Playa del Carmen 2012 (Honeymoon)

Lindsey and I got married earlier this year in February. We had a small, private wedding at our favorite drinkery....Mercy (http://www.mercywinebar.com/).  We had a nice mixture of family and friends.  Lindsey and I took off to Playa del Carmen the next day.  We had an wonderful time and thought I'd share some of the pictures from our visit.  Lindsey had never visited the Yucatan (my second trip) and it was a great experience.  We stayed at La Tortuga which is a really exclusive place (not to be confused with inclusive) and basically in downtown Playa.  The accommodations and staff are nothing short of amazing.  I highly recommend this place for those that aren't married to inclusive resorts.  They have a restaurant (El Bistro) that provides complimentary (FREAKING AWESOME) breakfast with lots of choices.  This isn't some buffet like you get at most resorts.  They have a nice lounging area for drinking and using their Wi-Fi which came in very handy.

  

Mamita's Beach Club & view

One of the coolest places we went was Akumal Bay to swim with the sea turtles.  They have a dive shop for those that need equipment, scuba, want to do a dive trip, etc.  We had our own snorkel gear and rented a locker.  The water was a bit cold but the tortugas were awesome.  What we didn't expect to find was lots of  reef out there.  We probably swam out about 100 yards (still in the bay by a long shot) and found Rays, lobsters, plenty of diverse reef fish, giant Gorgonians, lots of Porites, Barracuda, and a trio of CUDDLEFISH swimming!  That was the biggest surprise by far.  Unfortunately we didn't bring the camera but the memories will last forever.  Coolest part is you don't need a guide to do this.  Just swim out there and see it on your own.

We used the collectivo (bus) to get around about 95% of the time rather than more expensive taxi's.  It's literally dimes on the dollar if you want to save some money.

We also did a guided snorkel trip in Puerto Morelos which was nice but having to wear a life jacket was super lame.  It's a National Park so it's mandatory apparently.  We'll do that one differently.....like go further down the beach!  Here are some pics from that gorgeous area.

We attempted to do a cenote dive but (unlucky) found a place that wasn't snorkel friendly....Cenote Azul. It would have been suicidal to try and dive down and come up into the cenotes at this place without scuba.  It was a really beautiful spot though with really pretty freshwater fish.  

One of our favorite places to eat by far was El Fogon.  This was a small restaurant that made PURE AWESOME on the grille.  

Carboncito's is also another really good restaurant with AWESOMELY large margaritas.

Downtown Playa