Das Friendymoon: Where We Stayed & Tasty Tacos

Oh hai. It's me, the recently married bee who's been all mopey about the wedding & planning being over. You know, the one who hasn't written much the last month and needs to get her act together? Yep. Let's try and change that.

First off, thank you for all your lovely comments and support in regards to my post-wedding blues last week. Writing that post and reading your thoughts seemed to provide a small amount of "closure" for me, if you will. I've decided that it's definitely mostly the planning and the doing that I miss, so now I just need to find things to keep myself busy during those times when I would normally be doing weddingy things. Maybe I'll finally get my lazy ass back to a dance class. Oooh, the possibilities.

Anyway, let's get this show on the road. The other week I was all, "oh hey look how awesome I pack for Mexico!" and then I just kind of left you hanging. Sorry about that.

So let's start with a quick flashback: back in April, brideslady M and I found an awesome little vacation-rental-by-owner place to stay in for her bachelorette party in NYC. It was such a good experience that I never, ever wanted to stay in a hotel again.

I continued with the trend for our recent Friendymoon in Playa del Carmen, Mexico - this time with the help of brideslady Bunny Love - and I am so, so happy to say that I'm still just as obsessed with and in total favor of the vacation rental thing. (So.. do it, 'kay? 'Kay.)

If you recall, the actual house we stayed at in Mexico was just beyond. There was more than enough room for the eight of us that went to have our privacy should we want it, and enough different yet convenient gathering places for us all to hang out together.

A small but secluded high-rise couch!

Morning yoga in the main living area!

Enjoying the rooftop jacuzzi/pool (and vino).

More rooftop pool, because I can't get enough.

Foxy's favorite spot, the quasi-outdoor lounge area.

Before we go any further, I feel like I should probably preface the rest of this post by saying that I've never stayed in an all-inclusive resort. I should also say that I'm not sure I would have enjoyed staying where we did as much if I didn't have brideslady Bunny Love with me most of the time, since she was only one of two people with us that was actually fluent in Spanish and could communicate and translate for us when necessary. I had my moments of sorta-accurate flashbacks to high school Spanish, but let's be real - I couldn't keep up 99% of the time. I started catching on a bit better by day 3 or 4, but it was no where near what it should have been or where I would have liked it to be.

So, a good tip: if you stay in the middle of a town like Playa - touristy or not - know at least the basics of the language. Just trust me on this one.

Now, Playa del Carmen is an interesting place in that it used to be a little fishing village, and has slowly but surely become more touristy and populated. This has led to some great little beachfront hotels, restaurants, clubs, and shops, as well as recent construction in other parts of the city of new houses, condos, and apartments similar to the one we stayed in.

Once you get away from the immediate beachfront and closer to the area where we were staying, you see a little more of the "real" side of Playa. We may have been staying in this gorgeous house, but across the street, you had relative poverty. Our neighbors had no real doors or windows - just different sheets to try and cover the openings. You would go through streets and see similar scenes - one house big and fancy, the next small and run down. Some cities have this variation by city blocks, Playa had it by individual houses. I'll admit, I actually liked being smack in the middle of it all - I feel like it really gave us a feel for the city that we were traipsing around in all week.

Across the street - in better shape here via Google Maps (2009) than when we were there.

Seeing as we were staying where we were, we clearly needed to travel in order to get to anywhere (namely the beach and the grocery store). This resulted in several spontaneous adventures around town, one being to find some tasty tacos. Actually, a lot were to find tasty tacos, because my husband is apparently obsessed. He got these random pregnant-woman cravings almost every day where we just had to to stop, drop, roll, and get. the boy. some. tacos. (I wasn't complaining.)

Unfortunately, I don't have pictures from the first (and by far, best) of the taco joints (it was literally the only time I didn't have my camera.. clearly learned my lesson there), but I was able to snap a picture of the store front later in the week.

El Sobrecito del Fogón

Translation: om nom nom nom

All you need to know: it's open air, hot as balls, they cook the food basically right in front of you, they have orgasmic pico de gallo, and their fresh juices are like nectar from the gods. Oh, and everything on the menu is like $2. Take that, Taco Bell.

We happened to find another tasty place on a random day trip to Tulum that I could easily say the same fantastical things about.

Beer is also like nectar from the gods, btw.

Flautas, pico de gallo, guac, & fajitas!

(There were a few other random, phenomenal taco joints that we stumbled upon as well, but all these pictures are making me super hungry and I need to stop staring at food right now. So, another tip: tacos. That is all.)

Another perk of being in the middle of the city is that it enabled us to walk around and explore some of the little stores and shops in the area. We ironically mostly stuck to the touristy ones, but it was still fun nonetheless.

I was in love with those jellyfish lanterns!

It was also kind of fun to bargain with the shop keep.. again, I felt better doing this when Bunny Love was with me - just because I think they took her more seriously than my pasty, non-fluent, American self. Either way. My favorite purchase by far was our blue woven blanket from Tulum for a reasonable $20!

I think I covered most of the basics of where we stayed.. the reason I even mention all of this is because I'm not sure we would have had the same experience had we been at an all-inclusive resort. Again, I've never stayed at one, but knowing myself.. if there's free food and booze, why would I ever leave? (Aside from a good taco search, that is).

Stick around for some more useful tidbits about our adventures and things I most definitely take for granted. Huzzah!

The crew on our first night out!