Mexico 2020

*I have been dreading this post for a while... not because I had a bad time in Mexico.  We actually had a great time in Mexico. I have been dreading this post because it represents the end of an era. This is the last time in life the we did something where COVID didn't change our plans.  We were in groups, we went out to eat, we sat on crowded planes, we went shopping every day, we rode in elevators WITH other people... we did so many things that we probably won't be doing for quite some time.  

We headed for the airport very early on March 9th.  We noted that it was a tiny bit faster going through security than some years, but there were still plenty of people in the airport.  We planned ahead and watched what we touched and used hand sanitizer.  I also brought some essential oil roller balls and put them on my wrists and under my nose before boarding the plane.  Once on the plane we wiped down every area we could potentially touch.  Everyone on the plane was doing this.  I always wipe down plane seats because I don't want to be sick on vacation, but this time I saw many others doing it too.  I think I saw one person wearing a mask.  Overall, the mood wasn't heavy or somber.  

While at our layover in Dallas we saw that there were now 300 cases in the US.  300... total... in the whole country... these days the tally of cases goes up by 300 every time you refresh the screen.  CNN was declaring it a Pandemic for the first time... and I want to give more commentary here about what others were staying, but I don't want to show bias or make this a political post.  We boarded the second plane and prayed that we would make it safely back home on time and that coronavirus wouldn't take over our vacation.  

Arriving in Mexico felt the same as always, the smells and sights made me smile.  Customs had really long lines so we had a much slower start than many years.  Check in at our hotel was the easiest it has ever been, in fact we didn't even have to talk with the people who try to sell you timeshare!  

Once we got to our room we disinfected every single door and switch and button with wipes.  It felt like the cleanest room ever and we were so thankful to be in such a lovely place.  

After a run to the on site store for supplies we enjoyed time at the lazy river and pool before our first night eating out.  We had wonderful food and wonderful weather and all the chaos of disease felt like a million miles away.  We were in paradise again and we quickly got into vacation mode!

Our room was on the 8th floor and we had some lovely views of the Mts and the sea.   I snapped some pics on the day we arrived.

The view of the Mts 

You can sort of see the ocean!

Waiting for a table on the first night.

I enjoyed getting up fairly early each day to journal and pray and read my Bible.  I would sit on the deck and watch the sunrise over the mountains.  It took my breath away.  At home I get to see the sunrise over water so it is always special to see the sun peek out over the mountains.

Another day in paradise!

This year we repeated many of our annual traditions when it comes to our daily routines.  Here was our typical day: time reading and praying in the room, breakfast in our room, time lounging and reading by the pool, a couple trips around the lazy river, more reading and possibly a swim for me, a short walk to the store for me (I was ever optimistic that my favorite hummus would come in... it never did all week... and I managed to live without it just fine :), lunch in the room, a walk along the ocean, reading for Brandon and a swim/read in the pool for me, more reading, heading to the room for a bath and reading, getting prepped for dinner, eat dinner out somewhere, another walk, chatting and more reading, bed.   This is not a sustainable routine for normal life, but it a delightful rhythm that we LOVE while in Mexico.  In the past Brandon has biked or lifted weights in the afternoon while I walk on the beach.  After getting lots of floaters in his eyes during his first workout he decided to walk with me each day.  The first day I didn't really know what to make of walking with him, but I got used to it and loved our daily walks.  We actually even walked out on a breakwater outside the resort which is by far the most we have ever escaped from the resort haha.

A view back towards our resort (the far away buildings, not the white ones) from the breakwater!

I sure do love this man.  Happy 41st Birthday Brandon!

A quick kiss to gross out the kids. 

Me living the dream with our condos behind us. 

Because we are creatures of habit and routine we took things one step further this year and sat in exactly the same spot every day of vacation!  Yes, we are now 75 years old haha.  This spot offers good shade for Brandon and good proximity to the pool for me.  Everything we could want, right?

