Last full day on the Riviera Maya, Mexico and the weather man had predicted full on tropical storms. Luckily we are leaving tomorrow.
But true to the form of weather predictions, they never materialised. The best we got were some moody looking clouds lurking just off shore, a bit of a stiff breeze and some warm drizzle just as we sat down to lunch. We have our holiday tactics sorted by this point and made our way to the restaurant before the weather broke. We had prime seats watching the unobservant people scurry around to find shelter from the tropical “storm” while we sipped cocktails and tucked into lunch at the beach bar (again)
After tackling a monster lunch we were both knackered, this level of sloth really takes it out of you! In addition, Aimi had dragged me out of bed – literally – so we could get to the beach and reserve a sun bed in a spot away from the hordes. My eyes were still full of sleep as we casually placed the sacrificial sunglasses and sarong, before walking over to get breakfast.
The morning coffee helped me feel more alive… No, I’ve not given up tea, I’m actually really looking forward to a proper brew when I get back to England…coffee is all they have here. Well they have hot water that you can use with tea bags and milk, but the thermos it comes from has had coffee in it in the past which leaves its taint on the water… I’m not fussy, I just like good tea, or no tea. Bad tea is worse than no tea and ironically, builders tea, with bits of plaster and man-glitter (sawdust) in it, is the best. But this holiday has been a tea-free experience. I’ve mostly substituted tea with cocktails, as you do.
The cocktails help lubricate interactions between orange skin seekers at the resort. You can almost script the conversations that get started,
“Hey, how’re you doing?”
“Great, you?”
“Yeah, this place is awesome right?!”
“Yes, we love it here, this is our [insert qty times attended] holiday here. Have you been before?
“No, but I can see why you like it”
“Where are you from?
“ [insert very specific location in America, or just a country] ”
“Oh cool, so that’s, what, an XX hour flight?”
“More like XX+5 hours, what about you, where you from?”
“ [insert very specific location in America, or just a country] ”
“Oh cool, the place with the kangaroos!”
……
Pretty much word for word every single time. I’ve no idea how everyone puts up with this all holiday long. It may seem anti-social, but we have plenty of friends, we don’t need any more. I can string these conversations together when needed, it’s very superficial but it’s useful when you want to build just enough rapport with someone to be able to socially pressure them into playing pool volleyball with them.
The activities co-ordinator wasn’t having much luck drumming up interest so I turned on the charm and chatted up some Americans and a fellow snow white skinned English man to join in the game. I dont think his heart was really in drumming up the players because this is winter for the Mexicans and he was not thrilled to get in the moderately chilly water. But he did, and we had a great time getting thrashed, splashing around in the pool. So much so, that after the decisive 2 games were lost, we carried on playing for another hour, just to see how long a rally we could sustain. It was never longer than 5-6 hits but it was great fun. Then we parted, never to see each other again, and with no awkward preconceptions that we would be facebook friends for life.
The hotel puts on activities during the day, one of which is coconut painting. There are hundreds of colourful coconuts dotted around the flower beds and lining the edges of paths. Its nicely cheesy all the sunset motifs and “I ❤️ Mexico” shining up at you as you walk around. I know Aimi is arty and I like to give it a go occasionally so i dragged her over to paint one. She produced one of her cute little cartoon characters and I tried my best to paint an ATV. On the back I “immortalised” our engagement for all to see.
