Riviera Maya January 2016

(It's been almost 2 weeks since we got back, and I just barely finished unpacking my bags yesterday. In denial that it's really over! :) )

Riviera Maya - January 24-30 2016
10 year anniversary celebration

We had SO much fun on this trip. It was our first vacation with just the 2 of us, and we enjoyed 'almost' every minute. (We left Sunday morning, and it took me until Monday morning to finally stop worrying about the kids... specifically Charlie... ;) ).

We stayed at the Iberostar Playa Paraiso in Riviera Maya, and were told by several people we met that it's the best place to stay. I haven't experienced anything else down there, but can't imagine anything being as amazing.  The hotel grounds were beautiful and huge. People were constantly working on the gardens, cleaning, and painting. Everything looked perfect.  There were about a million pools all over the hotel (no exaggeration ;) ), and lots of restaurants, snack bars, and shops.  Plus the amazing beach.  It was all inclusive, so we enjoyed lots of virgin pina coladas, coco locos, and several ice cream cones each day. Plus all the amazing meals.  The breakfast, lunch, and dinner buffets were all delicious, and huge.
Here's Spencer about to enjoy a chip with some sort of green pepper for breakfast:

Right after I snapped this picture, he took a bite and about died. Turns out it was a habanero pepper, and hotter than normal. He's a spicy food lover, but Mexican spice about did him in.  A few days later we were eating tacos from a little taco shop on the hotel property. We asked for a variety of tacos, and I happened to bite into one that was super spicy. I immediately spit out my bite, and Spencer grabbed the taco to try it out himself. (Just thought I was being a wimp... funny story about that later...)  He ate almost the whole taco before he realized I wasn't kidding.  His face turned bright red and he had tears coming out of his eyes. We had to run over to an ice cream shop nearby and get an ice cream cone and lemonade to help him out. I wish I got a picture. :)

**Spencer told this story to the kids when we got back .  They thought it was so fun and talked about it a lot.  A few days later, David was telling the story and said dad called me a 'jerk' when I ate the taco.  We had to talk about the difference between 'jerk' and 'wimp'. :)

We loved seeing our towel animals every day when we went back to our room.

It was so fun to walk along the beach by our hotel. The first few days the waves were huge and so fun to play in.  Every day we would go for a walk down the beach.  To the north there were more private beach front houses, which then ended in a large wall that stopped our exploration in that direction. We could walk as far as we wanted to the South, so we went that way several times.  It was just trees and jungle for about 20 minutes, and then a huge abandoned hotel.  It was kind of cool to see.

Our hotel beach is in the background, from where we are standing up to that white building near the water in the background.

South of our hotel, jungle area between us and the abandoned hotel:

Every time I look at this picture I think I caught a rainbow glare on my camera, but it's actually a huge pile of twisted up rope of all colors.

The abandoned hotel:

*We were both so sure we were going to gain weight on this trip, since we'd be relaxing and eating a ton. We were shocked to discover we had both lost weight when we got home. Must have been all that walking. :)

The grounds on our hotel were beautiful.  Lots of huge open grassy areas, trees, and flowery bushes.  There were also tons of peacocks, coati, and iguanas.  We did a bike tour of our hotel one day, and it was an hour long going to all the different areas. (There are 5 different Iberostar hotels on the one property).

Our dinner reservations for 5 of the nights we were there.  We went to a Brazilian restaurant, a Steakhouse, a Cajun restaurant, French, and one more... I'll have to zoom in on the picture to see (haha, it was the Mexican restaurant). All of them were delicious, but the steakhouse and the French were probably my favorites.

A pretty pavilion in the open space right outside our hotel room:

Beautiful outdoor walkway in the main lobby, restaurant, theatre area of our specific hotel. Both sides of the walkway were open to water, with no railings.  I was always happy I didn't have Charlie with me when we walked in this area. ;)

You can see 4 of the millions of pools in this picture. We only came to this area once, it was further away from our room. There are 5 hotel 'sections' at the Iberostar, and 3 different entertainment teams. One for the lower 2, one for the middle 2, and one for the 'adults only' hotel.  The entertainment team (star friends) was one of my favorite parts of staying here.  We were at the middle 2 hotels, and our team was so much fun to watch.  There was constant singing, dancing, and activities going on.

