Postcards from Mexico

Oriole Restaurant

Only a short walk from the beach, Oriole is an open air grill.  We ate here often because it was thirty feet from the pool and extremely casual.  Little kids melt down at the pool, need some food quick, and head in here.  Not so little kids get salty and hungry, dash in, and before you know it a gourmet burger on the way, or a light batch of prawn tacos and some guacamole.

Kaffeine Cafe as seen from the roof of our room

The sheer luck of getting located in a rooftop room overlooking the coffee shop was better than good. The smell of the morning brew rising up to your room in the air, itself bright and blue by 7 a.m., and a symphony (or cackle) of palm-nesting birds made mornings a time to look forward to.

Flavours Restaurant

Flavours restaurant was hoppin' at all hours since this happened to be (as advertised) a family friendly resort, and this the only buffet on the grounds.  We could see from our rooftop suite the red-eyed parents of infants and toddlers pushing their strollers towards Flavours very early in the morning.  Once in, the cooking was tremendous and fresh: chicken and beef satay on sticks by night, hand-picked, made on the spot omelets by morning.  The surroundings surprisingly intricate and cool to look at.

Las Palmas Poolside Bar and Grill

A long narrow pool curved along the center of the resort complexes offering two swim up bars,

Lizards and Las Palmas.  At the back end of each there was a little cantina in the shade.  Families would sit in half submerged poolside lounge chairs then wade over to the bar for food and beverage.  A constant breeze swept through the palm trees.  Once in awhile a faint cry or giggle from a poolside infant or toddler.

Tsuke Japanese Restaurant

If every city had a Tsuke Japanese Restaurant (or two, maybe three), we'd all be happier campers.  Authentic Japanese food is an adventure in micro-portions and fresh crisp ingredients.  Here

we chopsticked a little bit of everything from Vietnam phyllo wraps, lemongrass pork, fish roe sushi, cold calamari, to the gigantic hit of the entire trip – Jan's new favorite sweet goodness – coconut gelato (haylado).

Rooftop dining

Very possibly though the best meal of the entire trip was room service breakfast the first morning on the rooftop of our own room under the pagoda sun screen.  The mini pancake, the banana granola, and the simple hash brown tastes that much better underneath the morning Mayan sunshine.