South of The Border

(Sorry Amy R., you already know all this too :) 

Just as I started getting into the swing of things with school, Luke and I left for the Mexican Riviera.  Seth and Amy (Luke's sister and brother-in-law) joined us and we had a great time. We went for a whole week, which made me nervous in respect to leaving the kids, but they held up alright.

Despite hurricane season the weather gave us no problems and the resort was great; I love all-inclusives. We enjoyed golfing, swimming, reading, relaxing, snorkeling, site seeing, and eating - a lot. The first day we were there I slept in, took a nap, and went to bed early. In between I ate and read books and hardly moved from my pool-side lounge chair. All that sitting around wore me out so I slept in the next day too :) 

A really cool place we went was a state park called Xel-ha. We rode bikes through the jungle to get to the mouth of the river. Then we snorkled down the river to where it met the ocean. We saw the largest school of fish I've even seen.  It was almost hypnotizing to see how that group of thousands of fish could move and turn all together. Suddenly I decided it would be fun to try and swim into the middle of the school and be surrounded by all those fish.  I started to swim slowly down into the center of the mass only to be met by a jelly fish swimming slowly up out of it. Mental note to self - trying to swim through a school of fish is a bad idea.  

On the same day, we toured the site of some Mayan ruins. They were amazing and the scenery was beautiful. It was just so dang hot and there were mosquitos everywhere so we didn't linger too long.  One morning we enjoyed riding ATV's on the beach and in the jungle (well, mostly enjoyed - I was holding on for dear life most of the time). We saw an alligator in a marshy spot in the jungle but I was without a camera. Oh well.  We took  some wave runners out on the ocean and the water was so clear I got an irresistible urge to go snorkeling again.  We joined a short afternoon snorkel excursion and it turned out to be one of the best snorkel experiences we've ever had. There was so much to see everywhere and several species I don't believe we've seen before. I kept a nice distance from any large schools that time.

One of the highlights for me was the sea turtles. We were walking back from dinner and this baby sea turtle was flip-flopping it's way across the side walk. Seth tried to point it to the ocean but it kept turning around, so he picked it up and started carrying it to the beach. Then we saw another, and another. When we got to the beach hotel security was there with a bucket full of baby turtles they were taking to the ocean. Without the moon on the water, the turtles were confused by the hotel lights and couldn't find their way to the water. We picked them up and held them and took pictures. Then I thought, "Aren't these endangered, and therefore illegal to touch?" Woops. But at least we were trying to save them while we were touching them.

It was a great week but like all good things, it had to come to an end. Home was waiting and in some ways I was glad to see it. What can I say? There's no place like home. Although, when you're not home, on the beach in Mexico is a very nice runner-up.