Thurs 9/2/10 We're leaving - but not before a bike ride

It was Kellys idea!! But, man it was hot. We did a guided tour of the area around the resort. The area is near the Cancun national forest, and there also a private community/golf course near by. We did this tour, it was about 45min bike, then 15 min walk. We got some cool pix of the wildlife, natural flora. We had to wear these stupid fluorescent vests.

The golf course - dont know the name. Even at 10am its way too hot to golf.

GREEN AGAVE plants

BLUE AGAVE  - more betterer tequilla.

Red Hibiscus. High in polyphenols, makes a good tea.

Other Hibiscus

???

We got to a spot like a little wildlife preserve. Iguana, parrot, flamingo, ducks. Then we walked up an observation tower. Iguana everywhere around the resort - this guy was big.

This parrot eating a mango.

Then there was this huge rat-like creature. Apparently, they are rare and shouldnt be kept captive, but this guy was blind so it was OK. he likes fruit.

This is La Amada. Its owned by the same people who own Excellence where stayed. These are condo/timeshare type properties. Very nice, they sit right on the water.

This is Excellence Playa Mujeres where we stayed as viewed from an observation tower during our tour. Its a pretty big property from this view. In the foreground is a helipad for all you super-rich who think commercial flights are for peasants.

Then we headed back, showered quickly and headed to the airport.

Kel and I both agree this is a great resort and we cant wait to get back here.

Adios!

Wed 9/1/10 Dinner at night

We had dinner at the Mexican restaurant onsite, Agave. The restaurant was beautiful and our waitress was really nice. The restaurant had like a shrine to the dead. We had some great Mexican food and finished it off with Mayan coffee. They do this cool tableside flaming coffee, tequlli, cinnamon, ice cream thing. really good. Finished the night with a nice walk and the entertainment was 70's and 80's music at the theatre.

Wed 9/01/10 Kelly cooking?!?

Chill day again, some clouds and a bit of raining. Kelly and I took a 'cooking class'. That is, we watched a demo on how to make salsa, guacamole, and shrimp ceviche. Yum.

Then we took a tour of the resrt kitchens. We both thought it was gutsy to show the guests the kitchen area,but it was pretty clean and the staff was great. We some tastings as we toured the kitchen area.

Tues 8/31/2010 Happy bday Ken Part II

One pic left over from the cenote yesterday. Its a good pic, so here you go. You can see the roots of the plant all the way down - ove 100ft long.

Mid-morning on my b-day. It took us a couple days, but we found some sweet beach lounge chairs under one of the grass huts on the beach. No problem getting one either, we just hadn't been looking on the beach. The picture below was after the delivery of our first drinks of the day (10:00am?!?!). Kels says "that would make a nice picture" and Ken says "OK....there is a hot chick in the water".  I saw some sunbather later in the day too (wink), uh huh..  its my birhday. Sidenote: Kelly did her first ever tequilla shot. Its good tequilla, smooth. I think she hates it. I do another one during bingo later in the day ("bingo, bingo, mama sita, en cancun"). Thats what you have to say if you win bingo - we didnt. Im multiple tequilla shots and multiple Coronas today. I need a  siesta before dinner, Aye!

More monkey madness! We got another monkey drink today because Kel wanted to pose it with her Boston Red Sox hat. But, our monkey was cross-eyed and had no upper lip. So, we called him Corkey. I know, thats really bad, we're going to hell. But, we're drinking banana mama's all the way there.

Just a cool sunset photo from our balcony.

We;re at dinner at the "japanese" restaurant and the lights behind Kelly are changing color. I'm sitting there like a dummy waiting for the lilght to turn green (Kelly green, get it) so she can pose. She's holding her new favorite drink, a leaping lizard - melon liquor, coconut cream, rum, and banana. Its also green, looks like Hulk juice. "HULK DRUNK! WANT BANANA IN BLENDED DRINK". Dinner was so-so again, Not bad, but not great. There was a cool casino night followed by a Mexican magician for a show.

We get back to the room at the end of the night and the resort sets up a nice b-day cake waiting for us.  Chocolate ganache - thick and creamy, yum.

All in all a great birthday. thanks Kel, for dragging me away.

Tues 8/31/2010 Happy bday Ken Part I

Sometimes, life is good .

