This morning I slept waaaay in until past 9am – but that’s Akumal time, which means my internal clock still had me up shortly after 7. Nonetheless, I was rewarded for my (relatively) early rise with a spectacular sunrise, and a view of the Caribbean that basically confirms all of the paradise movies you’ve seen
After tinkering around with some photo editing and ensuring all my gear was charged back up, I settled into my book in the balcony Adirondack chair until Sharon got up about a half hour later. The temperature was already into the mid-twenties, and I’m just coming to terms with what has been called “a tropical breeze.” It’s not just a rustling through palms; there’s actually a quality to it that is quite unique, combining the salt air, the increased humidity, and the mangrove trees. It almost has a flavour, and it’s quite nice.
Not long after we had put ourselves together, we phoned down to the kids’ room to wake them. They called back shortly after, dealing with a plumbing issue similar to the one we dealt with last night. We phoned it in to the front desk, and then all convened with Scott and Lynn back at the breakfast buffet table.
Breakfast was almost as elaborate as dinner last night, with a very wide range of breads, cereals, egg preparations, fruits, meats, pastries… it was all there. Cappuccinos complimented our meal nicely.
Next, our “orientation” courtesy of the Air Transat rep. assigned to our resort. Charles Alexander was very nice, and appears to be French Canadian, though he has worked in the resorts for many years. He gave us the run-down on the local tours and towns, where we can go for shows and how to get there, and was able to work in references to Tim Horton’s and the Leafs fairly seamlessly along the way.
Armed with options and prices (better than what we had researched) we found a big table in the resort lobby and planned out some of our agenda, with room to adapt depending on weather. We also checked online pricing on local attractions. The big decision: tomorrow we do Chichen Itza, the Mayan ruins designated a UNESCO World Heritage site. We returned to Charles’s table and booked it.
By this time lunch hour was already underway, so we returned to the buffet and had another round 🙂
We spent the afternoon wandering through the resort, checking out the six available restaurants, the beach access, the pools and the patios, and spotting various lizard species strolling through the gardens. We eventually ended up back at our rooms where we reapplied sunscreen and decided to take a walk along the beach to the town of Akumal. The beach is movie-white, but not “hot” despite the temperature now being in the low 30s, and we walked bare-foot the whole way along.
Not surprisingly the town south of the highway is very “tourist-friendly” offering everything from t-shirts and fridge magnets to local artwork. We had a great stroll past the local merchants as well as popping in to the “Super Chomak” grocery store for refreshments (and air conditioning). It doesn’t take long to do a circuit of town, and we were soon headed back to our resort.
Probably the highlight of the day for all of us was the adventure we had snorkelling in the bay for the balance of the afternoon. We Sutherlands had not had experience before so we were patiently coaxed through our masks and fins by Scott and Lynn (spit here, stick your face in the water…) and pretty soon we were paddling along the bay in search of life in the sea.
It was fun! And it was quite relaxing, too. It’s quite fascinating just to see what the underwater terrain looks like and how it changes rapidly as you float by – sand, sea grass, and coral all the way along.
And YES, we also saw some of the turtles the bay is famous for. They are protected in this bay (there are police along the beach regularly) but they are completely unconcerned by your presence. Between us, we think we saw four differently turtles – two of which were very large, and one a “baby” that zipped by us at hight speed! Add to that a couple of rays and some very brightly coloured fish in the coral – we had quite a lot to see for our first time out.
By the time we returned we’d been out for a couple of hours, though it hadn’t seemed like it to me. We went back to our rooms and got the sea water off, rinsed off our gear and got ready for dinner.
We ate tonight at Liin, the Japanese specialty restaurant, which was very nice. As you might expect, there was a range of fish and rice based dishes, and the special was a lobster preparation that I for one really enjoyed. Mimi studiously broke the social media etiquette of not photographing your food – wonderfully enough, her school Foods teacher gave her the assignment of recording what she was finding to eat while in Mexico. We topped the meal off with chocolate brownies!
Dinner was leisurely so it was already quite late by the time we finished eating. And although the food was very good, it wasn’t as filling as our teens’ metabolisms require, so we finished out the evening back at the buffet table. We visited for a long while finally decided to call it a day – we’ll be up early for our trip tomorrow!