The Hudsons: April 2009

Tuesday, April 28, 2009

RIVIERA MAYA

We had tons of fun on our trip to Mexico! The weather was perfect, our hotel was great, and the sites were spectacular! here is a compilation of some of our photos...enjoy!

OUR HOTEL...

All of the main buildings at our hotel had these huge grass roofs they were really cool!

Our actual hotel rooms looked like the orange building on the side, they were fairly basic, but nice. The resort we stayed at was located right on the beach...this picture was taken from our hotel room balcony.

The shopping center at our resort

A shot from the main lobby area

Another shot from the main lobby... there was a giant stone colunm that went from the floor through the roof...it was awesome to see when we first walked in!

SHOPPING...

One of the greatest things about Mexico is how colorful everything is! We had this great little shopping center right at our hotel...the only downfall was the workers had so much business they weren't willing to bargain their prices down very low.

JUST FOR FUN...

These Nacho Libre masks were at all of the coolest shops...unfortunately we didn't pick one up, but we kept thinking if anyone should have one it would be Bryce!

Down town in Playa Del Carmon

What do you know, my favorite ruins named a restaurant after me!

COBA...

Coba was a huge ruin area and it was cool because we actually got to hike to the top of this one! when we first got there is was really hot and we decided to be cheep and not rent bikes to get around like everyone else was doing so we got a pretty good work-out walking around the area.

We made it to the top! it was much harder then it looked!

Another ruin area of Coba, but you could only walk 1/2 way up this one.

YAL - KU...

We walked about 20 min. from Akumal Bay to get to Yal-Ku, a little lagoon to snorkel in. We saw a ton of tropical fish including some sword fish (at least they looked like sword fish).

The Lagoon has all these funny little statues... we tried to make friends with them, but it didn't really work out to well

Akumal Bay...

We took a public shuttle to Akumal bay for the day and it was very fun! We snorkeled around and saw 2 giant sea turtles! The beach here was amazing and there actually wasn't many people!

I don't know what this thing is but I thought it was cool

Don't look to closely you might see a topless lady behind me!

Fun at Tulum...

These lizards were EVEYWHERE! at first we throught it was cool because they were hanging out right outside our hotel room, but then we relized they were all over the place!

These crazy Mexican's climb to the top of this pole and play music for the tourists...but you have to pay them to do it!

What a stud!

I thought abe wanted a picture of me...but really he just wanted to get the sweet guy in the speedo!

TULUM...

The Tulum ruins were probably my favorite. According to our LDS guide Lemhi, Tulum was once a holy temple for the Nephites but was later taken over by the Lamenites. There was a lot of symbolism about Christ and the importance of April the 6th. We went to these ruins twice, once on our own and once with the guide.

CHITZEN ITZA...

One of the most famous ruin sites we visited. We had an LDS tour guide take us here and also to Telum. It was cool because he was able to relate the sites to the Book of Mormon. We learned that although very cool, the people at Chitzen Itza were very wicked and had some crazy customs and rituals. The picture below is the main building on the site, you use to be able to go inside and walk to the top, but i guess about 5 years ago they stopped letting people, we were pretty sad about that.

The happy couple, standing in front of the sink-hole where the Mayans use to sacrifice their people and throw there bodies into this pit... you can see the remains of the platform behind us...eerie huh?

These columns are thought to represent the strippling warriors.

I can't remeber what these buildings are...but they were pretty cool!

Bryce's Birthday Cake

I created this cake for my cousin Bryce's 22nd birthday! It was my first large cake done in all butter cream (except for the polka-dots are fondant) and the whole thing is actual cake, no rice crispies. I'm not sure if he is a fan of bugs but I just went a little crazy on this one!

Service Cake

I recently put together a fondant cake for a girl in my ward who needed it for a friends bridal shower. It was right in the middle of finals week so I was in a crunch for time, but I think it turned out pretty well! The cake was made with fondant, and butter cream boarders.