We’ve never travelled at Christmas (other than to visit our parents of course). We’ve actually never really seriously wanted to. But for some reason, Marie and I both thought that this year it might be nice to head to some place other than Victoria for Christmas. No decorations. No Christmas tree. Minimal Christmas shopping… What’s not to love? But that meant convincing Caitlin that we should spend Christmas away for the first time… Now to understand what a big deal this is, you need to know Caitlin’s approach to traveling for Christmas… which can be summed up as “NO! Christmas is for being at home. With family! No matter how dysfunctional! So NO! Absolutely not!!” But we asked anyways. Her response was “YES PLEASE!” Go figure…
So we set about figuring out what days we could all get off – or rather what days Marie and Caitlin could get off because, let’s face it, as a teacher, days off are not something I have much problem with… It turns out Caitlin’s office (she’s doing an 8 month co-op placement as a Program Assistant with SFU’s Sexual Violence Prevention Office) is closed between Christmas and New Years so she had a decent block of time available and Marie was able to swing her holidays for the same time frame so we settled on leaving on Saturday the 22nd and returning on January 1st. We had contemplated me taking a couple of discretionary days without pay so we could leave before school got out but a summons for jury duty with the possibility of being in a trial until December 21st killed that thinking… Step one completed. Now to find a place to go…
Originally we had thought of going to New York or maybe Disneyland or Disney World but the low Canadian dollar, Trump, the US’s utter and complete failure to do anything remotely sane with respect to gun control, the possibility of border agents asking awkward questions about previous marijuana use and a general sense that things are not quite right down there these days, led us pretty quickly to look at other destinations. So we thought maybe Quebec City (a pretty awesome place to spend Christmas we’ve been told) but it never really lit a fire in any of us… And then I made a small tactical error. I asked Caitlin if she would like to do Mexico or some place warm… you know… just kind of throwing an idea out there and not really thinking of the consequences… The idea was enthusiastically received and all thoughts of a Canadian Christmas vanished in a heartbeat… except for Marie… she had somehow sort of settled on Quebec City… I was thinking maybe Paris… We settled on someplace warm and tropical… Which pretty much tells you who runs things in our world…
So we started looking for places that we could go for 9-10 nights that wouldn’t be too expensive, that wouldn’t take days of travel to get to and from and that would have things to do other than just lounge on a beach every day. We pretty quickly settled on Mexico and Jamaica – mainly because those were the only two warm destinations a shortish flight away that wouldn’t cost an arm and leg for flights and accommodations. In the end we settled on Mexico because it was cheaper to get to, faster to get to and because, in the end, Jamaica just seemed like too much work to pull together for such a short trip. So Mexico it would be…
But where to go? And what to do? We bounced around the idea of going to an all-inclusive somewhere (not at all our style of travel but who knows, it could be fun, right?) but prices in the $2000-$5000 PER FREAKING PERSON for 9-10 days killed that thinking dead. At $200 to $500 per person times the three of us, we’d be looking at a minimum of $600 per day for accommodation, food and activities. That just wasn’t going to be doable. And the thought of traveling with a 21 year old college student to a place with open bars did not seem like such a good family vacation idea. Seriously, though, who is staying at those places? So after rejecting the all-inclusive idea we kind of bounced around a few other places and ideas (Isla Mujeres was nice when we went there years ago… maybe Tulum… or maybe Puerto Vallarta…).
In the end we settled on the Caribbean side of the Yucatan and picked Puerto Morelos (about midway between Cancun and Playa del Carmen) because it’s supposed to be a little more laid back and less trampled by tourists than the other places on the Mayan Riviera) for 4 nights, then we’re going to head to Valladolid (a couple hours inland) for 3 nights because it’s supposed to be a bit off the beaten path, has some interesting colonial architecture and culture and is close to Ek’Balam (a set of ruins that’s less popular than Chichen Itza which is apparently swamped by tourists) and then we’re heading back to the coast for 3 nights in Playa del Carmen (coincidentally staying in the same place we stayed in 22 years ago when Marie and I spent a month in Mexico on our first ever trip together).
We’ve booked some decent (albeit a bit pricier than we’re used to) places to stay and have some vague notions of what we might like to do while we’re in Mexico (lounge on the beach, maybe take a cooking course, check out some ruins, swim in a cenote, drink some cervezas, buy some souvenirs) but have otherwise not planned much of anything other than how we’re getting there and how we’re getting home. We’re two days away from departure and Marie hasn’t even started packing yet. So this is either going to be our most laid back holiday ever or it’s going to be a complete crap show of a vacation… Time will tell. What I do know is that we’re 5 days away from Christmas and for the first time in 20+ years, Marie has not put up a single Christmas decoration (and you need to understand that she has an entire section of our basement dedicated to Christmas decorations so this is a very big deal). We don’t even have a Christmas tree up…
If you’ve followed my blogs before you know I often have a lot to say about airlines… try this one. We’re flying using our Avion points so all we have to pay cash for is the taxes and any $$ over and above the maximum allowance for the tickets. In our case, we found return flights between Cancun and Victoria for about $169 (over and above the Avion points). But we wanted to see if we could get Caitlin a return flight from Vancouver to Victoria and back so she didn’t have to take the ferry (and risk bobbing around in the ocean for 3 hours while the ferry is unable to dock due to high winds as she did just this past Monday night). So we added a Vancouver to Victoria flight to her Victoria to Cancun round trip and a flight home from Victoria to Vancouver to the equation and the system spit out the price for her ticket… $159… she basically gets paid $10 to fly round trip between Victoria and Vancouver… How WestJet works their pricing will forever remain a mystery.
In the end we modified things a little bit so that Caitlin flies to Victoria on Friday night (the 21st), then we all fly together to Cancun on the 22nd, then we fly together from Cancun to Calgary coming back then Caitlin will fly home to Vancouver while we fly home to Victoria. These new multi-city tickets ended up costing Marie and I $159 each and Caitlin’s ticket will cost $179 or something like that… Plus the Avion points of course. But this let us stay an extra night (New Years Eve no less!) in Mexico and still gets Caitlin back early enough on the night of the 1st that she can go to work on the 2nd. Which Marie also has to do… I will be able to sleep in and continue lounging around for a few more days as school doesn’t start up again until the 7th of January.
So that’s the plan – 4 nights in Puerto Morelos, 3 nights in Valladolid and 3 nights in Playa del Carmen… Stay tuned for more exciting adventures as the Dohertys go back to Mexico… with one extra this time.