Riveria Mayakoba, Mexico Day 3

Finally, Day three.  Mike and Steve got up early for the awards presentations, Debbie and I slept in (after all in is a VACATION!).  Mike received recognition for having sold $1,000,000 in product!  Congratulations!!!!

After a wonderful lunch we boarded a bus and headed south to Telum.  This is a city of the Mayan people built on a cliff top overlooking the ocean.  They estimate in was inhabited around 1200 to 1600 BC.  The whole city was surrounded by stone walls as you can see...Steve and Debbie are just entering into the opening in the above picture.  I found the ruins and history of this people fascinating.  They were a very bloodthirsty and superstitious people.  They worshipped the sun, wind, rain, etc.  They were pretty short we determined by the height of the doorways into the buildings. 

Apparently Telum is one of the least restored ruins they have uncovered.  many of the buildings were crumbling.  The interesting thing is the buildings weren't used for shelter.  It is so hot there, and it is 20 degrees or more hotter inside the buildings.  The buildings were for storage and worship.  There were about 30 family units that lived at Telum.  Only the rich were allowed to live inside the walls of the city, the poorer people and servants lived outside the walls.  There were several cenotes inside the walls that brought them water.  They had a temple.

You can see the decay of the stone very well in this picture.  It was so hot the day we were there...a hat was a necessity, but I think we all had a bit of heat stroke after an hour unprotected in the sun.

On the top border of this building about in the middle you can kind of see an upside down man that looks like a frog.  This is the God that caught the sun with his legs as it set and returned it to its rising place in the west.

There were soooo many iguanas there roaming around.  I was fascinated by them.  This one seems to enjoy the sun...go figure?

The building in the background you can see is their temple.  What a beautiful view of the ocean from the hilltop! 

I still can get over the color of the ocean and just how warm it was.  There were stairs down to the beach and many of the visitors took a chance to cool off in the waves.  On the clifftop there was an oceanic breeze....Ah..Heavenly!

Here we are looking a bit hotter and the wind kept blowing off our hats....can you tell which one of us has "hat hair"....Dad of course :)

That evening (after a long cool nap and a shower) we went to "Club AFES".  They had turned the island into an upscale club.  They had every delicous food you could imagine. The band tonight was playing pop music, and after dinner our entertainment was watching all the drunk people dance.  The main slinger was pretty good at getting them upfront, singing and dancing...interesting!

They put together this pyramid and covered it with white cloth.  After it got dark, they turned it into a light show of sorts.  Not only could they make it change colors, but they had dancing lights of differents sizes and shapes that would spin around the inside of the canopy.

We did have one more day there in Mexico, but due to Montezuma's revenge, we stayed indoors all morning taking turns using the facilities.  By afternoon we were sufficiently 'empty' to spend the afternoon at the beach.  We didn't get to go Horseback riding or snorkling...much to my sadness...but we did spend a nice slow day together enjoying the beauty of Mexico.  We have tons more pictures, but these are a few of the best! 

Riveria Mayakoba, Mexico Day 2

             Well, our second day in paradise started with a breakfast that had every breakfast food I could imagine plus a few I hadn't thought of.  We spent a lot of our time with Steve and Debbie Call from Pocatello.  They joined us for a leisurely boat tour of the resort. 

This is the view of the resort from the boat.  They dug the canals throughout the resort, but didn't have to fill them with water because the water table is so high!  So you can either go through out the resort by boat or by the roads.  If you want to go by road, you can walk, bike on BMW Bikes (there are bike racks everywhere and you just hop on one and go where you want, then leave it at the next bike rack), or you can stand at the main road and they will pick you up in big golf cart type vehicles and take you where you want to go.

 

This is where we saw the crocodile.  You can really see him in the picture because only his eyes and the spines of his tail were about water....they didn't even have to tell us twice to keep our hands in the boat!!

This (under the overhang of rock) is a cenote (remember Chris Heimerdinger....they came up through an under ground spring.)  They are all over this country.  Even in the canal there were several Cenotes!

After the boat ride and lunch we decided that it was time to go check out the beach.  So we slathered on the "biodegradable" sunscreen (which by the way didn't even work), packed up our little beach bag and headed out to catch a golf cart.  When we arrive, we stopped by a little thatched roof shack where another Amigo grabbed towels and took us to the beach.  This pool you see looks like it flows right into the ocean, but the ocean is 20 feet below.  It was a popular spot because of a swim right up to the bar arrangement.

He led us down to the beach where he set up our beach chairs, laid out our towels, asked if we needed anything to drink, and then turned us loose.  Below was our view to the right...

