Thanksgiving Vaca

Oh so many things have happened since I last wrote so I'll catch you up quickly on a few and then tell you about my amazing weekend!

1. My weekend in Richmond for Leslie's wedding was amazing. It wasn't too weird being in the States, but being able to flush my toilet paper was hard a hard adjustment.  Seeing my best friends was refreshing, seeing my family was hard, coming back wasn't too bad, being back has proven to be more difficult.

2. I got to go to a teacher's conference at the Marriott Hotel. This has been the only place in Honduras that I have been to where you can actually flush your toilet paper. (sorry for all of the toilet paper references) The conference was pretty good, and the fact that I didn't have to go to school on Friday was a bonus!

Sofia Caceres (one of other math teachers) and I at the Thanksgiving Dinner

3. The school puts on a Thanksgiving Dinner for all of the teachers and staff.  It was at the Humuya Inn (look it up online).  This is the Inn that the Crook family owns. Mrs. Crook is an amazing interior decorator and the whole Inn looked beautiful with lights and Christmas decorations.  The food was equally delicious. Turkey, stuffing, green bean casserole, sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce and of course pumpkin pie!  Mimi (Ms. Crook) told me later that all of the recipes were from the States.  Her husband, Scott, is American so they have quite a bit of family in the States.  


Now for my amazing weekend...

As you may remember, I ran in a 10K Race back in October and won a free, all-inclusive trip to La Ceiba.  My original plan was to go with Jeremy in June, but I found out I had to use the trip within three months so I decided to go over our Thanksgiving Break.

As Wednesday rolled around, my roommate, Jess, and I thought to ourselves that we couldn't imagine not having the rest of the week off because we were so exhausted.  Wednesday after school we came home, Andrea and I ran, and then we headed out of the city to the Crooks house for the night.  We rented a couple movies and had pizza with the girls.  It was a great start to our long weekend.

Thursday morning we were awakened by the smell of bacon and eggs.  We had to catch an 8:30AM flight so we left the Crooks house around 6:30AM.  Carlos got us safely there, and we spoke (or tried to speak) Spanish the whole way.  I think Carlos asked me if I would buy him some shoes from the States when I go home, but my Spanish is still a little shaky so I'll have to ask Andrea to translate next time we are all together. 

Anyways,  we hopped on our plane and got to La Ceiba around 9:45AM.  The taxi ride to the Resort took about 40 minutes, but once we got there we knew it was going to be a good weekend.  The place was beautiful and the staff (although not terribly fluent in English) were very accommodating.  We were forced to speak Spanish to Marco, the older man who worked at the towel hut by the pool, he wouldn't help us otherwise:-) We spent most of our time laying out on the beach and by the pool reading. I am now reading through The Chronicles of Narnia books, which are amazing!

View from our balcony

 There was a restaurant that served three meals a day, buffet style, and also snacks and drinks available by the pool all day long.  We were given a neon yellow wrist band when we got there and after that we were never asked to pay for anything.  All of the food, drinks and activities we wanted to do were included. 

Friday we decided to go kayaking out in the sea (Caribbean Sea) and boy what an adventure it was.  We laughed about how there was no waiver to sign, or even a requirement  that we wear life jackets. (actually they didn't even have them) As we made our way out to sea, Jess was trying to tell me how she had gotten soaked by a wave when another wave came up on her all of a sudden and...FLIP!  No more Jess!  I almost flipped my own kayak I was laughing so hard.  I tried to hold her kayak and paddle while she attempted to get back in, however the first attempt was a failure.  Not only did she not get back in, she nailed her leg on the side of the kayak and was now working with a bum leg.  She seemed a little ticked at this point so I decided to paddle away and let her work it out on her own. But what happened next was hilarious.  Apparently, since she didn't quite give it enough umf the first time, she decided to really jump into the kayak this time.  However, I think she gave it a little too much, and up she went on one side, and over on the other.  I did wait to start laughing this time, but as soon as Jess came up with a smile on her face, I burst!  I couldn't contain myself and even now as I write this I can't stop laughing. 

No worries, she made it back in the kayak on attempt #3 and all was well after that.  We paddled down the beach about a quarter of a mile or so, and then went back.  Overall, the experience was quite enjoyable (for me)!
 

One night we climbed trees:-)

We realized shortly after arriving at the resort that we were the ONLY gringas there...so we stuck out a bit. Talk about being stared at constantly! Apparently this time of year is not very busy for the resort and the majority of people that were staying were there for a conference.  While they were all walking around in business attire, we were laying around in our bathing suits by the pool!

There was also entertainment at night, a Tropical Dance show at 9:30PM out by the pool.  It's pretty sad when you have to go back to your room to take a nap so that you can stay up past 9:30, but I guess that's one of side affects of being a teacher.  However, the show was a little less than mediocre.  The performers changed outfits between every song and even tried to perform a western dance...to a song in Spanish.  It was pretty funny, but we decided to leave after that one.

Overall, spending the weekend with Jess was really great.  We had so much fun, and were able to just relax and not worry about anything! 

There was a dock just a little walk down the beach

I'll try to write more often until Christmas.  There are several things going on (as I'm sure there are at home as well) here for the Christmas Season!  I'll keep you posted so you can experience a Honduran Christmas with me!