Bienvenido a casa, Food Lady!

Harumph. Some welcome.

This is our car, at YVR, covered in 3 feet of snow. Since all the other cars were covered in 3 feet of snow too, it was kind of difficult to locate in the parking lot.

The more observant of you may have noticed the tow truck in the background. It was there to rescue our car, which in addition to being buried under a mountain, was also stone cold dead.

Chucks and an autumn jacket were inappropriate homecoming wear, given the snowy state of our fair city. Best Place on Earth my fanny!!

THIS is the best place on earth:

The Caribbean is possibly the most beautiful place I have ever been. I didn't know water even came in that colour! It sure has our oceans beat by several bazillion miles. It's even kind of warm, if a bit wavy-crashy. A rogue wave (never turn your back on the ocean) in Tulum caused me to flash my sister's boyfriend (never wear a bikini AND turn your back on the ocean), but snorkeling in Puerto Aventuras was heavenly. The water was calm in the bay, and it was literally deserted ... it was just me, and a whole lot of extremely curious and friendly fish who swam right up and kissed my mask. Meanwhile, my mum was back at the pool downing fruity boozy things, and my stepdad was clinging in terror to the side of the fishboat that took us to the snorkeling place.

But you sort of can't blame him. On the way to the snorkeling bay, he was fishing and caught two of these:

Barracuda. With really big, sharp, pointy teeth. And they were angry. So you can see why he was reluctant to get into that same ocean!

Everywhere I went in Mexico, I befriended dogs. We went into Playa Del Carmen and wandered around, and I made friends with this little cutiepie button sugar lump that I named "MINE!!!!"

She was dirty, and super skinny, and very mangy and was obviously someone's dog as she was "protecting" their property. But she was also about 6 months old and as wiggly as an orgasmic eel and keen to make friends. I thought she would make a beautiful compadre to Wootie Boots, but my parents would not let me take her home. This was a theme throughout our entire trip: "No Food Lady, you cannot have that dog either." Harumph.

Bye bye MINE!!!! :(

When we went to Tulum, I also made some friends there. I called them Guy and Bunny. First Guy appeared at my side and strolled along the water's edge with me, and after about 20 minutes Bunny appeared out of nowhere and joined us. And we walked and walked, while I threw sticks for "my" new dogs and got lots of snuzzles, in between wrasslin' bouts.

The dogs live very differently in Mexico. There doesn't apear to be any leash laws in Tulum, so while these two fellas obviously belonged to people, they were free to wander around the beach at their leisure. I never did see their humans. They also know not to come up to the hotels along the beach.

I was thinking about how much a dog like Mr. Woo would like that sort of lifestyle (it would terrify Tweed, who can't do anything without checking with me first) but I also felt a bit sorry for the dogs there too. Even the owned dogs were dirty, and had ticks or patches of mange, and they were all skinny. And every single one of them had testicles the size of bowling balls. Apparently neutering is not a priority in Mexico.

There is a really interesting group called VIDAS ("lives") that is composed of volunteer veterinarians and staff who travel around the world administering vet care to dogs and cats in low income areas. They are very active in Cancun, Puerto Morales etc. Our fishing guide's girlfriend works with VIDAS.

I didn't see nearly as many street dogs in the Yucatan as I saw in Puerto Vallarta last time I was there, but I did see loads of cats. And every single last one of them appears to be retarded. They too are mangy and ticky, but they are also mostly cross eyed and have weird broken meows. They all look like they are drunk.

This fella was slinking around the Mayan Ruins in Tulum:

And this big bruiser was yowling at us in Akumal:

"No Food Lady, you cannot take home the cats either."

*shakes fist at cruel parents*

I saw just one border collie in Playa, and it was only an inch tall. It was herding a small flock of ducks in a creche outside someone's house:

RANDOM BARRACUDA INTERLUDE!!

One of the coolest places we went to was something called Crococun Zoo in Puerto Morales - once upon a time it was a commercial crocodile farm, where the giant lizard things were raised for their hides. But as the crocodile is now an endangered species, it has become a crocodile sanctuary, where they breed and raise crocs for re-release in safe areas.

Ummm hi! No fence between me and this mouth, btw.

Crococun offers guided tours to the public, to help sustain its conservation efforts. You get to walk in and amongst the crocodiles and even hold the little ones.

What you cannot see in this photo is the lump of poo in my stepdad's pants. HAH!

You can also hold snakes. In this photo, my stepdad looks very concerned ... not because he is holding a snake, but rather because our guide told him the snake was about to SHED. English is not Carlos' first language, so he thought the snake was about to SHIT and he was kind of worried it would shit on him.

We had the BEST guide named Frank, who was from Belize. He saw how excited I got when I saw the Xolo dogs, so he brought some up out of the pen for me to snuzzle.

And then I got loads of Xolo Snuzzle Time.

They feel really cool, cuz they have no hair. They were all warm and shizzat, and this one was super friendly and licky.

Look at that face!

And look at THIS face!

There were other super cool things to play with at Crococun as well. I got to pet and feed deer:
*dies from cuteness*

and feed monkeys.

It was the best Christmas Day EVER. So if you ever go to Puerto Morales, make sure you stop in for a tour at Crococun. You can read more about the park here. And make sure you ask for Frank as your guide, cuz he was great!

All week long at the hotel, I tried to catch one of these things, called an Agouti.

I figured Wootie would really really like one a whole lot. They look like rabbit/pig/deer/guinea pigs and they were all over the hotel grounds. But the little suckers are super fast and too hard to catch.

Mexican crows:

and toucans

and parrots. Oh my!

And now I am back with my own Canadian beasties, and we are out 'enjoying' weather that looks like this:

It's a little difficult to reconcile!

Feliz Navidad and Prospero Año Nuevo dear readers!