I’m sitting in a mosquito net tent surrounded by paintings
of Hindi gods, buddah, the word love and listening to Mexican new age music.
I’m surrounded by jungle, a cenote and cabins. I am in the hippie new age town
of Tulum in Mexico.
After staying in Cuba, the craziest developing country ever,
Mexico was a shock of Western culture. We flew into Cancun and took a bus to
Playa del Carmen or Playa del America I should say. Think McDonalds, Subway,
Gelato, big lights, lots of shops and advertising. It was a stark contrast to
everything that is Cuba.
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| Our Captors |
We got off the bus, looked at our map and stepped into the
street straight into a carnivale parade. Think twirling dancers with masses of
brightly coloured feathers, sparkles, brass bands and decorated cars. What a
shock; the streets were packed and the place was loud, crazy and full of life.
We waited a while then decided we needed to get to a hostel and find accommodation.
Thinking we’d sneak up the street we ended up caught up in the parade,
surrounded by dancers and not being able to leave. Yes, in Playa Bernie and I
were an accidental part of the carnival parade. Luckily there was a room free
and the whole shenanigan wasn’t for nothing. Our hostel was amazing-bunks,
toilet paper, toilet seats, HOT SHOWERS, a kitchen to use and INTERRNET!!!!
Hurray for capitalism!!!
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| Pretty puch my impression of the nights |
We wandered the streets and ordered our first tacos
(questionable as it was not from a touristy place and vegetables didn’t make it
to the menu). We strolled past the crazy American stores and tourists eating
tacos before heading to our hostel for free drinks at our bar. That night we
had in depth conversations with Argentinians in Spanish(it got better as we had
more free drinks-amazing). The rest of the night was a blur of clubs and bars,
all with crazy entrance fees that our bar friends got us out of paying and even
crazier dancing. When it felt like 12:30 it was actually 3:30 am and we finally
bailed. Playa is a party town where time gets lost.
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| The many tourists and resorts |
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| Cenote Diving |
The next morning we
woke surprisingly well and relocated ourselves to the beach. The beach is
crazy with massive resorts at every part and every patch of beach taken up by
tourists (like Australia day at Cottesloe). The water is clear and the sand
white so it was still fun, just really different. The next day we packed our
things and headed to the cenote dos ojos for a dive and snorkel. A cenote is a lime stone sinkhole-in this instance
a limestone cave with all the usual cave things but completely underwater. It
has amazing visibility(200m) so you don’t feel like you are looking through
water, but that you are flying through a cave and can get as close to the roof
or stalagtites as you want without the climbing or dirt! It was also located deep in the Mexican jungle
so it was a beautiful drive and walk. My instructor gave me two wetsuits and a
hood which I need, it was freezing!! It was pretty cool diving for 600m through
tunnels in caves but also scary to think if anything went wrong you were
completely screwed. The instructor carried two tanks of oxygen for this reason.
On paper it was one of the craziest dives I’ve done but it was stunningly
beautiful and so relaxing. From there we got dropped off on the highway and a
passing shuttle picked us up and took us to tulum.
Tulum
Tulum is a little beach town full of ‘yoga retreats’ and
‘eco lodges’. It is set on the most beautiful, powdery white sand beach with
wonderfully temperate water. It is also expensive. We took a taxi to our hostel
to get told it was $50 a night!! We pretty much begged them down to $15. This
place is completely new age. The showers are outdoor, the water all from the
nearby river, a campfire burns even though it’s at least 30 and everyone here
are artists or writers or finding themselves. There are only expensive, organic
hotel restaurants but we have a kitchen thank goodness. It’s an amazing place
but we probably shouldn’t be here. Our first night we spent drinking beers on
the beach over sunset(trying the tomato beer-don’t do it unless you like fizzy
salsa). We realised we couldn’t afford to eat out so explored the one shop
which had about 4 ingredients: lentil nachos it was. That night I managed to
roll my ankle on the rocky ground between our cabana and the outdoor, eco
friendly toilet. My trip definitely got a lot less active after that. The next
day we hired some snorkelling gear and headed out to Akalam beach, the most
awesome place ever. Here we took turns(me with one flipper) snorkelling in the
most incredible reef. We swam with manta rays, sea turtles and beautiful fish.
I even saw a pair of shy cuttle fish!! It was as good as diving(better than
some) and there was no time limit! After we’d had our fill of the sea turtles
and sunbaking we headed to the Tulum ruins. This was an old port city like freo
but dedicated to the worship of Venus. It is now a remnant of it glory days and
overrun by iguanas that really do think they own the place. That night it was
lentils and nachos again. The next day, after a massive home-cooked breakfast
of lentils and eggs, we packed up and realised we couldn’t afford to taxi it to
town. This was my first real hitchhiking experience in Mexico. Ten minutes later, thanks to a nice, old American couple and an Argentinean girl, we were
in town with tickets booked and drinking coffee at our favourite cafe.
Valladolid
Next stop was Valladolid, a very cool, very Spanish feeling city
with colourful Mexican buildings, cobbled streets and many courtyards. The
evenings here were balmy and perfect. That first night we checked into a very
colourful and fun backpackers, Hostel La Candeleria, and went for a walk. We
came across a beautiful chocolate factory where a very enthusiastic woman gave
us the entire story of cacao which was the beginning of chocolate(including 9
samples). After a hot chocolate we were sold and departed with our cinnamon
chocolate balls. We wandered the winding, cobbled streets, stopping for
hibiscus drinks and to check out the old convent of this magical place. The
next day we got up early and bussed it to Chichen Itza, the Mayan
pyramids. I hate to say it but I was more impressed with these than Machu Picchu.
Picture a pyramid so tall and grand with levels, steps and panels all
representing a calendar. It was built about 2000 years ago to count down the
days to the end of the world (on 23
Decemeber 2012). This city, the ‘capital’ city of the Mayans, is now overrun
with Iguana’s and jungle. We got up
really early so managed to avoid the majority of the tourists and had an entire
ancient Mayan jungle city to explore by ourselves. Very Indiana Jones. I
headed to the most beautiful Cenote for an afternoon swim. Picture a huge
limestone cavern with tree roots almost to the clear water, surrounded by a
lush, green limestone wall. Not a bad local swimming pool.
Bacalar
The next few days we weren’t 100% sure of our plans. We
decided to get off the bus a place called Lake Bacalar-just to check it out. A
taxi ride from the busy, dirty town revealed the most incredible, blue Caribbean
lake surrounded by lush green jungle. We were sold and wandered until we found
a basic hostel. Bacalar was a strange town, definitely not a tourist
destination. It had the beautiful lake for swimming, amazing houses but so many
drunk men staggering around-where did they all come from? The next two days we
lounged by the lake drinking tequila, wandered the streets and chatted to
locals. We got invited to a bar opening pirate party and had a fun night of
cocktails, music, tequila and pirate fights. This was our last, seedy night in
Mexico. Next stop Belize.
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