Our view every day all day!

We only really took daytime pics one day so that is why I am wearing the same suit in all the pics.  I actually wear a different top each day. Our in unit pool this year was quite warm and a delightful place to relax at the end of the day.

The kids would have loved this. 

The sunset over the water from our room. 

It is so much fun to dress up for dinner each night.  We were very careful to use sanitizer after touching menus and not touch things others touched without sanitizing. This year we tried a new restaurant and almost left because nothing on the menu looked awesome.  I told the waiter that I simply wanted some grilled chicken and veggies and he found something on the menu to match.  It ended up being a winner and I would love to go back to this place!

Walking the boardwalk to the restaurant for the night. 

Incredible sunset views!

This year I read several books (I think 6 or 7) including two Corrie TenBoom books.  One was her first memoir pre Hiding Place and one was about her final years written by her last assistant/companion.  Her life is so fascinating and encouraging. Over and over again I kept applying the lessons from Corrie to our current realities as we could see the writing on the wall that COVID was not going away.  It was wonderful for me to wrestle with these things before reentry.  I also read some lovely historical fiction books that were previously owned by Brandon's grandma.  It is always such an encouragement to read books that I know she once held.

While we were in Mexico we kept hearing news coming from America. We heard of NCAA Basketball going fan free.  Then we heard of NBA stopping a game right before it started.  We speculated about why and learned that a player tested positive.  Then we heard about NCAA being canceled and then seemingly every single sport.  Auto racing was the only thing continuing (at that point). I don't really touch my phone the whole trip so I don't get much news.  Brandon is on the internet a little so he gave me updates.  The resort had a few channels in English, so I was able to catch some CNN, but it was mostly feel good stories from around the world and very little actual news.  We did hear about the second Super Tuesday and were happy with the results. We saw the news switching from politics to pandemic.

It wasn't until the end of our vacation that we began having many conversations with others.  I love meeting new people and chatting and sometimes making connections. Much of the conversation would revolve around coronavirus and our wonderings about going home and new news we were hearing.  We talked to a retired Dr from Canada who was planning to stay on in Mexico a few more weeks. I wonder often if he is still there or if he got out before borders were closed.   I talked with brothers who were an Eye Dr. and a Pharmacist in Kansas City.  They recognized my Corrie TenBoom book and we talked about heading home and being Corrie's.  I think of this conversation often, and I wonder if they do as well.  While transferring some money one night I spotted a woman holding a water bottle with the word "Cobbers" on it and I walked over and found out that she graduated from my college one year before me and her husband graduated with me.  We didn't know each other or take time to find common friends, but we did leave smiling. Small world.

The final night we were there we saw a family eating some very unique looking food.  As we got up to leave I told Brandon that I wanted to find out what that thing was.  It turns out it was some sort of pork taco thing and they had no idea it would come in this big steaming pot.  Anyway, we got to talking with them and found out that they went to an E-Free church in MN and their brother's brother is an area paster who Brandon knows well.  The couple had two young adult children with them.  The son was about to graduate from medical school very near us and has worked at our children's hospital.  The daughter works in NYC.  They were heading home the following morning too.  I think of them often, thinking of the son who most likely graduated early and became part of the work force caring for those in my state with COVID.  The daughter went home to the epicenter of COVID, I wonder if she was able to stay healthy.  That conversation was such a dear one to me as it is the last long one we had with another family face to face without totally focusing on social distancing or major fears.  We all acknowledged that we sort of felt like we were on the moon and that we were going home to very very different worlds than we left.

Our favorite restaurant is right at our condo!

View from dinner the last night.  Seeing the pool at night is so soothing. 

This year I ate a lot of fajitas and a lot of hamburgers.  I am always trying to get substitutions for things I can't have.  I was able to get a huge bowl of pico instead of fries. The pico was so incredibly fresh it tasted like the limes were picked that day.  It was incredible!  I love fresh pico!

