My family and I arrived in Cancun last night to attend a good friend’s wedding in Playa del Carmen. We used to live in Playa – as it’s fondly known – in 2005 when hurricane Wilma destroyed Cancun. The year my husband and I spent here has been the most magical in our lives and the friendships we made still remain strong. My husband’s sister and her family live here as well, so we’ll take any excuse to come down here and we’re always dreaming of buying property and hoping on Virgin America’s direct flight from Los Angeles at a moment’s whim to spend relaxing days in the Riviera Maya.
But today I did more than dream and enjoyed one of the things we crave Mexico for: food! In this area there’s a lot of restaurants that serve fish and seafood in so many varieties. We headed with some friends and Camila’s adored cousins to a place called Los Aguachiles in Cancún. The first thing I ordered was my chelada Ambar XX bien fría and then two lettuce tacos with fish ceviche and shrimp aguachile. The aguachile is a succulent dish from Sinaloa that’s similar to a ceviche, but with more chiles – mostly serrano.
Still wanting and craving more and not wanting the mouth-exploding experience to end, my husband and I ordered a cayo de hacha aguachile.
Y para terminar, why not a dessert of red apples covered in tamarindo con chile and dipped in chamoy? I thought it would be a bomb for me, but I actually loved the combination of sweet, tangy and spicy.
The place also had a lot of funk and a fun, Mexican kitschy vibe to it.
Oh, and when we arrived last night my in-laws had ordered a spread of tacos al pastor and gringas to get us started on quenching the cravings! Now that’s familia!
We haven’t hit the beach yet, but are heading straight to Playa del Carmen tomorrow and plan to really get on vacation mode.
Camila has been doing so well with her Spanish and is actually in a completely different attitude about speaking it here than she was the last time we visited her cousins 4 months ago. She’s definitely trying harder to have Spanish come out first and doesn’t seem intimidated by it at all. That just gives me even more of a yearning to have our little place here to escape to enjoy what we love the most in Mexico: family, food, beach and español!
¡Qué rico todo! And I’m so happy for Camila and her Spanish!! BTW, apúrense and get your little place over there, like you call it, so my family and I can enjoy the food, the beach and the español too!!!
¡Que emoción que Camila esta hablando más español! y que sabrosa comida, el aguachile es lo maximo, disfruten
These pictures made me hungry! Que rico! I love the funky designs and vibe of the places there. it’s so cool that Camila has a different attitude about the Spanish too