Posts under ‘Travel’

The first day we were in Cancun we went on a zipline tour. The tour included a number of zip lines followed by a short bike ride to a Cenote. The zip lines were so amazing! They wound 2 miles through the beautiful Yucatan jungle. Then we rode about a mile through the jungle to a gorgeous cenote. We swam in the cenote and Bryan rode the zip line into the water. It was such a fun and exciting day!

For dinner we went to La casa de las Margaritas. While we ate dinner we listened to a marachi band. It was so much fun!

When we were in Cancun we had a couple of days that we didn’t have anythign planned so that we could relax and soak up some sun at the beach. On Saturday evening we made reservastions at the Laguna Grill so we could watch the sunset. However, after dinner we got a real treat when an alligator swam up right next to our table. We all decided that the Laguna grill had the best atmosphere in Cancun.

Last Friday we visited the AMAZING Mayan ruins of Chichen Itza. We had a guided tour which took us 2.5 hours from Cancun to Chichen Itza. On the way there we got a good glimpse of how most of Mexico lives when we passed through the small villages. When we got there we ate an authentic Mexican meal at the Mayaland Hotel and watched some talented dancers. A lady was making corn tortillas from scratch. The men and women first danced with bottles of water on their head. Then they came out with trays that were filled with cups of water. When they danced they would spin around and the good dancers were able to keep the trays spinning on their heads after they stopped twirling. 

After lunch we took a guided tour of Chichen Itza. Words can’t even describe how intelligent and advanced the Mayan people were. The people built the Temple of the Kukulcan (Meaning Feathered Serpent), with such knowledge of the seasons and they based it off the Mayan calendar. Every step, design, and platform on the temple represented something significant in the Mayan world. The Temple had 4 sides to it, which included 91 steps for the 91 days of each season, the last platform on the top was the extra day of the year. It was named after the Feathered Serpent because when the sun sets they built the temple so that you can see a serpent sliding down the side of the temple in the shadow. They also made the temple perfectly acoustic. If you clapped at the base of the south side of the temple your echo would be the noise of a bird. That was so amazing to hear. There were many other structures at the Chichen Itza site. They were all so intricate and detailed. The whole experience was so mind boggling and now we know why Chichen Itza was recently deemed one of the new 7 wonders of the world.

Bryan and I recently (we got back this morning at 1:00 AM) visited Cancun Mexico with some friends. We had such an amazing time visiting Mayan ruins, relaxing on the beach, taking zip line tours, snorkeling, and sailing.

I will post the pictures from each day separately since we took over 200 pictures. The pictures below were taken from our hotel balcony. It is a view of the lagoon and the ocean.

Bryan and I went to Vancouver Island last weekend for a quick trip. The highlight of our trip was definitely Butchart Gardens. They didn’t have many flowers, since it is the middle of winter, but the gardens were still so beautiful. We took about 200 pictures at the garden alone. We are planning on going back during spring when all the flowers are in bloom.

The hotel we stayed in was a different story. From what we saw on the web site and the reviews we read, it sounded like a really nice hotel. When we got there the outside looked very nice, and the lobby looked nice, but our actual room was a different story. The hotel was so old that Abraham Lincoln could have possibly stayed in it. The main problem was that the heater didn’t work. We asked the staff to fix it early in the afternoon so that it would be warm by the time we went to sleep. When we got back it was still freezing. So, just before dinner we inquired about the heater again. They offered us a space heater with no sympathy. Since it was our only option at the moment we agreed but Bryan couldn’t seem to get it to turn before we had to leave for dinner. So, when we got back from a delicious dinner (about 10:00 PM) he tried to turn on the space heater again. When he finally got it to work it shorted the circuit and we were left without power. By this time we were so tired that we just froze.

We also enjoyed walking along the coast and walking through downtown Victoria. Even though we had some misadventures we had lots of fun and we will definitely look back on our trip and have a couple of good laughs. We also learned A LOT about Canada so if you are ever planning a trip there call us and we will give you a few pointers of what to do and what not to do.

Ferry Ride

Butchart Gardens

Hotel And Coast

Bryan and I decided to get away for a day so we went to San Juan Island. We took the hour long ferry ride to the island on Friday night and spent the night in Friday Harbor. Then, on Saturday we drove around the whole island stopping at the parks and beaches to take pictures. We took some pictures near the light house at Deadman Bay, but the visit was very short, the temperature was in the low 40′s and the wind made it even colder. From the bay you could look across the water to Victoria on Vancouver Island. On the south East side of the island we stumbled upon the American Camp National Historical Park. The park had a long trail dotted with informational plaques. Bryan and I walked along the trail and read about how a war almost started between the Americans and the British because an American settler killed a pig belonging to a British company. It was a very interesting story indeed; however, I was much more interested in beautiful scenery.