Cabo remembered Oct 20-27, 2012

I can’t believe we haven’t been to Cabo San Lucas Mexico to vacation until now.  Being only a 3 hour direct flight from SFO, we had a blast this past week and are several shades darker  – came back just in time to see the Giants sweeps the Tigers to win the World Series.  Yeepy!!!

We definitely plan to go back.  This has been our first vacation in almost two years – a reward to ourselves for having Alexis – we did miss her a lot in the last few days.

Here are the highlights:

• Our hotel, Pueblo Bonito Los Cabos is in a great location – we had an ocean view suite – got an upgrade J.  It’s right on Medano Beach where all the water activities are and 5 min walk to Mango Deck – famous for their day time contest – We saw the push up contest on our first day there.  Stay tuned for our detailed hotel review in the next post with more videos :-)
• All inclusive deal was perfect  - no need to worry about where to eat.  We ate about 5 meals a day (definitely got our money’s worth). There are 5 restaurants as we had use of both hotels, ours and the one next door – Pueblo Bonito Rose. + pool grill & bar where they delivered food and drinks to our cabana or lounge chairs.  Imagine mango smoothies and shrimp cocktails by the pool and tuna serrantino sashimi by the sushi bar.  Yum!  We loved having lunch at Cilantro - it's got a great view of the beach.
• Beach massage - $32 an hour.   5 min walk from our hotel, we found a great little massage spot.  It’s upstairs but outdoors so we can hear the waves while we got our massage.  Only $40 with tip for an hour!  It was divine.  The massage in the hotel is priced at $130 a hour in comparison.
• Cabo Wabo – it’s happening every night in downtown with a live band that starts at 10:30pm.  We were there for 4 nights.  All with different people so it was fun.  The only thing was the crowd is on the older side.  But I enjoyed dancing on the raised platforms with some new found friends. 
• Winning contests:  I won the sexy dance contest the first night we were there.  Didn’t realize what I signed up for and ended up performing a little in front of 100 people and won first prize.  The prizes were lame but it was really fun and people started saying hi to us every day after that.  Jaime and I entered the ping pong contest a few days later and he won us a beach bag (which we forgot to pick up) oh well.  All in all, fun stuff
• Running with the Mexicans:  First night, we were tired so turned in early and I ended up getting up at 6:30 in the morning and decided to go for a run around 7:15am.  Well as it turns out, there is a local marathon going on that day as well.  So the main street was blocked off for the runners.  I ended up running with them for about  30 min.  It was so fun.  Will upload the video later to show you a clip.  I actually dropped my hotel keys without realizing it on the way there but luckily it was by the police station.  When I passed them again, they were all lined up on the street and waved at me to give me the key.  They were so nice!
• Sunset Cruise on Cabo Escape: I heard this was a party boat, but I had no idea how fun it would be.  It was an 2 hour cruise around the arch and lovers beach from 6-8pm with all you can drink and fajita dinner ($35 a person – I bargained this deal of course).  We took a water taxi to the marina which was beautiful and the boat crew welcomed all the guest first with a dance – so cute and fun and then it was non-stop music, booze, and fun. We had dances to learn (will upload a video), macho man contest, tequila shots which was not bad.  The upstairs was laid out like a club with large white couches all around narrow tables.  We got there early so got ourselves a great spot upstairs.  We also took fun pictures before the sun went down by lovers beach (see photos and video here - a little drunk dancing haha)
• Alyssa and the Gang:  One of the other guests at the hotel stopped us on our second day to comment on my dancing in the contest the night before.  She started calling me “salsa” since I did a little salsa during the contest. We found out she and her husband Jeff and a group of friends are also there until Sat.  They are actually from San Jose.  We spent quite a few nights with them for dinners, drinks and dancing.  Alyssa and Jeff Thomas, Derek and Josey, Matt and Pam Burke (Matt works in Wholesale at Wells – small world), then there are a few singles – John (who led the Kindle development at Amazon), Amy (works in sponsorship at Visa and knows Ajantha – small world) and Rob (the only really eclectic one we didn’t get along with).  We exchanged info so hopefully will see them again in the bay area.
• The pool at the Pueblo Bonito Rose – We spent most days at the larger pool next door.  It had more young people and fun activities.  Two days, we were early enough to get the cabana which had curtains to block out the sun if needed.  I was pleasantly surprised there was no extra charge for it.   I did pool aerobic at noon for 3 days.  It was a good arms work out surprisingly to fun music.  They also had modified pool volleyball and other contests through the afternoon. I took a video of one of them.  See uploads later.
• Seeing Carlos and Oscar & wifes in Cabo -  Carlos and Oscar are good friends of Jaime from Judo and he found out on facebook that they were also in Cabo when we were so we met up with them at Cabo Wabo our last night there.  Oscar and Sarah are celebrating their 10 year anniversary. 
• Late night local tacos joint - For two nights, we stopped by the late night tacos joint by the clubs and had our street tacos for $1.50 each.  It was greasy and good J
• Gorgeous weather – 88 degrees every day and  75-78 at night.  No rain at all.  We lucked out as it poured for 2 days the week before
• Water taxi tour - 30 min around the arch and lover beach and then dropped off at the Marina for some shopping
 

