2017-2018 Blog posted here:
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We left for Sudbury on Saturday (October 6/18) , with an early morning flight out the following day (Sunday October 7th) to Cancun. Our time in Puerto Morelos is going to be longer this year - about 5 months, actually our time there depends on circumstances and of course Maple Syrup Season!
This Thanksgiving Weekend started out to be a wet one, but still some beautiful colour and lots to be thankful for.
Traffic was light
and the channel was calm
the colour was beautiful
We are so fortunate to live in Northern Ontario where we can enjoy the vivid beauty of Autumn.
We stayed at the Fairfield Inn and Suites, they have nice rooms at competitive prices.
Clinton and his family met us for dinner at Red Lobster. A favourite of ours and theirs too. A final time to get together before we leave. Our plan is to not come back until end of February or first week of March.
Our flight left on time from Sudbury- what a beautiful morning - the sunrise was spectacular to watch on our way to Toronto. I was fortunate to get the window seat - Allan always likes to sit there which is OK with me because I am not too interested in what is beneath us but this flight was different. Before take off they asked for one person in our area of the plane to move to the back to adjust the load weight, Allan took the offer - so we both had window seats!
One more reason why I don't take a window seat is because I am usually asleep before take off and/or landing. This time I was sound asleep when be we landed in Toronto - the bump and slight noise upon landing awoke me - in my sleepy state I was sure we were driving over the train tracks at Espanola just before Highway 17. I was a bit surprised when I became conscious of the fact we were on the tarmac at Toronto Pearson Airport!
Our wait time was a short one until we were on our flight heading from Toronto to Cancun. Much to our surprise and pleasure we were given First Class seating. Not sure how or why that happened but we accepted it with a smile, we had a nice menu for breakfast, drinks, snacks and lots of leg room. Awesome. We are certainly going to miss Westjet flying out of Sudbury.
The flight was scenic - many different cloud formations
along with dense cloud
and fog or mist.
This is interesting - one of the runways coming into Cancun actually goes over the highway, It gives you a bit of a thrill if you are on the highway when a plane comes in.
The shuttle service we have been booking for our transportation from the airport is La Siesta Tours - Francisco's driver was prompt as usual. What a nice feeling knowing your driver is waiting for you with your name on a card to take you to the next location. He even brought along two nice cold cervezas for us! Awesome service.
Our good friends Kris and Claudia came by our house with partying in mind,
Who would guess that Allan has been up since 3 am - it is now about 8 pm. Time for bed!
We had a great dinner at the new burger place at
the end of our street.
Lots of catching up was done.
Tuesday we had friends from Canada come to visit for part of the day, we took them souvenir shopping and to Pelicanos in the Port where we had a great lunch. The girls were introduced to a new drink ---a spider monkey, a drink made with creme de banana, Kahlua and ice cream. MMMM-mmmm Good!
Allan and his harem
The race is on - who can finish first and be able to move away from the table? LOL
The flowers are blooming, I think the greens are more luscious right now - this is the rainy season so it stands to reason. However there has been little to none since we arrived.
Allan checked our propane tank pressure and found it was on zero so that meant a dinner out. We went to one of our favourite places for seafood - shrimp - Allan's breaded and mine garlic butter of course.
While we were waiting for our dinner the neighbouring eatery was refurbishing its kitchen walls - wood pallets are the answer to all construction concerns here. What a simple life they live.
A little newt came by to watch us for a bit and
a pair of turtles waded in their pool passing the time not too far away.
We have a new visitor to our pool and trees surrounding our back yard - they are the Great Kiskadee. ,
They use the pool as a bird bath - very social birds compared to others in our neighbourhood.
Our neighbour Claudia treated us to a Mexican dish called Huitlacoche on a Quesedilla with Oaxaca cheese. Huitlacoche is fungus that grows on corn in the husk. Allan was not too excited about it but I loved it. It tastes like mushrooms.
https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/the-blight-known-as-corn-smut-allows-fungus-to-grow-on-ears-news-photo/121249797 this site will show you what it looks like on the corn cob.
Plantains
Another park being build in a green area of our subdivision.
This construction site is at Super Aki, one of our two major grocery stores. A few weeks back a section of it collapsed while under construction and men were killed due to the falling dibres. The construction is progressing rather slowly at this point.
Here we are in Super Aki getting some early morning shopping done - hoping to beat the heat of the afternoon.
Here is Allan dealing with the cashier - we are 5 minutes too early to buy beer! So we took another walk about the store and came back on time to make our purchase.
Later in the day we heard some major thunder,
upon going outside and looking at the sky directly
above us this is what we saw.
This is the sky looking to the east - toward the ocean
This is what we see looking to the West - toward the jungle. The storm passed within about 10 minutes and we never had a drop of rain but we did had lots of lightening and thunder.
Friday evening we were invited to join friends for a little get together - it was nice to see them again.
Today while out for a walk we saw this little green iguana - first time we have seen one this colour.
This completes our first week in Paradise and it has been wonderful. The temperature during the day is 33 - 34 degrees and the pool is like bath water at 30. That brings back memories of the hot tub at camp.
