Mid-November pile of awesome!

The trip I don't want to end! Great weather! A lot of fun! Cupid Janet and a broken centerpiece Paty O's table!

I'm off to bed but wait for a great TR soon!

 

Anyone seen my tape measure!? I had a great trip also!

 

All right folks time for me to clear the cobwebs from my mind and put in writing my trip report. The names of the innocent, guilty, and others have generally been omitted as I met nearly as many people as I had drinks and can't possibly remember them all!

My trip began a week before in Central Florida, for the sake of completeness I will give a quick overview. I stayed at the Orange Lake Resort in West Irlo (near Disneyworld). This was a guys trip for myself, my 2 brothers, and 1 male cousin put together by my dad and uncle. We spent 3 days taking golf lessons at the McCord academy. I discovered that my swing was about as bad as you could possibly have! By the end though I found out my best club may well be my driver! After that we spent parts of the next few days going to various disney parks. How does one prepare for TTR like this?

Well one prepares for Temptation by hitting up Tampa for a night on the town and a Bucs game! Don't ask me for the name of the bar but us 4 boys after bidding adieu to my dad and uncle in Orlando had a night on the town that cost my brother over $700 alone. He decided to buy multiple trays of shots to give out... The next afternoon we watched the Bucs get mauled by Texas, I know the game was bad but for a stadium holding nearly 70k people I would have expected it to be louder. By the end of it we were wondering if anything short of a wall could stop Arian Foster, that guys moves have moves!

Oh right, this is supposed to concentrate on TTR isn't it? Well there is lots to say about this 10th trip... Details can be fuzzy so bear with me if I miss or gloss over something. Monday morning we bid adiue to my older brother and cousin, my little brother and I would make our way to Cancun next.

The Flight:

It's so much nicer to have less than 3 hours in the air to get to Cancun. We took off from Tampa at 10am, travelled to Miami and another 1.5 hours later we were in customs at Cancun International. Outside we went and into the Transbeach van we went.

Check in:

Check in was pretty uneventful, except for my brother losing his iphone. After about 10 seconds we realized he had left it in the van. This was a recurring theme on the trip. In Florida on the golf course I lost mine (found it thankfully) and at the Magic Kingdom my wallet had fallen on the ground. Again I was lucky to find it on the ground exactly where I thought it was. My brother got his back as well after a call to Transbeach who returned it a few hours later. We made sure the driver received a good tip. Even as a member they sign you up for the timeshare spiel, I just happened to forget to go the next morning lol! My second roommate for this trip (Crazy Jeff) arrived about an hour later. Those of you who met him understand the reason for me calling him crazy... The three of us shared room 1233, nothing fancy 2 queen size beds, but who comes for the rooms? We had another 3 people show up later in the day (2 more guys, 1 girl. All fun people, and close friends of my brother.

The food

On resort everything we ate was either from Tex Mex or the buffet. This suited us fine, planning was NOT going to be a feature of this trip. Consistent with my previous experiences over the years the food was solid to excellent. The rest of the group thought the same. If you go for fine cuisine you will be dissapointed. If you go for decent food and variety you will find it in my opinion. Of course late night burgers at Paty O's are always great!

The bars

As always the guys behind the bar at the pool, at Paty O's etc are always happy and working hard. Over the years my favorite has become Johnny late at night. To do the graveyard shift putting up with they yahoos who are out at 1am or returning from the clubs with a smile is a rare talent. We were not wanting for anything in terms of shots or drinks, maybe 1 or 2 more servers at peak times would help. And even though we all do it on occasion if you are up at the bar and have your drink move along! There are others waiting to build up their buzz!

One unfortunate soul on my last night decided to get up on the table where the dancers perform at 3am to music from my sound dock. While not a very big guy he did weigh more than those lovely ladies and the table gave way. I found out in the morning that the hotel was going to charge him $600 to fix the damage. The material is 1-inch thick plastic with patterns meant to mimic limestone/marble. I feel bad the hotel charged him for the damage as he was only about 160-170 lbs at most. If it wasn't him it could have been one of the dancers down the line. Hopefully the repair includes reinforcement underneath.

Entertainment staff:

The elephant in the room, what most people in here are eager to find out, how is the crew running the show? In my opinion pretty good, in my opinion not quite as good as Chinos but not something that will make me look elsewhere in a panic.

Overall the games are less wild, no darts that I saw, regular or daring, but there was naked tequila volleyball so rest easy my friends. Not all is lost!

The two with the most mic time are Sarah and Brenda. Sometimes they do need to get the mic closer to their mouths or have the dj up the volume a bit, but both speak clearly, with Brenda getting a bit of an edge on clarity. Sarah has a sense of humour not too far off of Chinos, probably as close to being a female equivalent as possible. One positive thing I saw from the crew which was new to me was that if you took advantage of the busses to the clubs on the way downtown one of the staff members took time to explain the difference between included service and shots from the ladies in the clubs. Over the years I have spent a couple hundred bucks rescuing fellow travellers who find that out the hard way when they only have $20 on them to get back to the resort.

