Friday, March 09, 2012

PV, the beginning

We flew out of Regina late on a Saturday evening in a snow storm (a rare event here in this mild winter weather we've had this year).
It was only the second time in my life that I've been on a plane; hard to believe in this day and age, huh?  We found out that we'd been upgraded to first class on this flight which was a great thrill!

We arrived at our hotel at about 5:30 a.m.  I decided that I'd better take some sunrise pictures because I would not be up to do that any other time, night hawk that I am and all.

The hotel lobby was completely open to the outdoors on either side which blew my prairie girl mind - we have triple glazed panes and screens on our windows and the hotel didn't even have walls!  The notion of being completely open to the elements is very foreign to my mindset.  The lobby itself was gorgeous.
The hotel, Friendly Vallarta, lives up to its name!  All of the employees waited on us hand and foot with unfailingly cheerful and friendly eagerness, from the beach staff to the porters and maids.  With all of the bad press that Mexico has been getting, I have to say that we found the Mexican people to be completely delightful and respectful.  We felt welcomed and safe everywhere we went.  Tourism is big business in Puerto Vallarta and many depend on it for their survival.  It is a city of over 350,000 people so I'm sure there are unscrupulous people there but we certainly didn't experience any problems apart from charming and pushy time share salesmen.  We received excellent advice from our travel agent about what to expect and what to avoid and the airline had a representative employed at the hotel to provide guidance as well.  We wouldn't hesitate to go back.

I will leave you with a pic of our view of the water aerobics class from our lunch table in the buffet restaurant (look! no screens in the windows).

3 comments:

CelticCastOn said...

The atrium looks loooovely!
The hotel we stayed at in Cuba was open to the elements too. We'd be missing a few limbs from frostbite if we were open to the elements huh!

Monika said...

It all looks lovely and nice.

Lynn said...

Beautiful!!! Congrats on the bump to first class. that happened to dh and I once and OMG it's teh only way to fly!!! Better than the very last row in steerage, I can tell you that! What a beautiful hotel.