Welcome back! I am so sorry for the lack of posts these past couple of days… I lost my ability to formulate sentences after about two days of no sleep 😅. It may be 2:30 am on a Sunday night in Michigan, but I am here to catch you up to speed with what I’ve been up to!
Let’s start with Friday.
I woke up and went downstairs for breakfast, not knowing who I would find. I walked in and saw Chris, who I had met on Wednesday night before the Cercle Moment actually started. Yay! A familiar face! I sat down next to him, grabbed some breakfast, and attempted to hold a conversation. It was hilarious because we were both sitting there —our brains very obviously fried— trying to make small talk. A few minutes later, CJ, Eric, and Cheryl came down and joined us. Then, Chris had the great idea of getting an energy drink from the hotel store. I had completely forgotten that energy drinks are a thing because I don’t usually drink them… but WOW did this save me during the rest of the trip!
I walked over to the store and picked up a Red Bull. I ran into Lily there, and when she saw what I had in my hands, she gasped and went: “what a GREAT idea!”. She got a Red Bull too. Then, we all piled into the vans and headed to our first destination of the day: Casa Chavela.
Casa Chavela & Yulia Niko
The drive to Casa Chavela was about 1.5 hours up into the mountains. I was blessed to be in the van where Chris was on aux because his playlist was SO FIRE! Everybody talked about how much they loved it. Vlad even told him he should quit his job and become a DJ. The house itself is in a very secluded area, so the nature scene is really beautiful. When we arrived, we entered into the house where we were greeted by people in cultural dress. I’m still not exactly sure what the meaning behind the ethnic clothing was, but it was interesting!
We made our way through the house and out to the grounds. There was a pool, a gazebo, and a lot of open space. Once everyone was outside, the masked people made their way down to the yard and started dancing in a circle to the sound of a live band playing. Eventually, they pulled people from our group into the circle to dance with them. And then, I was pulled in by others in the group.
When the music ended, I took a moment to look around the space and admire the beauty of it. The backdrop of the mountains was absolutely stunning, and the place as a whole was very peaceful. I talked with Vlad and Eric for a bit before we all decided that it was too hot to not be in the pool. We changed into our swimsuits and spent almost the entire rest of our time in the pool!
I enjoyed talking with a handful of people in the pool: CJ, Eric, David, Vlad, Marina. We had poolside service as well which was great. They just kept bringing us fruit, tacos, water, alcohol, etc., so there was no reason to ever get out!
For most of the afternoon, Yulia Niko was playing in the gazebo. Towards the end of her set, we all got dressed into our normal clothes again and danced to the music. I danced with JJ, which was fun as always. I also witnessed David launching an ice cube out of his mouth and it accidentally landing on a worker… that was hilarious! David and I also split another Red Bull. We were like “woohoooo we’re getting real crazy up in here!”
I really LOVED Yulia’s set — it was one of my favorites from the whole trip! I had listened to her music prior to coming on this trip, so it was especially fun to hear the songs that I knew well. I also just couldn’t believe that I was so close to her! What a unique experience.
A chaotic bus ride (Part I of many)
The drive home was absolutely chaotic. I was back in the same bus as before with Vlad, Eric, Josh, Chris, Cheryl, and others. I swear, Vlad, Eric, and Josh are like the three musketeers. If you get them all together, they are 1000 x more funny than usual. Plus, if you add the three bottles of tequila that were being passed around, it makes for an even better time. Our bus ride home was only supposed to take 1.5 hours, but it ended up taking way longer than that. I can’t tell you how many times someone would ask, “how much time do we have left?”, and Vlad would reply with the estimated time on the driver’s Google Maps. Almost every time, the answer was the exact same —or maybe two minutes less— than it had previously been. It had to have taken us 2-2.5 hours to get back. We were all DYING to use the restroom, so we asked if we could please stop somewhere on our way to the next place. The driver said no. The three musketeers went crazy laughing at the fact that the driver said no to stopping! I was laughing so hard at them, and Josh just kept saying that I need to be refunded for having to be with them 😂.
Salón Palomilla & Luch
At about 7 pm, we arrived at our next destination: Salón Palomilla. We had the entire upstairs room to ourselves. The rooftop opened up to the sky, which created another unique atmosphere. I particularly enjoyed experiencing how the atmosphere changed during the transition from daylight to nighttime. The DJ who played at this event was Luch, and I enjoyed his music too!
I danced for about three hours, taking a few breaks to eat the small bites being served to us. I spent a lot of time with CJ. At one point, we were eating some delicious carrots when I noticed that Yulia Niko was right next to us! WHAT?! She had just come to the party to hang out, and then she ended up dj-ing with Luch for a while. It was so fire.
It was clear that we were all a bit low energy after being out in the sun all day, but most remained committed to dancing our hearts out. I remember looking at the clock, seeing that it was 9:30 and going “okay, only 30 minutes left… I can do this!”. It was a pretty short night after Salón Palomilla since we would be leaving at 5 am sharp the next morning… stay tuned to find out why we had to wake up so early!
Until next time,
Clara
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