The Serpent!

In Mayan culture, the serpent is an important creature. At Chichen Itza, for example, the serpent is built into the stairs of the great pyramid and on the spring equinox, at an exact hour in the afternoon, the sun highlights the serpent and it appears to undulate down the pyramid. This serves to herald a good growing season for crops and animals.

Whomever the powers that be who design the roads in these parts decided to incorporate the serpent onto the medium on the highway between Puerto Morelos and Playa del Carmen. Here, you get an idea of how big this sucker is - he ate Miki as we drove down to Akumal on our way to Yalku to go snorkelling!!!


Another shot will give you an idea of just how big this is.














The side detail of the head is wonderful.........
And when you see it from the reverse direction, the length is truly wonderful. All this work just to decorate a highway - we could learn something from our Mayan cousins, don't you think????

A night out.

Rosie and Martin - these are for you. A group pulled into town and had dinner, browsed the stores and enjoyed PM. The rain has stopped (only a little at night now) so they had a dry ride.




On Wed. eve we went out for a little pub crawling. Started at the Biergarten, a new restaurant/pub in town at Mexico Plus called Yodis. Then we went on to the Cantina Haberneros to congratulate Ed and Natalie on their new baby, Jeremy, and pick up a Puerto Morelos calendar from Frank.

Finally, we ended up at the new Bistro which had a live band playing - and they were awesome. Hard to sit still to good loud Mexican salsa music...!! The Bistro serves quiche, baguettes, great salads and cheap red Chilean wine.

Rain in paradise...!

The tropical rains have been battering PM for almost 5 days now - I feel so sorry for anyone here only for a week....! Heavy rain at the bookstore again - a very empty town square, but still lots of customers, thank goodness.












Our pool has become an infinity pool with all the rain.....had to pump some water out one morning to keep the chemical balance ok.












Went shopping to Market 23 in Cancun with Jill. An amazing place with a gazzillion large and small markets, one of which was a children's clothing store called Vanessa - same name as our 9 year old grand daughter.














What would the blog be without an update on an animal...little latte is getting a tiny bit bigger, but is still pretty tiny, as you can see

Bookstore fun

While their owners came in to buy books, these 2 handsome fellows waited patiently outside.
















Saturday night is always fun in the square and in front of the store. Here is an awesome collection of musicians who played on the street - a combination of guitars, mandolins, saxophone and bongo drums, played by the only woman in the group.












Two of our favourite customers, Valorie and Ken, from Victoria, had to stop and do a little salsa dancing to the wonderful music before they could continue on for supper!!














Today is very cool, just 21 at high noon, and it has rained off and on all day. We feel sorry for the people who are only here for a week, but for we locals it is just a nice few days of cool before the heat returns.

More Posada

Here are Mary and Joseph going past the bookstore window,



followed by the entourage of angels, and even a perky looking devil













The whole town ended up at a stage area on the basketball court, with the procession folks in the prime front seats.


The show that followed was a wide selection of Christmas songs performed by groups of kids from the smallest up to adults. The whole show was finished off by all the kids whacking on pinantas and taking home their loot.

The Posada

Tonight the whole town came out for the Posada, a re-enactment of the Virgin Mary and Joseph going from door to door to find a room at the inn to have their baby. A show of sorts was held at the front of the church first.














Then Mary and Joseph walked all around the town square (you will notice that they are a tad past child bearing age, but very sweet), followed by a procession of wise men, Roman centurian (who knows why he was there), kids, angels and then the town.
The live donkey was a hit, (why am I here and not in my nice comfortable barn???)
And a REAL sleeping baby in the manger.....seriously!!!!

Tropical storm!

We went to the beach on Thursday afternoon, setting up beside our favourite little beach bar, which makes excellent margaritas!!

It had been sunny all morning at home, while we sunbathed and enjoyed our pool, but the clouds started forming about an hour after we arrived.
Miki has been waiting all this time since she had her cataracts done to finally go snorkelling WITHOUT her glasses and still be able to see the wonderful fish. You can tell by that smile that she was pleased!!!!~
Later in the afternoon, this wonderful black sky developed, got blacker and blacker, and finally erupted in lightning, thunder and torrential rain. We packed up slowly, taking pictures, until we were the last ones on the beach and finally made a dash for the car.

Ah, for a wide angle lens that could have taken it all in.
There is nothing as spectacular as this tropical rain - it bounces 6 inches off the road and creates instant lakes everywhere. It also fills the mangroves, which is so needed throughout the year, and cools the temps off a bit as well. Always a fun experience!!