Cheap fun in Cancun

Here we are in Mexico, at the usual place because we can’t avoid it after an unfortunate timeshare purchase some years ago. The timeshare company keeps trying to convince us to buy upgrades, their theory being that by throwing good money after bad, we might be able to make our situation somehow less unpleasant.

Honestly, we enjoy their efforts to sell us upgrades because they take us to the fancy new resort, feed us, tell us outlandish stories about what we ought to buy, and then release us to enjoy the beach, the river and other attractive features of the place. Today’s sales guy had already fulfilled his November quota and had enough in the bank that he doesn’t even have to sell a thing inDecember. I suppose the bosses knew that we never say yes, so they sic’d their smarmiest, most effective agent on us. I begged him to let us off the hook early so we could all just go out and play, and he responded by telling us how f***ed we were (he actually used that word) because we’d bought a perpetual timeshare and were obligated to keep paying annual fees to his company for the rest of our lives and the lives of our heirs as well. By paying a bunch more money, he offered that we could get into something with possible resale value.

I maintained that having been duped (actually, I used his other word) by his company once, I had no intention of trusting them in another deal even more complex than the first. Finally, he pointed us toward the door and told us to get onto the van back to our home resort. I checked with the doorman, made other arrangements, and we went to the beach. We had a very nice day at Tres Rios.

We swam in each of the two main swimming pools, floated down the river, sat on the beach, and then floated down the river some more. When we finally went back to check on transportation back to our home resort, we worked out an agreement to go back at 5:00. With the extra time, we went out to lunch, swam in yet another pool and floated down the river a couple more times. I didn’t take a single picture of any of this stuff.

This evening we went to the welcome party at our home resort. Most of the guests forgot to bring their invitations, which turned out to be lottery tickets. I had ours however, and won second prize: a choice between a not-too-bad T-shirt and a garish Mexican-style hat; both made for tourists. I didn’t want either of these prizes, but intended to pick the T-shirt because I could imagine using it. From the audience, however, Alla caught my eye. She really wanted the hat, and now she’s ecstatic. I’m surprised. I couldn’t imagine that anybody would want it, but, well, she did. As she told me when we were dating, “I’m not crazy, but I like hats.”