el vacaciones

In February we had the annual company trip to Mexico. Here are some highlights in picture form:

For 4 nights we stayed at the Brisas del Mar in Zihuatanejo. Here is the view from our balcony looking out over the pool.



Zihuatanejo is the town that Morgan Freeman's character goes to once he gets out of prison in "The Shawshank Redemption". However, it turns out that it wasn't actually filmed here. Whatever. Here is a shot down one of the streets:
Mexico really loves it's wrestlers. This one loves his ice cream:

And we kept seeing this in the store windows:

That's right, it's a bacon-wrapped hot dog. You better believe we will be trying this out this summer.


One of our favorite things about going to Mexico is the food. We meant to take more food pictures, but only remembered to bring the camera to one breakfast and only remembered to take the pictures after we were half-way done. Oh well. The food was awesome, and you'll just have to take my word for it.


After 4 nights in Zihuatanejo, we moved a few miles north to an all-inclusive resort in Ixtapa. This is the part of the trip that my company pays for. The resort pool was huge. Here's the view from our balcony:

Just in front of the resort there is an island, Isla Ixtapa. Not to be confused with la isla bonita.
Some people we know swam to the island. We took a boat for 25 pesos round trip. Out on the island is a coral reef where the snorkeling is very good. So, we took our gear and spent the day on the beach which went something like: Snorkel, drink beer, people watch, snorkel, drink beer, eat chips and salsa, drink beer... ok you get the point. Here's what it looked like from our pov.

One of the nice things about being on the west coast of Mexico is the waves. We took the chance to surf a little bit. I found that catching a wave was not too difficult, but paddling out with 5 ft waves breaking on you was a challenge. The pictures speak for themselves:



Here is a friend from work who had rented the board for the week. It was his first time surfing and he was afraid of hitting his head. So, he wore a hockey helmet. Guess where he's from, eh? It reminded me of the Mike Myers snl sketch where he is the hyper-hypo kid leashed to the jungle gym. (here's the video)
Oh, and btw, there were crocodillos right there by the beach. I didn't get too close to them.

El gallo!

El capitan!

So, that pretty much wraps it up. We spent a lot of time just hanging out on the beach or by the pool. I read "The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle" by Haruki Murakami and the latest Cosmo. It was a great trip, and it is sad to think our next one is now a year away.