A Mexican Fiesta

After whale watching, we spent the afternoon swimming and eventually wandered down to the resort's market for a pinata (more pictures to come when Jim figures out where he has put his camera's memory card).  The girls were dressed in their Mexican flea market dresses, which reminded me of when I was a little girl and we went down to San Antonio for a wedding.  We went to the San Antonio market and bought colorful mumus--one for each of us and for our cousin Andrea.  Evie was very proud of her "Rainbow Princess Dress" and Cora and Millie looked beautiful, too!  

With the beautiful and stylish Aunt Kate:

                          

                        

 The pinata was a lot of fun, and after the kids all had a turn the adults were allowed to whack it, too (again, pictures on Jim's missing memory card):

 Evie kept all the leftover bits and pieces of the pinata:

We hadn't planned to go to the Mexican fiesta (besides going to the pinata), but after a strong mango margarita and when the Mariachi band started up, we just couldn't resist.  So we headed down to join in the festivities.

Here I am in the midst of my strong mango margarita, with Millie, who was trying to figure out how to eat her pinata candy while it was still in the wrapper:

Mexican fiesta-ers:



Evie met a real Mexican princess.  Millie was scared of her.

 We spent a lot of time eating our faces off while we were in Mexico.  All you can eat buffets were in abundance and we ate and drank all we could. The food was really good.

 Jim enjoyed his tequila shot (worn around his neck).

 Unfortunately, after all the whale watching, swimming, pinata hitting and princess meeting, Evie wasn't able to stay awake for the amazing Mexican dancing that was too come:

 

But Kate and Cora got picked out of the crowd to dance with the "old men."

 There was lots of stomping and swirling of skirts and sword dancing and all the dancers were really good, I thought.  (as a side note, we also saw some other styles of dancing during dinner a few nights before, where the costumes were less demure and the women wore lots of feathers and sparkles.  The men liked that performance better).

 And, the Mexican hat dance! 

After all the eating and drinking and whale watching and dancing, our party began to drop like flies.  Try as we might to keep on going, we ended up heading back to our apartment at 8:30 when they started playing stupid drinking games on the stage.

Mexico adventures continued--Whale Watching!

Well, that whole plan to blog about Mexico in pieces and prevent such a big gap in updates hasn't exactly worked out...but I shall persevere and eventually I'll tell the whole story of our trip to Cabo.

Early on Monday morning we all headed out to the front of the resort to catch a cab and head off for a morning of whale watching. Alas, Jim wasn't feeling well, so he decided to stay back with Millie.  Here is the whole Whale Watching Crew:

 We visited a not quite open flea market on the Marina to get Evie a Mexican straw hat.  There were small children playing the xylophone for tourists. They didn't look very happy and when we were in town and away from the fancy resort we were faced with Cabo's poverty.  Despite that, everyone in Cabo was always very friendly and good natured...a nice break after being in London, where people have a lot more money than people in Cabo, but go out of their way to avoid interacting with each other.

Whale watching is actually a big boat party, with lots of yummy food and all you can drink and booming music and a funny MC.  

                                         

 Finally, after a lot of hanging around and eating food, we headed out of the marina!

 A view of the beautiful beaches we would visit later in the week:

 As we pulled into the harbor, we had our first glimpse of some big, playful sea lions (which you can't see in this picture, but they were there). 

 And, after a while...some humpback whales!  Unfortunately, I never managed to get a good picture of them when they surfaced, but it was pretty amazing to see them.  We kept our distance, because those were the rules, but some of the water taxis who were also taking people out to whale watch were getting very close to the whales.

 In between seeing whales, Kate led Evie and Cora in an on boat ballet performance.

 There was plenty of beer...

 What a fun day, in beautiful weather, to see the whales!  And we had a lot more fun to look forward to later in the week, too.

Mexico: the first couple of days

It seems like it's been months already since we were in Mexico. It's kind of depressing how the things that we really look forward to come and go so quickly.  Anyway, enough sentimentality...on to the story of Mexico!

We had a short, but scream filled flight (courtesy of Millie, who, it is becoming clear, is not very good at coping with her jet lag) to Cabo, but when you're on a plane full of people who are anticipating their vacation in sunny Mexico, no one cares if your baby is screaming. In fact, they all think it's really cute and funny and everyone wants to talk to you about their kids and grandkids.  I'm pretty sure that our flight from Houston to Cabo was the happiest flight I've ever been on.

