The House
We rented a
big, multilevel house for the twelve of us.
We
had 5
bedrooms, a large living and
dinning area, upper balconies and a
big area around a saltwater pool. The
concept of being in or out of the house is a little strange.
I guess once you're inside the gate, you're inside the house.
All the halls between areas are basically
open on all sides except there
is a roof overhead. The same
applies to the stairways up to the bedrooms and down to the pool.
We had
direct ocean access with an area we could jump into about 10 feet of water and
snorkel around in front of the house. There
was a nice ladder with handrails for getting back out. Towards the end of our stay,
Hector and the girls enjoyed
jumping and diving off the platforms and walls into the sea. The current in front
of the house could be strong, so we
snorkeled up current first, then drifted back.
Hector and I did a shore
dive that lasted over an hour and managed to
return to the ladder without a problem. Some
other divers
were not so lucky. One
day four divers showed up and asked if they could come ashore at our ladder.
They were counting on having the current blow them either north or south
and had pickup vehicles at two locations. The
current just kept switching and they just kinda sloshed around in front of our
house. As they were leaving and we opened the gate, a gringo with a
fishing rod in his hand just wandered in and started down to the pool and sea.
Sylvia stopped him and asked him what he thought he was doing.
He said his hotel told him he could fish along here somewhere.
Sylvia told him to move on. Pretty
gutsy move to walk through someone's house and start fishing off their diving
platform!
I didn't
think I'd like the saltwater pool, because after diving in salt water all day,
a nice dip in fresh water is always nice. The
pool was really nice, though. Every
few days, they would pull the plug, drain the water into the sea, do a bit of
cleaning, then pump water from the sea back into the pool.
No need for lots of filters, chemicals and all that other stuff.
The girls worked on their tans around the pool and occasionally swam. Becky developed a technique for floating into the pool on a
air cushion without getting wet.
The family
that cooked for us and kept the house up
lived in the house in a lower level.
At first, they kept their pets
away from us so we wouldn't be bothered.
After they
understood
that most of our group liked animals,
the pets were
given more access to the house.
Debbie was talking to a parrot one day and she extended her hand and
the
parrot climbed
up
her arm and sat on her shoulder. All
was well until it was time for the
parrot to dismount.
Debbie couldn't convince it to leave and some others tried to pluck it
off her. The parrot panicked and
Debbie got a parrot bite out of the deal. Nothing
to serious. The family also had a
very cute little puppy. The Spanish
name for the puppy sounded a lot like Cheese Pizza, so that was what most of us
called her. One of the critters in
the area that was not a pet, but showed up in the driveway or in the halls now
and again was a lizard. A big
lizard is a startling critter if you aren't expecting them, especially at
night.
After the
rest of the group left, three of us stayed in a hotel on Cozumel, did the day
trip to Tikal, then spent a couple of days on Isla Mujeres. We stayed in a hotel for $15 a night on Mujeres.
No AC, but clean and acceptable.