:* Playa del Carmen *:

We got [back] to Playa del Carmen pretty quickly and with no drunken sombrero incidents. The plan was pretty much to find that Extra where we could get the tickets so we walked around and asked directions, then asked again, and then some people seemed to generally gear us in the right direction but maybe not with the right number of blocks so we did some back tracking and were sad to find that a hotel that would give us “just a bed/mattress” was going to cost us 550 pesos. We kept walking, kept walking and came across another hole in the wall type place (though this one had a box light with the word “hotel” on it). We went to check out how much it would be and they told us 250. Sweet!

We ditched our stuff (it wasn’t much to look at, especially cause the maid was in there cleaning at the time) and continued our pursuit of the Extra. Upon arrival, (yay we did actually find it!) we asked about the tickets and they confirmed that in fact the tickets were sold there they just hadn’t arrived yet. Okay, we thought, we’ll just hang out and have some lunch and wait for them. It was about lunch time anyway.

So we ate pizza in a way that was particularly reminiscent of our failed attempt to go to the Disco oh so long ago only we weren’t dressed up fancy. Same kind of pizza though. And after a while of eating, the tickets were still no shows. We figured we’d come back.

I believe that Chelsea actually said she was tired so we made our way back to the hotel and took naps. I actually ended up sleeping much more than her even though I wasn’t the one who felt so tired apparently. Who knows what the deal with that is. But after we got up, we walked back to the Extra who still didn’t have tickets.

We spent the day doing a little bit of shopping. Chelsea got a purse which we later discovered was the culprit for her suddenly pink shorts and trying-to-turn-pink white jacket. I got video taken with this adorable little monkey named Lola (who's in the picture at the top). For dinner we met up with Megan and Laurie who were also in Playa that day. Originally we were going to try to find a place with live music but finding that, the time we wanted, and within relative price that we were willing to spend, we were out of luck but dinner was still nice. Afterwards, with Lauie, Chelsea and I went *back* to the Extra. This time they had the tickets! WOO!

As it turned out, what we would have spent in Merida for general admission tickets we were able to get VIP tickets for. So we got VIP.

Upon return to the hotel, I tripped. Well let me backtrack a little. Chelsea had been tripping over the sidewalks all day as we walked along and did so right in front of this group of Mexican guys which we found to be rather hilarious but she never actually fell down. So we were walking, checking to see if maybe there was another hotel because *OUR HOTEL WAS ANT INFESTED*. YUCK. Bleh. So we were checking out our options when I tripped beside this Marquesita stand into the mud-slime-guts of the gutter. Thing is, there probably really were guts that I tripped into; I’m pretty sure there was a butcher shop like right there.

But anyway, we made it back to our hotel. I looked at the yellow stained walls, the ants crawling around in the bathroom (The ants go marching eight by eight HURRAH HURRAH). And contrived to rinse myself off (because I don’t think I would have felt much better if I had actually showered. And so much for my jean shorts.

After that experience we decided we’d head out to Cancun early and just hope we could get a good place. So we went to bed, and then in the late morning walked over to Wal*mart where we ran into Megan and Laurie and informed them of our change in plans. We also bought granola bars and yogurt drinks which made for a very tasty breakfast on the ride from Cancun to Playa del Carmen which we just hopped on the bus for.