After spending Christmas in Puerto Morelos this year, just up the beach from the Pearl, and walking past Pearl daily to get to town, the possibility of a visit became a regular subject for discussion in the Brit/Texan household.. Mostly from Mr Brit/Texan who’s been trying, rather in vain, to get me naked on a beach for some time! When that trip turned out to be not the vacation we’d hoped for, we decided to take the plunge (me), and booked our trip… then began the nerves (again, Mr B/T would be sure to remind you… it was me, Mrs, that had nerves!!) Reading the forums provided both fuel and relief from the nerves, but mostly relief as I began to realize that we could be who we are and not concern ourselves too much with others’ expectations… more on that later;)
OK.. details:
Day 1 & arrangements:
We booked through the excellent Wicked Travel (Sunset Travel) under the kind encouragement of Deb, their CO specialist. Included were transfers with Olympus travel and upon arrival at Cancun airport, the efficient Olympus looked after us splendidly, with cold water and cool towels while we waited for a few moments for our supposedly shared transfer to be ready. I say “supposedly shared” because for both trips we were the only passengers and the drivers were the soul of courtesy and welcome, even down to ensuring we were comfortable with how our bags were handled! Great Service!
Upon arrival at Pearl, with our (ok my) trepidation in full force, we were greeted by our bellman for the trip, Luis, who spirited away our bags and introduced us to Axel, the irrepressible welcomer at the front desk. Axel, who, upon hearing that this was our first time, immediately plied us with champagne while loudly exclaiming that we were virgins to anyone within earshot!! Talk about shedding your shyness early!
But seriously, the light-hearted joking and gentle teasing totally helped us to laugh off our nerves and feel very welcomed right from our first “Welcome home!”Fortunately, we had arrived late enough that our room was ready, although we were prepared for a quick change in the spa with the convenience of a locker, we were glad to have our room to go to and take a breath, unpack and pop our heads out onto the balcony to get the lay of the land.. did I mention this was our first CO vacation? Having extensively read the forums we had a pretty clear idea of our plan and after a quick, delicious, late buffet lunch in Aphrodite, we headed to the beach to find Jared and ask for his help to find a beach bed. After explaining to us that the beds were reserved for penthouse guests / premier members, he set us a bed for us with fresh towels since it had been vacated by it’s guests when they headed to the fun side of the pool for the remainder of the day.
I, Mrs B/T, had imagined I would have a lot of trouble getting nude.. but acting on the advice of many forum posters, I didn’t even take a bikini down to the beach, and ‘ripped that band-aid off quickly’… and no-one stared, despite my Day-Glo white “bikini” marks… and then Fabiola arrived with a mojito, and then another, and comfort set in!
I had had a lot of fun shopping for evening wear, mostly at Bebe, and dressing up for dinner was fun, especially with my hubby looking fine in new duds for the occasion too. We opted for Pearl every evening, for the sense of occasion, the change of scene and the people watching
It was wonderful how happy in their own skin all the guests were. It made such an impact on me, especially. I felt great, confident and sexy in a dress I wouldn't have been able to wear at home and never felt like I was under/over dressed once. I had thought I would participate in the costume / theme nights and had done some shopping to provide for this eventuality… but it just wasn’t in my comfort zone, that first night.. or as it turned out, any other. The costume parade as people gathered for the disco, however, was great fun, as the most surprising people turned out to be the boldest, bravest and most confident. As I mentioned before, their confidence in their own skin was inspiring for me.. perhaps inspiring enough for me to dress up next visit? Who knows? After some other reviews we hadn’t expected superlative food, and so were very pleasantly surprised by the dinner at Pearl. The expert guidance of Edgar was much appreciated and our meals were beautifully presented, and very very well cooked.. the beef (every time we had beef) was cooked to perfection! The one disappointment was the included wine.. it was basically undrinkable… not good enough. There’s really no excuse for bad red wine, when you can buy bottles or even boxes of perfectly drinkable wine at Costco just up the road in Cancun for the same price as in the USA. Both red wines were revolting, and I have a very broad palette. In the end we stuck with Vodka and Tonic and sparkling wine and were happy, but that is my only negative thing to say. Even in that one little thing, Edgar was superlative, whisking away my undrunk red and replacing it instantly with sparkling wine.
After dinner we sat out in the lobby bar with a whisky and listened to the band… here we come to my one regret of the trip.. that we didn’t dance to the band. They were excellent! Our first night was a Friday so it was 80’s music and the band were brilliant! I wish we’d been braver and just got up there and boogied, but we were newbies and didn’t have our feet under us yet and hubby had a crashing headache…
When the disco and show opened we headed back to our room and crashed.. it had a been a long, slightly over-stimulated day and rest was needed!
Day 2:
We left our blackout drapes open on purpose and consequently woke up pretty early with the sunrise. I slipped out while Mr B/T was still sleeping and went to see if I could figure out the pool / beach bed system.. Victor kindly showed me how it worked and explained that although the beach beds were officially reserved for Premier members (more on that later), he said that most prefer the active end of the pool and that he’d gladly make up a bed for us on the beach and mark it with a USA today for me. He wrote our room number on his chart/map and made the bed up for us… and I went off in search of coffee, which i found in the lobby bar. After an excellent latte and one to-go for the Mr, I headed back to the room and we hung out on our balcony overlooking the quiet middle of the pool and the beach. I suppose the neon/70’s night at the disco was pretty rocking as the morning was pretty quiet and we had Aphrodite to ourselves for breakfast as well.
