Wednesday, September 4, 2013

Honeymoon Part 2


Honeymoon Part 2

 

 

I spent most of the last post on just 1 day of our honeymoon, because as you saw it was a FILLED day. That was Wednesday. Thursday was a MUCH more laid back day. I had made a reservation at the spa and got a deep tissue massage along with a reflexology massage. Which if you don’t know anything about massages, it concentrates on your feet. There are tons of pressure points and nerve endings in your feet that correlate with other parts of your body. It was my first ever reflexology massage and it was HEAVENLY. After a 50 minute deep tissue I was already almost sleeping, but within seconds of her doing the reflexology, I was OUT. Twenty-five minutes later she was waking me quietly, “Miss Megan, time to get up.” I was so relaxed I didn’t even want to move. But I got dressed and headed out to find Ben who had come to get me. I wasn’t all that keen about walking around the resort alone. (Its Mexico, you never know). Once we were back in the room, I quickly laid down and continued my nap…… for three hours. Yeah, I slept the whole afternoon away. While Ben was down in the pool getting drunk. Lol

But I was so relaxed and happy, that was the point, right? It was vacation after all. Besides, I made up for it on Friday.

Friday we went to Xcaret an ecological park in Mexico. It was kind of like an extreme zoo…. Maxed out to the extreme! They had animals and exhibits, aquariums and river snorkeling.

And they had DOLPHINS!


And you could SWIM WITH THEM!



She was really playful and 9 months pregnant! You couldn’t even tell! They’re pregnancy last 12 months!



She swam in circle around the group of us at 25 miles an hour! It was really cool!
 

This was definitely one of the coolest experiences of my life! I had always wanted to be a marine biologist as kid, and having done this, it really makes me think about changing my major!

After swimming with the dolphins alone, Ben and I went on a Snorkel Tour in the ocean thru the Xcaret Park. It was an interesting expeirance, but neither one of us really enjoyed it. We had gone on a different, much smaller, tour a few days before and were a little let down by the Xcaret experience. I’ll do Part 3 of the blog on snorkeling, when I get my under water pictures developed.

After snorkeling I had the insane chance to swim with SHARKS!


 
They were nurse sharks and one of the “friendliest sharks” there are. Yeah, I wasn’t buying that either.

I was actually really scared!

Then the trainer picked up this 7ft shark and put it in my LAP!


Yeah, its resting in my LAP!!

And guess what male sharks have?!



 
 2 PENIS’S!!! LOL You see them??

1’s to hold open the females “opening” and the other is to penetrate! You can imagine the jokes Ben made about that 1!

This was another action packed day that almost had us missing our bus! After we were done petting the sharks Ben and I had to RUN across the park to get to the parking lot in time for our 4:30 pick up. If we had missed it, we were stuck until 10pm. Which I was informed, “was not happening.” So we ran, made it, and sat on the bus for an hour dripping wet in air conditioning back to the hotel.

There was so much going on at the park, I could see why they had 2 day passes for sale. We missed the chance to snorkel in the underground river, but it was still an amazing day. I’d love to be able to go back some day!

 

Honeymoon Part 1


Honeymoon

 

 

Alright, I should probably start with the Wedding Post, but I had so much fun on my honeymoon, I wanted to get this out before I did the Wedding. Our honeymoon was beyond magical, and I’m not just saying that to be cliché. For our first time ever leaving the country, it really was an amazing experience. We (I) had specific ideas for what I wanted to do on my honeymoon. They included hiking in a rainforest/jungle/forest and being able to lay on the beach on the same day.  Not exactly two things that really go together. We were also very strict about our need for the resort to be “All Inclusive”. Trying to make all of that happened, I soon found out, was a lot harder than I thought it would be.

I was at a complete loss in the initial stages of planning our honeymoon. Luckily I knew of a travel agent and soon enlisted her help! After we explained to her what we were looking for in our honeymoon, she quickly recommended Riveria Maya Mexico; a coastal strip of land, just south of Cancun Mexico. It had everything I was looking for. Day hikes into the Mexican Jungle or crazy adventurous Zip-lining tours. Plus it had the best deals for all inclusive resorts.

We stayed here: Now Jade Riveria Cancun

 


We were there for 6 nights and 7 days. We spent the majority of our time here in the pools, or on the beach just behind it:

We didn’t spend the ENTIRE time in the pool, it was our honeymoon after all. (Get your minds out of the gutter) We wanted to experience the adventure that Mexico had to offer. So we booked ourselves 2 excursions ahead of time. They were both all day events and we were glad after they were done, that we had only booked the two.

Wednesday was our 1st excursion and oh man was it an adventure! Zip-lining! Swimming in underground river systems! Off road vehicles! Paddle rafting thru an underground river! It was an amazing and breath taking day.

Xplor Park in Mexico really is an humbling experience.




 It was REALLY HIGH! I was scared at 1st! But then toward the end (3 hours and 14 lines later) I was having a blast!





The water landings and the end of the 2 circuits were AMAZING. Great way to cool off after being in the sun all morning.

Ben even eventually came around:




Zip-lining was not Ben’s idea of fun by any means. In fact, he really hated it and has a HUGE fear of heights. He only did because I absolutely begged and pleaded and groveled for months on end to… get my way. Lol. I had to put in a lot of hard work to get him to do it! But he did and I had an experience of a lifetime.

After Zip-lining we headed underground and back into the water to help calm Ben’s nerves and to cool off.
That Mexican humidity is no joke!



I love this shot because you can see in his face he’s telling me, “You don’t know.” Something he tells me too often. J

Have you ever swam in a cooler place than this?



After swimming we decided to head back into the daylight for some lunch (it was included in the park admission) and then onto the “Amphibious Vehicles” as they called them. It was like  a Gator or a all terrain golf cart. Lol



They were kind of cool actually. The roads went a 3 mile trek thru the jungle, over bridges like this into the underground river and thru the caves.



After the vehicles we decided to head back underground and into the river again for some paddle rafts.




This was our least favorite part of the day (Even for Ben) because for as cool as this SHOULD have been, the employees didn’t have a very good handle on this. They were cramming people into the river, without seeing how many came back out. There were WAY too many people who didn’t know what they were doing on a kayak essentially. It was more than frustrating the amount of “pile ups” and collisions there were because people didn’t know what they were doing. So instead of taking the long circuit like we’d been doing on everything else, and doing both circuits, we cut this one short and bee lined for the exit. It was horrible and left us both kind of cranky.

So we headed to the last thing of the day that we hadn’t done! More Zip-Lining! In Hammocks!

 
 

The day was definitely more adventurous than either one of us could have imagined, but it was so totally worth it! We had a blast!



That’s it for this entry. Lots of pictures. Will do Excursion Day 2 next! Stay tunned! A special Thanks to Xplor for having the bright idea of putting computer chips in their helmets that triggered cameras thru-out the park!