Today is our down day. There is nothing like a Sunday at home to recuperate from a long hectic week. We lounged around this morning and watched France and Croatia compete in the World Cup. We were so disappointed that Croatia didn't win. We have visited Croatia a couple of time. We have always been impressed by the beauty of the country and even more by how warm the people have been to us as we travel through their beautiful county. It would have been great to see them win!
When the game was over, we headed out on our morning walk. Today we were heading up the mountain, directly behind where we are staying. Our plan was to just walk up the roads and take in the sights. Just a block up from our hotel is a steep set of stairs and a venicular for those who don't do stairs.
But we do stairs, so up we went.
We've heard that Casa Anita is an inexpensive hotel option here in Vallarta. It is right on the highway and has lots of stairs, but if you don't mind that, it's in a pretty central location.
We crossed the highway and walked up on Calle Hortensias. It makes a big loop and ends up back on the highway, so we thought we could get some good views up there. And we were right!
We were once again walking on narrow, cobble stone streets.
And they were very steep!
We turned off of Calle Hortensias and went up Calle Gardenias for a ways. It was very steep and windy, although that was nothing new!
At one of our overlooks, we walked up to the wall, and this huge lizard was sitting there. He scared us and we scared him! I think it is an iguana. It was really fun to see him.
All of the steep streets have two deep grooved tracks for the cars to drive on. They are even harder to walk on than the cobble stones, so most of the time we stuck to the cobble stones.
We went up Calle Gardenias quite a ways, in fact, the surroundings were turning to jungle, but we could never figure out how to get up to this place. I'm sure it was on this road, somewhere up there, but we wanted to be home in time for lunch, so we turned around and headed back to Calle Hortensias.
Keep in mind that our hotel is one block from the beach. We have really climbed.
This condo had stairs going up to each floor, and there was also a venicular off to the right. These hill sides are so steep!
But on steep mountains sides are amazing views. If you want views, and solidarity, this is the place to be, but it is very removed from town.
We were walking past this small area where they were building a wall. The soil is so fertile here! It's kind of crazy compared to what we are used to in Arizona.
Back to the stairs leading back to town.
We walked about 5 miles this morning and did 27 flights of steps according to Steve's phone. In reality, we only did one actual flight of steps, but the hills were so steep his phone thought we were climbing stairs.
Back to our quiet little patio for a nice quiet lunch. We will be eating our leftovers from Martini En Fuego! I can't wait!
And since we had a small lunch today, we decided to treat ourselves to iced mochas from the little restaurant down the street. We enjoyed them on our beautiful patio as we watched the world spin on below us.
We enjoyed a nice quiet afternoon on our patio, resting, and de-sweating. It is crazy hot here, so when we come back from a walk, we are soaked from head to toe. It is typically about 90 degrees F and about 90 percent humidity, so nothing like we are used to in Arizona. When we get home, we have to strip and let our clothes dry before we can even put them in the laundry basket. I think they would mold if they went directly in. We have become quite creative finding places to dry our clothes.
When we get home, we put on swim wear and jump into the shower to cool off, then we can sit on the patio and relax.
We have the most beautiful pots of flowers on our patio, and one of them is a fern.
I never realized that ferns bloom, but they do, and their blooms are really pretty.
As we walked past the Rio Cualle, there was a tree full of birds; pelicans on the bottom and herons on the top. It was interesting.
Then down to the craziness of the Malecon. There was a performance going on in the square and it had drawn quite a crowd.
It was all in Spanish, so we're not sure what was happening.
The Cheeky Monkey got good ratings on TripAdvisor, so we decided to give it a try. The main reason we headed down to the Malecon for dinner tonight was to watch the sunset, and this place gets great reviews for it's sunsets, which is kind of funny.
Our waiter.
They had a dollar margarita special, so Steve and I each ordered a margarita to drink as we watched the sunset. But unfortunately, as we started looking at the menu, all of their food was bar food. Steve and I aren't big on bar food, we really prefer healthier options. But since we were here, we made some selections from the menu. We started with an order of onion rings.
And then for dinner we split an order of linguini with crab cakes.
They were both fine, but just not the kind of food we prefer to eat. But we were enjoying the views!
The moon and Jupiter (?) were beautiful as well!
When we got our bill, we noticed that they had charged us for two extra margaritas. When you only order two in the first place, that's kind of obvious. So we talked to the waiter and he removed the two extra margaritas.
All in all, we weren't overly impressed with the Cheeky Monkey. We may go back some day to watch a sunset again over a drink, but I don't think we'll be eating there again, and we'll definitely check our bill before we pay it.
The Malecon just keeps getting busier!
As we walked back toward our hotel, the pirate ship began shooting off fireworks.
And then the highlight of our evening. We looked out onto the beach, and this sea turtle was up in the sand laying her eggs.
We have dreamed about seeing this our whole lives, and here she was on the beach of Puerta Vallarta.
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