Ixtapa: Monday

We set the alarm earlier in order to catch up some time, and made it to breakfast before they closed it down. Huge chunks of bacon, as well as cereal, fruit, etc. It would be very easy to put on a lot of weight here. Today it is slightly cooler: high-level haze, with a moderate breeze. Welcome relief!

During breakfast Heidi's back spasmed, undoubtedly due to two nights on the rock-hard beds they feature here. She went back to the room for some relief while I took Tasha to the kids club. Unfortunately, Tasha balked at going to the club with about a dozen different excuses, so it was back to the room to rethink our plan for the day.

Tasha and Heidi decided they wanted to get their hair done in braids. There was a long line and it takes a long time per person, so we were in for a fair wait. I decided that I didn't want to get my hair braided (heh), so I took a taxi ride into Ixtapa to scout out some more powerful painkillers for Heidi's back.



The taxi dropped me at a little mall, and I wandered around for a while noticing all the signs trying to lure American tourists in: "Hamburger here!", etc.


Mexico is notorious/famous for their liberal dispensation of powerful medication without a prescription, and I was assured that I could obtain something like Percocet without trouble. The first farmacia I tried either didn't have it or didn't want to give it to me, instead directing me to another one a block further up. This farmacia was in the back of a tourist-trinket shop, and the lady looked on the shelves to see what they had. After a short game of charades, she presented me with a medication called Somalgesic^TM. I didn't recognize any of the active ingredients (Carisoprodol, Naproxeno), but the magical phrase Su venta requiere receta médica on the side spoke of the medicine's power.

Back at the resort, I checked online to see what I'd scored. I was mildly surprised to see Google.com come up in Spanish, but was quickly able to find out exactly what Somalgesic is: a combination of a muscle relaxant and a powerful anti-inflammatory... as it turns out, medicine we already had in our arsenal.

Tasha's and Heidi's hair weaves were now finished:

...not bad for 40 bucks! The only problem is that a criss-cross pattern of Tasha's pale scalp is now exposed, pushing my paranoia about keeping her out of the sun into the stratosphere. A quick trip to the boutique secured a spray-on sunscreen that I'm sure she'll be sick of by the end of the trip.

Around this time my back started to get stiff too, so we took it easy for the rest of the night. Tasha and I went for a swim in the pool, and we then went to dinner. Tonight, it was a French theme: onion soup, roast lamb, battered frog's legs... plus a whole pastry shop full of pies and cakes, including Baked Alaska.

Tasha was spending the night with the Lynch's, so we dropped her off there and both took some muscle relaxants for the tortuous night's sleep.