Isla Mujeres Trip 2015: Day 2

{Day One found here}

DAY TWO : Friday, March 13

Nate woke up at 6:30 am and I was just sort of laying there, willing myself to fall back to sleep because this would be the first time in years that I could 'sleep in'. I knew I had lost this skill sometime in the past five years but I still wanted to try! Then Nate announced that he was 'going to check out the sunrise situation' and I couldn't formulate a coherent sentence, let alone announce that I wanted to come along. Because, you know, I *did* tell Nate that I wanted to see at least one sunrise while in Mexico and I also wanted to go for at least one run. (Foreshadowing for Nate stealing my copyrighted ideas).

I eventually propelled myself out of bed and realized there was no way to find Nate and meet him on the other side of the island for the sunrise which would happen in a few minutes at 7:00 am. I greatly missed the immediate communication that cell phones provide us in the States (i.e. phone addict?). So I sat out on the patio and Erin joined me shortly after, and we assaulted the WiFi like usual. Nate came back and apparently he not only saw the sunrise but he also ran for a little while. Way to steal my great ideas, Nate!! ;) He made us coffee, Ben drifted out of bed, drawn to the scent of strong (Milwaukee based) cups of Joe, and we all chatted a bit. We might have Facetimed here, or at least texted to check in with the children. Peanut butter and toast, coffee, and water fueled us to start our second day in paradise. And then we decided to officially go out for (real) breakfast.

We walked on the beach for awhile and took the long way to town, heading down our side of the beach to the end of the island and back around to the other more rocky shoreline. I brought my camera and took lots of pictures of our beach walk, of course.







Then we decided on breakfast at Cafe Mogagua. I got a banana smoothie (sans alcohol since it was barely 9 am, people) and a omelette stuffed with various breakfast meats, house potatoes on the side, along with refried beans. Superb. Nate was less than impressed with his spinach omelette, but I gave this place a solid two thumbs up.





Loved this thing.


Cheers.


Hot and sweaty here, plus neither of us is wearing makeup.


Interesting bar quote.

 YUM.


Then we decided to make another grocery store run for random additions to our food stash at the condo. I think this was the day when the boys went to the grocery store three times---very inefficient planning but luckily the store was close to our condo and SUPER cheap. Like, a big bag full of groceries was four dollars cheap.

Love the colors in all of the street shops.


We all walked back to the condo and Nate and I took a detour through a different beach. I wanted a hammock photograph and achieved this goal. Check! The clouds were rolling in at this point, which made for some beautiful pictures.









Back at the condo, Ben was getting ready for a run and I wanted to tag along. Then Nate said he would join us, and right as we all got ready it started to down pour. Erin timed it and the rain lasted 10 minutes and immediately cleared off, returning to sunshine and humidity. We figured we could handle random tropical storms like this, and it doesn't seem like it is ever raining all day long or even overcast in Isla Mujeres. Like I said: perfect destination.

The dudes and I went for our run and mostly stayed along the ocean on a paved path, heading down the other side of the island further than we'd been before. We stopped at a dive shop so that Nate could buy his precious snorkel set that he so fiercely wanted, and once we stopped I noticed that I was literally melting from the heat and humidity---reminded me of running in St. Louis summers;) The giant puddles in the road from the storm soaked our feet and it seemed like parts of the town were semi-flooded from such hard rain. But all in all a good 3 mile run on vacation = guilt free overindulgence later.

We came back to the condo and quickly headed to the pool for a post-run dip. Erin was on the beach and we observed the condo staff setting up a shade umbrella for her. Ah, the luxurious relaxation of a beach vacation. Seriously. We all bounced back and forth from the pool and beach most of the day, and the guys decided to rent paddle boards. We thought it was 25 pesos (2 bucks) but it turned out to be 25 dollars for an hour, so I decided it wasn't worth my own board. The guys went out, then Nate let me try his while he snorkeled, and eventually Ben convinced Erin to sit on his board, too. It was a lot harder than it looked but really fun, and a serious balance work out.

LOL.




View from the ocean, looking to our condo.








We all split some nachos from the Beach Grill at our pools, then Pina Coladas were had on the patio by the non-pregs, Face time, internetting, chips and salsa, chatting, and eventually showers to get ready for our evening. I walked onto the beach during sunset, which was around 7pm, and took lots of pictures.







We went into town and had a list of dinner places from Erin's extensive online research. Eventually we decided on Angelos because they specifically had pizza and it sounded delish. We also ordered our traditional guacamole, I had a mango margarita and lusted after Nate's mojito, and Erin and I split a four seasons pizza. It was yummy but nothing truly spectacular or anything.....but really, I love any and all pizzas so I was content.







We walked for awhile and the other three got some ice cream, which didn't sound good to me, so I took pictures of them eating instead.

The girls, one with an adorable bump.


So many souvenirs!




ICE CREAM!




One important part of the story here: Nate pulled out his iPhone to take a picture of a Sol sign (favorite Mexican beer) at a bar earlier, and apparently his cash was stuck to the back of his phone. So the money fell out of his pocket with this picture taking business. As we walked back to our condo, Nate was patting all of his pockets and looking perplexed when he said, 'I lost a bunch of money....like $100.' My first thought was that maybe he got pick pocketed and didn't notice it, but he didn't lose all of his cash---just $100 of it. He and Ben went back to the main street to retrace our steps while Erin and I went back to the condo. That's when Nate remembered he had taken the iPhone picture of the Sol sign. And of course the money was not magically resting on the ground anymore. Sigh. Losing a hundred bucks is not the end of the world but it's still a gigantic bummer and Nate was understandably irritated about this part of the night. My favorite statement back at the condo, when we were all trying to make Nate feel better, was when Erin said: "It could always be worse. You could have gotten knifed." Not sure why I found that so hilarious at the time but possibly the constant stream of alcohol was to blame.

Just to add insult to injury after the 'Throwing Money Away' incident? 'The Safe' incident. This one was all my fault and super annoying/irritating. Basically, our condo had a safe that could be locked and unlocked with just a key pad. You could change your code as often as you liked but APPARENTLY you are supposed to pay attention to the numbers you set as your code. Who knew? We had our pass code set for the entire time, and then earlier this afternoon I accidentally punched in some wrong numbers in there and proceeded to lock down the safe with that new pass code. Problem being, I only glanced up at the screen after it beeped, noting the numbers were different before I could actually memorize the new accidental pass code. 'Oh well,' I figured. 'We can always make a new code.' But actually you can't unlock the safe unless you supply the correct code. Huh.

So basically, we were screwed because I didn't know which numbers I messed up with my new sneaky code. And Nate was already irritated by the missing money and now his wife just locked down the safe, which contained our laptops, passports, and his wallet. This probably would have been no biggie but combined with the money loss? Double whammy. 'This is just a crappy night,' was even something Nate said, until I reminded him about the knifing possibility;) And the fact that we were on vacation and pretty much living the dream.

I knew the owner of the condo probably had a master passcode for the safe and after trying approximately 152 different combinations, I gave up and went to bed around 11:00. I probably dreamed about that stupid screen on the safe! Nate also decided that his missing hundred bucks might have made a local's night, hoping it didn't end up going to some other traveling American. I guess we'll never know! Good times on Friday the 13th in Mexico.