Grown and Sixty – The View from Lajeune

I turned 60 on February 14, 2022. I’ve been tripping over my “advanced age” (smile) for a minute because it suddenly hit me that I likely have no more years behind me than I do in front of me…

However, on the other hand, I consider my age a blessing because it is not everyone Lives to the ripe old age of 60 years.

And to truly celebrate this birthday, as well as our 10th love anniversary, my boyfriend and I embarked on a much-needed and long-awaited vacation to Cancun, Mexico. My travel agent Karen booked our stay at the adults-only all-inclusive Iberostar resort. We upgraded to a Junior Ocean View Suite on the 13th floor which has a spiral staircase downstairs leading to the upper deck which features a hot tub and outdoor shower as well as a small table and two lounge chairs. The look was very comfortable especially at night when the warm ocean breeze drifted into our room.

And this is how we spent our days on the beach right outside our bungalow:

On our second night at the resort, we met up, talked for 5 minutes and then had dinner together at American Bistro with this couple from Southern Virginia. They have been married for 40 years and told us over dinner that although they no longer work for a living, they have not “retired” but are back to normal. I will use this term when I officially “retire” (smiles). Anyway, at the end of the night, they told us that their next stop on vacation was a semi-nude beach in the islands…

La Parilla (steakhouse) on our third night is where we received cheesecake after dinner Happy 10th anniversary It says…This was a big surprise for us although we remembered that the lovely waiter asked us if we were celebrating anything special that night…

We missed our reservations for the Japanese restaurant on our fourth night because we were caught in downtown Cancun in the La Isla shopping village. This village was a very large open indoor/outdoor market consisting of retail clothing stores, souvenir shops, restaurants, travel kiosks, and much more. We were lured by a guy on the street who worked for a travel agency and sold us on a speed boat and snorkeling tour at a cost of $150 (including snorkeling gear) and left the pier daily at 9am, 12pm and 3pm. We agreed it was a good deal and came back the next day to take advantage of it.

The most memorable dinner of all was on our fifth night – A Private dinner for two with special menu and fine wines (Photo courtesy of Quinn/Panzer Travel Agency at our resort restaurant of choice). We chose La Horma, a gourmet restaurant where the wait staff literally treated us like king and queen the minute we walked through the doors. They were literally tripping over themselves as we sat at a table overlooking the ocean. Plus they anticipated our every need, and fed us plenty of food – James had a sushi appetizer with breaded shrimp, crostini topped with veggies, beef tacos with ceviche, and for his main course: steak and sides. I ordered off the menu – I chose the linguine with pesto sauce topped with Parmesan cheese which looked as good as it tasted. I also devoured the hot, crispy rolls with olive oil and parmesan cheese. In appreciation of our 10th love anniversary, I received beautiful roses from our waiter.

I stopped drinking alcohol nearly two years ago when the pandemic first started, so I’ve probably lost money at the resort since I threw in the grapefruit juice, mineral water, beet juice, coffee, expresso, virgin strawberry, green juice, and bottled water (smiles).

Our sixth and final day consisted of breakfast al fresco at the resort (now wearing our street clothes) and waiting for the emailed results of our Covid tests which were of course negative.

We got our airport transfer 3 hours before our flight and mentally prepared ourselves for the flight back to Connecticut.