Rise at 6:15 and head down to the malecon in back of Francis Arlene and wait for the sunrise. It’s still incredibly windy & a little chilly. I think I spot Jamqueen down the beach a bit waiting too, but I’m useless without my glasses (I later find out that it was her – had I known for sure, we could have had coffee afterward!).

Around 6:30 mother nature’s lightshow begins – switch on, switch off – stage left, stage right – spotlight center, footlights twinkling between the clouds. Putting it to music in my head, it slowly gets louder as the lights become brighter. Waves crash in time with the cymbals in my music. Frigates soar and glide, seeming to dance to the music as well.

A lone Isleno is sitting on his moped watching the magic unfold – the grand finale is near. Hard to find words to describe the beauty of the day unfolding. Today’s show is over, mother nature goes about her daytime business and gets ready for another show at sunset.

I’ll be back for another. I’m still tired – had lots of dreams last night and the memories are fuzzy vague. One particular one had me yell out “THAT’S BULLSHIT!” in my sleep – not quite sure why, but I think I remember dreaming about Karyn telling me about some hurdle they ran into with the build. My shout awakened both me and Tim – sorry honey, I was dreaming… a dog fight woke me up around 3:30 – not an incredibly aggressive one, but lots of barking and growling and some kitty snarls thrown in for good measure. We left the air off and the slider screen open because it was so cool last night – MISTAKE! Sleep a couple hours more after the sunrise, get up and hit the balcony for a cigarette and some people watching.

Tim’s starting to stir & I see Roy making his way up the street to our place. Rise & shine Tim, time for breakfast – I’m STARVING! We pick Alexia y Giovanni this time – excellent choice! I have eggs Motulenos ala Leonore – EXCELLENT!! (I told you, Catz – I’m now addicted!), coffee and OJ. Roy, having pulled an almost all-nighter isn’t very hungry and chooses a fruit salad and limeaid. Tim’s a tad hung over and decides on just toast, coffee & chocolate milk. Got a couple of shots of Leonore hard at work – she has such a beautiful smile. She posed for a picture with me and gave me a great big hug & kiss afterward. She admires my Marianne Isla button, raises her arms & says “Viva la Mexico”.

We say adios, go up the stairs to the little Mercado for some shopping. I spot a really nice blanket in a lovely shade of aqua and tan. It has a likeness of Chichen Itza in the center with 4 Mayan warriors at the base. I like it. I want it. “How much?” “400 pesos” me “200 pesos” him “no”. OK, walk away, look at the Isla windbreakers – I told ya, it’s been goosebumply chilly when there’s no sun, my sweatshirt that I came down with is too much, a long t-shirt not enough. Must have – it’s white, says Isla Mujeres down the sleeves, then a very colorful map of the island on the back. “How much?” “120 pesos”. I don’t even argue, it’s good quality, decent weight fabric and I like it. “OK” I say. I see a mayan calendar t-shirt, I like it. We go back and forth again, Tim finds a pair of board shorts he likes. Green background, red hibiscus and silhouette girls that you see on the mudflaps of 18 wheelers – yup, that’s my baby, and I’m good with that. Just another thing I love about him. Here we go again with the bargaining – I’m not done shopping, shopkeeper says “ok, you shop, we make a deal later”. Fine.

Tim now asks me for the room key, he’s gotta visit. Looks like we got a case of Tourista brewing (no pun intended). Hand him the key & keep shopping….

Did I mention yet about the joys of Acidophilus? Thanks to this board, I never would have known. I’ve always gotten a mild case of the gurgles on our many journeys – not this time. After seeing so many posts about it and the responses, I must say, the remedy works!! Started taking it 2 times a day the week before our trip and then during our stay. Not once did I feel the gurgles and had to run! Thanks to Bob in Iowa for some invaluable advice – I owe ya a cervesa!

Back to shopping – last item, elastic waist (THANK GOD!) shorts with CANCUN blasted across the a$$.... ohhh they look so comfy after all the food binges. I don’t even care how much they are now. Give me a deal. He wants 900 pesos for everything. Nope, 600. No, I can’t do that, it costs me blah blah blah. I say 700 and start to walk away. OK, show me the money. I pay, he looks a little perturbed, oh well...

