Welcome to part two of Holiday in Mexico. If you haven't checked out yesterday's post, swing on by and get caught up. Or not, I'm not the boss of you. ;-)
Yesterday I talked about our hectic first day flying in and getting settled. Now it's on to the fun stuff; the actual vacation.
After getting a much needed nights sleep, we headed down to Siete again for breakfast. This is the only restaurant that serves breakfast other then getting room service. It might sound like it would be hard to get a table, but the most we waited was five minutes. Siete is a buffet, but a large buffet. They only make small batches of food to put out, so there are no big vats of food that have been sitting under a heat lamp for hours. They also have a smoothie station as well as three egg stations; all of which will make you whatever your little heart desires. And if that's not enough, let your server know and they will run to the kitchen to have the chef make you something.
This is what my breakfast looked like most morning. Well this plus a beagle and lox because I already ate that before I took the photo. And you might have noticed the Bloody Mary. I had a Bloody Mary and/or a Mimosa every morning. Okay, maybe I had a few, don't judge, I was on vacation. J only indulged in Mexican coffee and his favorite, green juice. We think it was apple, kiwi, cucumber, and spinach. But they had any juice you could imagine. We even tried watermelon juice one day, it was pretty good.
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After breakfast was when we would go out and explore the town. The first day we went across the street to La Isla mall. It's a large open air mall that also has some pretty upscale stores, think Gucci and Coach. But we always forgot that we were still on American state of mind and forgot that stores don't open until 11:00 in Mexico, so don't think you'll be getting in any early morning shopping done.
We also stopped by the bank, which is conveniently located across the street, to use the atm. This is the best way to get pesos. You will get the best exchange rate and the fee for using the atm is smaller then if you would use any of the exchange places. Just make sure to use an atm at a bank, because just like anywhere, there are a lot of fake atms that will steal your debit card info. Hotels can no longer exchange money for you, so you have to do it yourself. You do not need to get pesos, because 99% of places will take cards or American dollars, but you're in another country, you should try to use there currency.
We would also use the morning time to go into town and walk around. We got to know the bus system very well and it's less then $2 USD for two people to take the bus. If you pay in pesos, if you pay in USD, it's $2 even. Getting pesos or paying with your card everywhere is worth it because you will be charged the pesos amount, not the USD amount.
We got lost one day, but the people of Cancun are very friendly and helpful. I know enough Spanish to get us around, but most people spoke English. We had about three people help us out, most of them were trying to sell us something, but we just told them no thanks, and they still helped us.
There is a part of Cancun that is very touristy. If you go to the part of the strip that has the clubs, expect that kind of atmosphere. This is where Coco Bongo, Hard Rock, and Senor Frogs are. It's very touristy with shops and markets that sell extremely touristy crap. If you've ever been to the WI Dells, it's like that, only in Mexico. We were overwhelmed with people trying to sell us crap and get us to go to the clubs. That's not our cup of tea, so we politely declined and went back the to the hotel.
The city itself (away from the resorts and clubs) is very clean and everyone is friendly. We even went to the local Wal Mart to pick up supplies. I think that was the first time in years I've been to a Wal Mart, but I sure wasn't paying $35 for a bottle of sun screen (that's what places around the resorts were charging). Just beware, they will also try to sell you things there as well. Everywhere you go people will try to sell you tours or cheep crap from China (oh yes, things aren't even made in Mexico any more), so just politely decline and they usually leave you alone.
After our morning adventures we always headed down to the beach. I mean, that's why we were there. We would snag some chairs under one of the tiki type huts. People didn't seem to want to sit here, so we always got one. They were much cooler then the regular umbrellas and we were close to the bar.
See, here's J enjoying a "couple" drinks. We were always the first one's that our beach server stopped at and we got to watch the volleyball games because we were over by the court.
Everyday we swam in the ocean. We just relaxed and read our books. We took a long walk on the beach. We drank the delicious fruity drinks our server brought us. It was perfect. And for the majority of the week, this is what we did. No responsibilities. No plans. Just relaxing. It was just what we needed. It was amazing.
Our server on the beach was always super friendly. She was always nice to talk with and always had great suggestions for drinks. If you go there try the Sexy Banana and the Strawberry Banana Daiquiri, they are both amazing. I have forgot everyone's name, because I can't remember a name to save my life, but everyone was awesome. And we always tipped our servers. Some people don't, but many did. It's always nice to show them how much their hard work is appreciated.
So that's how we spent the majority of the days, sitting on the beach. We always took a nice long walk up the beach and looked at the fancy houses and the large resorts. It made us appreciate our resort even more. It was the perfect size and all the rooms had balconies and an ocean view. I would say the best resort there.
The resort wasn't busy, but we went at the beginning of the slow season. The activities coordinators we talked with told us the hotel was at about 60% capacity. So I can't say what it would be like if you went during a busy time, but during the slower times it's amazing. I would recommend trying to go between the end of August and the beginning of November. That's the best time to travel.
But anyway, that's how we spent most of our days, just relaxing. It was great. In the next two and final installments I'll talk about the food and our trip to Yucatan. So don't forget to stop by next week for the finally. Tomorrow is our regularly scheduled Friday Freebie, so don't forget about to pick that up as well. Take care.
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