Mexico or Bust

Since I last went on a out of country journey we have added a new family member to our pair of two.  So now I have married an Indian and had his baby!  Six months after Marley entered the world it was time for our baby girl to get a stamp in that blank passport of hers.  My traveling friend from before I had a baby Laura Mullkoff agreed to go on an international adventure with the Peanut and I.  After two hours of planning we headed to Mexico, the trip started out on a high note with an upgrade to first class!  We landed in Mexico and cleared immigration in record time.  The adventure really began in the car park of the car rental facility.  In order to rent a car we needed to have a credit card hold for the value of the card, neither of our credit card companies were willing to authorize a $7000 bill from Mexico.  As we were trying to figure out cellular service (yea we were renting a car from a place that didn’t have a phone) Marley blew out her diaper with an Epic brown movement.  Here was the moment I was waiting for having to change a diaper in a country that doesn’t have those fancy tables that come out of the wall in restrooms.  I quickly set up a changing area for Marley on the ground and used a pack of wipes to get fecal matter out of all of her rolls and every inch of her car seat.  We finally got a car (the size of a match box) and we loaded up and were off to Tulum.  Our lovely rental place also didn’t have a map so we were working off a Lonely Planet and a print off of google maps (half the ink because laura’s printer was out).  Once we set off down the road we realized that our car had no gas.  We pulled over to a gas station with an attendant, opps we have no Mexican Currency!!! They don’t have pay at the pump and only take cash.  The attendant said he would take US dollars (of course) but in our two hour planning session we didn’t look up the exchange rate.  We are extremely out of traveling shape and underestimated Mexico!  All gassed up ($30 USD with 15 M in change) we drove 150 km down the coast hoping to find our hotel.  Once we entered Tulum which is a happening little backpacking strip with lots of taco stands we looked for our hotel.  Well driving around randomly didn’t pan out too well and asking store owners didn’t work either.  The people who spoke Spanish we couldn’t understand and the people who spoke English didn’t know where they were.  One internet store, one taxi driver, two stops at hotels and one acquired bad map we made it to Villa H2O where we arrived in a lovely room.  We then headed out to a late night taco joint drank our Mexican sodas and enjoyed freshly made tortillas (all for the small amount of change from our gas station experience. 

The next morning we ate breakfast pool side and swam.  We walked into town and found an ATM and espresso.  We had a great lunch and headed off to Gran Cenote.  Cenotes are prevalent in this area and are basically large caves filled with fresh water.  It was an amazing escape from the warm weather where we could swim from cave to cave and look up and see the bats hanging over head and the fish swimming below in crystal clear water.  Marley was reluctant to get in the cold water but once in she was loving the cool water and all the amazing things to look at.  That evening we headed to the beach to dine on the rocks as the sun set.  We finally got our first margaritas of the trip and had a superb evening!