Living my best life with my best friend.... the last supper!

After dinner that night I started to have a drippy nose.  Actually, I think I might have had it all that day.  I was so nervous that I would be detained at customs that I hardly slept all night.  Re-entry scared me like crazy.  To make matters worse we saw headlines about O'Hare customs and 5 hour waits and the fear grew.  It was hard to think about leaving the state of warmth and bliss and going home to stress and chaos... even though we knew we needed to.  It was also becoming increasingly clear to me that no one was going going to see my tanned skin or sit with me while I chatted with them about my week in Mexico.  

This year we were able to fly out midday which meant we didn't have to wake up super early and could check out right at the 10:00 check out time.

The hallway view!  Good bye for now. 

Each day we walk to the end of a point on the beach and I wave to the planes going home.  The airport is very close to our resort so it is fun to watch planes.  I wanted to take some pics from the air this year.

Taking off... our resort in the background. 

Our resort.  You can see the point that we walk to in the middle of the pic. 

Our first flight to Chicago was pretty uneventful.  We still only saw about 10% of passengers with masks.  We cleaned things as well as we could.  The woman sitting next to us seemed totally oblivious to the pandemic.  She and her husband had been in Mexico for a long time.  I think she probably had a rude awakening when she got home.  One row up a woman was very concerned about connecting flights.  She was able to see that customs at O'hare currently had a 4 hour wait.  Yikes!  I was starting to wonder if we should just call Tom and Judy when we landed and ask them to drive to O'Hare.  We decided to wait and see. 

You can read more about our time at the airport HERE, but I will do a quick recap.  Basically, we made it through customs in about an hour and were able to make our scheduled flight.  While in customs we were surrounded by a sea of people and had we landed 20 minutes later we might have had a 3 hour wait. The line behind us was crazy.  Every person must go to about 1 of 20 customs computers and touch the screen.  GROSS!  Our whole bodies smelled of Clorox wipes which I was using very liberally. I am so thankful I decided to just carry on a full container of them.  The customs checker didn't ask about my cold and we were cleared to leave the secure area.  Actually, my cold ws much better by then.  I think the essential oil rollers truly helped me. We had to take a bus to a different terminal and we got there with enough time for Brandon to get pizza.  

Watching the sunset on our final flight. 

The final flight was just 16 minutes from wheels up to wheels down.  I timed it.  We got to watch the sunset the whole time.  We didn't do any circling and just followed a very clear path.  It was exciting to be so close to home.  Everything at our airport went super fast and we ended up waiting for the fam at baggage for about 20 minutes.

Annual trips to Puerto Vallarta are my favorite week of the year.  As I type this, I am not sure what 2021 will look like.  Will we have to skip a year of this blissful time?  I told Brandon a month ago that maybe we could just try to book tickets and time share two weeks before travel if all seems to be OK at that point.  Perhaps there will be a vaccine by then... I am not sure.  I am not super eager to fly or leave the country right now so I am glad it is a ways away.

We were so very blessed to have this special week in Mexico.  We truly needed this week to unwind and reflect on the last year with the building project, new hires, classes in our home, Brandon eye and countless other topics of stress.  We also needed to prepare for our new normal.  I was able to come up with daily agendas for the kids which proved to be a lifesaver those first days.  We are so thankful for our parents who supply childcare (Brandon's parents) and lodging help through timeshare (my parents).  We couldn't do this trip without them and it is a deep treasure.  This year was probably more sacred that ever!

As much as I could mentally prepare for the culture shock I was about to face... nothing compared to the actual feeling of leaving peace and paradise and coming home to the chaos of the unknown and real life at the start of homeschooling and self isolation.

In the following posts I will be sharing photos of our first weeks of Safer at Home.  I will give some commentary but also link back to the real time posts I wrote when we first got home.  I really hope to zoom through these and get to a point where all the posts become real time posts :)