Real Kato Blog: Cancun

Last week we went to Cancun for a wedding, for my friends Scott and Amy (whom we'll call AmyB to avoid confusion with my wife Amy). Pictures and more after the jump.

Cancun is a pretty spectacular place, a booming tropical resort destination that's only a few hours' flying time away. Yes, it's touristy, and yes, it's somewhere you'd want to avoid during spring break, but it's also lush and beautiful, and the people are exceedingly friendly.

We stayed at an all-inclusive adults-only resort called the El Dorado Royale. All-inclusive includes food and drink, including alcoholic beverages. When Amy found out about this, she pronounced, "When we get there, they will RUE THE DAY they decided to include booze in this package."

Also included? Jacuzzi tubs in every room. After several rounds of free booze, this was the second thing we took advantage of.

I somehow didn't get many pictures of the resort itself. Amy has some video of the place, but I wish I'd snapped more photos. In particular, there was a warning sign that told beach swimmers to stay off the giant sandbags that the hotel set up as sort of an artificial reef. But the sign looked more like it was saying "Do Not Hump the Sandbags", and I really wanted that photo to put up in my office at work.

Scott and AmyB had a beach wedding, which was beautiful.

The gods looked favorably upon this wedding.

(Oh, and speaking of the sky and good omens, how can you go wrong with a wedding when the year's most spectacular astronomical event happens that same weekend? Below is the crescent moon, Venus, and Jupiter in conjunction.)

Here are Amy and I at the wedding.

Beyond hanging out at the resort's many pools (with swim-up bars, natch), we all went to the Mayan ruins at Chichen Itza for a day.

Our tour guide was knowledgeable and friendly. When Hollywood makes a movie about our trip, the guide will be played by Jack Black:

My favorite thing at Chichen Itza was this relief in the Great Ball Court, depicting the beheading of the contestant who lost one of the games. The snakes shooting out of his head represent the blood spurting out of his newly-decapitated body.

Amy's favorite thing was the wall of skulls that matched her Día de los Muertos tattoos:

After Chichen Itza, we visited Cenote Ik Kil. A cenote is a sinkhole or underground cave. There are hundreds of these around Cancun, and they're essentially giant holes in the ground with water from underground rivers. Cenote Ik Kill is 196 feet wide and 130 feet deep, and it was amazing.

We've got some video of me and Amy jumping into the water there, which I'll try to put up in a future post. Also in a future post: video of me and Amy on a zip line tour in nearby Selvatica.

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