Day 3 – Villahermosa / Palenque, Mexico – June 10th

This morning, Mike was so excited to go down to breakfast to have more of the pork in red sauce, but they were serving different items today, so they didn’t have any. Mike was so disappointed that he just ate some fruit and a roll and said he was done. I thought everything else was still delicious. We boarded onto the buses and went to the airport to fly to Villahermosa. It was about an hour flight. As soon as we got off the plane, you could feel the difference in climate. It was hot and humid. Mexico City was nice, probably mid 80’s. Here it is mid 90’s and very humid. We were sweating the rest of the day…and I don’t sweat! Our first top from the airport was an outdoor museum called La Venta. It is all about the Olmec civilization, which is the oldest civilization in the Americas. They may be the Jaredites referred to in the Book of Mormon. There are many correlations between them. The park had many of the large stone heads, statues, stela and altars, even an original sepulcher. There were also jaguars and monkeys and crocodiles and turtles. The walkways are all paths in the jungle, so it was very fun. We then had a 2 ½ hour drive to Palenque. Palenque is in the state of Chiapas, Mexico. And the ruins of Palenque are found in the hills nearby. We will visit those tomorrow. The hotel we are staying is the coolest place ever! This is the jungle and we are staying in little bungalows surrounded by jungle, with little pathways and bridges and flowers and butterflies and lizards and monkeys in the trees. I love this place. We had a nice verandah with rocking chairs. We did, however, accidentally lock ourselves out of our cute little house when we went out to the verandah. Mike closed the door behind us, so the cool air from the AC wouldn’t all just go outside. The door locked behind us. It took about 20 minutes for someone to come let us back in. Dinner was a buffet here at the hotel, since we are in the middle of nowhere. There are no restaurants we can walk to. They had a creamy zucchini soup that was delicious, and some fajita style beef with onions and peppers. Those were my 2 favorites. Mike loved the fish. John Lund gave a short fireside tonight after dinner. His main theme was “show love to your loved ones, and take your frustrations to the Lord”. He challenged us not to criticize anyone. He also talked about the 5 principles of intervention, being: 1) soften hearts 2) raise someone up 3) strengthen 4) exodus 5) remove the problem. It was very good. I love listening to him. He is an encyclopedia of knowledge. He must have a photographic memory, because he can remember everything he reads and reference them as he is speaking. We introduced ourselves to each other on the bus while driving here, and people were shocked Mike is my son. Some thought we were brother/sister. Several thought we were married. Once even thought we were a newlywed couple! That was odd.