Phlargo's Parallel Universe and Lonely Void

As many of you know, I recently embarked with my family on a trip to Quintana Roo in Mexico for a week long vacation at the Rui Tequila resort in Playa del Carmen.  If you don't know about it yet, I would highly suggest taking a look at the photo albums I posted from the trip about a week ago.  It was a beautiful place and quite an amazing experience.  I've included a bunch of links to pages about thing I'm discussing if you're interested in a little more information.

Let's start with the concept that I have not left the country for over a decade.  Last I left the US, I was only 14 and on a trip to Denmark.  I had to get a new passport (my office laughed at me when I showed them my passport from when I was 14 (wearing my Ren and Stimpy shirt!!)) and had to alert the local authorities that my car was not an abandoned drugie theft (not really). 

Prior to going down to Mexico, I had a couple of days at home to spend time with Mom and some local friends (I spent some nice time with Michael-Scott, Jon, Jason, and Kara).  I had a lovely dinner MS and then lifted some kettlebells together (his recent obsession) and watched some jdramas and ate "frozen dessert" with him and Ginger.  Kara and Jason and I went kayaking in the Channel Islands harbor and went out for a kick ass sushi dinner - one of the first times I've had the pleasure of ordering the "Chef's Choice"  Solid.  Afterwards, Jon, MS, Jason, Kara, Ryan, and Laura (Ryan's recent fiance!) spent some time back at their place, watching some Planet Earth and just hangin' out.  It was really great to get to spend time with everyone.  Makes me realize how much I enjoy my friends, really!

Mom, Joe and I drove down to Van Nuys to take the airport shuttle at like 5:00 AM the next morning.  We met Leah and Chris and the rest of the troop (Nancy and Alex Mireles and their family (and a good part of their extended family) & Danny and Veronica and their children) at the airport.  The lines at the Delta terminal were absolutely amazing considering it was before 8 AM on a Sunday morning.  In classic Nancy fashion, everyone was lined up and being processed in good order.  The flight down to Cancun was about 4.5 hours.  Flying into Cancun was quite something: it's jungle, jungle, jungle, then you're landing on a runway and it feels like it's in the middle of, well, the jungle. We waited in customs for a bit to be processed and admitted then we went out to wait for the bus which would take us down to the resort.  The level of tourism was amazing - immediately outside the airport more than 100 services and offers came flying at us: car rentals, excursions, vacation packages, timeshare opportunities.  It was quite warm outside and very humid and the bus depots were busy with the newly arrived travellers from all over the world.  Finally our bus arrived and we were on our way down to the resort.

It was about an hour trip, or so, as we had to stop at several other resorts to drop off passengers.  The area is absolutely amazing.  It's as though the entire highway is built around these tour buses: moving people from the airport to their little resort safe haven.  All the stores on the side of the road seem to support the tourist economy: building supplies, restaurant supplies, bulk furniture opportunities.  And then every now and then, out in the middle of the jungle in the distance was a little shack that you could only assume was a holdout local who wasn't buying into the tourism game.  There were literally dozens of these monumental resorts, each with more impressive, grand entrances than the last.  And they were just plopped in the middle of the jungle.  I figured that if you happened to wander off the grounds into the jungle for just a few feet, you'd likely be eaten by dinosaurs in short order. 

"If you come to our resort, guess what?  You're staying the whole week."

We arrived at the Riu Tequila in the early evening and the whole lot of us were starving, so, after dropping our carry-on items in our room (the luggage was moved for us), we all met in the main dining room.  It was a huge affair, pretty well documented in the Rio Tequila picture album.  Several hundred tables for two that were attached and removed as parties were larger and smaller.  The food was generally pretty average, but there was almost at least a couple dishes at every meal that were pretty stand-out.  The good news was that there was always a huge variety.  Literally everything from pizza and pasta at every dinner, to cactus salads (the cold salads, many of us agreed, were a highlight) and other more traditional Mexican fare.  The resort was pretty neat - everything was included in the price of entry, so all food and drinks were part of the deal.  There were bars spread throughout the campus, including a 24 hour sports bar and a swim-up poolside bar.  The rooms even had fully stocked bars, including self-serve vodka, rum, tequila, gin, and brandy, not to mention beer (Corona) and soda in the fridges.  The landscaping was very much like the local jungle - very thick and pretty natural, if quite a bit more manacured.  The pictures really show off the resort itself - so I'd check them out if you haven't already.

Each night, after dinner, there was an evening show at the on-campus theatre.  The shows were maybe not the most interesting things (some were pretty cool), but it was a good time to get together in a group and share our daily experiences and have some drinks together.  The first night was no exception and probably one of my (and many other's) heaviest drinking nights.  The younger crowd was up until at least 1 or 2 that first night, heading into the little disco ("La Pinata") for some afterhours dancing and revelry.

