The Niederhauser Chronicles: Mexico Part 1

IT'S FINALLY HERE!!!! The much anticipated and awaited day of vacation arrived. Man the kids had been soooo excited! And so were Tanner and I! (I'm not excited about blogging it because there are so many pictures...and not all in order and I don't even remember all the specific days and things that happened so the pictures are going to just have to tell most of the story, hopefully!)

The kids did great on the flight. They were pretty good waiting in the airport and all the other places we had to wait. Thank goodness for screens and movies. The flight wasn't bad. Direct to PV and only a few hours.

We stayed at the Barcelo about a 30 minute drive south from the airport. I thought the resort was great. It maybe wasn't the nicest thing ever but it was PERFECT for our needs. The food was not awesome but the pools and the beach were perfect and there was lots of stuff to do nearby. We would definitely go back! We loved it. The kids LOVED it.

We didn't waste any time getting in the pool. The first day was a little rough for me because I had a bug bite that was getting worse and worse fast and was embarrassing and MISERABLE. It had been going on for over a week - just SUPER itchy and then the scab broke off and I think I spread nasty toxin and so the itching became unbearable. So I think with all the scratching I caused a secondary infection that spread to my nose - so I had a weeping scab on the bottom of my nose and a disgusting weeping arm that was swollen and painful and AWFUL. I ended up taking a taxi by myself back into town to get some medicine - antibiotic pills and ointment and steroids. Luckily it did help eventually but the first 2 days were pretty awful and I didn't get in the water at all. (Pictures I think are at the end of all of Mexico).

Harvey took to the ocean immediately. He LOVED it! The girls had a blast at first until they realized it was salty and kind of burned in the eyes and so then they stuck to the pool for most of the time but we couldn't keep Harvey out of the ocean. I love that he loved it so much. Diving constantly looking for shells. It was awesome. The water was perfection.

A couple views from the drive with my taxi driver. I loved being able to have a conversation with him while we were driving. I love Spanish!

Kids club that we did a few things with. It was nice to have the option but the kids didn't love it so it wasn't utilized a much as maybe it could have been but still a fun change of pace.

This little pool was perfect. A fun slide and the perfect depth to let kids just go to town and not have to be watched so closely.

Kids Club got invited to a kids bday party. They got to do the pinata. Kind of a fun little something.

The big kids watched all the little kids so just the adults could go to dinner on Preston's birthday. It was really fun and we had fun conversation with Clare and Berrie - just stories about how they met and wedding and early life. This trip was technically for their 50th wedding anniversary.

They planned to go do a zipline tour that I didn't think I would go with because of the girls. Harvey was luckily big enough and wanted to go do it. But then Carson and Nat offered to watch the girls so I could go. And luckily they had enough space since I jumped on late. I am SOOOO glad I got to go. It was probably my favorite thing of the trip. So fun doing it with Harvey. And it was just FUN! Cool, pretty, exciting, awesome.

That's where the pictures stop. They wouldn't let us take cameras because we got really wet - and they took a bunch - but charged a million for them so we didn't buy any, which I'm pretty sad about - because there were some really cool ones of Harvey and us and just for memories. I wish I would have asked about buying just like 5-10. We had to ride mules to the top and Harvey loved that. We did a couple pretty big, long, high ziplines first. We rapelled down a waterfall. Went down a waterslide. Did some ropes course walking stuff. More ziplines dropping us into pools. Dropping off a ledgd into a pool - rappelling over that ledge just free. We did this coaster thing where you sat down and were hooked into a rail and went sailing down, flying over the river and just drops and bounces and all the things that were SOOO fun. I was just giddy giggling the whole time. Sooo cool. That was my favorite part. Then that just dropped you hard in a big pool in the river. Harvey liked all the things. He got pretty cold so got a little whiney a few times but was brave and a good sport and I think thought it was pretty cool he got to do it all. We did a couple other zip line things. One upside down (if you wanted - that was kind of painful) and then a surfboard one which was really fun) and then ended with a big waterslide, wearing hockey helmets/masks and elbow pads. Ha. Kind of funny. But it was all very exhilarating and so fun. Did I mention it was fun??