, Beto, was very knowledgeable and did a great job explaining things to us. We saw the historic ball court where kings would watch a version of futbol/basketball played with such honor and conviction that historians think the captain of the winning team would volunteer to be sacrificed for his great sportsmanship. Cities were won and lost in this ball court. Can you imagine that? Beto went on to explain how precisely all the structures were built. On the solstices and the equinoxes, the sun hits them at certain angles to produce shadows that look like snakes or the sun rises between two specifically built columns. The buildings face the exact cardinal directions and the locations of the other structures around them are not random. The temple of Venus is situated in position to the main pyramid so that when Venus and the earth lined up with the sun in real life, the buildings also lined up with the shadow from the sun. The list goes on and on of all the amazing things the Mayans were able to put into their creations. And they didn't have the luxury of a computer or calculator. We bought a few items and took some more pictures on our unguided part of the tour, then headed back to the bus for a cold cerveza and a nice rest.

Next we headed to an authentic Mayan restaurant for lunch where they danced for us. The food was delicious but the salsa was vary hot, even for Robert. Then it was off to see a cenote. Cenotes are gaping sinkholes that are scattered around the Yucatan Peninsula. For many years, no one could figure out why these caverns in the limestone appeared, or what caused them to collapse in on themselves, or why they all seemed to form a perfect semi-circle shape with each other. Then, not to long ago, it was discovered that a giant meteor had struck the earth very near the peninsula millions of years ago. (Adios Dinosaurs) They realized that these cenotes formed a circle around the main crater and that these were likely formed by smaller meteorites that broke off from the big one as it approached earth. Once they explained that it was 150 meters deep Robert decided he should definitely not swim but take photos instead. I however found inner courage and jumped off the highest point of the stairs - 21 feet above the water's surface. It was awesome and something I will probably never do again. The water was cold and I quickly tired of treading water. Then it was time to head back to the resort.

We had a wonderful time and came back reconnected and recharged. We did miss Emerson but since my mom was taking care of him we knew that he was in good hands and getting spoiled by Grandma! We'll definitely be going back again in two years.

Malob Kin  (That means Good Day in Mayan)