Day 11: Freedom at Punta Leona

Today was a free day, which was actually pretty brave on Mo's part, considering she let 16 college students have total freedom at a beach resort in a foreign country. Most of us took some time to sleep in and relax a little bit before heading to breakfast at our leisure, and then walking down to Playa Mantas, the black sand beach. Laurie and Izzy had an eventful day, getting stung by jelly fish while swimming in the shallows. Izzy was stung just once, but Laurie was less fortunate: five stings in three minutes. Thankfully, both were okay after trips to first aid.


The rest of us had a lot of fun on our private beach, and also spent some time relaxing by the pool. From there, people took shuttles to Playa Blanca, the white sand beach, while others rested in their rooms. A few adventurous souls even rented a golf cart.  Later on in the day, some of us surprised Mo, Luis, and Kara by passing them at the bus stop with 6 people on the golf cart on our way to the white beach (they were unaware up until then that we even had a golf cart). They came to the beach with us and we had a few fun hours body-surfing in the water with Carlos and Adrian. Gabe got buried in the sand in the guise of a mermaid, and we relaxed and watched Beyoncé videos together under the shade of a tree. Olivia got a not-so-pleasant sunburn early in the day, which comically included tan lines both from holding her iPad and from her hotel wristband. Needless to say, she spent most of her day in the dark, watching countless episodes of Friends and The Big Bang Theory.

Most of the group  meet at the dining room for dinner and shared the adventures of the day. After a filling dinner, we all took it pretty easy and relaxed so we could prepare for the last part of our trip!