Monday 17 February 2014

The GO! Team goes Mexican Part 2

I awoke on the second day expecting to be in a hurting state, but really I felt quite refreshed.  I woke up Just Leafy and we got ready to tackle our day.  We headed down to the buffet for a bite to eat and java, and soon joined up with groom to be and some of his new extended family.
Since Mike had been here a day or so already, he was able to offer us some helpful tips to make the best out of our stay.  He asked what we were up to today, and we told him that we had a geocaching event that we were holding just outside our resorts gates. We also spoke of the virtual cache that we had planned to walk to 20min up the road, and he said that he would like to come with us.  I was all up for that, so we planned a time to meet and split to get ready for the event.

Well even in Mexico the visiting cachers still act like cachers, and that's being early-birds.  We were on time for our event, and there were my attendees waiting for us.  We had four attendees, a family that were actually two teams.  So in the end that was the smallest event log I ever had, three team signatures including our own.

We had a nice hour of talking and getting caching tips for the area, and getting other tips to enjoy our stay in the San Jose del Cabo area.  After all the chats, taking a couple of pictures, and trading some trackables to move along we parted ways and met up with Mike up at his room.

Mike, Leafy and I headed out to do the 20min walk up to the virtual cache.  I was expecting it to be
uphill and not easy to reach due to traffic since google maps made it look like it was in the middle of a busy traffic circle.  But in the end it was a nice lazy incline all the way up the road, and the traffic circle was not busy at all.  We found the required info for logging the cache, took our celebratory photo with the bust of the person the monument celebrates, and made our way back to the resort.
Along the way we paid a visit to a local cemetery, which was amazing to see.  Unlike our cemeteries, this one was colorful, and the people laid to rest here all had little huts or shrines built for them.  It was a sight to see for sure, and I am glad we took a moment to check it out.  After that it was a short walk back to our resort and back to enjoying our vacation.

The third day we just hung out on the beach and at the pool, and of course drank lots of fun and interesting beverages.  And had a great day with our friends.

On the fourth day I had to get up before the sun, as the boys were heading to Cabo San Lucas to go fishing for the stag party.  I had ordered a hamburger and fries via room service the night before so I could have some sort of a breakfast when I woke up.  We met at some god awful hour in the hotel lobby, and hopped in our cab to take us to the marina in Cabo San Lucas.  It was about an 45min from the hotel to the marina, and many of the guys who came were still suffering with some major hangovers took advantage and grabbed a few extra Z's along the way.

When we arrived at the marina we all unloaded and met with our charter guide.  He took us out to the boat where we loaded our gear, ice and booze for the day (of course there was booze, it's a stag party).  We headed out to sea, cast our lines, and those who needed rest dozed while the rest waited for a bite on the line...
Hours and hours passed, we drank, we sang songs, we goofed off, and finally toward the end of the fishing trip we had our bite.  Almost everyone had a chance to reel the feisty little thing in, but the final reel in was reserved for the groom.  And what he pulled in was a fish unlike anything I had ever seen before, a beautiful Mahi Mahi.  It was the strangest fish I had seen too because as it died it changed colour many times, from green to grey, and to the most beautiful blue! 

When we came back in to port, we had these giant sea lions swimming in our wake begging for
leftover bait. Once back on solid ground I asked my guys to let me take off for a few minuets to go grab a quick cache that was nearby.  I ran over, was stumped, and then clued in to what it had to be and shortly had the cache in hand!  After signing I ran back to the guys, hopped in our cab, and headed home to the resort.  That night the resort cooked our fish for us, and we had a fantastic meal!

Later that night many of us were still awake having drinks at the resort's bar which was decorated nicely for Valentines day.  We were pleasently surprised when right at midnight when it officially become the 14th, a Mariachi Band seemingly appeared out of nowhere and started playing.  Then after one song they proceeded to parade out of the lobby into the courtyard onto a stage that was set up, and continued to play serenading to the entire resort.  Just Leafy and I enjoyed that, and had a Valentines Day dance under the stars.  After they were done we turned in for the night, after all the reason we came was today... Mike and Mo were to be married.



The next day was like all the others, except there was wedding to attend.  We had some time to ourselves until then, so we all did what we wanted to until it was time to get ready.
When the time arrived Leafy and I got ready, met up with our friends and attended a beautiful wedding on the beach.  It was a fantastic service, and it was so nice to see Mike and Mo finally tie the knot.  The reception that followed was so much fun, and we had great food and drinks into the wee hours of the night.

The next few days was more of the same stuff, beach time, pool time, lots of drinks, and tons of fun.  So to save time I won't write about that stuff.  But Sunday (our last full day in Mexico) was the day something different happened, so it would be worth telling about that... After all this is a geocaching blog, and that is what happened along other stuff.

We all met after breakfast in the lobby of the hotel and sent a representative to haggle with a taxi driver for us so we could all go to Cabo San Lucas for the day.  For us the guys this was our second trip to this city, but for the ladies it would be their first.  Actually that isn't totally true, as some of the ladies had gone the other night with their boys on a Mexican Bar Crawl that took them to Cabo San Lucas.  But this trip allowed for them to get some shopping and more touristy things done. 