2 of the many iguanas we saw during our stay:

A walkway in our hotel:

The beach:

They did a show every night, and completely redecorate the stage for the show's theme daily. The shows were amazing! I couldn't believe all the practice that went into them.  Our first night was a magic show and I was really impressed.  It was the best one I've ever seen, granted I haven't been to many magic shows. ;) The next night was the Rock Show where they sang and danced to lots of popular rock songs through the decades.  Another night was Boogie Nights which had lots of singing and dancing as well.  Our last night was a pirate night, which I wasn't as impressed with. It used a lot of audience participation and didn't have much singing and dancing.
The shows started at 9:30 and went on for an hour, followed by live music and dancing.  For an hour beforehand the Star Friends would play games and sing, with a show by the kids club before that. I'll post some video at the end.

Tulum Mayan Ruins - Thursday January 28th

We went on a guided tour through Alma's LDS Tours to Tulum, Coba, and a Cenote.  I loved this day of our trip! We'd had a lot of fun relaxing at our hotel, and it was nice to get out and see the area.  (We were supposed to go deep sea fishing Wednesday, but they had to cancel due to the large waves.)

It was so interesting seeing all the old buildings and structures, and hearing all the details that went into them.  I loved our tour guide - he had so much to say about each of the structures, I wish I had filmed it all.  The picture above was one of the temples at Tulum.  You can see a flat surface behind the 2 columns, and he said that was a bed, and talked about how they could make mattresses with something that had to do with chicklets... see, I should have recorded it. ;)

The main temple up on the hill:

If you look closely, you can see several iguanas hanging out of a hole on this building. This was a smaller temple below the main temple.  There was a special gap between stone walls up on the main building, which allowed light to shine down straight into this hole on a certain day of the year. (April 6 maybe?)

Another view of the smaller temple: (The couple in this picture is from Lehi and was also on our tour with us, along with a couple from near Brigham City celebrating their 20 year anniversary, as well as 2 couples from Idaho who had been in a bishopric together and now like to take vacations together every year. They were all lots of fun to visit with).

You can see some pictures in the upper rectangles in this picture, along with the profile of a face along the left side of a picture where someone's finger is.

This is the gap in the upper walls that let sun shine through to that tiny hole on the lower temple:

The building behind me has a special little whistle on top that would warn if a hurricane was coming soon. If the wind was blowing in a certain way, it would enter a hole in the wall and be funneled up to a little cylinder on top and let out a loud whistle sound.

There is a wall all around the outer edge of Tulum, with 2 entrances.  Each of them were at least 10 feet wide.

Lunch outside Coba - Thursday January 28th

We took an hour bus ride inland from Tulum to another Mayan Ruins site called Coba.  This one is not as popular, but I enjoyed it a lot more.  This restaurant is right outside the ruins, and is where we stopped for lunch. Yummy tacos and salads.

Coba Mayan Ruins - Thursday January 28th

You can see piles of rocks covered in trees in the background. It's some of the ruins that are still covered.  Our guide said that only 1/3 of the ruins have been uncovered so far.

We got to ride bikes around these ruins:

Our first stop was the large pyramid.  Only one side of it has been uncovered, so you can see all the trees growing up everywhere else:

This was one of my favorite parts, because we were actually able to climb to the top of it.  It was super steep, and a little scary. Especially coming back down.  Lots of people have come down in the sitting position, which has done some nice polishing to the rocks in the center, making them especially slippery.  We were encouraged to climb down a little further out, and sideways.

Our view from the top. Our guide said to look for any of the mounds out in the trees, and that's where there's more large ruins that still have not been uncovered.

The view for the climb down: (don't look down...)

One of the smaller pyramids:

The Mayans built a road all the way from Coba to Chichen Itza.  It was a raised pile of rocks about 15-20 feet wide.  It was built with a curve down in the middle which was sealed off and filled with water. They would then fill that with rocks, using the water as a guide to make it flat.

The game arena at Coba.  Kind of a crazy game, where the winners were honored by being beheaded.

Another huge pyramid at Coba:

Coba Cenote Thursday January 28th

This was so much fun, and a little creepy at the same time. :) Our guide said it's been rainy, so the water on the platform down below might come up to our ankles.  It was up to our knees, and there were lots of little fish swimming around. (One of my fears...) The water was super deep, so I was a little nervous swimming around down there in the dark with mysterious fish. But Spencer was brave and jumped from one of the platforms.  He was dealing with a migraine by this time, so didn't venture up to the highest platform, but would have had he felt better.

