Riviera Maya

September’s been a pretty busy month so far. Aside from all the craziness in the news, we’ve also had our son’s second birthday and my husband’s birthday as well. Last year we invited everyone on the compound for the kids birthday, which was a month after we arrived, and it was fun getting to know everyone. But there weren’t any kids his age, so this year we only had a few littler kids over so he could interact more. For my hubby, we didn’t really have a big party since there was a conflicting event at the CMR, so we just had drinks by the pool with our neighbors.

We also went to Puerto Aventuras between b-days. PA is a collection of all-inclusive resorts and restaurants inside a gated community south of Playa del Carmen. We’d never been before but had heard rave reviews from our friends. So we took an extra day off at the beginning of a three-day weekend, drove the six hours through northern Belize and the Riviera Maya, and spent four lovely days in PA.

After being in rural Belize, Mexico was fantastic! The roads were smooth and wide, people were friendly and hotels were clean and beautiful without being outrageously priced. And it was quite baby-friendly. The pools had sections for toddlers, and our room was a suite, so we didn’t have to go to bed at the same time as the baby. It wasn’t terribly soundproof, but it did have separate temperature controls, which was handy.

We ate out as often as we could, and we also went to the Tulum ruins and participated in the dolphin swim. Everything went pretty well, but A was often tired and fussy and hot. So we’d probably wait till he was a little older to do the sightseeing part again. But overall, any weekend away is a great weekend.

Chetumal

We finally made it to Chetumal last weekend. It only took us a year, so we might be able to squeeze in one more trip before we leave next summer.

Actually that’s not true, my hubby did one quick roundtrip when we first got here to go grocery shopping, and I went up once for work. But it’s almost a six-hour roundtrip to this particular Mexican border town…home of Sam’s Club, Wal-Mart, McDonald’s, Burger King and Dominos Pizza (none of which they have in Belize). So it’s no fun to do it in a day.

This time we went up on a Saturday, spent the night in a hotel, and drove back on Sunday. Another reason we hadn’t attempted it was because of the baby. He can get kind of annoying in the two hours it takes to get from Belmopan to Placencia, so we weren’t really looking forward to the ride.

But he was actually really good! He talked to himself (and us) for most the trip and napped for about half an hour before we arrived. I think one of the highlights of the road for him was seeing motorcycles…his latest word, which he pronounces “mo-na” with the accent on the second syllable. We also had a secret weapon, another toddler in the car in front of us.

We caravanned with some friends and stayed in the same hotel…a little collection of villas really…duplexes, with one family on either side.

The villa wasn’t spectacular. We had a ton of ants in our bathroom, and they found a scorpion in theirs. But it was cheap, and they had two pools that were kind of murky, but the babies didn’t care. They plunged in with their floaties and splashed and played for however long we were there.

The small pool was the perfect size…about eight feet across with a submerged tile bench that ran along three sides and was a great height for the boys to stand on. Even though it was ridiculously hot out, the water was quite cold, but most of us got in and spent the afternoon drinking Modelo beer instead of water since it’s safer and about the same consistency.

The rest of the trip was pretty uneventful. We hit McDonald’s for lunch, had fajitas and quesadillas delivered for dinner, found a random diner in the mall in the morning, cruised through Sam’s club, and were on our way home.

Waiting to cross the border into Mexico.

Hotel Villas Bambu.

The little pool.