Xcaret, Mexico--"Day Three: Invasion of the Honkin' Big Iguanas!"

Our third day was infinitely better than the crabby day before. When we arrived at the wildlife park, we wondered if there would be much to see. The place looked desolate. I expected to see tumbleweeds rolling around at certain places. The stadium where they hold their nightly wildlife shows seemed vacant and abandoned. We saw some trails that lead to nowhere and some that lead to back areas where I assumed they pulled their trucks in for the shows. There were signs for jaguars, which we never saw. At one point, I told my husband that if it were dusk, this whole scene could really start feeling very "Blair-Witchy" to me.

So, we kept walking and finally found some interesting things, including huge turtles at an aquarium, dolphins, a crocodile, more macaws and brightly colored tropical birds, and some semi-friendly donkeys and horses. (Actually, the sign for the donkeys was pretty funny--"We are friendly and like people, but sometimes bite." (Nice, I guess we're supposed to just reach on in and take their bites as love nips? We kept our hands to ourselves, thank you!)

Big turtle saying hello at the wildlife park

We also toured through some ancient ruins. They had some at our resort too, but these were much better because you could go inside them. This one had a throne inside that my son sat on.


Ancient ruins at the park

But, even with all these wonderous sites, what will stay in my mind are the honkin' big iguanas. Folks, these things were more prevalent than roaches at a nasty side-of-the-road, $19.99 a night motel! We almost walked into several, almost put our hands on them perched motionlessly on the ruins, and generally got creeped out at how many were really sitting around us and watching at certain points in the wildlife hike. I actually like lizards and am not grossed out by them, so I was facinated, but still mildly disturbed by the sheer numbers of these things on this trip. Truly, at any point if we were to stand still and just look around us, we could probably count 4-5 at least, and that's the ones we could SEE!


Exhibit A: One of the many huge iguanas in our path


Exhibit B: A rock-hider tries to blend in


Exhibit C: They were even in the trees!

Alright, alright...enough with the iguana shots. I know! At this point on our hike, I told Ryan I wasn't taking another shot of a lizard unless we found one that was pink with purple polka dots. (I actually did take one more, that you'll see on Day 5, but I couldn't resist that one!)

After the long hike, we spent rest of the day at the pool a bit, and had a great dinner out at the resort's attempt at a Texas style steakhouse. Very delish, but not 100 percent Texan...no pecan pie or pralines on the desert buffet! But, I of course found SOMETHING I could choke down from there!

Join me tomorrow for "Day Four: Hammockers, Schlammockers!"