On the way out at the first loncheria from here, there’s an adorable little boy playing peek a boo with me. I pull out a hand puppet to see if I can break the shyness, no dice – he’s more interested in playing with the knobs on the gas meters – hello…. Get your kid away from those!! Grandma pulls him away, we get pictures, kisses & bye-byes!

Roy & I stop at Chris’ DigaMe to dump my camera once again. The employee on duty wasn’t quite adept at this yet (they just opened the day we got there) so he allows me to “drive” on the computer – I download, but I’m not familiar with the software Chris uses so I left the pictures on his hard drive for him to download later. That’s ok, I’ve got my other card, but I’m not deleting these till I know they make it safely to CD. I tell the kid we’ll be back later, no big deal.

We start back up Guerrero and a pickup truck adorned with posters for one of the candidates running for something plastered all over it is coming down the street. They’re blasting salsa music & there’s a bunch of men in the back waving banners & Mexican flags. Roy & I bust out into a salsa dance on the sidewalk to the cheers of the guys in the truck!! I almost split a gut laughing at the moment – good times!!

Get to the room, Tim’s o.k. now and we decide to catch the bus south and maybe check out Mundaca’s and whatever else we come upon. On our walk down toward the ferry area Roy decides he’d like to go check out Tulum. We’ve told him about it, and from staying at the Hostel, I gather lots of the backpackers have also raved about it to him, and this is what he wants to do. It’s close to noon and I’m not sure he’s got enough time, but he’s a big boy and if this is what he wants to do, go for it! We stop in a store and look at all the different types of tequila – Roy’s asking questions of the shopkeeper. He buys a pint of Mezcal with the worm (YUK!) and says he’ll sip it on the way to Tulum in the bus. My mother’s instinct kicks in and says nothing good can come of this! We part at the ferry, I tell him to be careful, and off we go on our separate ways.

Tim & I catch the bus – a fun ride taking in the scenery, bouncing over the topos and seeing the sights of the colonias. Three siblings are squirting water at eachother from their water bottles and having a grand old time for themselves. Before you know it, we’re at Mundaca’s and hop off. We pay the $1 to get in and run into Tim & Natalie (UK) from Adelita’s the other night. They’ve just finished seeing Mundaca’s and are on their golf cart to go exploring. Natalie pisses and moans about the plight of the caged animals inside, then off they went.

We made our way around the paths, snapped some pics, saw the poor animals. The hissing python, who must have been at least twelve feet long is in a 2’ x 2’ chicken wire box. No wonder he was hissing! The poor deer, all alone in a 6’ x 8’ pen broke my heart. The spider monkeys, although with no trees to play on, seemed content. I believe there were 5 of them. Very entertaining, climbing the fencing, swinging from their rope, playing with eachother and coming close to us for treats of bananas. We see some of the people from our snorkeling trip – they gave the monkeys granola bars for treats and they absolutely loved them! A few minutes later, a couple from the UK came along with a bunch of bananas – the first monkey to take a piece had just finished a yummy granola bar, smelled the banana & threw it to the ground! Too funny! One monkey came up to me and tried to grab my cigarette out of my hand (I guess he didn’t read the label on the pack). When I put it out on the ground, he tried to pull it in with his tail… crafty!! Most comical is when they walk upright like humans. I could have watched them all day!

O.K., enough of that. We leave the “estate” and start walking. Head up to the turtle farm… lots of little ones, snap some pics, see a single albino turtle that’s in a solitary tank, say hello to a very pretty silver tabby kitty that also has spots, much like a purebred ocicat. We leave, start hoofing it to Playa Tiburon – I’m starving!! We chose Tiburon for I think, a good reason. We heard from several people during the week that Lancheros was using painted wood for their fire – this is Mexico, not the U.S. – chances are, lots of that painted wood is painted with lead based paint! We’ll pass.

