Tulum Mexico - Sunday, October 26, 2008

We woke up around 6:30 this morning and headed off to breakfast around 8:15. First, we stopped at Maya Tulum to see if they were open, but they told us the hotel was reserved that week for a group and was not open to the public. Then we checked El Tabano - closed (is this place ever open?). Finally, we stopped at Casa Banana and they were open so we decided to have breakfast there. This is such a cute place - on the beach road, kinda set into the jungle a bit. I liked the new age music they were playing and the jungly atmosphere - the place just had a really cool vibe. Mr. Sassy ordered some kind of egg dish that had tomatoes mixed in, as well as Chiapas coffee which he said was excellent. I ordered vegetarian eggs (scrambled eggs with veggies mixed in) as well as my favorite Mexican hot chocolate. (Total came to $195 pesos - about $16 USD)

After breakfast, we headed back to our cabana. It was windier today and the ocean was a bit more rough - lots of waves. Not calm enough for me to float like I like to, but the late afternoon dark skies made the turquoise sea even more intense by contrast. I love this photo.

Harry made several appearances today. It seems like he likes to come out to sun himself in late morning and early afternoon and again, he was in the same spot as always - upper right side of our patio. He was extra sociable today - at one point he walked up to Mr. Sassy's chair on the patio and another time, we caught him walking on the beach!


Later, he even made an appearance in the bathroom. I had walked in there to get ready to take a shower and when I looked up to my right, he was on the rafter above the sink. He really startled me and I screamed (like a wuss) and he quickly scurried away.

At this point, Mr. Sassy and me are getting very attached to Harry. We've already gone from thinking he is ugly, to constantly gushing about how cute he is. We are constantly looking for him and calling him. I've started talking to him in my high-pitched pet voice and today, Mr. Sassy put down a little "water bowl" for him (an inverted bottle cap which he filled with water) - you can see it in this photo. Of course, we both realize it is completely ridiculous to put a water bowl down for a wild iguana. I mean, he's survived his entire life very well without our help, but I guess this is what you resort to when you are away from your pets for too long. Our maternal and paternal instincts just take over and we act like 2 morons.

(In case you haven't noticed....you won't find too much reporting on interesting adventures in this trip report. This was basically a lounge around and eat vacation for us and today was another example of this. We spent the whole day lounging around, reading and napping.)

Speaking of napping, I must comment on the hammock at our cabana. OMG it is TOTAL HEAVEN ON EARTH. This hammock is the most comfortable hammock I have ever lied in and it is positioned so perfectly, on the front edge of the patio facing the ocean. It molds itself like a glove to the body and is a cozy cocoon. The soft ocean breezes swirling over me, under me and all around me, as I slowly rock back and forth it is like being on narcotics. I simply cannot keep my eyes open. In case you are wondering why I am so bundled up...I burn very easily, even with strong sunblock so I normally stay in the shade as much as possible, but I just had to get on this hammock today, sun or no sun.

For dinner we thought we would check out the highly-recommended Mayan Grill, but alas - it (and all the other restaurants in that area of the beach) are closed down which I suspected might be the case (apparently the government has taken over this area of the beach for - they say - environmental reasons but I don't think anyone will be surprised if we see a bunch of all-inclusives popping up in the near future). So we headed back south and stopped at Zahra to peruse their menu. It wasn't grabbing us. It seemed to consist of mostly sandwiches and pizza and we weren't up for anything that casual. So we decided to eat at our old standby, Zamas.

The food and service were particularly good tonight. Mr. Sassy ordered a dish called "Tuscan fish" (which had an olive tempanade) and I had the fried fish which I remembered was excellent from our last visit (and it was excellent again!) We shared an appetizer of guacamole which was good, but nothing special, and the serving and the chips were a little skimpy. I had a banana daquiri and Mr. Sassy had a shot of tequila. For dessert I had the chocolate cake which was very good, and Mr. Sassy had a fruit smoothy. He said he needed something cold to put the fire out in his mouth from the hot green sauce that came with the chips. Sorry, I didn't use the flash so the photos didn't turn out so great. The bill came to $635 pesos or $53 USD. Aside from the excellent food, one thing we really like about Zamas is the atmosphere, especially at night - with the cool downtempo music playing, the candles and the little white twinkle lights.

When we got back to the cabana, we were awe struck by the billions of stars in the sky, so brightly visible from our patio. We just stood there and stared up at the sky for several minutes, breathing in the beauty of this magical place.

Once inside, that magical feeling quickly ended when I looked at the bed and spotted what appeared to be a tiny black bug near my pillow. So I got a tissue to pick it up and....um....it was not a bug, it was feces. I was so tired, I didn't want to think about who left this little present for us but I had my suspicions. (Could it be?) After a few minutes discussing with hubby about whether it was Harry or perhaps a scorpion paid a visit to our cabana, followed by a debate about what size scorpion and iguana feces would be, we finally put it out of our minds and drifted off to sleep. (I guess the Mexican chill approach is rubbing off on us).