Spencer preparing to jump from the 'lower' platform:

This was the opening to the Cenote.  These are found all over the area, where the limestone has worn away and an opening has formed.

Xel Ha - Friday January 29th

Since our deep sea fishing/ snorkeling adventure was cancelled on Wednesday, we decided to venture out to Xel Ha on Friday. It is a snorkeling park about an hour from our hotel, in an inlet right along the Caribbean Sea. It was a little cooler that day, which made it a little harder for me to get in the water. But I had fun snorkeling around for about an hour. We saw SO many fish, all different sizes and colors. It was amazing.  Spencer spent another hour or two snorkeling around later in the day while I sat on the beach and read.

We also got to ride bikes at Xel Ha, wander around in beautiful garden areas, tube down a tunnel of mangroves and into the inlet area, and other activities. We crossed a huge rope where you stand on one rope and hold onto another above your head. That was an adventure, and my arms were dead by the time I finally fell off.  Spencer enjoyed a couple of trips down the zip line while my arms recovered. He also braved the cliff jump.

This was kind of cool - our tour guide at the Mayan ruins showed us the two trees that work together.  One of them has black powdery sap coming out of it that will make you super itchy if you touch it, and another one will make the itching stop. So if you see one of these trees, look around and you will find the other nearby.

The rope swing: Spencer went on this several times.  I went on it twice, but chose not to land in the water. :) (I was cold... ;) )

This is the area we snorkeled in the most, there were so many great fish here. It was crazy to be so near them.  Spencer took a bunch of video with his gopro, so we'll have to put some up here once he's picked out the best.

Saturday morning on the beach. I went down our last morning to say goodbye. It was so peaceful! There were no waves that morning, it was so calm.  Our last day we enjoyed great meals, and relaxing by the pools and reading.  It was such an amazing, relaxing, fun trip.

This first video is of the Cenote near Coba:

One of the songs and dances from the nightly shows. This is from 'Movie Night'.  Someone told us most of the performers in the resort shows are from Cuba, with a lot from Mexico as well. Our airport shuttle driver told us Play Del Carmen has grown a ton in the past few years because of all the people coming in from all over the world to work at the resorts. Mainly from lots of different parts of Mexico, but also from all the outlying islands.

These are some Coati we saw at Xel Ha. They were all over the place, both there and at our hotel.

Spencer on the rope swing at Xel Ha:

The dolphins jumping at Xel Ha:

The Star Friends were great at explaining everything quickly in Spanish and English. It was a little tough to follow along sometimes, with how fast they would go. Sometimes it was hard to tell which language they were speaking.

A few more memories:

The 2nd night was the Rock Show, which is the most popular event there.  Earlier in the day we'd seen a guy down on the beach who was drunk and playing in the water with what looked like maybe his wife or sister and his dad. He and his dad were wrestling and wacked into the girl really hard. It looked painful. (She was pretty drunk too, so didn't get too upset about it, but was in pain).  The night of the rock show their family sat right next to us. Super loud, super drunk, super obnoxious.  The guy kept getting up and walking up to the runway they'd extended out from the stage to give the singers 5.  We finally moved to the back of the theater to get away from them.  We saw them our 2nd to last night at the Mexican restaurant, drunk again and talking super loud. Everyone else in the restaurant was furious, and they happened to sit us right next to them.  We eventually moved to the other side of the restaurant, and the waiters spoke with them several times about quieting down.

There were several things that made me laugh while we were there. One thing was the choice of music at the kids club. There was an area with several huts for kids to hang out and watch movies and do arts and crafts while their parents relaxed. There was always loud, upbeat music playing there, and I had to laugh at several of the songs they played, one of which was 'Hotline Bling'.

The Star Friends had a song that they were constantly singing, with a sound that Spencer loved to mimic.  I'm sad I never got a good clip of it, but check out  this link.  (This version is with the kids club singing along, but you get the idea).

A map of our hotel. We were staying in the blue section. Most of the red shapes are the buildings with hotel rooms. We were in the building that is a large red square with a green square in the middle of it.