With the wonderful Fabiola in attendance and brief sojourn to Aphrodite for lunch this is how our day went; Lie on Beach Bed, Read Book, Apply Sunscreen, Drink Mojito, Repeat! Now, at this point, veterans are shouting loudly.. Foam Party, tell us about the Foam Party! Underwhelming… that is the word I’ll use. I’ll admit that we were a) not wasted, b)not interested in bumping into other people’s naked bodies, and c) not college kids at heart… and none of this is to diminish those who enjoyed it, it just wasn’t our scene, it was soapy, a little claustrophobic and a bit strange - for us… and then we returned to our beach bed and reprised the non-activity of earlier in the day. Mr B/T reminds me that one of the major factors in our non-enjoyment was the appearance of a group of “Girls Gone Wild / Spring Break” types who were obviously given day-passes from Temptation to liven up the place or some such nonsense. For me, they rather spoiled the foam party… Pearl has it’s wild moments but this group were obnoxious and loud and didn’t fit the culture.
Saturday evening was a reprise of Friday.. another great dress (Mrs), great dinner at Pearl and reticence where there should have been bravery.. (Side Note: Salsa lessons greatly needed!) The crowd changed quite a lot from Friday to Saturday and they upped the ante on the costumes quite significantly… there was one truly outstanding contribution and admiration on all fronts was forthcoming! At this point, I should mention the entertainment staff, Marco, Amy and the others whose names elude me, were outstanding and great dancers.
Sitting on the sidelines is not normally a part of my DNA, but I did feel a little like a fish out of water in the evening scene. It wasn’t clear to me what the rules were… (Yes i know, no means no - but honestly, I wasn’t really even up for being in a position where I had to say no), or how to make friends (without benefits). It was all a bit overwhelming that second night and I retreated to our room wondering if we fitted in here at all…. at this point Mr B/T reminds me that we don’t have to fit in, we just get to be ourselves…hmmm working on my issues a little perhaps?
Day 3:
Sunday started much the same as Saturday - coffee, chat with Javier at the pool about beach beds, breakfast etc.. by this point we have the daytime scene down and feel very comfortable. The thing I thought would be the hardest, walking around in my altogether, turned out to be easy. Everyone is naked, of all shapes and sizes, fit and not-so-fit, young and not-so-young, but confident in their skin. However, the feeling of insecurity, of not knowing the rules of social engagement plagued me somewhat on Sunday, and, combined with a fear of missing out, marred the idyll a little for the day. After a few more mojitos and a (slightly exhibitionist - in my head at least) wander out onto the pier, and a reminder from Mr B/T that we can just be ourselves and don’t have to feel like we are missing out if we don’t do costumes and discos… my confidence gradually returned and another fun (ridiculously tight) dinner outfit was donned and we headed to Pearl.
Now, at this point, I should mention that since we hadn’t really met anyone, we had given a few of our fellow guests nicknames to pass the time and make the people watching more interesting and less “ooh, look over there, no not there, on your six o clock, now your five o clock…” We admired Mr & Mrs Benedict Cumberbatch, wish we’d made friends with Bill & Melinda, and Ally McBeal and Mr McBeal, enjoyed the transformation of CJ Craig and Guy-who-dressed-like-my-dad, not to mention Coach Underarmor and Mrs Coach. We would have really like to get to know you, but didn’t, and to a certain extent still don’t, know how to make a connection without sending the wrong signals. I think, for us, this is where traveling with a group may make it easier, having others who know your boundaries and are content with that, would at least have given us context and Mr B/T a break from an extraordinarily extroverted Mrs B/T.
Since Sunday night’s “live band” turned out to be a screen playing concerts and then potentially karaoke - something I consider to be life-threatening - we headed back to our room after dinner. On the way back, we popped our heads around the corner of the jacuzzi to find it deserted - one of the perks of an early dinner - and after leaving our dinner clothes in our room headed down for a little private jacuzzi time…very fun and lovely to have it all to ourselves!
Day 4:
Monday was a great day, the routine continued with coffee, quick chat with Javier /Jared at the pool to secure a beach bed, breakfast with attentive service from Jose Luis who after two days had learned our preferences and brought the salsa, juices, coffees we like without being asked. The beach bed was a haven of sun, the sound of surf and the ever present Fabiola bearing mojitos or cokes or whatever our little brains could conceive of. We walked on the beach, trying not to upset the walkers too much.. though sometimes we looked them in the eye when they were gawking, which put an end to that pretty quickly… wandered down to the pier for a spell, swam in the sea and even played a game of volleyball (Mrs)… the confidence level was much improved and relaxation was at a maximum.
After another superlative dinner at the Pearl attended by the wonderful Edgar we took our coffee out to the lobby and even got up and danced to the band, who were, once again, brilliant. The theme was anything but clothes and some of the costumes were absolutely hysterical… some truly inventive uses of belts, balloons and Froot Loops, including an honorable mention for Charlie’s box costume! A truly fun evening only slightly marred by the fact that just as we finally felt at home, we had to leave the next day.
Day 5:
We made the most of our late flight and did our best to make the most of the whole day. Top tip - the spa lockers are available for use after checkout and our bellhop even kept our traveling clothes hanging up for us until we needed to get dressed. Oh, the sadness of having to put on real clothes… and the sunburn (ouch!) … We enjoyed the pool and pool bar on our last day, swam off the pier, got pushed in the pool (Mrs by Mr B/T) much to the amusement of our fellow guests, and headed back to the real world vowing to come back as soon as we could.
Overall, we thoroughly enjoyed our vacation. We surprised ourselves with how much, Mr B/T was thoroughly surprised how much I enjoyed the CO aspect, as was I. This trip was great for us as a couple, the intimacy of five days at Pearl revealed a great deal of love in our marriage and stoked the flames, which after 13 years married might have grown somewhat dim.
We will definitely be back, and hope to be a little braver in getting to know people next time.
without sending a message we didn't intend to send. 