And going through Customs in Mexico is also a happy experience. In London and in Houston, despite our legal and legit visas and our American passports, and our complete innocence and respect for the law, we always wonder if they're going to let us in. It's just so intense.  In Mexico, the customs people are just happier and friendlier and not so scary.  I'm sure they deal with a lot of illegal activity, but they seem to give you the benefit of the doubt (unless, like the guys we saw being frisked by border patrol outside of the airport, you look like total stoners)...I'm not sure I would want to be on the wrong side of the law, though, in Mexico.

After customs we entered the onslaught of people trying to convince us that we should take their taxis instead of the one we had pre-booked. We had been warned that they would do this, so we weren't swindled.  There was then mass confusion with the taxi we actually were booked with, because all of us were under Dad's name.  But eventually we managed to get into the van to Cabo San Lucas with someone's golf clubs behind us in the perfect position to decapitate us, where we to make any sudden stops.  Despite all this, we made it to our resort.

Unfortunately, I didn't really get very many pictures of Cabo outside of our resort. It's a very arid place. In one direction there were shanties and miles of desert with huge cacti and sand...and then Wal-Mart, Home Depot, Sam's Club and Starbucks.   In the other was the Pacific Ocean, bordered by giant resorts and multi-million dollar oceanfront homes.  That's the side we were staying on ( a side note, as testament to how warped my sense of reality has become since moving to London: when I was flipping through a real estate magazine, I actually thought, "Wow...you can get THAT house for only $3,000,000!" In Hampstead, you can get an upstairs, tiny two bedroom apartment, with no modern fixtures and disgusting carpet for about a million. But it has a view of the Heath!  If you want a big house, you have to have at least 20 million at the ready. Sheesh. ).

This was the view from our suite (and Jim and Shug enjoying the view with fresh and delicious Mexican food and very strong margaritas):

And this is what we got to walk out to on our first afternoon in Cabo.  Off in the distance are the famous Cabo Rocks (including the dramatic "Arch" through which the waves crash from the bay to the Pacific Ocean and back again).  There were some beautiful beaches over there which we explored later in the week, but on our first day we stayed on our little resort/tourist strip of beach. 

Evie was fearless about the ocean on our first day, excited to be in the water with her Daddy.  And Millie was having a great time watching Evie and Jim in the water.  But after getting knocked over by the waves, Evie decided that the ocean was scary and that was the end of that.

On our first night, our room was the 'hub.' It's always a lot of fun when we all get together (and loud).  We were all in suites next to or across the hall from each other and when we were all 'home' we left our doors unlocked so that it was easy to come and go.  It was almost like having our own 5 bedroom house to wander in and out of and after my mom walked in on Jim in his underwear, he realized the importance of staying dressed during the daylight hours when you are on vacation with the Carpenters.

Will and Hope, looking handsome and radiant:

Sunrise on our first morning...yes, we were all up before the sun rose thanks to jet lag!

We took a family walk to the sister resort Villa del Arco (where we were supposed to stay, but for some reason, could not). Cora and Andy dug some holes en route. 

Villa del Arco had a pretty awesome kid's pool with fountains and rocks...but we weren't, it turned out, allowed to swim there.  Obviously we are good at following the rules.

Not to worry...there was a lot of fun to be had at our OWN kiddy pool, which is where we spent the majority of our time during our week in Cabo.

Fun in the sun at the kiddy pool...and bunny ears:

Millie suited up for snack time:

And Evie took a dip with The Shug in the big kiddy pool, which was heated and perfect for people who are wimpy about being cold!

Later in the day, we headed down to the beach, where we were hit up by all the beach vendors selling silver, name bracelets, henna tattoos, plates, bowls, blankets, dresses, purses, fish mobiles...and cigars (with a side of weed).  Their persistence was impressive!

Will, in Baywatch mode:

On the beach, we all enjoyed lying on our beach chairs with our beach drinks. I was double fisting:

Millie contemplated the sea...

And Hope enjoyed some beach yoga:

Cheers to Dad..the one who made our whole trip possible! 

The beautiful Aunt Kate and Cora, enjoyed the sun:

So did Evie, the Beach princess!

And Will and Hope gave us a little break, so we could just lie there like beach bums for a few minutes!  We were off to a great start to a fun week.