Lingere night

One of the best I have seen, lots of participation, sure guys who had shirts on were allowed but the no camera policy was still being strictly enforced by Jose at the doorway, my brother who came downstairs not knowing had to go put his camera away as proof. :ernaehrung024: The topless ladies only table run by Chinos has been retired from what I could tell but everything else remains.

The best part of that night was after everyone came back to Paty O's, not long after the music kicked into a gear a short but heavy rain came down. About half the people retreated under whatever cover they could find. The other half (including yours truly wearing his Family Guy Boxers and a white boa) embraced the rain and danced until it was gone. The party never slowed!

The Boobs Cruise

The main event, the great climax to a great trip! The crew led by Antonio on the mic did an amazing job as always In fact this was the first trip I remember that we had tops go all the way to the top of the mast with a couple others on other lines! the girl in my group did lament to me that we passed by some boats with kids on when the ladies were topless. Being the kind considerate soul I was I joked that her breasts may have been the first a poor kid saw. It's all in good fun and I am certain that the parents of kids on the other boats were proactive in shielding the eyes of the innocent as required, however briefly we may have been in view.

Due to high seas because of the wind, the usual snorkeling location to the south tip of the island wasn't used so the ladies had to reattach their tops as there were lot of other boats on the water that day. All did so without too much protest.

After those who snorkelled were back on board it was off to the beach club for lunch, which again was terrific! My favorite was the variety of chicken they had, my friends were much more into the fried fish. Afterwards it was off to the beach for some games run by Chinos and Omar.

Oh wait did I forget to mention that? Yes Chinos and Omar were entertaining as ever on the boat and on land. They added to an already great cruise! I think I will hit the gym as Chinos and Omar had to take a picture with their budda (aka my belly lol) early on! We had a great day and then into town for a couple drinks at the hole in the wall pub. This place isn't a high end establishment by any means but the beer is cold the atmosphere is fun and the beer is only 20 pesos (about $2) a piece. It has character and I love it!

The ride back to the mainland was an adventure due to the wind. The boat crew as well as Chinos and Omar kept us all smiling and laughing. Needless to say with swells pitching the boat up and down sometimes more than 6 feet based on the wave people kept movement on deck down. I spent most of the afternoon chatting with Steve's wife Janet and her friend Erica who made the trip out for the day. Lots of great laughs and I'm not sure but I think Janet was enjoying my relatively shy nature when talking to women one on one lol. don't know what it is, but I just don't know how to become the alpha male womanizer. Anyways I am keeping in touch with her and look forward to my next time in Cancun, who knows maybe I will get over my shyness around women by then? lol.

Steve and Janet were kind enough to invite me for a drink with them after the cruise so I didn't ride the bus back with everyone else. Steve got separated from the rest of the group visiting the banos on the dock and missed saying goodbye to the bus which was eager to leave. Janet and Chinos took care of those duties, highlighted by Chinos in highly emotional fashion didn't want to tear up so told everyone to fuck themselves as a goodbye, which is fitting. I talked to him and Omar briefly after the bus left and they were on their way home. They both had a great time on the cruise and Chinos in particular is highly appreciative of all the well wishes he receives both on here and on facebook. He may not be at TTR any longer but he is still happy and enjoying life.

I ended the evening with a couple beers with Steve and Janet, her friend Erica and a couple members from the boat, who seemed to think I needed a night partying with them. A great day and a near perfect way to put the top on my trip!

In conclusion

I just realized this turned into a bit more of a book than I thought it would but the stories I could tell about some of the antics that go on at the resort would venture into the realm of fiction to those who don't already know how this place works!

For anyone who wants to keep in touch, feel free to PM me or hit me up on facebook. Until next time, have fun folks!

 

Great TR Keith. I felt like I was there with you as I read it. So much so that I kinda have a little hangover now...

 

Haha Bruce, mine might have come back partway through it!

 

Great TR! Very detailed and thanks for adding most important parts that some of us going have been concerned about.

 

ok a couple quick pictures from my nighttime camera...


DSCF1011 by keith_pottruff, on Flickr

My brother and "Crazy Jeff"


DSCF1014 by keith_pottruff, on Flickr

Me inspecting damage done to the dancing table for the girls at 3am. So word of warning don't dance on them. They can be broken!

 

The pleasure was all mine Steve! Scary town isn't so bad after all! Although a guy might be tempted to run into the water really quick at the end of the cruise to wash off some of the sweat collected during the day. Or are there showers at the dock?

 

Nice trip report Keith! Hope one of these days our paths will cross! Met Jim last trip in Sept and he said I have to meet ya!