Down to Sea Level

A view from the lobby overlooking the separate bungalows
and villas of our hotel complex.
Yes, and that is the ocean directly behind.

Last weekend, we took our first beach vacation! The whole crew jumped in the party van and headed off to Veracruz, a pretty touristy area on the Gulf Coast of Mexico. It was roughly a 7,000 ft. change in elevation down to sea level, which my lungs enjoyed, but my yet-to-be-healed sinuses did not. Our hotel was in Boca del Rio, just down the road from the center of the port of Veracruz and right on the beach. Between the fourteen of us, we got two hotel rooms, so as you can imagine, it was a bit squishy. My room, Villa 53, had seven girls, one boy, and one bathroom. Within minutes the place was a complete desmadre but it served its beach and cheap purpose.

Trusty shopping cart and excited crew

The first thing we did when we arrived was head out for food. The closest thing we could find without taking a taxi was a mall with a food court which featured a restaurant with comida tipica de Puebla. How exciting and new! After we had our fill from various places, including McDonalds, we decided to stock up at the grocery store for the rest of the weekend. This adventure concluded with the entire Villa 53 crew pushing the shopping cart across a 6ish lane (there aren’t really “lanes” per se in Mexico) highway bridge and all the way up to the door of our humble abode. We got some looks and some laughs, but hey, it beat carrying all of our supermarket bags.

That night was almost entirely spent swimming in the sea. It was wonderful. We ran along the sand and sprinted into the waves to see how far we could get. Well, when I say waves I mean two-foot baby surges in water. Both the air and the water was warm  and we just floated, talked, and played Duck Duck Goose. Duck Duck Ninja is actually what it is technically called. The main difference is that you can pick anything you want to act as while you chase your prey around the circle. The game didn’t last too long, but I’d like to give it another shot sometime. I digress….

Front to back: Alexxis, Malia, and I
rocking our books and our shades

Saturday we made love to the sun. Maybe that’s a bit strong, but really, the day was spent laying on a beach chair, taking occasional dips in the ocean or the pool, and reading some JPII goodness.  All of this, along with the overload of vitamin D, was good for the soul. Also, I drank a Piña Colada and got caught in the rain. Don't worry, the rain came later. 

That night we went to the Zócalo of Veracruz, ate, shopped around, and ate. The area was decorated with beautiful lights and there was a group of dancers and a band displaying their skills.  I was amazed by the dancers. They were all older couples dressed in traditional Mexican clothing. When I watched their faces and their eyes, it seemed as though the dance had just been engrained into their being from when they were young and first fell in love with each other. Pardon my cheesiness, but I really just thought they were all beautiful. 

Sunday we went to an aquarium!!! Really though, I don't think it deserved three exclamation points. It was cool, but let's keep in mind that I grew up relatively close to Monterey Bay Aquarium that has over 200 award-winning exhibits so it was a bit difficult for Aquario de Veracruz to compare. Still though, a good time was had by all, until a manatee ate the kid with the beard (who is now beardless by the way). 

Actually the manatees seemed very nice.  This picture was just before the manatee on the right planted a huge kiss on the other one. Manatee love. And of course I started singing Veggietale's Barbara Manatee. 

For any of you Amazon Trail players out there, I got super excited to capture a shot of the rare macaw. Major points for that one! Ok, it wasn't that hard, and in reality, the bird in the game is the Scarlet Macaw, but I pretended anyway. 

The ride back was a bit of a doozy. We had a fourteen passenger van for sixteen of us. I either served as a pillow for three people or part of a spooning train the entire way back. I always heard you get close to the people you study abroad with, and this was a very literal experience of that. We also watched Harry Potter 6 which is just chock full of awkward and sexually tense pre-teen moments. So, besides my dear sinuses adjusting back to the mountainous elevation, it was a good ride. All and all, another Mexico trip for the win. 

Mexpandable Waistlines

The night we spent in the Zócalo we went out to dinner at a restaurant that was clearly used to tourists. First, we were approached by roughly 37 street vendors trying to sell their goods. Dinner consisted of the routine:

1. Put a bite in mouth

2. Say, "no, gracias"

3. And, repeat

Second, they handed us english versions of the menu. We didn't really want to use them, but it turns out, without the crosslisting ability of both menus, I would not have been able to order baby shark empanadas! Hmmm now that I think about it, that's kind of sad that I ate a baby shark. Or at least part of it. However, it was pretty tasty, and I did it for the sake of the blog, of course. For the most part, it tasted like a cross between fish and chicken. Empanadas are basically stuffed and fried pouches of goodness, so mine was stuffed with the shark. 

Libby ordered shark too so we attempted a shark face.
Who says your ever too old to play with, or in our case act like, your food?

You would never know they were stuffed with baby shark...

Stay tuned for the Independence Day post! I was going to do that first, but it just really would have bothered me to go out of order.