We just got back from our 1st vacation in a couple years and I wanted to make a quick post regarding the resort that we stayed at and the service we received. Normally when you hear an article starting off like this you immediately think that something terrible must have happened, because why else would someone else take to the internet if not to bitch about something… Well I assure you that our experience at the Aventura Spa Palace in the Riviera Maya area of Mexico was anything but terrible and I just wanted to take a minute to post about our wonderful experience.

When we first started looking at resorts in the area we only had a few stipulations; had to be all-inclusive, there needed to be a direct flight, and it had to be adults only (gf’s choice, I didn’t really mind either way at the time). We didn’t want to stay in Cancun because we’re not 18 anymore and I didn’t really want to go to Cabo and my girlfriend had just been there last year anyways, so we knew that the Riviera Maya would be a good choice, but we had no clue how to pick from the hundreds of resorts in the area. We did the normal research, trip advisor, expedia, etc, to try and find a good deal and a well  reviewed place, but it seemed like people had gripes about every place we looked at. We finally ended up going over to a travel agency in town and talking with them about what our options were and what our best bet was and it was there that we decided on the Aventura Spa Palace.

The ‘Palace’ had everything that we wanted, it was an hour south of Cancun, Adults Only, All-Inclusive and there are plenty of direct flights out of O’Hare to Cancun. The only thing we were a little worried about was the price, it was a little more expensive than some of the other places in the area. This actually wasn’t a problem though, after we discovered that the resort includes a “Passport” deal where a bunch of excursions are included in the overall price whether you go on them or not. So while we would have paid upwards of $100 per person to do the ziplining tour and the Mayan ruins at Tulum, through this resort we paid nothing extra. So that right there sealed the deal, we booked up through the travel agency and awaited our departure. (click through the jump to read the rest).

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Want To Pay Less For Air Travel?

If you’ve never heard of Shoemoney or read his blog I suggest heading over there to check it out. Actually, if you want more information about this article you’re going to have to head over there anyways. He basically blogs about how to make money on the internet, or rather, how he makes money on the internet. He talks about the different trends in making money, advertising techniques, his experiences with this stuff, and sometimes he just talks about ways he saves money or just nothing at all.

I just checked the site and found he had written this great article about how to get up to 80% off on your air travel. It’s actually really simple. His example is going from Nebraska to Minnesota. If he takes a direct flight it would cost him about $800, but if he goes from Nebraska to St Louis, with a lay over in Minnesota, the flight only costs him $165. So basically he takes the first plane to Minnesota, where he is trying to go, and never boards the plane headed to St. Louis, since he’s only adding that leg to get the discount. Head on over to his site and read the full article, it’s not long and has screenshots of everything and explain why this is like this. And check out some of his other posts, they are pretty interesting if you’re into this kind of stuff.

Source: ShoeMoney

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A Few Pictures – Roadtrip2k8

I put a few of the pictures that I took (that I had time to edit) on Facebook, but anyone can check them out here

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2085604&l=e17a1&id=48602799

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Last Days – Roadtrip2k8

So the trip is over and we are all back home.

The last few days were good, when we got to Pittsburgh we chilled in the hotel room that night trying to figure out what the hell we were going to do for an entire day in Pittsburgh before the Pirates game… We ended up going to get some food at the original pancake house, then Pat wanted to check out this Mt. Washington or something. It was basically just a cable car thing that pulled you up the side of a mountain while checking out the live Turkey’s running around the hillside. Once we got to the top, we looked around a bit and took some pictures, then went back down, it killed all of an hour at the very very most. The only other thing we could think of to do was to head to the movie theater… again. So we ended up seeing “What Happens in Vegas”, it was alright, but either way it helped kill some time before the Pirates/Brewers game.

The game was pretty good, the stadium is pretty cool, but obviously the Pirates are not that popular of a team. Grand total for paid attendance was just over 7,000 people. I’d say the stadium could hold about 42,000, it was empty.

After the game we drove straight to Cleveland and got some sleep. The next day (yesterday) we went to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum for the day. They wouldn’t get us bring our cameras in so there are no pictures, besides the 2 or 3 that Pat snuck. It was interesting although I enjoyed the Baseball Hall of Fame more. And that was it, after that we jumped in the car and started making our way back to Chicago. We got into town around 9PM last night.

Overall a great trip, personally I wouldn’t change anything about what we did… Well maybe wouldn’t have booked the NY hotel room so early, but we really had no choice, nor did we know that the game in Boston would get rained out, causing us to stay in Boston another day and have to drive straight through to New York. But all in all it was a great trip.

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Washington – Roadtrip2k8

We stopped in Philly yesterday just to get some Philly cheese steaks at Pat’s Steaks. They were decent, I don’t know if they were the best I’ve ever had, but at least I can say I’ve had a cheese steak in Philly. That was pretty much it in Philadelphia, we headed straight to Washington DC. When we got there it was about 6PM and the Nationals were playing the Philly’s at 7. We walked up to the ticket window and bought $60 tickets.

It turns out those seats were pretty good. We were 3 rows from the field, just past third base. The Nationals stadium was very cool, probably has the coolest scoreboard I’ve ever seen. But I guess that’s what you get when the stadium is brand new. So the game was good, Nationals won, then it was time to look for a hotel.

We couldn’t find anything in the city that was either not sold out or not less than $300 a night, so we ended up finding a Budget Inn, which was in ghetto. I seriously thought the car was going to get broken into while we were asleep, but everything turned out fine. We toured all of DC today, saw all the monuments, the white house, our car on the grass… Yeah, apparently we parked in a bad spot on the street and didnt see the sign that said we had to move it at 4PM, we got a parking ticket and to get our car off the busy road, they towed it up onto the grass… it was kind of odd, but whatever at least they didn’t tow it away.

So that was that, no we are in Pittsburgh, going to see the Pirates play tomorrow night, then drive to Cleveland to sleep, then wake up, check out the rock and roll hall of fame and then head home. So we will be home Thursday night at some point.

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