playa del carmen, tulum, valladolid

so...
i have been scolded for not keeping up with my blog on this trip and although i am not inspired to write i have the time so here i go...
hightlights...
-vitas mom has been staying with us so she has been treating us to sweet hotels and adventures! we went on a private fishing trip in puerto morelos and caught a bunch of trigger fish. we also has some cool cervescas on the boat and then got to fry up the fish for dinner. guess what, i caught the first one!
-after that we went to tulum , which has myan ruins on the beautiful coast!
-then we took a bus to valladolid where where we stayed in another nice hotel and went to a beautiful cenote (look them up online) and chichinetsa(not sure of spelling) another great ruin site.
-today we went to a cool place that i can{t remember the name of but we got another private tour. This consisted of taking a private boat through a park and then going to the home of hundreds of flamingos, we got to see the red water that is filled with the little cril things they eat to make them pink . We floated in water so salty we were like blow up toys and then COVERED ourselves in mineral mud. Then we got to rinse of in the beautiful ocean, visit yet another freakin ruin site and see a tradition myan village.
It has been a privilage to participate in all of these things, most of which i would not have done without Bonnie. She and I go to cancun tomorrow what she will fly out and I will spend one more day on my favorite island Isla Mujeres before flying to Mexico city to meet my dad for ten days. I have AMAZING pictues to come and will post them soon
much love, em

More of mexico

Goodbye Isla Mujeres

Me and my granola, Vita and her Ukulele life is never boreing!

Pelenque

That is is big leaf

Parque de Venta, Villahermosa

Her name is Abuela

Mexico has swollowed me up and I run on mexican time which means I have no idea what the date, day or time is- ever! That is my excuse for not having written is so long! Now it feels like there is too much to write down but I have had some of the most amazing adventures and I want to share them all.

I left off in a small jungle settlement outside of Pelenque. Our room there was a few plywood boards tacked together covered in screens, diveded into four rooms. We were the only girls surround by bg groups of Australian and French Canadians- you can imagine we all got to playing practical jokes on eachother as we could hear everything in everyone's room- the best part was that we practically never saw eathother's faces!

We took a day trip to Aqua Azul *look it up on line* it was absolutley breathtaking. Miles of limestone pools, clear water, stunning. Then a we spent a day inside the ruins of Pelanque. That was really something, we wandered through abandoned palaces, death chambers halls etc. and we allowed amazing access. Vita and I took an afternoon break and sat a top one of the hightest ruins and just sketched out the beauty below. Exploring the city and walking through the halls I could really imagine the way of life there those thousands of years ago.

Then we took a 14 hour bus ride to the coast and passed through Cancun to get to the small island, Isla Mujeres. For five days we really just chilled out and relaxed. I didn't even take my camera anywhere, just imagine the typical white sandy beaches... We made tons of friends staying at our hostel including travalers on the same type of trip as us and the typical travlaers who have been doing this type of thing for 5 years. We also had a great day with some boat captains from South Carolina. Shout out to Bobbie, Ford, Eddie, and Ron! They are awesome and fixed us fresh sashime that they caught that day! I hope you guys arn't disapointed by the blog... its kinds of boreing but you might just become famouse now...

You can imagine the life of lounging in hammoks all day, and partying all night gets a little exausing so we headed just a little south to Puerto Morelos to meet Vita's sister.

Here we stayed with Vita's family friend, Oma, and her friend Megan for three or four days. These women are absolutely hilarious. Free spirits and tons of fun we've been to beaches, centones and around town laughing the whole time trying to keep our eyes on the keys that are perpetually getting lost. Vita's mom met up with us yesterday and now we are in a nice hotel by the beach *thank you mom!*

That is about it. I'm flying to meet my dad in Mexico city and we are going to San Miguel de Allende on the 25th. My spanish is getting better, my writing is chugging a long, time means nothing to me and all is well. Until next time...

cross country

In the last few days we traveled to Cueranavava (probably misspelled) which is the capitol of the state of Morela and stayed with a friends family for three days. The city was beautrful and in the same colonial style as the other big cities we had seen. From there we knew we wanted to head East and hit the more jungle area. So we took a three hour bus ride to Puebla, and then an 8hour busride to Villahermosa arriving at five in the morning. Villahermosa was not the beautiful city that its name promised to to be but we did get to go the Parque Venta and see some great (I mean amazing) giant pre Myan statues. I took a million pictures and will post them later. Despite the fresh coco milk drinks, and the delicouse fresh shrimp tacos I wasn´t feeling very satisfied with Mexico. I realize now that I just needed to get out of those big cities!!!! So we took an early bus this morning to Palenque, the town near the famouse Myan ruins. We are staying in a very secluded area outside the town located just before the gates in to the park. We have a tiny cabana with only half walls and the rest screens (hopefully enough to seal out mosquitos!!) and took a walking tour of the whole area through jungle paths. I realize suddenly that it is not mexico that I was not connecting with but the big cities. Vita and I being very good practicing our spanish and intend to be very creative while in this amazing space. Most of the other people are drop dead gorgeous Argentinians (a little intimidating) and cute Europeans. Tonight we are planning to go the one bar and hear music from South America. If I dont drink too much tonight I am going to wake up and do yoga... but we will see because to save money Vita and I bought our own bottle of Mezcal as well as bread, avocados, and a can of beans. We might just be drunk fattys who eat and drink enough for two days in one night.
Dad, I can´t wait to go to Palenque tomorrow. I heard so much about it growing up! I promis to take a lot of pictures and post them for you. Everyone else, I feel guilty posting a blog without pictures but you´ll have to wait in suspense...