Cinco de Waito

I decided that I wanted to go to a mexican restaurant for Cinco de Mayo. I've never been & I keep hearing about how much fun it is. We decided to go to La Caretta. It's close to home & the food's good. So me & Dean went with our friends Dennis & Jackie & their daughter Allie. We got there at 5:45 & there were people everywhere. Dean had to park at Albertson's which is across the parking lot from the restaurant. We went to put our name on the list. They'd ran out of pagers so they were taking cell numbers. Good luck hearing your phone in that crowd! They said the wait was approximately 2 hours. Normally, we would NEVER wait that long especially for mexican food but there was a band outside & it never takes as long to get a table as they tell you it will. YEH RIGHT!!! I got a Rumrita & started to people watch. OMG! Seriously, what are people thinking??? There were more "store bought parts" there than I've ever seen in one place! Of course there was the usual people wearing stuff they had no business wearing, a few random sombrero's & even a guy with a fake mustache. Not sure what that had to do with anything but whatev. You know the part in Sweet Home Alabama where Reese says "You've got a baby...in a bar"? Well, I had that thought several times. I know technically, it was a restaurant but last night it was really more of a bar & there were people that had little kids & babies there. It just seemed strange to me. Here's me, Jackie & Allie. The iPhone camera & sun aren't the best mix. Obviously.

The band was interesting. Like I said, I've never been to Cinco de Mayo but I assumed it would involve Mexican music. Not that I'm a fan of that, I just thought that was part of it. Well, it's not at La Caretta. The band was a bunch of white guys. The singer wasn't good. Although, the later it got the better he sounded. I guess he just needed to warm up. He did sing a really good variety of stuff. There was Journey, Better Than Ezra & even Def Leopard. Thinking back, I guess that was kinda strange to have one guy singing all that stuff.

There were a couple of tables outside where we were & if you were lucky enough to snag one you didn't get up. Finally, around  8:30 we were able to get one of these tables. It was after 9:00 when we ordered & got our food. That would be twice in 4 days that I've eaten after 8:00. At least this time it wasn't because the waiter forgot about us but this is not a trend I want to continue. I tend to get grumpy if I have to eat that late. I was good last night because there was so much to see. It really reminded me of back in the day when we always went to a bar in Tigerland called The Stadium Club. At one point I thought we were at a reunion. There were all sorts of people there that we used to see. We ended up seeing a lot of other people that we know too so that made it fun & the time go by fast. At 9:40 when we left they still hadn't called to tell us we had a table!

Cozumel

Friday morning when we woke up we were docked in Cozumel. I took a couple of pictures from the ship.



We had an excursion booked & it was one that I wasn't looking forward to. Maybe I shouldn't say I wasn't looking forward to it, I just had zero expectations. That way I wouldn't be disappointed. It was a cooking class. That's right, we were paying someone to teach us how to cook an authentic mexican meal. Everyone knows I don't cook, I don't like to cook, I don't really want to learn to cook & I don't eat authentic Mexican food. See why I didn't have any expectations??

We had to take a bus to what they called a resort. It was really just a park but it was nice. This is a picture while we were waiting for the bus.


At the resort/park there was a restaurant, a pool & of course beautiful water & a nice beach. They brought us to a room that had windows everywhere so we could see the water. It had all these little cooking stations & there were 4 people per station. Perfect since there were 4 of us.


The first thing we had to do was put this on


Don't I look thrilled? Chef Luis insisted we wear them the entire time. I was ponytailing it that day so I guess it didn't really matter. He proceeded to teach us. He was very funny. Our main course was fish wrapped in a banana leaf. Here's Dean cooking. Not an unusual sight at all.


Here's proof that I really did participate.


He also taught us about presentation.




These were the tortilla's we cooked to make our appetizer. If you notice the skinny legs in the background, they belong to one of the gay guys on the cruise. His presentation was UNBELIEVABLE! It was amazing how pretty he made his plate with that red dye!


This was the appetizer once it was done. It was REALLY good.


This was dessert.


It's cookies layered with rice pudding with cinnamon sticks as a topper. It was good if you like rice pudding.

Here's me & Chef Luis.


Doesn't he look about 12? He studied in Paris which to me is really strange considering he's teaching us how to cook mexican food in Mexico. Anyway, we had such a good time in this class. I highly recommend it. See what happens when you have no expectations!

I was a little startled when class was over & we went to the place where we'd eat. This thing was sitting right outside the door.


After we ate, there was a little mexican walking around with an iguana asking if you wanted to take a picture holding it. Ummm, no thanks dude. I certainly wasn't interested but then Cliff informed us that iguana's are carriers of salmonella. I guess that's one the reason the ship makes that announcement that you can't bring animals back on the boat.

Here are some pictures of the water!



We took the bus back to the port & did a little shopping. There was a band playing.


Carlos 'n Charlie's & Senor Frogs were in the shopping area so we went to Carlos 'n Charlie's for a drink.


Dean's starting to age & his eyes aren't as young as they once were. When the waiter brought the menu & he couldn't read it in the dark they brought him this.


These were the largest & cheapest drinks we had the whole week! Only $27!!!! Dean got nervous when the waiter brought the ticket & it said $365. It was in peso's not dollars!!!



I'm still amazed at the water.




That takes care of all of the ports we visited & the excursions we did. We had a fabulous time & I highly recommend it!