Playa del Carmen with my Mom

After a trip to San Pedro I thought I would be spending the next couple weeks in Corozal before my trip a planned trip back to Oregon but plans change so frequently and those plans were no exception.  A friend of ours, Capt. J., asked us if we would be willing to drive him, his son and their friend back to the Cancun airport because there was so little time between getting back from the San Pedro Dorado Rodeo fishing tournament and their flight back to the states.  We said we would do that but instead of going there and back my Mom and I decided to stay a couple nights in Playa del Carmen to break up the driving.  So I was on that particular road for the 5^th time in about a three week period of time after spending just one night back in Corozal.

We dropped them off at the appropriate terminal and made our way back to Playa from the airport (about a 45 minute drive).  We stopped off at one of the Pemex gas stations just outside of the airport to fill up the tank which is typically no problem but this particular time they wanted to check the oil – I think the fact that we were two females prompted this.  The attendant quickly showed us the dipstick which indicated low oil and wanted us to buy oil from them.  I thought the whole thing was a little fishy so I didn’t believe him at all and assumed he was just trying to sell us oil that we didn’t need.  Sure enough after checking the oil our own later we had plenty of oil.  They’ve never done that when I’ve been in the vehicle with males and the attendant wasn’t very happy when we told him we would wait to get oil.

We didn’t have a hotel booked in Playa so our plan was to park the truck and find something close to the water that wasn’t too expensive.  We didn’t walk around too long before we decided on the Blue Parrot Hotel on 5^th Ave (http://www.blueparrot.com/).  It was cute, clean and only two blocks from the beach.  They are also associated with the Blue Parrot Beach Club which we could utilize for free.  The bonus was that our room was on the top floor so we were able to view the ocean from one of our windows.  This trip we were on a budget so the plan was to buy some food from the grocery store for our lunches and snacks, eat our complimentary continental breakfast and then go out for dinners.  We weren’t sure what we would do for drinks when we went out dancing but decided just to play that one by ear.

Our daily plan was beach time.  We got cooled down from our trek from the truck to the hotel with our luggage (in hindsight a taxi would have been the better option since the sun was brutal that afternoon).  Luckily we had air conditioning in the room so we turned that on right away.  Then it was suits on and down to the beach.  Our beach time over the next couple days was outstanding.  We got to witness about three men’s professional futbol teams out practicing on the beach and the fire dancers who perform at the Blue Parrot Beach Club were also out practicing.  So there were lots of options for pleasant viewing beyond just the beauty of the natural landscape.

We lucked out for partying at night since we were there during a Tuesday/Wednesday night the beach clubs were trying to get the ladies in so ladies drank for free from 9:00pm – 2:00am.  So we really managed to stay on budget during our two night stay.  We had a blast dancing until the early morning both nights and meeting lots of new people (including some of those futbol players).

It was a great mother/daughter bonding experience although most people thought we were friends since mom looks so great at her age.  We had a blast but I was definitely ready to get back to Corozal and spend some time at home.  The drive back was easy and a little faster since we were coming from Playa rather than from the airport so we were back in Belize late afternoon and finally back at our house.