Mexico … take two

I must start off by saying it was very remiss of me not to mention in the previous blog that during our 5 hour hostage event, all of the locals we encountered expressed their heart-felt sadness at the devastation caused by the fires in Australia, asked how bad it is, the causes, the solution etc.

Next update is that although Airbnb host tried to deny everything I complained about, he immediately undertook to refund the entire amount we paid for the two weeks and that has been processed by Airbnb today. So we’re no longer on a budget of 2 minute noodles for the next 6 months (much to Jarrah’s disappointment)!

So after a harrowing taxi ride, we arrived at the hotel in Puerto Vallarta and I’m delighted to say it is wonderful. We dropped our bags, caught up on urgent emails, bank transfers etc then took a walk to check out our new surroundings which, by the way, are worlds apart from Bucerias. It’s hard to believe we’re in the same country … never mind just 22kms up the road!

Fiesta Inn is 250m from the beach and located within a very upmarket shopping centre with clothes shops, cinemas, restaurants and even a little turtle sanctuary and a canal! Within 2 minutes of stepping outdoors Jarrah and I simultaneously let out the hugest sigh of relief 🙂

Ordinarily this type of place wouldn’t appeal at all – it’s a bit like the Gold Coast – very touristy, commercialised and nothing much Mexican about it, however given our start – we are delighted/relieved.

Yesterday we located a laundromat and a grocery store – the likes of which we’ve never seen before and certainly not in the last month. Everything from pre-cooked, hot meals (of an excellent quality), to freshly baked goods to clothes, luggage and car tyres! Again, we felt like we’d died and gone to heaven. Were even more delighted to find that branded products that are available in Australia are HALF the price here.

En route to the supermarket (which is in a less touristy shopping centre), we passed an outdoor food market just one block from our hotel where we had yummy Shawarmas for dinner last night.

Getting to the above places was a tad hair-raising though – crossing the main road (NINE lanes of traffic coming from multiple directions) is a bit like playing chicken!! First of all, I am STILL not used to the cars being on the “wrong” side of the road (which is a bit worrying given I have to start driving a 7m vehicle in less than 2 weeks), secondly despite no pedestrian light at the traffic lights and despite road markings implying a pedestrian crossing – we found out the hard way that turning cars do NOT give way to pedestrians.