This was the view in front of us....We couldn't resist, so we ran right out.  The water was sooooo warm that you didn't even have to get used to it at all!  It was so beautiful and blue, but no seashells....kind of weird.  There were chunks of limestone here and there under the water, but that was about it.  We waved jumped and talked for about and hour until our hands were all pruned up, then back to the shade to recoup....And yes.....we really do have swimsuits on....the nude beach was further north!!!

And this was us after

Riviera Mayakoba, Mexico, day 1

This is us on the bus after a long day of travel, passport checks, customs, a policeman who tried to get us to take a limosine.  We were excited to be in Mexico with the other top salesmen from American Fidelty.  Every other year they take their top 100 to a wonderful place and treaty them like royalty.

Below is a picture of me minutes after finding out that we're going to have to change our names to Gramma and Grampie...Congratulations Dana and Brian!!!!

We enjoyed the 45 minute trip and all the different sights on the way to the resort.  It was fun to read the signs in Spanish and try to guess what they were about.  As we reached the Fairmont at Riviera Mayakoba we were greeted by our new 'amigo' who gave us each a cold wet towel to wipe our sweaty brows after the grueling trip.  They then hauled our luggage down to our rooms while we were led into our gorgeous lodgings.

We were taken into the ball room and given gifts at every turn.  It started with a beachbag full of sunscreen, treats, waterbottles, and added to it...t-shirts, and designer sunglasses.  They gave us money for our dinner in town, name tags, drinks, and then led us out to a wonderful buffet lunch.

After our tummies were full, we were led by 'Senor Chatterbox' down this beautiful  walkway to our spacious 'home' for the next few days.

 

The bathroom reminded us of the garden of eden.  The bed itself was a work of art.  I loved watching the bedmaker work his 'art' on the bed, it was quite the show!

We took awhile to change and explore before we headed over the bridge to our evening dinner/entertainment.  There are so many different pools at the resort, I wouldn't even guess at how many different ones I saw while there. The food each and every time was amazing and overwhelming both in quanity and quality.  I took a picture of my favorite new dish...Ceviche...Brian, note the squid!  It is a wonderful combination of seafood and garlicy salsa sauce...to die for!  The performers you can see at the front of the tables were amazing.  The were dressed in native costumes and their instruments consisted of turtle shells, conch shells, antlers, a digerdoo kind of thing, drums, etc...it was amazing! 

After a wonderful dinner, the performers came out.  The only way I can describe them would be a Chris Heimerdinger nightmare.  They were all painted like Jaguars, birds, warrriors, etc and they came out doing a mayan dance depicting a human sacrifice among other things.  I wished that Jon and Amelia were there to enjoy the dancing along with us!  Their headdresses were 4-5 foot feathers....What awesome costumes!  What a great night!

MEXICO

Spencer's Graduation 6/4/10

Well, here it is...the end of an era. All four kids have sucessfully graduated from Hanford High School. It was both wonderful and a little nostalgic all at once. Spencer's class was the largest yet...322 kids. Dean Moody, Jim and Crystal Field, Cassie Dohse, and Regan Bishop were the cheering section. Nancy Smith was the faculty speaker. She did a great job talking about, "it's a privelege to be here." But before we knew it, the walk had been made, the caps had been thrown, and the hugs were being given.

We had a great celebration dinner at Outback Steakhouse (where else would Spencer choose?) and then ...after a brief stop to do some Spanish home work (it's a bummer to have college at the same time) He was off to the all night party. Sadly he came home empty handed, but had a good time with all the activities. Now he just has one more week of classes, then finals, and providing he passes all his classes, he will graduate from CBC on June 18th. Congratulations Spencer!!! We are so proud of you! Our first "double" graduation! Way to go and good luck in the fall at BYUI!

Dana and Brian surprised us early Friday Morning by knocking on our door just before 5:00am. We knew they were coming for the weekend, but didn't expect them until Friday night. We had such a good visit.

They Played on Friday, while we worked and schooled. Saturday we picked up a new entertainment center and had fun putting it together and organizing it. We had a yummy lunch at Mongolian Grill. Then Spence and Brian took off to get a haircut. (Spencer's first actual professional haircut!) Gram came over for dinner...Hambergers are magic!

Sunday we had church, and then missionaries for dinner. Brian made Halooshkie...sp?... A yummy dish from Czech Republic. We topped off the evening playing Settlers and watching movies.

Monday we went to the new Robin Hood, then celebrated Spencer's 18th birthday by a fun Geo-Cacheing Adventure orchestrated by Ben and Sarah. They had him find a different location for each gift, and he had to do a "task" at each home....speaking spanish to Fields, Singing 'You light up my Life' to Sister Gallup, etc... It was so fun!