Falcon Photography

Ahoy Mates! We have seen Mexican wrestling to pirates of the Caribbean, or in Español, it’s pirata. For our final evening in Cancun, the group event was a voyage on the Captain Hook Pirate Dinner Cruise. It was an evening of fun, food, entertainment, and ARGH! some good old pirate sword fighting. Our ship, the El Galleon battled the El Bucancero for bragging rights and a share in the bounty we captured… What, you say? Belay! You scurvy scallywag! You’ll have to wait and read who won the fight.

OK, where was I? Oh yeah, so they persuade you with grog and grub, then make you participate in sea shanteys and group dances. Aye! Never you see such a crowd… like sheep to the slaughter, filthy land lubbers shakin’ their booty to the music or was it the waves from the ocean? It could have been the margaritas too? Either way, I present to you evidence of the crimes at sea committed by the filthy lot and only I survived to show you the evidence. So hoist the main sail and let’s get to the pics!

Here’s our ship, the El Galleon, the mighty warrior!

Some of the land lubbers getting on board. Preparing to commit unspeakable crimes.

I told you there was some strange sing-a-longs and group dances. Grog will do this every time!

Aye! The Captain and his men performing some swashbuckling sword fighting.

Ah, this one, definitely a group dance!

Our ships finally meet and the fight begins. We are trying to rescue our captain’s wife from the El Bucancero.

Johnny Depp wannabe. Teaching the latest pirate line dance, of course.

The crowd roars for more! Actually, just the group giving me a AYE AYE! We had a great time on the ship. Why a great time you ask? ‘Cause we won, Mate. We kicked the other ship’s “booty!” So now you have yer answer. Bother me no more, scallywag!

OK, you now have the evidence of the land lubbers committing these unspeakable crimes on the high sea. I say we make ‘em WALK THE PLANK, never to ride upon the waves in Cancun again.

Oh, and if yer interested, here’s the other evidence of the crazy things that happened on our evening voyage. Good thing I hid my treasure before they boarded. ARGH!

Let no one say that I am uncultured. Yep, when in Rome, or in this case, Mexico, one must embrace the culture and experience what it means to be a luchador. After trekking to Playa del Carmen, we walked to our restaurant for lunch. Nothing like working up the appetite. It was a great open air restaurant where we sat on the second floor and had a nice view of the street and other establishments who were hawking their tourist trap souvenirs to unsuspecting travelers. Are you suspecting a story here? Wait for it…

So after eating a great lunch and enjoying a national frozen beverage (maybe two), we happened to notice that right-across-the-street was a rack of Mexican wrestling masks… well, the discussion went from “Huh, look at that, there’s a Spider-Man mask” to “Hey did you see that movie Nacho Libre?” to “Hey, if I buy one, will you?” Well, one thing led to another and a pact was formed. Below are pictures of the Lucha Libre Clan and our super hero names we gave ourselves. Because as I said earlier, when in Mexico, buy a Mexican wrestling mask!

Shopping for the mask.

“El Gato Peligrosas”

“El Conquistador Verde”

A deal is made. Five masks are bought. And the agreement in the Clan is to walk down the street in the mask, all the way back to the bus!

“El Falcon Negro”

The only thing worse than actually walking down a public street in a mask is shopping in a mask. But it was for tequila, so we blended in perfectly. By the way, sampling is allowed. We NEEDED lots of samples. We came, we drank, we purchased!

We made it all the way back to the bus with our masks. I don’t know about dignity but hey, we may never be there again so it was all good! Not sure but the masks may see another outing…

So did you know that they have Iguanas in Mexico? Lots of ‘em? So our tour of Tulum was interesting but for me too short. I wanted time to roam around and get some nice pictures. Bonk! Thanks for playing… after our tour guide gave us the quick history, we had about 15-20 minutes to wander before we had to load back up on the bus to get to our lunch reservation in Playa Del Carmen. Ouch! A few photos from Tulum.

Yeah, I felt rushed and I wanted more time but I understand that getting that many people from point A to B to C is work. It just seemed as though we barely got to know the city. We did have Iguana territory fighting as our entertainment. Yep, we happened to be there during the upcoming mating season where the male Iguanas stake claim for territory and fight it out for real estate. If an Iguana babe crosses his land, she must pay the toll.

Check out the winner of a fight that happened right in front of us while learning about the history. Notice the blood on the winner. The loser had to sulk away. No girlfriend for you this season!

Tulum happens to be the highest elevation, actually having cliffs, which historically gave this area a natural benefit of protection from attackers. This was the view from the cliffs.

OK, people, back on the bus!

Ugh! Did I hear right, I asked? 8:30am we have to be in the hotel lobby? This was the conversation last night as confirmed plans for a group excursion were discussed at our end of day meeting. It went… “have fun tonight but remember, 8:30am tomorrow in the lobby for the trip to Tulum to visit the Mayan Ruins.

And yes, we had plans on having a Friday night of “cocktails” to celebrate a hard week of meetings and discussions. Anyway, all but one soul made it aboard the Tulum Express. I don’t think everyone was alive, but they made it aboard. See evidence of that here…

As the tour guide provided those that were coherent enough to hear the history of Cancun, Playa Del Carmen, and Tulum, there were a few that were recuperating from an evening out at Señor Frog’s. I wonder who remembers the history lesson that was taught on the bus? Hmmm, is there a test at the end of the tour?

So here’s few shots of my colleagues that I captured yesterday at sunset. Really spontaneous as I had to convince them that I wasn’t going to bribe them later with the photos I took. Thank you ladies.

Carolina

Rose & Carolina

Sherry

I did say that we were here for work. And I meant it. We are here to discuss and decide how the software we use at work will run in the South American countries where we do business. We have people here from the business that will tell us more of how they do their business today and then we will discuss how they will do business in the future once the software is configured and set up.

My boss asked me to take a group photo of everyone, the project team. Here is the team.

Since the project is a South American project, soccer, er, fútbol is the sport down there so we had fútbol shirts made with our project name, etc., printed on it. Go team! Notice the soccer ball. After the pictures were taken, it was necessary to play fútbol on the beach. A few pictures of the guys huffing and puffing through a match.

OK, I’m tired watching the game… or is it that my beer can is empty? Una mas, por favor.