Day 2 was a lazy one.  Early awakening, but relaxed.  Checking out the beautiful pool at the Riu Tequila and lunch at the pool side dining area.  Pretty much took the day off to "recover" from the trip down.  I did some walking out to the beach and checked out our neighboring Riu resort, the Riu Yucatan.  The area where we were housed a battery of resorts - 6 Riu's and probably a dozen others.  I think dinner that night had a Mexican theme, so there was a little more in the way of specialty local dishes (which I thought was some of the better food offered).  The show that night was a Grease themed show, where they sang songs from Grease and showed clips from the musical or film.  It was a pretty early night for everyone.

Day 3 was not so idle.  Mom, Joe, Leah, Chris, and I took a walk into the town of Playa del Carmen Tuesday morning.  It's about a 20 minute walk out there, and while it was quite warm (as it was throughout the trip - sweaty was pretty much a constant state for the full week, so I won't mention it again) we survived.  The coffee snobs that we are, one of our top priorities in this shopping hell was a cafe.  Leah and Chris, always prepared with the local tourist information, knew of the two spots in the town that were our best choice for a superior cup of joe to the swill that was offered at the resort.  Playa del Carmen (at least the tourist district that's within walking distance of the beach and the resorts) is literally hundreds and hundreds of shops, each boasting callers trying to get the innocent tourist-passer-by's attention.  At every corner, there were 10+ merchants vying for your attention.. and money.  Silver jewelry shops (there must have been 50 of them), trinket stores, "tequila outlets", bars, ridiculously overpriced restaurants (one bar open to the street had Linguini with Shrimp advertised for 280 pesos (about $28)), each luring you in with refreshing air conditioning and "the best prices in town".  It was truly surreal.  The economy survives solely because people come and spend 10x or 100x the cost of production on touristy goods and services.  Worth noting:  I didn't buy a single touristy good or service, except for the coffee at the first cafe we stopped at, which I offered to pay for.  Leah and Chris and I went on for lunch at a local (and yes, the kind of local that wasn't catering to tourists) chicken place and managed a really nice meal of roasted chicken, tortillas, rice, bottled water and salsa for about $10 for the 3 of us.  Lazyiness and impatient won out: we took a taxi back to the resort (the prices for taxis to and from the resorts were fixed at $5 by the local government and they stopped at specific touristy places to make sure the rich outsiders could redistribute their wealth in the most effective manner).

The afternoon was spent at the beautiful beach.  The water was beautiful teal and sky blue.  The beach was absolutely packed with sunbathers.  I've never seen so many people with such brown skin before (I mean, outside of Africa).  These westerners (and they were almost all, at least once, fair-skinned) had spent so much time in the sun tanning that many looked like they were, in fact, African.  Dark bronze and bright red were the two most common skin tones.  I, fortunately never adopted either of those choices and maintained my lovely shade of dayglow pale with effective use of sunscreen and protective barriers (concrete suits, mostly).  Leah, Chris and I ventured a walk down the coast for a good half an hour to do a little snorkeling practice and found a nice area under a large rock overhang to stow our goods and jumped into the tepid, calm, and shallow waters of the Caribbean.  It was really great water to swim in and you could go out like 300-400 ft and still touch the sea floor with your feet.

Wednesday, Mom and Joe went to Xel-Ha ("Shell-Hah": a protected river/water theme park) and Talum (a Mayan ruin) for an all-day outing.  LeaCh (hehe) invited me to go for another little excursion of our own to the island of Cozumel to go snorkeling at one of the most famous reefs in the world as a reward for my recent bar passage and admittance.  It was a wonderful trip and the snorkeling was truly amazing.  The fish swarm right next to us and the plant life was so beautiful.  The tour we took consisted of three different stops at popular snorkeling and diving sites.  At the final site (when I was finally getting the hang of diving down to the bottom), there was a huge school of fish (maybe 100,000 or more) that turned the bottom of the ocean black.  I was able to swim down to the level of the school and swim through them and it was really a neat experience.  They would flee, but the effect was that I was practically engulfed in fish.  A little scary, really.  The coral was so rife with biodiversity that I could have spent easily 3x as long looking at some of the neat structures and ecosystems it permits.

