Sunday April 17th

Sunday April 17^th –

               Well, our travel day to Mexico has finally arrived and starts off like every other trip where I wake up at 6 am for no apparent reason – must be the excitement of the event! Nicholas walks in the room at 630 too excited to sleep as well so I shipped him downstairs to watch a bit of TV. Upon opening the curtains, we were surprised to see another 5cm of fresh snow – and still coming down. I decided to do my good deed for the day and shovel off 4 driveways before we headed to church. We packed all the suitcases up and took off for church at 830, earlier than usual! The roads were a complete disaster and icier than ever. Church was packed for Palm Sunday and I really enjoyed singing the mass with my choir.

We left at 1030 and headed to the airport. The Minnings family that was going with us passed us on Deerfoot trail just before the airport and we unloaded the vehicles together at the drop off. Randy and I parked the vehicles at the Park to Go lot where they park your vehicle for you and you just jump on the shuttle and get dropped at your gate – sweet deal. We arrived and checked in with the girls and the 4 boys and headed to Kelsey's for Lunch. 2 Corona and a burger later and the boys were getting restless, so we ran around for a while and went to the Spaceport to play some videogames before heading to the gate. We went through security in record time and after a bit of shopping we boarded our flight at 145 and departed at 205 sharp. Great start to the trip!

               The weather was crappy for an hour and then cleared off and we had nothing but sunshine all the way to Mexico. The boys took turns in different seats playing their Nintendo and games on the Itouch and Ipad as time flew fairly quickly. We arrived in Puerto Vallarta around 630 which was 730 Vallarta time. We breezed through security and customs but of course the Minnings family got flagged randomly and had their luggage gone through for 5 minutes and then we were on our way. We bolted past the time share sharks and found our transportation. We got a cargo van and drove 20 minutes to arrive at the Mayan Group property at sunset. We got our luggage off the van and walked through the ominous entrance with giant statues as we entered the Grand Mayan hotel. We got checked in, finding out the hotel was oversold for the week. We ended up in two different buildings, but had ocean views so that was ok. It was only a 5 minute walk regardless.

               We ordered room service and ate every sort of Mexican food available. The bill came to $1450!! Except in Pesos, you divide by 10 so the bill was around $130 CDN for the 8 of us. Most places here the food is averagely priced but we were absolutely ravaged not having eaten on the plane on the way here. We got the kids off to bed around 1030. Krista and I stayed up and watched a movie on the Ipad and drifted off around 2. It would be a long day tomorrow in the sun.