Hermione, Micheladas and Good Friends

Semana Santa, or Easter Week, was a delightful time here in Guanajuato. Not in small part because the Kieffer-Conleys arrived just before Easter. We spent a few days checking out Guanajuato, during which Tony got us to try the ubiquitous michelada, now our go-to drink -- its a funny combination of tomato juice, hot sauce and other stuff and beer. We hunted Easter eggs in our garden and then headed to the beach.

Once again, we relied on Jos the Travel Planner to find us a great spot and he did! We went to a small hotel, really just a cluster of six houses, that is set on 3000 preserved acres. So we were in a true paradise. The beach is part of Costa Allegre, a wilder, less-traveled "happy coast" and sits between Manzanillo and Puerta Vallarta.

On the first day Nanne, being the only girl there, started staring at a pair of teenage girls who were there. After 20 minutes of being stared at, they headed off to their house and I apologized to one of them because "my daughter loves to stare at teenagers." She smiled and said no problem. Then Nanne turned to me and said, insistently, "That's Hermione." Huh? I didn't know who she was talking about but she took off at a run to ask the poor girl. "Oh no, I'm not," she said in a British accent, "but I get that a lot." Well, it didn't take long for Nanne and the rest of us to figure out the truth: she really was Hermione! The kids gave her a code name of Zak. Because there was no one else staying there, we got some quality time with H (or E) and she is truly lovely. Alas, on our last day when I asked if I could take a picture of her and her friend with the kids, they said no. So you'll just have to believe us that she was there!

But that was only a small part of our fun: swimming, tennis, walking the beach, eating amazing food, and just relaxing. Heaven.

We celebrated KK's birthday in Mexican style (although Nanne and Thorne got to do the mordita) and the kids even got to have a meal alone in the restaurant. They seemed to relish each others company which was such fun for all of us.

We said goodbye at the airport in Puerta Vallarta and the four of us headed off on a long drive back home. We decided to take the mountain route and were blown away by the beauty of this part of Mexico. We think of the beautiful beaches here, but the mountains are just as spectacular. We spent a night at a surreal "spa" set in the mountains. We took a horseback ride there and had some amazing food -- we were definitely the only gringos to be found. Not exactly rustic, more like a manicured acre in the middle of nowhere (most people arrived by helicopter), but quite an experience.
When we arrived home both Nanne and Price said, "Its so great to be home!" This was so different than our return from the beach in November when Nanne cried and said that she wanted to go HOME, and home is Boston. So we've come a long way settling in here.