I had a great time this April as the guest of Roy Fischer in Playa del Carmen, Mexico, along with a whole crew of other New Thought musicians (who shall remain nameless, because I am sure I will forget somebody, and plus you would think I was just bragging anyway).  This was my first time out of the country and what a great way to start!

Playa is about an hour from Cancun, and we stayed at a five-star resort called Xaman Ha (http://www.xamanhainfo.com/) situated right on the ocean - WOW!  It is so beautiful there, the weather was perfect the whole time. 

Every morning I got up and walked down to 5th avenue and bought fresh fruit from the Mayan women who had a stand there.  After breakfast we would all spend some time together at the condo playing music, talking, laughing, praying, and the rest of the time I was in the pool, on the beach, or on the avenue.  After a couple of days I got so dark that the locals thought I was one of them, which I thought was a lot of fun, especially since the vendors quit hawking at me when I walked down the avenue.

Two of my favorite places there were the Playasia restaurant and the lounge at the Hotel Deseo.  Playasia is built like a treehouse and they serve Asian food; check out www.blueparrot.com and click on Playasia Restaurant.  The Hotel Deseo lounge is on a roof, and they have a pool. hot tub, and beds outdoors around the bar with a DJ playing ambient music while they show old movies on the side of the building next door - too cool!  The DJ and wait staff were really cute, too, and the lady that runs the place looks like somebody out of a movie, very classy and international.  They have a website at www.hoteldeseo.com but some really good pics are available at www.locogringo.com/playa/deseo.html.

The highlight of the trip for me though was doing the concerts for Carrie's Heart.  Rev. Roy does a lot of good work with his Contemporary Spiritual Arts Ministries (check out his website at www.csaministries.org) and one of the causes he supports is Carrie's Heart (www.carriesheart.org), an organization that provides support to educational and community programs for children with disabilities worldwide.  Please take a moment to visit Carrie's website!

So on Sunday morning we had a pool party at Xaman Ha for some of Carrie's kids in Playa, children with different areas of challenge, physically or mentally.  This was a wonderful experience and all the children seemed to have a really good time!  Roy dressed as Santa (except for the shorts) and we had Christmas in April for all the kids and their parents.  What a blessing it was to be able to do this, and there were times during this morning when I was in an awareness of pure bliss and completely present.  I will never forget blowing bubbles with Carlitos and Kathy Rice!  Such joy.

Later that day we went out to the little plaza at the end of 5th avenue and gave a concert on the gazebo there to raise some money for Carrie's Heart.  I remember one moment where I was rockin' out on the piano, and I thought I was going to levitate - I was thinking, wow, here I am, in Mexico, the beach is just right over there, I am performing with some extremely talented musicians and singers, the sun is shining, the sky is blue, the wind is cool,  the music is great, people are dancing and having a great time, it just doesn't get any better!!!  Thank you, God!!!

If you want to see any pictures of the party and the concert, go to Carrie's Flickr page at www.flickr.com/photos/carriesheart/, click on Spring Yucatan Missions 2008 and then Posipalooza Playa 2008.