12/7/11 On the Road- Day 2- Tulum to Cancun Mexico, 82 miles

After a quick breakfast of bananas and chocolate chip banana bread that I'd brought from Santa Elena, we headed to Cancun. It was less than a 2hr drive and a pretty one at that. It seemed that everywhere we looked there were huge resorts with impressive entrances and facades- some with moats and fountains too!

Aaron piped up with this from the backseat, "Daddy can you slow down, you're driving so fast it's making my mouth hurt." - where does this kid come up with this stuff? :o)

Lone windmill on our way to Cancun

We were stopped at one military checkpoint and had our car permit and Kris' passport inspected, but it was quick and easy. Cancun was beautiful! As we entered the town we saw these big sculptures of conch shells, starfish, fish, and coral on the median between the roads. We also saw some familiar names like Dominoes Pizza, McDonalds, Starbucks, and a Super Walmart.

conch sculpture

Starfish

One thing about big cities in Mexico that we'd forgotten... they are packed and very hard to navigate! We drove around for a while looking for a hotel with no real luck. So we followed signs for the hotel zone and ended up surrounded by big resorts and lots of Americans! We asked about rates at a couple of the hotels and the cheapest rooms were $500US per night! Way too rich for our blood, but we did stop at a Starbucks there and bought a coffee for $4.23 US (Venti Mocha Frappe chino) and used their wifi to research hotels. Armed with a list of about 10 hotels that were supposed to be $60US or under we set off again. There was lots of road construction resulting in many detours and just crazy driving in general. A truck came past us with some kind of cable dangling from it's bed and it hit our driver's side mirror, cracking it! Then we ended up on some back road and had a police officer pull us over because Kris didn't have his seat belt on- he'd been in and out of the car going into hotels, plus although its the law, most people don't wear seatbelts here. He said we'd have to follow him to the police station and pay a fine... or we could just pay it here. Kris knew he was in essence asking for a bribe. Kris told him that he'd just follow him to the police station. The police man kept telling us it would be more expensive there than if we just paid him, but Kris insisted. The police man finally relented and told Kris this was his one free chance and to keep his seatbelt on.

Not long after that we found a couple hotels that had secured parking, which was a big deal to us. We ended up staying at Los Cuates de Cancun, which I think means the Twins of Cancun. We paid $23US for one night and got a room with two beds, air conditioning, and our own bathroom. After nearly 4 hours of driving around we were settled in our room. Kris went out to buy a loaf of bread so we could make peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for lunch. While he was walking to the store he stepped over a puddle, then slipped, slamming his foot full force into the curb. His big toe is very bruised and it was very painful. He made it back in one piece (more or less) and we made lunch. Then he called the Dentist and found out that they had openings for that day. He got directions and took off. The boys and I happily relaxed with the air conditioning on and watched a few movies on our dvd player. The boys even got to watch an episode of Spongebob Squarepants that was all in Spanish (normally I'm not a fan of that show, but I let them watch it b/c they couldn't understand what they were saying anyways).  The hours creeped by and by 6:30pm Kris still hadn't returned and  I was starting to worry. We didn't have any way to call each other, and he had my ATM card so I didn't have access to any funds! I tried to keep praying, but couldn't understand why it would be taking so long. When he knocked on the hotel room door about 30 min later, I was SO SO happy to see him!! Turns out he'd been late getting to the dentist because he'd had another run in with a cop! Kris had run a red light that was covered by a tree. He'd also seen the police man sitting there and pulled over of his own accord. The officer told Kris that the fine would be very expensive to pay at the station and that he'd have to wait until tomorrow because the station was closed for the day, that they'd take his license away and that he wouldn't be able to drive the car any more today.... unless he paid the officer right then... I'm sure you can guess where this is going. Kris held\ firm to going to the station and told the officer that the only way he could get money was to go to a bank and use his ATM card. The officer actually offered to drive Kris to a bank! Kris declined and said he could wait until tomorrow. The officer said he could let Kris go for 1000 pesos, which is about $80US. No way was  Kris going for that. Kris talked him down to 200 pesos, about $15US. The officer pocketed the money and drove off with a smile on his face.

Kris said the dentist went well. The Dr. was from Mexico but had studied at the University of Michigan and was licensed in Michigan and CA. He got two fillings and a cleaning for $150US! Since he was home and safe it was time to get some dinner since it was already after 7pm. Jonathan had been feeling better, his appetite slowly returning during the course of the day. We stopped at a little taco restaurant and ate our fill of tacos pastor. I took a picture of how the meat is cooked because it is just too hard to describe... it's a rotating cone of meat that the chef cuts meat off of and into your tacos. We ate 16 tacos and had 2 XX beers (Kris had ordered one but it was a 2 for 1 deal, so I tried some. It wasn't nearly as awful as other beers I've tried and I ended up drinking half of one). Dinner was $8.46US. Bellies full we returned to our room, the boys had showers and were in bed.  Alas sleep was elusive for me that night. Even with the air condioner humming and a noise machine going, the sounds of the street were so loud! And our car alarm went off one time, false alarm, but I was still concerned about it. Morning came all too soon and we were off again!

Tacos Pastor

Snuggling with Daddy before bedtime