We enter, walk by the fire pit – all I see stacked up is firewood, much like we’d see at home for our fireplaces. We’re good with this. Tix n Xic already grillin’ and the grill masters are all too proud to show it off!

Get a table, order some cervesas and sit watching the pelicans diving for their lunch and the seagulls attacking diner’s leftovers before the plates were cleared.

Tim wasn’t hungry, but I was immediately after seeing the fish on the grill. Ordered ½ an order.

While waiting for lunch, a little boy, son of a beach vendor plays peek a boo with me. He’s too cute. I whip out a little container of bubbles and he’s amused. He runs off and is spinning himself in the pareos on display for sale, twisting and then untwisting. All the time he’s sneaking peeks at me – the minute he saw my camera, ready to snap him, he’d cover his face – this game lasted awhile.

He went over to his little slide in the sand and forgot about my camera as he played there – got some good shots. What a little cutie! Tim’s entertaining himself by watching a group of young Argentinian girls in thong bikinis posing for pictures that they’s asked their waiter to take. I zoom in & get a few for Tim to enjoy back at home! We have a couple more cervesas, and the Tix n Xic arrives! OH MY GODDELICIOUS!!!!! It was absolutely wonderful! I made all gone in no time. Tim tried it and liked what he tried, but still not convinced that he likes fish.

Hung out a while longer and walked back to Mundaca’s to take the bus back. Another fun ride, taking in the sights, sounds and smells.

Get back to the ferry dock area around 3:00, hoof it back to the room, pick up our books and head to the beach. Get a table, cervesas and wait for the sunset. Jorge was quite entertaining, offering to take beach shots of the same Argentinian girls we saw at Playa Tiburon. What a hoot!! He was hamming it up like a Sports Illustrated swimsuit photographer, telling them to lay in the wet sand, straddling them and snapping up a storm… too funny!!

Spent some time talking with a couple we met earlier in the week (soory, forgot the names) who went ‘cuda fishing – saw pics of their monster 45 lb. catch. Very impressive.

Beach vendor comes by with wool/cotton blend blankets… very nice for $20 I get one & am happy. Lynne & Wayne arrive to say goodbye, they’re leaving tomorrow. Wayne takes sunset pictures of us – Thank you Wayne! What a great couple! Incredibly beautiful sunset. Starts to get chilly, head back to the room, shower & get ready for some dinner.

Walking toward Hidalgo, we run into a girl from one of the hostels that just adopted a kitten, who's perched on her shoulder.... too cute!!

After cruising Hidalgo and menu shopping awhile, we turn down Madero and spot Manolo’s. I remember that Laura Mapchick recommended it, so we decide to sit in the garden area and give it a try. We were not disappointed. I had the chicken lime soup which was absolutely to die for! Tim gave it a taste and was sorry he hadn’t ordered one for himself. For my main course I had the combo chilis relenos (one cheese, one beef) YUMMMMMMY and Tim had pork chops which he enjoyed tremendously. La Cuenta por favor, head out for some walking and window shopping.

We run into Capt. Tony, who’s outside his house working on his golf cart – he’s got a short somewhere and can’t seem to figure out where. He tells us the Barracuda Bash is postponed for tomorrow – harbormaster says no go due to the forecast with that blankety-blank norte that’s still blowing!! Dang! We’ll have to stop at the Vistalmar in the morning to see what’s up with that!

By now we’re getting tired and we follow what’s becoming routine for us. Back to the room, stuffed and happy, hit the terrace with beers & the radio. It’s 80’s flashback tonight. Steve Miller’s “Abracadabra” drags me back to 1983 when my son was 4 and loved this song. I hear his little voice in my head “mommy, play the “Heat Up” song” as he called it. It makes me smile, but also feel a little sadness too when I think about then… cheating husband, divorce, alone with a four year old and very afraid…. It happened, it’s over, I hurt, I grew. And I’m here on Isla now and I’m happy, finally very happy.

A couple more beers, some reading and it’s bedtime. Ni-nite my honey baby… ni-nite my love.

Coming up – Part #6 Tim’s birthday, and does Tulum swallow Roy????