A good old friend of mine, Kel Griffith is touring around Europe. She's started a Tumblr blog to photo document the trip titled, Euro Trolls.
On top of being one of my favourite people, Kel is a real class act. If I still had the photo of her face down, blacked out in a backyard I would have posted that. You're going to have to settle for these instead.
Update: I don't need to dig up the old photo of Kel passed out in the yard, I have this new one of a power nap at 5am in San Sebastian...
This week we picked the spot where our I Dos and How Do You Dos will happen when our friends come visit the beach, staring at us while we kiss in public.
Tulum is a pretty special place and happens to be sitting in a good period of its history right now. The main hotel and dining strip are right on the beach. The area is developed just enough to enjoy some fine restaurants with quality cocktails, but not enough to bother you with the tourist traps of the north (Cough, Cancun, Fuck). If you want to have high quality food and great company at night while still enjoying quiet beaches during the afternoons, Tulum will be your Huckleberry.
While we're not having our wedding at Hartwood, through a few back-to-back trips recently we've been stopping off there for drinks or food. Both are damned good and mandatory to be sampled if you hit the region. I soberly, drunkenly, wholeheartedly think their signature drink, "The Hartwood" might be the finest cocktail I've ever had. Sure, I'm only a cocktail expert in the way that I've spent too much time with them on the seated side of the bar, but so what? "The Hartwood" is that kind of drink you don't need a break from while running a marathon. You can stick with it from beginning to end.
The owners, Eric Werner and his wife Mya Henry relocated from New York a few years back and went to work creating a restaurant where every detail seems so casually appropriate, yet painstakingly planned. I'm probably over thinking it, but they definitely had a vision and it worked out pretty damned well. They have been featured in The New York Times, Bon Appetit and a bunch of other lowlife blogs like this one.
Photos by The Selby
Now that we've got our location, wedding spot, hotel and a few other major details worked out... it's time to start sampling the food and booze around Tulum.
We moved to an unfamiliar place. We didn’t know the people, we didn’t know the streets or the landscape. In less than three weeks, we feel totally acclimatized and at home. Now I’m going to tell you how you can too!
Within the first week, you’re going to want to pretty much be a complete write-off. Aside from being the first thing you’ll want to do when you hit the beach, there is a psychology to it. Drunks move around from spot to spot more frequently and are far more talkative. It’s like hiring a more inquisitive, motivated version of yourself. All you have to pay them is liquor while you sit back and enjoy your new surroundings.
“If you’re one of those ranting, slurring, fall out of your chair drunks: skip the move all together and stay where you belong. You’re going to get eaten alive.”
Your new drunk employee will attempt to meet more bartenders and local patrons of the holes you’re going to crawl into. BFFT. Best Friends For Tonight! After relaxing for a week (or two, depending on your dedication to research) while your other-self does all the work is when the magic of the human mind starts to happen.
When you come to, you will know the lay of the land and have the beginnings of a small circle of friends. It will feel almost as though you have lived here in another life… because you have. Your drunk life last week. After your first cloudy walk around town, your brain will start filling in all the pieces, and your path to dropping, “I’m a local” to anyone and everyone that will listen has now begun.
This is the most crucial step of all: Taper the binging off immediately if you plan to actually survive.
Don’t take taxis. We all know what passenger syndrome is. As a passenger, you rarely remember directions to your best friend’s house, let alone explaining the way home to a cabbie through a whisky-thick language barrier. Any distance a taxi can take you is too far, anyhow. Learn your location in a gradually growing radius. First get to know where you’ll be the most.
Do they have rickshaws where you’re moving? Even better. Now you’re not physically doing anything, but you’re travelling slow enough to take in the streets. You’re also helping the lowest end of the local economy. Oh the places you’ll go! (Or won’t go, see below.)
You didn’t move to another country to hang out with more alcoholic Canadians, Americans, or whatever. Hit up the local spots.
“But how will I know if it’s a local spot?” you ask.
It doesn’t take math or science to know that everyone is staring at you and your plaid board shorts as you walk into a bar. I told you not to buy plaid shorts. What’s better, if it feels like they’re all making fun of you, it’s not just a hunch, they are. Suck it up. You’re pale as all hell, wearing a funny hat, Oakleys and you ordered a Piña Colada.
There’s not much you can do to expedite this other than by spending real time in the sun. Avoid pre-game tanning beds. A tan should always be earned, never purchased. If you’re getting as drunk as I’ve recommended, chances are you’ll pass out once or twice in the sun and speed things up a bit.
Don’t go lobster. “Burns peel, tans are for real, bro,” said someone in Cancun/Miami/The Okanagan.
Staying crisp is going to do one of three important things for you:
Don’t ever use this. You’re not. However, now you’re a bit closer to feeling like you belong and can maybe even slap a few high-fives to your new besties (read: someone you’re pretty sure you met last week) on your way around town.