After our snorkeling trip, we wandered around the town of San Miguel on Cozumel and found an exceptional lunch at a restaurant.  We may have had the best ceviche I've ever had - nice big pieces of fish with a wonderful tangy dressing.  It was amazing.  We also had some really great dishes to go with it.  A traditional chocolate chicken mole and a local Yucatan mole and a fish that had been prepared with tomatoes and a light tangy sauce.  But then it was time to head back to the mainland and meet up with the others.    Or rather, it was time for us to head back and crash in bed for a few hours before dinner :)

Thursday was another quiet day that, for me, involved mostly walking around the area and picture-taking.  I took a long walk down the coast and took some pictures of the coastline and beach.  I went to the gym in the afternoon and met the others at the beach in the late afternoon.  I also took the opportunity to check out some of the other local resorts, wandering through them to see what kinds of amenities and features they offered.  Riu apparently has many different levels of resorts.  Nearby were the upscale Riu Palace Mexico and Riu Palace Riveria Maya and the more plebian Hotel Riu Yucatan, Hotel Riu Lupita, and Hotel Riu Playacar to compliment our Clubhotel Riu Tequila.  Apparently, Riu also has a Grand Palace variety for super luxury treatment.  So the Riu Palace destinations were distinguished by fancier construction materials, design and the availability of 5 different reservation required dining service locations (still included).  Also, I'm sure the rooms were fancier.  The rooms in the Riu Tequila were perfectly serviceable, large and pretty well kept, but they weren't what I'd call fancy.  They were functional and attractive, but by no means luxurious.  On the plus side, they each had a balcony, plenty of space for luggage and storing clothes and goodies, a big shower, huge closet, lots of chairs, air conditioning, satellite TV (which I never turned on), and nice floors.

Friday was a big trip day for the whole family.  We had an early meeting time to accomplish our big trip to Xcaret, a Mayan themed eco-park that includes an amazing diversity of entertainment opportunities.  There is a focus on manual, non electric, natural presentation and maintenance to go along with the eco moniker.  We snorkeled through the natural underground river (though parts of it are connected together with manmade additions) which was really cool, if a little crowded.  Some of the caves went down quite deep and it would have been really amazing to have had the freedom to really explore all the nooks and crannies.  The park has tons of activities available and the day went by super fast - and we only did about a third of what there was to do.  We saw butterflies (check out my sweet butterfly pics), jaguars, puma, iguanas (yes, more iguanas), monkeys, strange raccoon-dog-bears, a baird tapir (taking a wicked crap as I photographed it, too), and giant sea turtles (I mean giant - like with shells 1 meter in diameter), a mock Mayan village, a Mayan cemetery, a beautiful aquarium, an orchid house (anyone surprised?), and a pile of other things.  The pictures really do this destination more justice than my words as it was a total feast for the eyes.  There was so much more to see too - it would have been cool to have had a lot more time.  We had an amazing buffet meal that was part of our all-inclusive package.  The buffet was really something and quite possible the halo meal for the trip - tons of good, finely made, authentic Mexican cuisine.  The variety was absolutely mind-blowing: maybe 60+ dishes, really, 20 salads, 7 soups, 10 salsas, 50 desserts, 30+ sauces and accoutrements.  The day ended with a highly reputable Mayan cultural show that took place in huge ampatheatre.  It was quite the production, but we ended up only staying for the first half of the show - I think we had all had enough for one day by that point (it was like 8:30 at night and we had been going since like 8 in the morning).  Xcaret was an amazing destination.  If you get down there, definitely go - it's quite expensive, but it's a keen insight into Mayan culture and local wildlife and plant life that I wouldn't have seen elsewhere.

Saturday was another quiet day.  We did some wandering near the resort, but mostly took it easy and Sunday was the trip home and saying good bye to our new friends.  Not feeling motivated to run around Sunday morning, we kinda hung out in the huge outdoor lobby waiting for our bus after breakfast. Chris took a couple cute pictures of me with Isabella, Danny and Veronica's youngest daughter who was specifically adorable and entertaining.  The bus ride to the airport was kinda fun as I elected to sit with the young ladies of the group and do my best to entertain the lot of them, showing my etch-a-sketch skills, as well as my ability to play silly trivia games that no 12 year old, 9 year old, or 4 year old girls could care less about :)

Back in CA, I had a day before heading back, but it was spent at home.  I had a really nice time taking Mom out to a new Thai place in Newbury Park.  We had a lovely discussion and meal together and then went home and met Jason for some coffee and picture sharing.  Jason ended up hanging out until nearly 3 in the morning while we chatted our lungs out.

Joe was kind enough to take me to the airport shuttle in Van Nuys on Tuesday morning.  My flight back to Seattle was uneventful, but the trip into Washington was beautiful as it was so clear you could see all the tall snowy peaks.  They didn't replace my kitchen floor, which they were supposed to do while I was gone.  That made me a little sad. 

I've also been really sick for the last week and I'm just at the cusp of getting better - but it seems to keep coming back.  Actually it's probably the sickest I've ever been as I was completely stuck in bed for 3 days and have spent several other afternoons near immobile.  I really hope I'm at the end of it, as I've had to miss some work and that's something I really can't afford to do right now - since I'm part time, I don't get sick time or vacation time - so the last 3 weeks have essentially been unpaid.  The next couple of months may be the most difficult, financially, so I'll really have to be careful and frugal (as if I wasn't already being so).

It was wonderful to have such a lovely trip and it only makes me realize how much I want to get the chance to do something like that again soon!  I know it may be several years, but I really had a great time.