White horses and a nail in the pool

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Today we take the public bus to the hotel area of Cancun. This is where all the beaches are and also where we can book up some scuba diving. It turns out to be very easy as the bus leaves from the main street just by our hotel.

We manage to get the last two seats and settle in for a drive through rush hour traffic. We wanted to be at the scuba centre early before they go out diving for the day! Though there is quite a breeze and out to sea, some impressive white horses, so it’s not certain that diving won’t have been cancelled anyway!

We arrive at the dive centre and book our dive at the ‘MUSA’ for tomorrow. It’s an underwater sculpture museum and an unusual dive that I didn’t want to miss. It’s a one tank dive - that’s all they have on offer - and we need to be there at 1.30pm tomorrow. Now that is sorted, we are off to the beach.

The beach is not looking good. No swimming - the red flag is flying, and no-one else foolish enough to be there either. We see a floating obstacle course...think ‘Jeux sans Frontiers’, if you are old enough. It looks like it might be rather fun, if only the weather was better! We take a walk along the beach and over to the rocks, then it’s back on the bus as we think the hotel pool might be a better option today!

Back at the hotel we spend the rest of the day lounging. The hotel provides us with lovely big towels for the loungers and I spend some time swimming. Ian threatens to join me but decides against it after feeling the water with his big toe. Honestly, some people are no fun!

Now, it is the 11th December and only today are the hotel staff putting up the Christmas decorations. This is a practice that I heartily approve of. The staff are on the top floor banging nails into the top inner balcony to secure a long string of icicle lights - no blu tack or sellotape for them. Unfortunately they have managed to drop one nail and they are fairly sure that it plopped into the pool. I am glad it was only the nail and not the hammer! I didn’t see it drop but they seem so certain that I help them to look since I’m the only person in here. Ian is despatched to the room to find my mask and snorkel.

A large fishing net appears, and when this doesn’t produce any results the pool cleaning tools come out. There are now three men hanging over the side of the pool, plus me in the pool, plus the cleaning kit. It looks like I might have to vacate the pool whilst they perform a full clean, but then they spot it. Using hand signals they guide me to the spot and sure enough...a two inch nail with a plastic clip attached. I grab it between my toes and lift it up. A round of applause from my three new friends and the pool cleaning man says he will be bringing me a tip tomorrow. :-)

I continue swimming. It’s impossible to count lengths here as the pool is only about 7 metres long but if I swim continuously for an hour then I have probably done a mile as that’s my usual timing for the distance back home.

Swimming completed and I am starting to feel a little chilly. The sun is sinking fast. Time for a shower. It will soon be time to think about dinner. We have eaten well today so we will probably have a light evening meal back at the food market. We had fresh ham and tomato baguettes for lunch and some other goodies from the supermarket.

It’s getting dark and the Christmas lights have been switched on. It looks very pretty. We wander across to the food plaza. Tonight we have decided to eat Mexican. We choose burritos stuffed with chorizo, potatoes, salad and other unknown stuff. They taste delicious. There is a man providing live entertainment, of sorts - he is singing. He’s not really very good but at the end of each song there is reluctant applause. Will you folks please STOP doing that, it’s only encouraging him to continue. The sound is being blasted across the area with a loudspeaker. The place is packed but gradually we manage to table hop our way over to the far side of the food court...this improves the situation slightly. :-)

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