So, you say you have an 8:15 a.m. flight to Cabo from Sacramento (SMF to SJD if you are going to Travelocity to check out the cheapest fares). It’s a relatively short, non-stop flight, not much more than three hours with a good tailwind.
After getting up sometime around 4:30 in the morning (because the airlines insist you be at the airport THREE hours 
before departure on international flights), why is it you don’t really feel that the vacation starts until almost early evening – after the flight; after standing in various lines in the airport to clear customs, including one where you get to push a button on, what is for all intent purposes, is a five foot high traffic light – green: o.k. to run the gauntlet of the first wave of time-share condo salesmen; red: you get to have someone check out what kind of kinky evening clothes you packed; after the rental car ordeal where the better-have-it-car-insurance-so-you-don’t-end-up-in-jail costs more than the car, itself; and after doing the hotel check-in and neatly un-packing your stuff ?
One entire day – poof, gone, done…it’s not that I want a drink…I NEED a drink!
If you are going to a nice beach-front hotel room for, say, three nights – which means you will be gone four full days – you only end up with only TWO days down there, fending off persistent and apparently self-replicating blanket and jewelry vendors and while wandering the streets going between Cabo Wabo and El Squid Roe cantinas, and then fending off the ubiquitous time-share condo sales people at every corner?!?
That travel day en route is less yours and more the various forms of transportation modes it takes get to the place where you are going to relax – at least when you are not being paranoid about actually eating or drinking ANYTHING without spending the whole two days you have in an uncompromising position in a small, tile-floored room with no windows.
And then there is the last day – which after mitigating the debilitating post-partying tequila affects- you get to spend trying to re-pack everything you brought with you, PLUS the very large, brightly colored ceramic dish – which you only hope isn’t covered with high octane, leaded paint and the over-sized straw hat you bought at the cantina after doing multiple shooters and just before standing on the table doing a dance reminiscent of Elaine on that one Seinfeld episode.
But, as we well know, the logistical implications of a semi-exotic vacation, while sometime daunting, are basically the cost of doing business.
My philosophy is to get a mind-set that the vacation begins the minute you leave the house.
So when you overhear the lady in 11A say “where’s the barf bag” before the plane even taxis out to the runway, you know that this is going to be yet another adventure, and isn’t that what it is all about?!?
And yes..I am down here now, and yes…it IS worth it.
Sand Dollar Adventures 
Leave a Reply