Viva Mexico: December 10, 2002

Note: Bear with me as I have a bit of blogging constipation. ie. stories to tell but no time to post them, hence stories are building up and blocking newer stories

Ok, so finally on to the second day in Ixtapa

Waking up to the sound of waves is just about as nice as being lulled to sleep by them. Bonus when you get to eat your breakfast by the ocean, too. (And for that I am envious of Angelenos who have both city-life and ocean-life all within their grasp) Good start to a crazy morning.

We were scheduled to cover 6 hotels in 3 hours. If it weren't for the close proximity of the hotels I would've figured it impossible. As it were, it was a nuisance as well as a time consumer hopping on and off the bus when most of the hotels we would be inspecting were right next door to one another. Ah well.

Just like the bus didn't help speed things up, it was also detrimental how we were welcomed with cerveza/margaritas/house specialty cocktails at every venue. A ploy to persuade our minds into seeing their property through beer goggles, no doubt.

But lo and behold, we survived, and only half an hour behind schedule. No biggie for the tour operator as it was now our free time. What to do with ourselves?

Thankfully, I hung out with a group of like-minded girls. After lunch (yummy fajitas! I bet they weren't "authentic" at our hotel, but who cares) we changed out of our "business" clothes and into more "sun worshipper" gear and trekked down the hotel zone to the local shopping areas. They had the requisite Senor Frog's (I really miss not having one here anymore, even though it didn't fit in with Calgary) They also had some brand name boutiques like Nautica, Mossimo (brand name? I suppose), and Roxy...making it very clear that this was a resort area and not your typical Mexican town. Some shops followed the whole lunchbreak/siesta tradition from 2-4 so we didn't get to see a lot. However, the local vendor marketplace was in full swing to accommodate the tourists not in the know about the whole siesta thing.

What goodies did I get? Well, *feeling sheepish* this lil shopping goddess didn't get much accomplished in the marketplace that day. Why? Well, boys and girls, it's like this:

I G O T M Y H A I R B R A I D E D ! ! !

Whooo! I was sooo excited. Such a treat to myself! I hummed and hawed about it for maybe half an hour before giving in. I could write a whole entry about my braided hair. Actually, I think I'll do that to keep the story moving for now. I bartered it down to 120 Mexican Pesos (20 Canadian dollars/12 US Dollars!!!) and it only took her half an hour, but after I got it done, the other girls were done scouting the market and the sun was beating down on us pretty hard. So where to next?

To the beach, my friends!

I was so in love with walking that beach. I wished that everywhere I walked in life that there could be a shoreline to take me there...makes the journey so much nicer. The beach was different in the daytime, though. Although they don't allow vendors on the beach to bother the guests/tourists, there are plenty of guys out there selling boat rides to Ixtapa Island (which I wish I would've had the time to do), banana boat rides, parasailing, horseback trips along the shore. Any activity you wanted to do on that beach, there was someone there to offer it to you. Legal activities, that is. Noone came up to me with any illegal or non-reputable activity offers. *giggles* Women offered to braid your hair. Yup, even when your hair was already braided. (Couldn't they see???)

At our hotel we came across a local man with two buckets filled with water and about 10 baby sea turtles. We had been educated about this at our Ixtapa Zihuatanejo seminar. The hoteliers have brought it upon themselves to help out the dwindling sea turtle population by collecting the eggs that were laid/buried on the beach, raising them for some time, and then releasing them back into the wild when the lil guys will have a fighting chance. I personally have a soft spot for turtles having had 3 pet ones at home once upon a time. These lil buddies who we happened to meet were going to be set loose New Year's Eve. That would have been a wonderful way to bring in the New Year, witnessing these turtles' fresh new start as a symbol of our own new beginning for 2003!

I apologize for the lack of visuals...pictures to come shortly, I promise!

Once we got back to our hotel we checked out some beach towels and changed into our swimsuits for some pool-time. (Surf was still strong that day. "Peligro!") We spent the remainder of our afternoon soaking in the pool, making eyes at the bartender (pool bar was only open weekends during low season) to get ourselves some chichis, playing in the fountain, and basically trying to keep cool.

Mmm, chichis! One girl asked the pool boy/cocktail waiter what was in a chichi and he misunderstood the question as being what was a chichi. At which point he blushed and made hand gestures simulating women's boobies. "So THAT'S why those girls were laughing with the bartender last nite!!!"

Never you mind. Una chichi mas, por favor!

