Friends, fun and lots of sun......Cozumel

La Lobsteria. Perfect first meal in Cozumel. We were the only people in the restaurant aside from the owner/server and the cook.

Cheers to finally arriving to vacation! Dead car battery, cancelled flight, rushed check-in to make an extra flight, delayed flight, sleeping in the airport, long wait for the ferry, extra rough sea....but despite it all, we have ARRIVED! If we only would have saw the "cash only" sign before we started ordering all these drinks and lobster!! These are the moments memories are made of......

Beach club with happy hour from 1-3PM, yes please! And the view was wonderful too =)

We spent one evening at the Festival of el Cedral. It is a local festival in this abandoned town of el Cedral; locals live here only a week a year during the festival. This is a festival that celebrates the Mayans returning to the island of Cozumel after the Spanish brought small pox to the island forcing the Mayans inland where they lived for 500 years. Its a Mayan street fair with rusty (EEK!) carnival rides, delicious local food, a steer taunt? (We never figured out exactly what we were watching in the top picture. We were only part of a handful of white people at the festival and the language barrier made communication mostly about pointing! We were told this event would start at 5. Men dressed in costumes that changed to drag that changed back to costumes ran around and taunted these steers. Eventually they would return the steer to the shoot and bring another one out. More and more locals kept filling the stadium so we thought, maybe this is the build-up to the MAIN event. An hour and a half later of watching this taunting, everyone went back into the shoot, the locals got up and everyone left. That was it?!?!? ) In our wanderings we also came upon a cock fight. Despite feelings of right or wrong for the practice, it was amazing to be witness to this local pastime. I will say that the owners of the roosters were so friendly with each other, it was all jesting in fun and they tried their best to help us understand what was going on even though we only understood maybe 2 words they said!!

We missed getting to celebrate the 2nd birthday of this sweet girl while we were gone. Good thing we now she received lots of loving on her special day <3 br="">

On our Polaris tour we visited the natural wetland area on the south end of the island where the crocodiles roam free! This guy was swimming right under the dock we were standing on. We also snorkeled but didn't see as much colorful wildlife as we hopes. Our tour took us to the San Gervasio ruins. These ancient ruins are actually in the center of the island. The cobble road lead from either coastline to the center of the town. In the above arch, you can see a low flat table. This was the place the people deemed unworthy of entering the city had to leave their offerings and then return down the same path back to the beach. From the ruins we headed for some tequila tasting. Before you shiver at the thought of tequila, let me tell you personally that true Mexican tequila is delicious!!

Our Polaris =) The lighthouse at Punta Sur- very picturesque. Neal and I enjoyed lounging/swinging in the shade at the lighthouse. Tourist picture at the top of the lighthouse to round out our lighthouse pictures.

Nachi Cocom all-inclusive beach club. White sand, drinks for days, great company. Gina and I decided to go for a little swim out to the "shallow" area of the swim area. It didn't seem far but once we got there, it wasn't shallow at all! At this point we decided to swim for the rope sectioning off the swim area so we could at least rest while we decided what to do. Our sweet husbands then convinced us that it wasn't THAT FAR to swim out to the red buoy on the far side of the swim area. Let me tell you, after a few drinks and not being a strong swimmer....the buoy is A LONG WAY AWAY! We made it though, and even were still smiling =)

By 1PM, we were the ONLY ones in the entire beach club plus 1 other couple. We quickly became friends with Dave and Sue; Dave happens to love taking photos as a hobby. Thanks to him we ended up with some great photos of our time at Nachi Cocom.

 

Sue, Gina, Melissa, Rob, Neal and Dave. Yes I am leaning in a little close to Rob....Whoops, I thought it was Neal until after we took the picture and Rob said "Hello Melissa!" Minor confusion =0

Swim up bar where there was more waitstaff than us!!

Fun nights!! And those margaritas were HUGE! Wet Wendy's was the margarita bar in the middle of town with huge margaritas with tables you could leave your mark on.

We had overcast evenings most nights, but finally we had enough of a cloud break for a BEAUTIFUL Caribbean sunset.

Our deep sea fishing trip had us up and on the water early enough to see the sunrise. I nearly caught a barracuda (darn!) and Neal caught a couple of trigger type fish.

Even cloudy days are a thing of beauty in Cozumel.

Swimming with our dolphin Marina!

Goodbye Cozumel!

This vacation was full of memories and lessons in flexibility. We spent many nights before we left planning our adventures and days only to have practically ALL of them cancelled or revised. In the end we had a blast!