(Disclaimer: only my books are professionally edited. Not my blogs.)
April 13th
In 2006 I went to Cancun for 4 days to celebrate my new life after my divorce. While there, I traversed through the Mayan ruins deep in the Yucatan jungle, Chi-Chen-Itza. Due to my short stay, I never got to see the other Mayan ruins near Cozumel, Tulum.
I began researching our excursions for our Caribbean cruise and saw, to my delight, Tulum was included! Finally, after nearly 5 years, I had a chance to go. As I read through the description of the tour, they mentioned having to go to the main land via ferry boat. Our ship had to dock on the island of San Miguel De Cozumel because there was no where to dock on the main land. The part that troubled me was that the water may be rough and to take precaution.
Armed with Dramamine and bread products for breakfast, I headed to the dock. I was feeling good until I saw the “ferry.” It was an enclosed pontoon speed boat. I kept looking for the windows—there had to be windows. They were covered up with black netting!
I’m claustrophobic, and the thought of being stuck in that thing for 30-45 minutes made me feel uncomfortable.
I can’t get out.
I can’t see.
I wasn’t happy.
Tulum. Pretty water. Ruins. Anything but this.
They shut the doors. My heart nearly leapt out of my chest.
You can do this, I tried to encourage myself. My stomach wasn’t buying the psycho babble.
Most tours hand out complimentary drinks or a snack.
They handed out barf bags.
Oh, Holy Hell!
Then they started the TV with the sound at a piercing volume. I thought if I watched it, it would relax me. Focusing on it made me sick. Travis and I discovered if we closed our eyes it made us feel better. I had to work hard on finding my happy place. He fell asleep.
Finally the engine slowed; the doors opened. I couldn’t get out fast enough. But what greeted me made it worth while. Turquoise water caressed soft, white sand. A light wind tickled palm fronds lining the beach.
We were quickly herded into our excursion category and told we couldn’t shop at any of the stores. My husband saw a Green Bay Packers poncho hanging in one of the shops and vowed, come hell or high water, he’d buy one.
After a 45 minute bus ride and a 10 minute walk, we arrived at Tulum. It was beautiful, but was disappointed that the ancient buildings were roped off, including the grass. At Chi-Chen-Itza you get to climb and touch the buildings, except for the large pyramid. Too many people were falling off of it, and after climbing up to the observatory on small, damp steps, I could see why.
We only got to walk around for 45 minutes, which included the 10 minute walk back to the bus. This gave me little time to enjoy what I was seeing. It was click-a-picture-and-run.
They had workers in red shirts working on a few of the buildings who ended up in our photos, which was kind of annoying.
Tulum was worth seeing, but I didn’t have the same amazing experience as I did at Chi-Chen-Itza. I felt cheated on time to fully explore and interact with history.
The ride back to our ship loomed in the back of my mind. I kept asking God if it were possible to sit near a window this time. Maybe I could pull back the netting just enough to see. My prayer was answered when we were the first group on. I ran for the front row window.
This ferry was larger and had regular pull-down shades. Immediately, I opened the shade. I didn’t care what anyone said. Apparently no one else cared, either, because every shade was pulled up. The twelve miles back was much more enjoyable.
As soon as we docked, Travis ran for the shops. We had twenty minutes before we had to board ship. Travis started asking the shop vendors, who were relaxing outside, if they had the Packers poncho. Sure enough, one of them got up and found the item. Meanwhile, I found a Cozumel tee-shirt with the Mayan Calendar and a gecko that changed colors in the sun.
There were other items I wanted to buy, but we were short on time and Travis brought the wrong credit card. I personally think it was a plot to keep me from spending money.
That night we ate at our first specialty restaurant, The Murano. It was the best dinner I’ve ever eaten in my life.
To clean our pallet, we were given salmon mousse with caviar. In all honesty, it tasted like tuna fish and I don’t do caviar. I gave it to Travis who loved it. I had crispy, seared sweetbread followed by a fancy salad that looked like art while hubby had the warm goat cheese souffle and creamy maine lobster bisque.
The main course was the Surf and Turf, fillet minion with red wine veal sauce and the largest lobster I’ve ever seen done Thermidor style.
Dessert consisted of a selection of six shot-glasses filled with yummy goodness. After dessert, they gave us more chocolates. Now I’m a person who never, ever gives up sweets, but I was so full, I had them package it to go.
We decided to walk off the dinner. We made our way to the upper deck to walk the track around the ship.
Lesson: never walk in the wind with a flowy dress. A gust of wind came up behind me and blew the back of my dress nearly over my head so everyone could view my polka-dotted Victoria’s Not-So-Secret underwear. Frantically, I recovered the dress to its desired position.
I turned to see if anyone saw the display and, sure enough, there was a young guy behind me with a look on his face of shock. I just started laughing hysterically. Travis was clueless to the entire event.