we also saw sealions on our way to the marina.
• No cover charge -  to any night life spots. 
• Got a nice tan and lost 0.5 lbs - bonus!

A few low-lights

• 24 hour stomach issue – I think I ate too much and then spent a little long in the sun as I had a stomach ache for 24 hours on my 3^rd day there.  Jaime had it for about 8 hours.  Good thing it passed but it was a little uncomfortable
• Tipping is necessary – even though our all-inclusive include tips and taxes, we noticed the service difference when we tip and when we don’t.  We decided to tip pretty regularly to get better service.  For $50 more for a week at $2-$5 at a time, it was no big deal.  It just means the hassle of bringing money with us.
• Mosquitoes – Cabo is more in the dessert and usually don’t have mosquitoes – but this year it rained about 45 days out of the year instead of the usual 9-10 days, so lots of bugs and their bites leave big red bumps.  I got about 10 of them and Jaime, poor honey, got lots the last night we were there.    Hydrocortisone helped a bit but we are hoping there will be less mosquitoes next time
• Limited hip hop clubs – Cabo is famous for its night life, but we couldn’t find any clubs that played hip hop for long.  Lots more plays the mind numbing techno music (music for white people who can’t dance).  That was a bummer as we would have like to dance more.  Friday and Sat nights seems better.  We expected more out of El Squid Roe but it was not that fun and music sucked. 

Other tips to remember:

• No real need for Peso at all.  US cash works fine.  Good to have lot of 1s for tips and taxies and bargain shopping.  Every where takes US cash and credit cards although most CC charges 3% for international charge.  C’est la vie.
• All prices in Cabo are high but you can negotiate it down and don’t use the service at the hotel.  Just walk down 5 min down the beach and prices will come down.  Some prices

o   Massage - $32 an hour

o   Sunset Fajita cruise - $35 a person

o   Water taxi tour to lovers beach and arch - $10 a person

o   Wave runner - $30 for 30 min (will try this next time)

o   Parasailing - $25 a person (may try this next time)

o   Water Skiing - $120? an hour (may try this next time)

o   Taxi to downtown from our hotel - $6 one way

o   Private Taxi to and from Airport - $126 + tip round trip for 2 people (may take up to 5 people)  by Cielito Lindo – cielitolindo2007@gmail.com   We paid by paypal in advance and tipped in cash.  One of the cheaper ones we found and they provide water and beer on the way.

o   7 days flight, hotel, all inclusive from SFO to PB Los Cabos hotel - $2715. J

•   Best nights to go out on the town are Friday and Sat with maybe Thursday and Sundays.   The other nights are less lively.  Day time entertainment are more water activities or drinking by the beach at the Office or Mango Deck where they have contests in the afternoon times
• Added $20 to my Verizon plan in order to call from and in Mexico.  Made things easier to talk to the kids, for Jaime to call work and for us to get in touch with each other. 
• Stay in Cabo San Lucas if you want to walk to everything.  San Jose Los Cabos is far from downtown Cabo and can have serious traffic.  For example, a friend was staying at Westin and got stuck in traffic for an hour and half to downtown. Ugh. 
•  Another place to stay at is Riu Palace – big all inclusive a little further from downtown but about $600 cheaper for the week.

 Lei