Mon 8/30/10 sinkholes

After a full day in the heat of Chichen Itza (93F, 65% humidity) we headed to take a dip in the cenotes. The Mayans built their cities in close proximity to these sinkholes. Turns out, Mayan culture is centered around water & rain. Kind of a no-brainer. They danced for it, sacrificed to the gods to get more of it, built cities near it, fought other cities for control of it. The cenote is a natural well, massive clean water. We were allowed to swim in one - after a small fee(which we didnt pay) and a shower to wash off who knows what (which we didnt take). And once down there, you must absolutely never touch the dangling roots (which I did). Im predicting that we will be captured Apacolypto-style from our hotel room and be scarificed.  Water was clean and cool, really incredible thing to see. You can see the roots from the plants above, they grow down all the way to the water (150ft?). They build bungalos and restaurants at the top of these things. We were actualy guests at this particular resort. Kelly is there jumping with full faith into the "bath of Mayan gods".

Sidenote: the busride over there were about 13 of us. A family of 7 chinese (grandad, grandma, grandkids, you get it). The kids were annoying from the start, we were stuck in the back with the brats. well, at the first chance we got on a stop, we took seats near the front and left our bag to hold the seats. On the next stopover after that, the chinese mother jumps into the van ahead of us, grabs all our stuff,and throws it across the van onto the floor. Im not fluffing the story here, she THREW our stuff across the bus. Well, Kel was all over her "why you throwing my bag bee-otch?". OK, thats fluffing. There was an all-out, name-calling, shouting match between Kel and this chinese lady. It ended with the chinese lady calling Kel a piece-of-sh*&$! Well, actually it didnt end there. Grandma starts in on Kel and Kelly is pulling the universal "zip it" hand sign. You know the one, the hand clasp one. I thought Kel was going to knock out a old chinese lady - bad PR for the tour company Im sure. Anyway, good times.

Mon 8/30/10 - chicken pizza

Dinner last night at tapas was forgettable. Service is great, food was....meh. The restaurant itself was beautiful, clean, decorated nicely. Maybe Im just a food snob.

Anyway, early breakfast (awesome again), sneakers on, backpack....well, packed. We're headed to Chichen Itza - its one of the many ancient Mayan cities here in the area. Well, why Chichen then? We're told that Chichen Itza was the pinnacale of Mayan society. Mayan astronomy, art, mathematics, sport were all at their peak at Chichen (as I explain this now, Kelly is bored to death! Snoring, I think). Sidenote: Kelly is not easily impressed. We went to the Grand Canyon a few months ago, and she was like "its OK. No biggie". What?!?! One of the earths natural wonders. Some pix below. We had an incredible tour guide, tons of info on the 2 hour bus ride to and fro (Kel wearing ipod).  I couldnt even begin to summarize, but I learned that the size and dimesions, and alignment to the sun, were not by accident. There are all kinds of formulas for how many steps, how many layers, 'add this many layers to that side and it equals some significant Mayan number'. Clearly, the solstice and equinox played a BIG part in the culture. 

                                                                                

Structure below was a temple of human sacrifice. Performed by religious clergy, you can see the top of the building has two sort of turned up "forks" - mauch blood spilled there.

       

An outcropping structure of a snakes head on the building of human sacrifice. The ultimate god was a combination of snake, bird, human figure - I forget his name. Turtles are also very prominant (longevity) as well as jaguars.  

                                                                                                                                                                              

There are still Mayan people living all round the city. They are slightly different from Mexican as we know them. Mayan are very short and thier beauty is based on (in thier culture) the "eagles nose" - a large shaped nose like that of an eagle beak, egg-shaped head, cross-eyes (no kidding). We can clearly see some locals that fit this description more than others.  At one point, two little Mayan girls sing to us and want to sell us a little Mayan cloth for $1. We cant resist, as I suspect most cant.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                               

One pic here I hope you can see is a short structure with skulls carved in the stone. Here is where Mayan warriors would stake the heads of defeated foes for the whole city to see - awesome!

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   

Two other pics here are from the 'stadium'. One pic you'll see a stone ring high above the ground, its part of a larger field of sorts. Maya produced rubber products from rubber plants long before it was widely accepted. They made a 2lb rubber ball that they threw around this massive stadium. It would take days, literally, to score one point. Then the game was over. I cant imagine throwing a 2lb rubber ball 20ft in the air through a concrete ring - it would bounce all over. So the best player of the tournament gets what? Rest? women? Riches? Fame? Nope...death!!!  The Mayans believe the gods deserve the best players. That just sucks on many levels.We have a really great lunch, some authentic Mayan foods, local breads cooked over a fire.

So, were super-hot. Sweating more than we ever have - we head off to take a swim in the Cenotes (sinkholes), and a barfight to finish the day off.

 

So, we took a llittle shuttle and met