THE ROYAL, Playa del Carmen, Mexico

Paradise, per dictionary.com is defined as a place of extreme beauty, delight, or happiness. This is how I would describe our recent trip to Mexico with our friends Shaun and Lauren Dodson. We stayed 6 days, 5 glorious nights at THE ROYAL Playa del Carmen.

This was our room for the first half of our stay- we upgraded for the last two nights. It is so odd for us to sleep in a big bed and without a dog snuggling up on our pillows.

We arrived in time for a lunch and immediately headed to the beach.

Dinner the first night was at Asianas. It featured several different Sushi, Chinese, Thai, and Japaneses meals so it was easy to please everyone.

This guy was apparently celebrating his bachelor party and his buddies had he dressed up like this. A part of me doubts their story but it was super funny seeing this kid on the beach.

The resort has 8 different restaurants and we also had access to all the dining options in its sister resort located right next to it. The biggest decision we had to make each day was where to go to dinner.

Each day basically look the same- breakfast (I was spoiled with yummy omelettes most days), a stop by the Coffee Bar, and then the beach/pool until it was time for dinner.

Two morning I did attend a Pilates Reformer class that was offered in the gym. If you are not familar with this class, The Pilates Reformer is the most well known piece of Pilates equipment. It is a bed like frame with moveable carriage where a person sits or reclines and does his or her stretching, is an excellent way of exercising without hurting the joints while strengthening muscles. (source)

I absolutely loved them! If anyone know of any classes offered in the Atlanta area, please let me know.

This was our room the last two nights. It had a living room, dining area, bedroom, huge bathroom with a steam shower, hot tube, and amazing closet.

With our upgrade we were giving cabanas on the beach. I was able to pop under when I got too hot and needed to cool down and Brian was able to still be right beside me.

The night we went to dinner at Chef's Plate was my favorite. This restaurant changes its menu every night f the week and is an eight course meal- I seriously thought they were never going to stop bring out the food.

I tried to take pictures of each course but I missed one or two.

It was truly an amazing vacation! I would highly recommend THE Royal if anyone is looking to go on a trip.