Trip to Beloved Playa Mujeres in Cancun November 2017

Carrie and John Parasailing in Cancun Mexico

Our vacation from 2017 and I realized I never finished this post which I had started back in December 2017 following our vacation. So, I decided to finish it out today.

Carrie and I celebrated fifteen years of marriage on September 21, 2017. To celebrate, we booked a all-inclusive vacation to Beloved Playa Mujeres in Cancun Mexico. We had looked at a number of all-inclusive resorts before selecting Beloved Playa Mujeres. We booked our vacation for November 12 - 21, 2017 so we could be back in time for Thanksgiving break. We were in for a treat of a vacation from arriving in Mexico.

Night Before We Leave and Our Flight

Carrie and John on Plane

We flew on American Airlines. We stayed at Hilton Kansas City Airport so we would not have to rush Sunday morning to get to the airport from Topeka. It worked out great! On the drive to the hotel on Saturday, we were trying to figure out where to eat going through options we found on Google. Finally Carrie asked what about Minsky's Pizza which was within driving distance and better yet they delivered to the hotel. We had taken a cooler full of beer with us for the hotel stay the night before where we enjoyed drinking beer and eating pizza. We ate the whole thing and I finished off the beer.

After finishing pizza, beer, and dessert, Carrie proceeded to get ready for the trip with such things as painting nails. I found a movie I had wanted to watch for a while but never watched. The movie was one I remember my dad liking a lot and maybe watching a few times. I recalled to Carrie when I came across the movie that I remembered my dad telling me how good the movie was and would be one I would like too. Sure enough, I tuned into Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World (2003) and I watched it to the end. I loved it! I thought it was cool that the movie was playing and I was able to watch it before leaving on our trip. I felt a connection to dad as I know how much he liked this movie. Carrie shared with me following the movie that it was based on a series of books that I might enjoy reading... which I plan to read.

We both slept well that night and got up early Sunday, November 12, 2017 ready to catch our flight. We were able to leave our car at the Hilton Kansas City Airport for $8 a day, so that was not too bad. We took the shuttle to the Kansas City airport and had no issues with making our flight. The airport was not busy at all. Our first leg of the flight was to Dallas, Texas where we then had about an hour layover in Dallas before our connecting flight to Cancun.

Vodka Tonic on Plane

No major issues with our flights although on one of the flights Carrie's knees were up against the chair in front of us. I believe this was the first flight to Dallas as we did not pay more for emergency exit row on that first flight. We both got a beverage to drink on the plane to start our vacation. Nothing like a little vodka before noon. We are on vacation!

The second flight to Cancun, I recall the flight attendant for American Airlines talked to us a lot and was so nice! We were even talking to her as we were going off the plane. She was telling us about her travel and where she was going after leaving Cancun. It was interesting to hear her discuss her plans. I believe she said she is currently living in Dallas but of course gets to travel to all kinds of interesting locations.

Arrival and the Resort

We arrived late afternoon on Sunday, November 12, 2017. Slightly overcast when we arrived, but the weather was not bad. We knew before we left that rain was forecast for late Sunday and most of the day Monday although we thought we would catch a break and miss the rain. It was a nice evening on Sunday as we checked into our room. We spent some time unpacking and enjoying some drinks in our room before we headed out to checkout the resort. We ate the first night at Isla Grill which was very good! I had steak and it was delicious. We never did have the bananas that we heard about as that first night we were too full to get that dessert and when we tried going later in our stay, they were out of them when we ate dinner the second time at Isla Grill. The flaming bananas sounded really good though, so we missed out on those.

A few pictures are below of the view from our patio which was Hermosa 2. We really liked the location of our room and being on the ground floor. Some days we left out of the back sliding glass and did not bother locking the room. We did this when we were going to the swim up bar or spending time in the area by the pool.

I did not get many inside pictures of our room, but I think you can find those elsewhere. My favorite part of the room was the bar. When we checked into our room and they came by to check on us if we needed anything, we told them we would prefer black label Johnny Walker. We were initially told that we would have to give up two bottles from the four liquor bottles and one bottle of wine. The liquor that was in the room for us included rum, tequila, vodka, gin, and then one bottle of wine. After we left for dinner and came back, there was a bottle of black label Johnny Walker and they left the bottle we thought we were giving up... rum. Good thing because we ended up finishing off one bottle of rum during our stay and started another one. I was really enjoying the rum while on our vacation.

Another favorite of being on the ground floor in Hermosa 2 was that the ice machine was right outside of our door. The first few days I would take the ice bucket out to fill up with ice and by the end, I was taking just our glasses out to fill up with ice for our drinks. Worked out great!

More Resort and Our Activities

For most of our vacation, we spent either by the ocean or by a pool. Duh! We got up early (by 9 am) most mornings as we did not want to waste any daytime as the days were rather short. Carrie read six or seven books while we were on vacation and I read two and half which was our goal for this vacation. Not have anything planned, relax by the ocean/pool, read, and enjoy adult beverages which is exactly what we did on our vacation. Oh, we also ate well at the resort. 

Ceviche with Octopus. Yum!

The sushi bar was really good! We did not spend as much time at the sushi bar as we could have done. We basically had sushi twice while on vacation. The first night we had the ceviche. Oh my! It was really good! The ceviche had shrimp, white fish, and octopus. We were not too thrilled about eating octopus, but I think it was our favorite of the combination. Really nice job with the ceviche at the sushi bar. We had ceviche again later at another restaurant, but the first night we had it was the best. They did a really nice job with the sushi at this location. We had no complaints and ate plenty of sushi. This was one of the first places we went when arriving to the resort and then we re-visited again a few nights before we left to enjoy sushi and drinks.

Dinner at Excellence
Playa Mujeres

On Tuesday, November 14,  2017, we were able to have dinner at the neighboring Excellence Playa Mujeres that we were able to eat at for "free" because we were staying over seven nights at the sister related restore of Beloved Playa Mujeres. It was fun to go over to see the other resort which was a lot larger than where we were staying. So large in fact, we had a hard time finding the ocean after we were done eating to walk back to our hotel. Anyway, we were able to hang out at Excellence Playa Mujeres for a while to drink and then eat. So many more people at this resort, so it was fun for us to be able to see that side with more people everywhere. The staff were very nice to us when visiting the other resort. They were attentive to our needs and we had a wonderful time. We were able to walk around the resort following dinner to check out the sports bar which happened to be playing Kansas basketball against Kentucky Wildcats. It was a fun night although we got out of there late and back to our room about midnight. (This might explain why we had problems finding the ocean after leaving the resort.)

Wrap Up and Conclusion

A wonderful vacation that we cannot wait to do again.  Excellence Playa Mujeres was a wonderful place to stay. The staff and various places to eat/drink were enjoyable. It had been a long time since we had been to an all-inclusive resort and hopefully we do not wait as long to do so again in the future. We have been on three cruises and enjoy those, but there is something special about all-inclusive and drinking or eating whatever and whenever we want.

See all of our pictures from our trip by clicking on the picture to the below. A memorable experience and look forward to going again.

Picture Album from Excellence Playa Mujeres from November 2017