Day 7 – Bite the bullet –
Playa Del Carmen
After spending the usual lazy
morning, we were at a bit of a loss of what to do. Neither of us fancied
getting on a crammed and hot local bus again. The wind was up too so no guarantees
of spotting turtles. After a bit of debate, we decided we would bite the bullet
and head to Playa Del Carmen, find some shade, and try to ignore the irritating
loud yanks.
It’s about a 20-minute stroll
to the beach where you must run the gauntlet, fending off hawkers selling tacky
overpriced tat, restaurant owners and boat ticket sellers. We then walked a
further 15 minutes along the beach to try and find some shade, we didn’t!
Our options were: A. head back to the apartments and the mozzie
infested pool or, B. suck it up and sit in the sun. We decided on the latter as
there was a lovely breeze
We had a cooling off dip where
we entertained ourselves practicing a couple of endurance exercises we had seen
on a marine survival download we had recently watched. Opting NOT to do the
backward crab in the shallows where the water laps into your nose and you must
hold the position because: A. Glenn can’t do a crab, B. I didn’t think the sun
worshipers would appreciate a view of my lady garden and C. we would both look like
a couple of complete pratts!
Instead, we started with
swimming with your arms tied behind your back, harder than you would imagine but
I won, coz I’m ‘floaty’.
Glenn, who isn’t floaty at all
and sinks like a stone, quickly moved onto the next exercise which was standing
waist height in the water, arms tied behind your back and diving down to
retrieve a mask (we didn’t have a mask so just improvised and had to make it to
the bottom). As predicted, Glenn did this with ease.
My turn and given I need to
strap the weight of an obese small child to me in order to submerge when Scuba
Diving, I wasn’t feeling hopeful, like I said I’m very ‘floaty’. After a bit of
coaching from Glenn, ensuring I had no more air in my lungs, I dived. Eureka, I
touched the bottom, unfortunately with my nose grazing along the sand, that’s
going to look pretty when I get back!
Exhausting all options here, we
headed in to dry off, eat our rolls before lathering ourselves in layers of
lotion. Feeling decidedly greasy and uncomfortable, we then pegged ourselves
out in the sunshine, in the hope that some shade would become available soon.
It worked for a short while
until the wind decided to pick up a pace and smother our sticky skin in layers
of sand. Humph!
Another dip to get rid of the
sand and there was nothing else for it. (Shel followed by Glenn) headed for a
slither of sand, shoe-horning ourselves amongst fellow shade seekers, both
taking great care not to meet our new neighbour’s
stern glances at us encroaching on their now very tight personal space.
We managed to stay there (we
really aren’t beach people) until around 4:30 where we made the long traipse
back to the apartment, stopping off for supplies on the way.
The evening was spent polishing
off Glenn’s Chilli, a bottle of red and chilling.
Day 8 - Our last day, what to do? Do nothing!
Our plan today was to spend our
last day on Turtle beach. However, waking up, neither of us really fancied the
trek, plus it was still quite windy and no Turtle guarantee. We would have a
long travel day tomorrow, have seen lots of beaches and turtles and not too
fussed about coming back tanned. So instead we settled down to keep ourselves
busy by doing not a lot a lot at all.
We had to vacate our apartment
at some point to get it cleaned so we ventured down as far at the outside communal
area around noon, neither of us fancying going to the next-door pool to be
snacked on by mozzies.
It’s a weird set-up here at our
apartments, lots of people seem to be retired long-term residence escaping the
winter cold. Mainly French, or French Canadian. It’s nice though and we are
feeling guilt free about not doing a lot whilst we are here, it was always our
plan. Plus it’s nice to be the youngest for a change!
Another uninteresting fact (you
can see I’m trying to fill the page). There’s a tip box in our apartment and In
the hope that we will be stuffing it with the kind of money that doesn’t rattle
come the end of our stay, we’ve[ some rather artfully arranged towels left each day by the maid. They
exceeded themselves with yesterday efforts as not only did they arrange the
bath towels but we had weird and wonderful heart-shapes made from the handtowels
too. However, I think they thought we were checking out today and not tomorrow
as the today’s towels have been un-ceremonially dumped on the bed, and the
cleaning looks a bit iffy too.
The rest of the afternoon was
spent catching up with the blog (right up to date now), reading and lying in hammocks,
with some attempt at preparing for home by sorting out insurance, phones etc.
By the way, did we tell you?
Our super-duper and very expensive GOLD cover insurance company has a clause
outlined in teeny weeny tiny small-print on a back page? They don’t cover
mobile phones! Whilst we are both glad that we haven’t had to use it for the
most important reason, our heath, it would have been nice to be covered for the
2nd most important thing, Glenn’s Android and my I-phone!
We managed to cobble some
leftovers for our evening meal. It’s amazing how far you can stretch 4
tomatoes, a few eggs, some leftover chorizo and a stale roll!
Opting to spend our last night
home and save our pennies for new soft furnishings for Glenn’s flat (well,
Shell more than Glenn here), we had a few drinks, watched a bit of TV, both of
our minds turning towards home.
Day 9 – ‘And now the time
has come’
Or more to the point ‘tell me
why I don’t like Monday’s’...managing to avoid that horrible Monday feeling for
16 months, today we got it in spades! The alarm didn’t signal the start to a
new working week, but the end of our 16-month adventure together.
We fly to Gatwick from Cancun
around 5pm local time tonight. Our transfer is booked and we have our room till
1pm so all that’s left to do is pack.
We are wandering around the
apartment in autopilot packing. But this time with a difference, discarding
long cared for and now unwanted items.
Out with those hole ridden knickers…point
to note, don’t buy anything trimmed with lace if you intend it to last for 16
months, it won’t, my backside looked like a bag of marbles towards the end! Out
with those chewed up bits of soap we thought we should keep, just in case. Out
with the stained and raggedy clothes, you’ve served your purpose, it’s time to
go.
We arrive at Gatwick around 7am
tomorrow UK time and as we lost our jackets, we are hoping the UK weather will
take pity on us.
But we are so excited to be
seeing our family again, we’ve missed you all! first stop to Maidstone where we will be
staying with my wonderful Mum and Des who has my favourite dinner waiting, cold
ciders and ales in the fridge, my family knows me so well!
We won’t be
unpacking for quite a time, March will be a bit of a road trip, visiting and
catching up with family and ending with a trip to Jersey to see Glenn’s
parents, Sandy and John. I can’t wait to see the reunion between Glenn and his
mum, I reckon it will be a real tear jerker! Really looking forward to seeing
you all.
So whilst we
are feeling a little bit melancholy, it’s time to come home and it will be ‘Good
to touch the green green grass of home’ (couldn’t resist!)
Don’t worry,
we wont finish the blog with that really cheesy ending, we aim to post a
summary of our experience too to round everything up.
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