We have moved into the new digs! We are so excited and grateful to be in a beautiful hacienda-style house we dreamed of; close to town, in a quiet neighborhood (with barking dogs of course), filled with charm…and our own pool – deep enough for Fluid Running (shameless plug)!!!
Since our last post, here are our goings on :
Britny came! We loved having her and she quickly said…”oh, I get it”. She was amazed by the kindness of the people going about their regular days. You can’t pass someone on the street without a kind greeting, as simple as “hola”, or buenas dias. On the local bus, people get on, acknowledge everyone “buenas tardes” (good afternoon), and get a polite response back. Women get on with their shopping, teenage boys offer their seats. People are commuting to their homes after a long workday, standing shoulder to shoulder, a young mother nursing her baby. I understand that is more likely in a small beach town than a big city but I have definitely experienced that in other cities. It does make Puerto Morelos special to us.
Enough softy nonsense. We have also experienced Mexico’s sense of time. We had an 11:00 “appointment” at Toyota for a 1-2 hour project and sat there for 5 hours. The plumber was coming manaña and never showed (twice) until we added “or we can contact VRBO” and he showed up that day. “I will be there at 5:30” likely means closer to 6 (ish). It can be frustrating but since this is something we already knew about the culture, we have learned more patience, well, one of us is still struggling – can you guess? Thank goodness we are retired and time is on our side. If going to Toyota is the only thing we “accomplish” in a day – that is good enough! If I told you the ways our sales person has gone completely over the top of her responsibilities, you wouldn’t believe me. The desire to please and do a good job is first and foremost. In all of those situations the kindness of the people doing the service is so over the top, you end up not caring how long anything takes and walk out with a smile. I love that.
Our next guests, Liz and Orlando, have been all over Mexico (they met in Mexico City), but never Puerto Morelos – they ended up loving it. Orlando got to visit his nephew who has a food stall business in Playa del Carmen’s Public Market (excellent tacos!) and the four of us spent a full day at Xcaret, a theme park that turns nature on its head. We weren’t sure what to expect and hoped it wouldn’t be too Disney-esque. It far exceeded expectations. I hope to put a little video together for it soon. We enjoyed some delicious street food, gourmet meals and a lot of laughs during their visit. We suspect we will see them here again soon.
Some other tasks we got checked off our list:
Gym memberships! We joined a brand new facility that will be opening in April right down the street. Danny went back to the old place he worked out at last year and picked up a one-month membership until then. I will be walking, biking and Fluid Running!
A shiny new Quintana Roo driver’s license for me! I was warned how painful Mexican bureaucracy could be but no one prepared me for getting a driver’s license. I walked in, was greeted with a friendly smile, directed to the office and told to take a seat. She requested my documentation and IDs, which I had ready thanks to some helpful Canadians going there before me and I was processed and out the door in under 30 minutes! Let the discounts begin!
The official records now confirm what we suspected all along, Canadians are now the leading foreigners entering Mexico, over U.S. travelers. We hear way more French than we do English in stores, on the beach and on the bus. We noticed it on the west coast 5 years ago. In Bucerias (20 minutes north of Puerta Vallarta) it was very clear the Canadians had taken over when we were there. Now, they are surpassing all other groups on the Caribbean coast. No wonder Tim Horton’s is down here, eh?!
Also since our last post, the disruption in the state of Jalisco was pretty big news here in North America. We felt the need to post quickly on Facebook to ease fears that people had for our safety. The unknown can be very scary and we were very diligent in staying informed from a variety of reliable sources. We fully understand many people have a different perspective on this country than we do, and that is fine, but please know that the chance of any violent crime happening to us is almost ridiculously small. Odds are much better a shitty sidewalk would take us out long before the cartel.
If you got this far in reading, thank you – it was a long one! Unfortunately, I am writing this on a plane to Chicago to attend a funeral for someone dear. During the packing for this quick trip (I will be back home before this goes live), it seems I have “lost” all the clothing we wore in our last months in Chicago so I had to cobble together cold weather gear for the 42 hours I will be there – should be interesting coming from 32 degrees celcius this morning!
As promised – a video tour of house 1 located in the gated community of Puerto Marino, calle Pez Vella # 16 (Google Pin) Puerto Morelos – 16 Jan – 28 Feb
And a video of house 2 located on Joaquin Hendricks SM18 M25 L27 (Google Pin). Puerto Morelos 01 Mar – 30 Sep
¡Hasta la proxima vez!