To Vegas & Back

Last week Seth and I, along with another couple, headed out to Vegas for a short vaca. 

We saw several thunderstorms on the way.
We never went through a storm cloud, but it was really cool to see the rain and even lightening in the distant clouds.




This is the strip as we were landing.
{I'm quite certain I wasn't supposed to have my camera on at this point in the flight, but I'm going to blame the three Chardonnays.}


Here was our view from the hotel room:


And here's the view from our friends' room:
 

We stayed at the Flamingo, so naturally they had a wildlife area with flamingos.


...and I am kicking myself because I did not get one single picture of Seth and I during our entire time there.
{Next time...next time.}

Oh, and if you would like to see my more artistic shots from Vegas, head on over to my photo blog.

365-250: Phone Booth

This one was, again, taken on my 2004 trip to Europe.

365-249: Eiffel Tower

I took this photo when I went to Europe right after college graduation...in 2004!
Wow, hard to imagine all that's happened/changed in 5 years!

Our Vacation, Part 5: The Wedding

Friday night was the wedding, which was absolutely gorgeous! How can a beach wedding not be?!

Here's Seth and me:


(Note: Seth barely returned from Margaritaville in time for the wedding!)


And some pictures I managed to take of the lovely couple during/after the ceremony!
(Congrats, Rod and Genn!)

Our Vacation, Part 4: Royal Hideaway Hotel

The whole reason for us taking this vacation was to attend the wedding of our good friends, Rod and Genn. They got married at The Royal Hideaway, which is an extremely (or at least to us) upscale all-inclusive resort. (and had the price tag to prove it) So, we only stayed there the night of the wedding, which was also our last night in Mexico.

When we arrived at the resort, we had to go through a security-guarded gate to get to the main lobby! (I'd like to say I felt rich at this point, but I mostly felt out of place...like they'd realize I'm severely lacking in the "class" department and kick me out!) Once we got through security, the van stopped and the bellman took our bags and escorted us to check-in. He left and returned with cool wash clothes and champagne! (ooh la la!) We were a little early checking in...like 4 hours early! So, we waited a while and the lady checking us in was able to get our room ready 2 hours early! So, we left our bags with the bellman and headed to the pool for drinks (we wore our swimsuits there in case we had to wait), a light lunch and to mingle with our friends who were already there.


Seth quickly made his way towards Margaritaville and I threw myself into a Corona commercial!


Around 2pm, we headed to our room:

There were several villas and each had no more than 20 rooms in each. And each villa had it's own concierge! We were on the ground floor and this was the view from our villa:

and this was the view from the main pathway:

as you can tell, there were no bad views!

We saw a nice variety of flora

and fauna without even leaving the pool!

Our Vacation, Part 3: First Day of Relaxation

After we got settled in, we headed to the beach next door because it was more conducive to swimming.

Here's a picture I caught of some stud coming out of the ocean. ;)

...and he even came over to talk to me! (lol)

And here we are together!

~~~

Later that night we went shopping for souvenirs for the kids and to dinner. We got a maraca for Rowan and a recorder/flute thing for Breck. We spent a whopping $2.00 USD, or $26.00 pesos.

(the conversion rate is $1 USD = $13 Pesos)

For dinner we went to the mexican restaurant that's part of the resort and it was fantastic! Seth ordered a shrimp dish with a taco appetizer and I got chicken enchiladas with mole sauce and a salad, which turned out to be a shrimp and avocado salad that tasted so great I had to get a picture of it. (and I'm not normally a fan of either of those ingredients)

While we were eating dinner, two older men were walking around, playing for people (for money, of course) so we gave them a couple bucks and got a nice song out of it. (at least I think it was nice - I don't speak spanish so who knows what it was about!?)

Our Vacation, Part 2: Grand Porto Real Hotel

When we got to the hotel, we waited and waited and waited for someone to check us in. I was immediately not impressed. After all, it is an all inclusive resort and I expected service, dang it! We finally got checked in and were told that our room wouldn't be ready for about another hour, which was expected since we were an hour earlier than check-in time. So, the bell boy took our luggage and we headed to the lunch buffet, which was also lacking. We realized that it was 2pm-ish, but the food looked old and like it had been sitting out...in the hot, humid heat. (It was an open-air kind of hotel)

We were, however, very pleased with the service we received from Freddy, our bell boy. He showed us where everything was, the amenities, what we had to do to keep the lights and ac on, etc.

The room was amazing!

We had an ocean front room on the top floor and had two balconies!

And the view was fantastic:

here's video if you'd prefer more of an experience of our view:

And Seth wasted no time in taking full advantage of the mini bar, which was really more of a full bar since the bottles were full size and there were mixers in the fridge! (he didn't really take a shot like this!)

365-152: Flora de Mexico, Tres

Our Vacation, Part 1: Getting To Mexico

Here's a quick itinerary of our travel day:

2:30am: (yes, that's am!) Get up.
3:00am: Leave our house for the airport.
5:30am: Get to the short-term parking.
6:00am: Get to the airport, go through security and wait.
6:55am: (roughly) Plane leaves for Atlanta, GA where we catch our connecting flight to Cancun.

(Our arrival time in Atlanta was 10am and our plane to Cancun departed at 10:55am. We were a little worried about only having 55 minutes to switch planes, since neither of us had been to the Atlanta airport before. Since we waited until the last minute to book our flights, we weren't able to sit together. Seth had a primo seat at the front (of coach) and I had the pleasure of sitting at the waaaay back.)

7:00am-9:50am: Enjoy some incredible views from the plane and realize that I'd have to crawl over two people to get the camera from my bag in the overhead. ...the clouds were amazing!

10:00am: (roughly) Land in Atlanta
10:35am: Board the plane to Cancun
10:55am: (roughly) Leave for Cancun!

10:55am-12:45pm: Enjoy the flight to Cancun, this time I remembered to unpack my camera!

Seth and I were able to sit together on this flight and we were entertained by a southern lady who reminded me a lot of Vicki Lawrence (the lady from Mama's Family). She talked a lot, chugged her mini bottle of bourbon and made us laugh quite a bit! I should have asked to take her picture - I bet anything she would have vogued for it!

12:45pm: Arrive in Cancun, go through customs.

1:15pm: Take a van to our hotel in Playa del Carmen. (about an hour away from Cancun)
2:00pm: Arrive at the Grand Porto Real Hotel and check in.

365-151: Flora de Mexico, Dos

365-150: Flora de Mexico, Uno

365-149: Pelican

365-148: Just Married

365-147: Sand Timer?

365-146: Chess Board

365-145: Toes in the Sand

365-144: Tide