That was a good way to end a perfect day for sure!
April 13th
In 2006 I went to Cancun for 4 days to celebrate my new life after my divorce. While there, I traversed through the Mayan ruins deep in the Yucatan jungle, Chi-Chen-Itza. Due to my short stay, I never got to see the other Mayan ruins near Cozumel, Tulum.
I began researching our excursions for our Caribbean cruise and saw, to my delight, Tulum was included! Finally, after nearly 5 years, I had a chance to go. As I read through the description of the tour, they mentioned having to go to the main land via ferry boat. Our ship had to dock on the island of San Miguel De Cozumel because there was no where to dock on the main land. The part that troubled me was that the water may be rough and to take precaution.
Armed with Dramamine and bread products for breakfast, I headed to the dock. I was feeling good until I saw the “ferry.” It was an enclosed pontoon speed boat. I kept looking for the windows—there had to be windows. They were covered up with black netting!
 |
| The Barf Boat, Cozumel Ferry. |
I can’t get out.
I can’t see.
I wasn’t happy.
Tulum. Pretty water. Ruins. Anything but this.
They shut the doors. My heart nearly leapt out of my chest.
You can do this, I tried to encourage myself. My stomach wasn’t buying the psycho babble.
Most tours hand out complimentary drinks or a snack.
They handed out barf bags.
Oh, Holy Hell!
Then they started the TV with the sound at a piercing volume. I thought if I watched it, it would relax me. Focusing on it made me sick. Travis and I discovered if we closed our eyes it made us feel better. I had to work hard on finding my happy place. He fell asleep.
Finally the engine slowed; the doors opened. I couldn’t get out fast enough. But what greeted me made it worth while. Turquoise water caressed soft, white sand. A light wind tickled palm fronds lining the beach.
After a 45 minute bus ride and a 10 minute walk, we arrived at Tulum. It was beautiful, but was disappointed that the ancient buildings were roped off, including the grass. At Chi-Chen-Itza you get to climb and touch the buildings, except for the large pyramid. Too many people were falling off of it, and after climbing up to the observatory on small, damp steps, I could see why.
 |
| Local inhabitant. |
We only got to walk around for 45 minutes, which included the 10 minute walk back to the bus. This gave me little time to enjoy what I was seeing. It was click-a-picture-and-run.
They had workers in red shirts working on a few of the buildings who ended up in our photos, which was kind of annoying.
Tulum was worth seeing, but I didn’t have the same amazing experience as I did at Chi-Chen-Itza. I felt cheated on time to fully explore and interact with history.
The ride back to our ship loomed in the back of my mind. I kept asking God if it were possible to sit near a window this time. Maybe I could pull back the netting just enough to see. My prayer was answered when we were the first group on. I ran for the front row window.
This ferry was larger and had regular pull-down shades. Immediately, I opened the shade. I didn’t care what anyone said. Apparently no one else cared, either, because every shade was pulled up. The twelve miles back was much more enjoyable.
As soon as we docked, Travis ran for the shops. We had twenty minutes before we had to board ship. Travis started asking the shop vendors, who were relaxing outside, if they had the Packers poncho. Sure enough, one of them got up and found the item. Meanwhile, I found a Cozumel tee-shirt with the Mayan Calendar and a gecko that changed colors in the sun.
There were other items I wanted to buy, but we were short on time and Travis brought the wrong credit card. I personally think it was a plot to keep me from spending money.
That night we ate at our first specialty restaurant, The Murano. It was the best dinner I’ve ever eaten in my life.
To clean our pallet, we were given salmon mousse with caviar. In all honesty, it tasted like tuna fish and I don’t do caviar. I gave it to Travis who loved it. I had crispy, seared sweetbread followed by a fancy salad that looked like art while hubby had the warm goat cheese souffle and creamy maine lobster bisque.
The main course was the Surf and Turf, fillet minion with red wine veal sauce and the largest lobster I’ve ever seen done Thermidor style.
Dessert consisted of a selection of six shot-glasses filled with yummy goodness. After dessert, they gave us more chocolates. Now I’m a person who never, ever gives up sweets, but I was so full, I had them package it to go.
We decided to walk off the dinner. We made our way to the upper deck to walk the track around the ship.
Lesson: never walk in the wind with a flowy dress. A gust of wind came up behind me and blew the back of my dress nearly over my head so everyone could view my polka-dotted Victoria’s Not-So-Secret underwear. Frantically, I recovered the dress to its desired position.
I turned to see if anyone saw the display and, sure enough, there was a young guy behind me with a look on his face of shock. I just started laughing hysterically. Travis was clueless to the entire event.
That was a good way to end a perfect day for sure!
 |
| Our sunset for the evening. |
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