Sunday, October 24, 2010

Welcome to the Jungle

I can´t seem to decide what´s worse, trying to avoid pot holes while driving, or trying to avoid crabs while driving. At night the crabs come out to feed, then scurry back to the ocean to breathe. Unfortunately for the crabs, this requires them to cross roads, which is the equivalent of surviving an air raid in 1940´s London. I try to avoid the crabs, but sometimes I think I´m the only idiot swerving quickly to protect an animal known for cannibalism. Colleen and I have seen signs to try and protect the crabs, don´t eat them, etc, etc. But I think it´s hard for a country to protect a semi-aquatic species when your citizens and tourists are running over them.

We´ve eaten at a few carts along the side of the road. The one thing about this that have to say is whatever Mexico is doing to its beef, the U.S. better adopt pronto. From a mexican cart I´ve had one the best burgers ever. I haven´t had ground beef taste like that in years. It puts every restaurant I´ve been to to shame. Cheaper and more delicious. And no case of the runs. Sometimes you might get that from McDonald´s.

Today we´ve went to Hidden Worlds and took the Ultimate Adventure pack. This included a sky cycle, zip line, snorkeling, rapelling, roller coaster zip line and snorkeling a cenote. All for a fairly reasonable price. We also zip lined into water in the cenote, which was one of the more fun events for me. We went twice, forwards and backwards. It´s hard to describe the feeling of a drop off rushing away from you while zipping down a line and not being able to see where exactly you´ll hit the water. The roller coaster zip line was really awesome, just imagine a regular zip line, that goes up and down through the jungle, down a water slide, into a cenote into cool water. All under the power of gravity. The roller coaster does have a few kinks however. The couple we were with were having a great time, but the guy got stuck in the middle of the roller coaster, twice. He went down the first time and got stuck in the cavern above the water. Our guide told him to push off the roof of the cavern. The second time, his whole handle bar came undone, and he dropped. Fortunately he was on the water slide when this happened, but this slide is about
40 feet above the water, and shallow water at that. Our guide had to go up, climb into the slide, and help him out. Perhaps a weight limit would be advisable.

Colleen has been very demanding. She peeled and cracked a coconut, to get to the milk inside, only to find it was rotten. So she found a more healthy looking coconut and went for a second go at it. It turns out non rotten coconuts are harder to get into. One of the cabana staff came by and saw her working tirelessly on this coconut. He told her it wasn´t right and there would still be no milk inside. She stopped and giggled and thanked him. He then said would go grab some coconuts and open them for us. We told him it wasn´t necessary, but Colleen must have given him some kind of look, because he showed up with two coconuts opened and straws poking out of the top for us to enjoy.

Drinking from a coconut. I thought I could only do that with Bugs Bunny or Daffy Duck. I miss Looney Tunes.

We watched the full moon rise last night, then the sun rise this morning. Sometimes you´ll see pictures of a full moon next to a sun, or in mid-day. The sheer mechanics of this are mind boggling, as it is impossible. However, I did see a full moon in daylight, but the circumstances must be right. It should be about a day after the true full moon, that way the moon wont set as the sun rises. As the sun rises, you can watch the moon lower in the sky, all the while the sky becomes more blue. After the sun completely rises, the moon should still be above the horizon. You also have to have no clouds, did I mention that? That one is important.

Oh, yeah, we crashed a wedding. I´m glad no one did that to us. We were looking for a party on the beach and we found one, just not the right one. That´s the problem with having a wedding on a public beach, it might get confused with some other celebration, like a moon rising party.

2 comments:

  1. Grandma Fern says she's happy to hear from you. She was thinking she wouldn't. Glad to hear your having fun. Glad when your home!

    Pam: Love having a great vacation through you! Blog on. Kisses

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