The Cab took us to the marina, and as we walked to our glass bottom boat destination we browsed theEl Arco de Cabo San Lucas, or Lands End, Cabo San Lucas.
various shops and kiosks.  At one point we stopped to watch some hockey on the TV of one of the watering holes we passed by.  Slowly but surely we made our way over to the dock where we were going to haggle for a trip on the glass bottom boats to see the famous
Here there are a few different beaches, but the most famous beaches are the two at the very end.  The beach on the harbor side is called  Lovers Beach (with distinctly calm waters), while the beach on the Pacific Ocean side is called Divorce Beach (which has some pretty wicked waves and an amazingly powerful under tow).

The boat Captain took us out and told us about the area and it's many features and I was able to get the picture I needed for the Earchcache that is located here "Lands End - GC319DN", and then dropped us off at Lovers Beach. 
Upon our arrival we were immediately hit up by the locals on the beach for money, specifically for letting us have our pictures taken with their iguanas.
We stayed at the beach for an hour, and headed back to the boat which had returned for us.  Sadly there was another cache on the beach cliffs that I could have gone for, but since it wasn't on my GPS getting it was next to impossible.  But at least it gives me a reason to return to this beautiful spot again someday.



When we returned the marina we all shopped some more, and some of us made some very nice
purchases that were to be proud of. Eventually made our way back to the taxis.  This time we were not as successful in haggling our price back home, so it cost a few dollars more to get back to the resort.  When we returned we had a little time to freshen up and met up with the newlyweds for dinner at the Italian a la carte restaurant.
After another fun night of drinking we headed off to bed one last time.

We thankfully didn't have to depart until later in the day on the 17th, so with a sleep in and some breakfast we packed up and got ready to go.  And when the time came we headed out to catch our bus to the airport and started the long trek back home.  We had a brief layover in Calgary, where the  Newlyweds and the Alberta folk parted ways with us.  After saying our goodbyes we headed back through Security, had us some grub in the airport, and then departed for Victoria.



A big thank you to Mike and Maureen for the invite, a thanks to our fantastic friends for being wonderful travel companions, another thanks to the geocachers who placed or setup the caches we did in the Cabo area, and super huge thanks to you my readers for patiently waiting for me to get caught back up in my blog.


The GO! Team goes Mexican Part 1

Hi every one, once again I am behind on writing about our geocaching adventures.  But back in February we embarked on an adventure that neither of us would ever forget.
After our wedding in July we received an invitation to witness one of my good friends from high school get married to his long time sweetie, and this was to take place in Los Cabos Mexico.
Well how could we say no to that?  Not only would this allow us to go somewhere both of us have always wanted to go to, but also would allow for me to add another country to the list of places I have cached in.

Like any avid cacher I instantly jumped on the computer, logged into geocaching.com, and started a search of the area we would be staying in.
I was a little disappointed at one point, as my search resulted in very little caches in the area.  But my disappointment dissolved when I reminded myself of the fact I really wasn't there to cache, but to witness my friends getting married.  So I created a PQ (Pocket Query) of what I thought I could do and went with that.

The months passed leading to when we would be going, and then I had an epiphany!!  Why not host an event!  With a little more than a month left before leaving I drafted up a listing for an event to take place outside my resort.  And shortly it was listed the "Will Attend" logs started to roll in (not many, but enough).

Soon the day arrived (February 11th), and those of us going out of Victoria all met up at the airport and started the long day of traveling.   It was neat for me to travel with these people, as they were good old friends that I had never traveled with before.  I was especially pleased to see that we traveled well together, since in the past I have learned you can be good friends with someone and not be travel compatible at the same time.

We all left from Victoria with a brief stop in Vancouver, and boarded our plane that would take us directly to Los Cabos.

While in Vancouver
we stocked up on some mini bottles of alcohol to get us in the mood for the gong show that would ensue once we arrived.  And in a short while we were on our 5hr flight south to warm weather, endless drinks, and fun in the sun... Not to forget geocaching!


The flight down was really nothing to write about, just us on the plane all seated together laughing and telling stories to catch up since some of us haven't see each other since our wedding in July!  But it made the time go by, and soon we arrived in San Jose del Cabo. We got through Mexican Customs nice and easy, and made our way to the WestJet Vactions bus that would take us to our hotel.  A short ride later we pulled into the driveway of our Resort, and there was our friend and groom waiting for us at the Resort doors.  We all quickly checked in, got our wristbands and grabbed our first drinks and headed to our rooms to settle in and freshen up before meeting the rest of the wedding crew downstairs.


Needless to say, the whole group of us really partied it up that first night and didn't turn in for the night until 3am. Well if this was to be a sign of what the rest of the trip would be like, I knew it had to be a total blast.







Stay tuned for Part 2 of this amazing wedding/geocaching trip to Mexico!