food and weather

We have amazingly good vacation luck - especially where weather is concerned. The weather report we'd been watching before we got here showed partly cloudy skies and some rain. We worried a little. But we've only had rain once, during the night, and except for those couple of extraordinarily windy days, it's been perfectly gorgeous. Like today. Blue skies, constant breeze, cadet blue skies, drifting white clouds here and there. Big horizons and blue patchwork water, with white sand. Kind of breathtaking.

Too bad my back is too sunburned to snorkel. Despite several slatherings of sunblock with the embarrassing number 40 attached, my back got burned yesterday. Marc's sunburn is turning, of course, to a beautiful deep tan. So he went out without me this morning to snorkel at the point, up the beach from our hotel. He saw a couple of new kinds of fish, and hoped that I'll be unburned enough to go with him tomorrow. Me too.

Lunch the last couple of days has been disappointing, but today marked a return to yumminess. We had empanadas, really crisp and flaky. One was filled with cheese and potato, one with beans and cheese, and one with little bits of chicken and red peppers. They were hot and crunchy on the outside and really luscious on the inside. The salad was shredded cabbage, tomato chunks and thinly sliced radishes, with some cilantro and lime juice, I'd bet. The starter was watermelon cubes with fresh lime for squeezing, and the standard pico de gallo and black bean bowls for dipping chips into.

YUM I love watermelon.

weather

What you have to understand when you look at the scenery photos is that last year, Hurricane Dean came in and completely destroyed this whole part of the Yucatan coastline. Its eye passed over Mahuhual, which is 25km from here. The cabanas were destroyed, the trees were destroyed, everything, twisted wreckage or dead. It was the 2nd most powerful hurricane to hit the Yucatan since they've been keeping records, apparently.


It makes for some eerie landscapes. The sunset photo in the previous post looks like something from Apocalypse Now -- at least that's what I thought when I took the picture. It was devastating for the region; they'd just built a huge pier for cruise ships (destroyed). They'd just done a major renovation project on Mahuhual so it was cruise-ship-people friendly (i.e., mostly bars, restaurants, and tchotchke shops) - all destroyed.

This morning after breakfast we drove into Mahuhual to look for a new face mask to replace Marc's, since the strap was about to tear in half. It was like a ghost town, very very sad. They're rebuilding, and it is great looking for what it is. Photos to come. Still, it's very sad.

I'm feeling a little like Quasimodo, who went mad with the bells (the bells! the bells! the bells!), but for me it's the wind. It never stops blowing. Marcia said the winter has been very windy; today it's been ~23 miles per hour without stopping for even a second. It blows on my face all night, which makes my hair tickle my face and wakes me up. It blows in every corner of our cabana, when we're trying to get some sun on the beach, when we're doing any damn thing. Growing up in Texas, I'm used to the wind. But still. Good grief.

We went snorkeling again this afternoon, but the winds were so high the water was choppy with big waves so I came back to the shore after just 5 minutes or so. Marc continued on, snorkel trooper that he is, and had a nice look around. More starfish, more red and yellow and blue fish. I watched nervously from my chair on the beach, watching his red snorkel tip.

For lunch we had salbutes, which were amazingly wonderful. That's the pattern; breakfasts are very nice, lunches are amazingly wonderful (yesterday was chicken enchiladas in a homemade mole sauce that was so subtle and delicious), dinners are meh. Last night? Spaghetti with chicken or shrimp in the marinara sauce. Every day I forget to take my camera to lunch with me; tomorrow I hope I remember.

salbutes

Having a simply wonderful time. Sun and good food, relaxing and reading, wandering around together, walking on the beach. Really good times.

our route

So here's our route -- nothing too hard here. We'll fly from JFK in New York, directly to Cancun. We're renting a car at the Cancun airport, and we'll drive down the coast to our little place. The red line is the flight, the blue line is the drive:

And here is a bit more detail. We'll drive past Tulum and Xel-Ha, around the Sian Ka'an Reserve, down to Majahual and then back up to Mayan Beach Garden.

It's all great, but at this point the best part is that it's the day after tomorrow. Marc already packed our big bag (full of flippers and snorkel masks, flashlights and batteries, maps, suntan lotion, all the stuff you need for a beach vacation) and gathered all the papers we'll need. He's so good at arranging details and getting the whole shebang organized. Me, I'm just the lucky girl who shows up at the airport.

At this point, the weather is partly cloudy and mid-80s most of the time, but a 60% chance of rain a couple of days at the end of the vacation. Did I say I can't wait?

Usually I post a jpg of our ticket, but I'm way behind on this trip so here are the details, the old-fashioned way:

Wednesday April 02:
Leave JFK at 11:00am, arrive in Cancun at 1:20pm, AA1671

Wednesday April 09:
Leave Cancun at 3:00pm, arrive at JFK at 7:50pm, AA1674

And oh yeah, did I say that I'm really really excited and can't wait?