Our Trip to Playa

On April 26, 1996 Tevia Marie Webb was kind enough to marry me over the altar in the House of the Lord in Mesa, Arizona. This year marks the 10th anniversary of that life-changing moment, and I wanted to do something special to comemorate it. In the end we decided to go to Mexico - a place south of Cancun, Mexico and just south of Playa del Carmen. We ended up getting an all inclusive resort called the Palladium Colonial.

We were fortunate enough to have my mother come out to watch the kids during our trip. It was even better having Jacob and Cari (and Cari's sister Nicole) visit as well. Thanks for working on the fences by the way! Great job.

Tevia and I flew out on Thursday morning, May 11. We packed light with just carry-ons as to avoid losing baggage. The flights to Dallas and then Cancun were uneventful. Upon arrival in Cancun we were reminded of how nice dry heat is. It was very humid. We headed out of the airport to meet our shuttle to our resort. On the way out Tevia was distracted by a guy who wanted to talk to us. In an effort to be nice we stopped and wasted a good 30 minutes getting a sales pitch, but we eventually got on our way.

Our shuttle was shared with a few other people. We would be stopping at two resorts prior to ours (which is one of the furthest south resorts on the peninsula). We had tried to avoid Cancun as we imagined it being very "touristy" and I pictured it full of white trash drunkards. Our shuttle didn't do much to break my stereotype as the people going to the first resort were already drunk (we just got off the plane!) and looked like they were ready to party. They were very nice, though, so I don't want it to seem like they were awful people.

After about an hour and a half we landed at our resort. On the trip we noticed a lot of the hurricane damage from last hurricane season. It was pretty bad especially further north by Cancun. Our resort was beautiful. We had stuck to our budget but were really looking for something great. I must say that the first evening there even exceeded my expectations. It was gorgeous. The lobby was amazing and there were bridges through the jungle and the perpetual breeze (which would stick around the whole time) brought some relief from the heat and humidity.

That night we walked around and went down to the beach, which was beautiful white sand. The beach at night was deserted (it would be every night) and we enjoyed some time in the breeze. I enjoyed being there with my wife of ten years and felt very blessed and humble to be there. We went to sleep in our little cabana which was just yards away from the beach. The room was awesome and had a bathroom with a shower outside which I loved.

Friday we spent most of the time at the beach. The sand was so white and fine, due to the reef which was visible. It wasn't very crowded. We went kayaking that first day, which Tevia loved. Most of the day was spent relaxing and enjoying each other. Our resort was set up so you could snorkel just on our beach. I grabbed my snorkel stuff and went out for an hour and a half among the reef looking at beautiful fish and a wonderful reef. I loved it. Though I did forget that your back is exposed to the sun while snorkeling, so I got a little red. We had dinner that evening at the Brazilian restaurant, which really wasn't very Brazilian. That was one of the only disappointments of the whole trip.

Saturday we rented a car (Tevia's idea) and went down to Tulum in the morning. Tulum is an old ruins city on the coast. It was a walled city on the beach and had some amazing architecture and a beautiful beach. Afterwards we looked at the street vendors and Tevia bought a double hammock. We were able to get it for nearly half the price they offered thanks to Tevia's good looks and some Spanish. I was able to use my Spanish a lot. It wasn't necessary, but it certainly gave us an advantage at many points. It was a lot of fun.

That afternoon we drove up to Playa del Carmen which is fast becoming a tourist town like Cancun. The beach is public and there is a ferry that goes out to Cozumel. The beach was nice but was regular "yellow" sand. We were glad our resort had the nice white sand. We walked the beach and went down "avenida 5a" which is their Fifth Avenue. We bought a few trinkets, but most of the prices were too high as they were more for tourists.

That evening, and I could be confusing this with Sunday evening, Tevia and I went on one of our many walks along the beach. We found a hammock on the beach and laid on it for a couple of hours talking about life and laughing. Tevia had the giggles and made up a new nickname for me: Butt Whistle Wall. This was probably my favorite part of the trip.

Sunday was another relaxing day. Beaches and walks. That evening we walked along the whole shore of the resort, which was probably near two miles. This was also beautiful as the southern side of the resort had less beach and more rocks. They had a salt water pool that had water from the ocean in it - so there were actually fish in it. Tevia wouldn't like that. In fact, the beach in front of our room had a lot of large, white angel fish in it. If you took some food out (which you could get from the bar at the beach which served food 24 hours) the fish would go crazy and swim all around you. I tried to get Tevia to come out and take a picture. She did but then freaked out as it was too much for her. I loved it.

Monday Tevia wanted to work on her tan so we spent a lot of time on the beach. I must say that this trip was very similar to our honeymoon and fifth anniversary where we spent most of the time relaxing and with each other. Not much touristy stuff here. It was ideal. Monday night we went to the Mexican restaurant which was okay. The food at the resort is all included (in fact, so is the alcohol), and they had buffets around the resort where you could eat. They then had a few sit down restaurants where you had to make reservations (we chose Brazilian and Mexican). The food was okay as I am not a fan of buffet food. Most of the food was European (the resort was more for Europeans - not as American as some of the northern resorts). This ended up being good because we were not tempted to eat a lot and hence gain a lot of weight. Though I did drink many pina coladas (virgen of course).

Tuesday was our day to come home. By this time I was thinking in Spanish and English was getting difficult. Our trip home was uneventful besides a huge line at the Cancun airport. But we made our flights and got home late that evening.

The one thing I left out was a warning from some of our friends about the Playa del Carmen area. They told us that many people go topless in this area. We were prepared for this and certainly I wasn't worried or anything. The funny thing is that for the first two days we were there we did not see one topless person. We eventually just assumed we weren't going to see anything. The third day changed that. I ran into one woman walking the beach who was topless. After that it was like a trend. More and more people took off their bikini tops. I learned a couple of things from this experience. One: most breasts actually don't look all that great without a nice supportive article of clothing. Two: the novelty wears off quickly. After the first day it didn't even seem all that odd. In the end, I think bikinis are much more sexy. I told Tevia that I'm not really a breast guy, but more of a "butt" guy. The odd thing is that with all of the topless people, we only saw one thong the whole time. I guess I was out of luck. :-)