Dinner tonight was held at the Barcelo. Some of you may recognize the chain name as they have a very high reputation amongst hotels/resorts. In my opinion it was not any more spectacular than the rest but it wasn't terrible, either. Actually, I enjoyed the dinner at the Riviera a lot more, earthquake and all. What the Barcelo did have, however, was a great dinner show. Caribe Tropical was the theme this night, a lotta booty-shaking on the stage. There was one dancer who could shake it like Shakira. And without any "jiggle" I may add! I was quite envious of her skills and lack of jiggle. For one routine she had a belt across her butt made of maraca-like bulbs and thus she became the percussion for the song. Quite talented.

The dancer who stole the show, however, was Oscar from the Dominican Republic. See? So memorable we even remembered his name. This guy had freakishly quick legs that just seemed to fly everywhere. You didn't truly appreciate just how fast he was dancing until you glanced over at another male dancer and noticed that guy barely even moving. Another thing about Oscar was that he was flamingly, absolutely, fabulously gay. He had sparkles on his bare stomach and in his buzzed hair, his shirt was tied chest high and he was loving his public. Loving it.

I heart Oscar from the Dominican Republic. Us travel agents should've packed him up and brought him back with us as a souvenir.

Another evening stroll along the beach. Stopped by the Fontan hotel to pick up some Cocos Frios/Cocos Locos. They're young coconuts with a hole poked into them so you can drink the coconut water out with a straw. Add like 9 shots of 3 different bottles of liquor and you get a coco loco. Trying to live in moderation, I stuck with the standard coco frio. We encountered some young Mexican adults having a little party on the beach...only song I recognized on their boombox was Madonna's Die Another Day, everything else was in Spanish, and not pop culture American Spanish. Wish we had taken a bit of time out of our "hectic" schedule that evening to join their partay a lil bit.

Never realized how heavy those coconuts are until we continued on our beach trek. Try carrying a bowling bball sized coconut full of liquid in one hand, your sandals in another, while trying to walk on the sand. The two cocos locos drinkers were not having much success at this task, obviously. We finally reached our hotel, some of us drenched in alcohol. The restaurant was closed so they couldn't open our coconuts for us so we could enjoy the meat. Took a little nibble from what we could scrape with our fingers then tossed the whole thing away. I wasn't going to hold onto that coconut overnight.

We cleaned up a bit and headed out to sample the nightlife at the reknowned Carlos N Charlies. Talk about prime location, our hotel was right next to C N C. Some very hot waiters there! (Side note: told Mijo about the one gorgeous waiter. He replied "And I bet he got gorgeouser with every tequila shot, huh?) One such waiter pulled me up onto the stage to join his troupe in a rendition of YMCA and a very twisted (and clothed, thankfully) version of the Hokey Pokey. "I put my sex in front, I put my sex behind, I put my sex in front and I shake it once or twice." Don't know if my roommate's pictures depict a more having-a-blast Leah or a more bewildered oh-my-virgin-eyes-and-ears Leah *lol*. (Yeah right, huh? *grins*)

The gorgeous waiter had a yummy concoction of tequila and blue curacao which he had in a glass teapot-looking device complete with spout. He'd cradle your chin with one hand, rest your head against his chest, tilt your head back, and pour that blue goodness into your eager mouth. My roommie did alright, Tall Girl, on the other hand, was a mess. I guess she panicked as her mouth became full and inevitably her instinct was to clear her mouth. Up came a huge gush of blueness! Our eyes widened at the sight, but then you caught a glimpse at how it threw off the hottie waiter and that brought us down in a fit of laughter. I didn't do too bad, but my mouth is kinda small so I didn't get as much as some of the other girls. I could understand how Tall Girl panicked, though. You realize that hottie waiter has no intentions of stopping the pouring of the blue stuffs down your throat and you have to figure out how to swallow with your mouth open let alone remember to breathe with your mouth open. I failed at this. Rather than spitting it all back up, though, I just closed my mouth to quickly swallow everything down, resulting in the blue stuffs running all down my closed lips and my chin. Hottie waiter had a towel, though, so all was good. Next time I go there I'll know what to do. That teapot of blue goodness will be all mine and I'll be a star! Hottie waiter will be all impressed and give me a yummy kiss of congratulations. *giggles* I better practice!

I was sad to leave Carlos N Charlies so early (they rage on until the dawn) but we had another big day ahead of us. Being good lil girls we somberly filed ourselves out of there. Bye bye cute crazy dancing waiter guy, adios hottie blue teapot waiter dood.

The waves again sang me to sleep, but now there was also the faint taunting of the music floating away from Carlos N Charlie's. Why didn't I hear the music last nite? I guess it was 'cuz now I knew what I was missing. *sigh*

I love Mexico.