Day 4 (Wednesday)
We woke up with plans of meeting a van @ 11 am that was supposed to take us to the Villa del Palmar. It was a mini-adventure but we finally found the shuttle bus all the way at the bottom of the hill. We arrived to a nice looking resort and went into this little office so they could jot down some info on us. We were then greeted by this nice young lady from canada, whose name I can't remember. I think she referred to Mike as "mulo" tho, cause the info desk girl had wrote his name down all messy. She had some funny jokes and walked us through the little market and into the restaurant/cafe for some continental breakfast. Her espanol was pretty fluent, no surprise there. We were brought coffee, eggs, fruit, oj and potatoes. She explained to us that it was more important to tip the help (waiters, maids) than the taxi drivers cause the drivers were the most powerful union locally. oops.
After leaving the kitchen help a nice tip, she then walked us to the upcoming resort that we were going to be seeing the timeshare offer on. The resort was still under massive construction but would be right next door to the palmar. She took us through two 'showrooms', showed us the typical "this is what you would be spending on future vacations" printouts via a kiosk computer, and then took us into the main conference room to give us a selling speech. One nice thing about the palmar location was that it was on the 'safe' part of the arch, so the water was swimmable along their beach. She then left us and we were then given Jill, who came in with all her charts and selling points. 2 hours later, after much ballyhoo and debating, I guess I was first to say "no thanks, i'm currently not interested" to the current deal she was offering at $17k with $3k down.
Immediately after I signed off the "no" form, Jill tried to direct me away to go back to the first chick, for our "goodiez" but I didn't want to leave yet haha.
After we all signed off, they sent in the real closer and another hour later, the girls decided they wanted to do the new 'super low' deal, so I agreed to that. $1k got us another free vacation, 3 more vacations stays avail for the $595 room rate, and the option to delay agreeing to the main offer for up to 2 years. At $250 a piece for each of us, that wasn't too bad. We toasted to some champagne and then went downstairs to see about our freebies. Immediately we started realizing that Rene had shorted us a bit, as the wave runner rates weren't as promised and the pirate ship cruise that we wanted was completely booked until sat, and tami was leaving friday morning. Eventually we decided to go on a smaller raft that did the same sunset tour for thurs evening, and Mike 'negotiated' a free bottle of Caballo Joven tequila. We took a few hits of it on the spot.. and yowsers, no wonder it was free!
We headed down to the beach and got some seats right next to this rope. Mike made a friend, this older gentleman who was their with his family and he shared his insight on the timeshare stuff, which he had purchased one of a few years back. After leaving and coming back with a few beers, we watched as the wave came barreling in high... right to the mark where the rope was but also right over unsuspecting Tina, who was sunbathing, drenching both her and the towel haha. Tami and Tina also ordered some food, chips and salsa (yes!) and some various tacos. After tanning a while, Tina, Mike and I went to wander further down around the beach playing with the waves and picking up various tiny shells (including one that looked like it could replace Jerry's busted toenail haha). Before leaving, Tina and Tami got a picture next to the large whale slide that they didn't get to ride down cause it was filled with kids and the bottom of the pool wasn't clear but rather lagoon'ish.
We took another shuttle back, but this time we had to pay ourselves, and it was a $12 ride. We went back, grabbed the floaties and the happy face ball, and swam around in the pool with the waterfall. Mike busted out the subbug again along with his snorkeling "seal team" gear haha. There was a group of young kids next to us playing some type of catch as well, i never quite figured out what those girls were playing. After swimming around for probably an hour, we went to the upper pool and jumped into the hot tub! We found out the most fun thing to do in the hot tub, besides it being scalding hot, was plugging up the powerful jets so that the water would shoot upwards of 4 feet! We did our own little bellagio-type show with full on video. We went back and realized our room hadn't been cleaned up cause we had accidentally left the "do not disturb" sign in the door, doh! no fresh towels! Jerry's bed was still "out" of the cabinet. I piled up our used room service dishes from last night and put them outside, cause the guacomole was starting to give off a funny scent, as well as washed the other cups and plates in the sink.
Changed, rested up, put on our cowboy hats (led by Tina in her cowgirl dress with full on pigtails), and headed off to Macombo. Macombo was a seafood restaurant that was also recommended to us by that older guy that Mike befriended while on the beach at Palmar. We received a lot of interesting looks since we were all wearing our cowboy hats haha. After ordering, Mike had been eyeing the flamenco dancing old lady and her band for a while and finally decided to get them to dance for us for a song ($6). During the song, the flamenco woman had Mike stand up, which Mike took as a cue to dance around with her, but in actuality I think the flamenco dancer just wanted him to stand still so she could dance around him heh. Mike and Jerry ordered these huge red snappers, a great deal at $9 each, I had breaded scallops (safe choice, i thought) which looked like mcd's filet o fish, and Tina and Tami shared another fish dish. The food was indeed pretty tasty and well worth the $12 we were paying per plate. I got the bill for us and we moseyed out and saw a neat taco stand/shop across the street that we were determined to try out sometime.
We walked back along the wharf, took a little tour around the Puerto Paraiso, and ended up in front of Senor Sweets! The shop had a large sign advertising "Free calls to the US" and we ran into the owner, who was an older white american, probably in his late 60's. The presentation of the sweets in the display case was mouth watering. The decor was top notch, all the seats were plush or leather bound. I sat down with Pang and I noticed there was one of those square candles in the middle of our table so I lighted it. A few minutes later, a waitress came by saying we need to blow it out otherwise it will set off the fire alarm haha. Turns out these candles weren't meant to be lit. Everyone ordered a delicious dessert (except for mike), I had the chocolate amaretto cheesecake and a cinnamon cappucino that even came in a big cup, tight. Tami used the phone to call her bf in NY and I used the voip phone afterwards to call BFF. Agnes was elated to be the recipient of my one and only call from cabo haha. While I was in the bathroom, the stealthy 4 paid for my dessert and cap... thanks gang!
On our walk back along the wharf, we encountered these two sorta tipsy white girls while we were amusing ourselves with the random cactus. The girls took a pic of us posing hickish with the cactus and in return I took one of them haha. As we walked by the entry gate, the guard booth was dark (probably turned off the lights to minimize heat) and the security guard was singing along with his guitar. He came outside and even sang us a little song haha. Sphere was on cable and we concluded the night watching about 30 minutes of it.
Current root beer barrel count at 33.
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Ooooh Hilary.. Wish me home!