I Could be a Beach Bum for the Rest of my Life

Today after school (and after a lot of debate) we decided to go to the beach with a small group! First we went to Centro to get lunch because we wanted to eat tacos, and surprisingly it took us like 15 minutes to find a restaurant that sold tacos! Aren't we in Mexico?? But finally we found a place and it was really good.

 Tacos al pastor... highly recommended!

 Lyndy, Tyler, and I eating our tacos

Caitlin, Alana, and Caitlin (There are two Caitlin's... i'm not going crazy!)

Then we went on a bus that took us straight to Progresso (the beach). It was an awesome deal, it only costed 16 pesos (less than $1.50) for a 45 minute bus ride straight to the beach. And the bus had air conditioning and a pirated version of Madagascar 3 in Spanish too! 

It was hilarious because while we were waiting for the bus we saw another white guy. (You have to understand that we don't live in a tourist city so we never see other gringos.) So we started to talk with him and found out that he was actually from St. George and that he was Mormon! What are the chances of that?? I'm convinced that he's the future husband of one of us or something because it was probably the most random thing in the world. He goes to UCLA and actually knows my roommates too! Must be fate. 

Our new friend Turner (the mormon guy) decided to come to the beach with us and it was a blast! It was so beautiful! The whole time I just couldn't believe that I am living in Mexico with my friends and that I was in an amazing tropical paradise with them. I sure am blessed. It was such a fun day! We swam in the ocean and tanned mostly because it was really hot out but there was also a nice breeze. It couldn't have been any more perfect!

The sand is really powdery! I loved it... I'm still finding it in between my toes and in weird places though. 

Tyler, Me, and Caitlin livin' it up on the beach 

We were just so happy to be there! How could you not love the beach? 

Lyndy and Caitlin in the water! I swear that they were in there all day. The water was so fun to swim in because it is so so so warm. It is the warmest water I've ever been in! It was almost too warm haha. Since we live on the coast of the Gulf of Mexico, all the beaches here have really warm water. 

 Caitlin built a sand castle. She's adorable. 

She caught me taking pictures! 

Tyler bought a coconut from a guy on the street. He's definitely playing the part.

Nancy and I (one of my roommates from UCLA) on the beach 

A hammock vendor came and visited us so we talked to him for a while 

And we all bought hammocks =)  

Caitlin was so happy! She wanted a hammock really bad and she got this high-quality one for a great deal. 

Tyler loves taking pictures... not.  

There are a ton of shells at the beach and they're really fun to play with and look at. 

We played beach volleyball for a while too and it was fun but there was so much wind so it kept flying super far away after every hit. 

Alana and Tyler vs. Turner and I

After a couple hours everyone wanted to leave so Caitlin and I decided to stay and walk around Progresso for a while. It's such a cute little beach town so we wanted to explore it. 

We forgot to bring other clothes with us (we only had our school clothes) so we just decided to YOLO and walk around Progresso in our bathing suits and backpacks. Our outfits helped us make many new friends lol. We got a ton of numbers and one guy even offered to take us to Cancun for the weekend and stay in his beach house with him! We'll have to ask Profe about that tomorrow ;) Wonder if he'll approve it? haha. We also got a ton of honks on every street that we walked on and at one point Caitlin was like, "Where is the traffic jam?" hahaha

We saw this little shop and thought it was a pet shop, but apparently they eat all of these. It smelled so bad in there!

 This little chick was pecking my camera and I just think that he has the funniest expression on his face!

We bought a little coconut empanada and it was delicious! As you can see from our faces, we got a lot of sun today! 

At around 7:00 we decided to go home. It was really fun to walk around Progresso though! There are a ton of fun things to buy there and lots of fun people to talk to. We spoke Spanish almost all day too which was really great. I'm at a weird point now where I'm starting to think in Spanish before I think in English.. I love it! And sometimes I can't think in English. I always thought missionaries who did that were so weird but now I totally understand. When you only hear Spanish 24/7 it's weird to talk in English again.

On the way home Caitlin and I were just talking about how much we loved today and how much fun it was! We were talking so much though that we missed our stop and we had no idea where we were so we just got off the bus and took the next one we saw. Then we walked around aimlessly without our map for a while and somehow we ended up on our street. It was quite lucky and a great adventure! 

 On the bus ride home we saw this graffiti and it was too cool to not take a picture with.

I love Merida!

A Night on the Town

Today we went to Centro for our first time! Centro is pretty much the downtown of Merida. There are lots of cathedrals, museums, stores, restaurants, and other things to do there!

Caitlin and I on the bus.. we're getting better at this! We're sitting in our favourite spot: the back! We love it because the bus drivers go over the speed bumps super fast and so we fly off our seats every time we hit one! And we never know when they're coming up so it makes the bus rides more fun haha. 

Typical bus in Merida. One day I want to just start singing and dancing like in Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants =) 

Might be the funniest picture of the trip. We wanted to look out the window but it was raining so we couldn't see anything. Then we tried to open it but it was stuck so this was the result of that attempt lol

The first thing we did when we got there was explore this giant cathedral that we saw. Pretty much everyone in Mexico is Catholic so there are a ton of Cathedrals everywhere. This one is the biggest one that we saw though. 

We also walked around the centre plaza for a bit while we waited to meet up with some of our friends. There were so many birds there! I though of you Kennie... you would probably die. 

Centro is so beautiful 

Freaking so many birds 

They were quite scary 

We thought we would run through the birds and take an epic picture but I don't think even one bird moved #fail

This was only a small group surprisingly 

They all moved together and when one flew, they all flew and it was way scary.  

It is secretly a devil

They have these sillas de amor (love chairs) all over the centro and they are great. Obviously Caitlin and I are the cutest couple around.

Ryan and I decided that Cecil needs to put these all over BYU. They have a great chastity line down the middle made of stone and they're perfect for talking in! 

My friends Bradley and Tom. They live really close to us so we always travel with them! 

Aaron! *please note the couple in the background 

Hahaha I couldn't resist. You know me and stalker pics ;) Apparently it's quite easy to cross the chastity line but still put the chair to full use. 

Marie is so cute! She loves Mayan culture and history so she was explaining her favourite legend to us and got really excited about it.

Tyler and I! We had to take a pic for Matt and Trevor... Look guys! We're friends now =) 

We also went to Colon. It's a famous ice cream place in el Centro. We had to try it so we stopped there for a snack and it was really good! I had helado de guanabana. There isn't an English word for guanabana because it only grows in the Yucatan for a couple months a year. Obviously I had to choose the weirdest flavour though and surprisingly it was actually my favourite flavour of all.

After we finished our ice cream break we walked down a random street and there were so many cool buildings there. I love all the bright colours! We also found a random museum so we went in there too and there were a ton of huge murals all over that apparently one guy painted all by himself! 

After a great evening at Centro we went back home with our roommate and had dinner with our family. It was a great day! I know that we'll be back at centro many more times!

There was a beautiful sunset tonight. The sky was so gorgeous and bright!