The Yucatan Peninsula

(Jan 6 – Jan 12) – get a cup of coffee this might be a long one

We had to backtrack to Mexico City for 1 day to try finalize our visa for Colombia.

It was not our intention to return, but we were told this was the only day available for the visa ‘interview’ and that the visa would be issued on the same day. Until fairly recently South Africans did not need a visa for Colombia so this is a new requirement, and the level of organization for the procedure shows. The website states it is an online process taking 3 – 5 days. It was anything but that. We visited the Colombian embassy in Mexico City twice, got given different stories about what documentation was required, and after our special return trip for the interview, we were told they needed additional paperwork.

Long story short, if you want to visit Colombia, sort out the visa well in advance. It’s expensive and not as straight forward as the internet leads you to believe. This meant we weren’t going to Colombia, and as a result of this we couldn’t do the 5 day sailing trip from Panama to get to Colombia that we had planned as one of the highlights.

Anyway, moving on!

We had been given a recommendation by a friend in Bahrain who had spent some time in Mexico and said that they really enjoyed the beaches around Tulum.

Because of the Colombia trip falling through, we had a few spare days available in our schedule, so we decided to spend some time along the Yucatan peninsula. It is an area that stretches out into the Caribbean sea and has many beautiful beaches and islands, most famous probably being Cancun.

We flew to Cancun on the evening of 7th Jan, and because we landed fairly late, decided to spend the first night close to the airport.

We had hired a car for a few days to give us the flexibility to check out the sites between Cancun and Tulum at our own pace.

Much to our horror, we woke up the following morning to torrential downpours! This time of year is peak season for tourists so we weren’t feeling too impressed with our luck.

Our first stop for the day would be Chichen Itza, the Mayan ruin. We left early to try and avoid the crowds that arrive in tour busses around 10am. Fortunately, the rain cleared up during our 1.5 hr drive inland and only a few clouds remained when we arrived.

This area of Mexico is littered with Mayan ruins, but Chichen Itza must be one of, if not the most iconic of them all – a definite bucket list item.

We were more excited to see these ruins than we were for Mitla (part of our trip to Oaxaca), as the site is more diverse, better preserved and includes a cenote – a freshwater sinkhole. Cenotes are usually known for swimming, although this specific one was used for human sacrifices in the past, so no swimming is allowed.

Chichen Itza did not disappoint. The scale of the main castle (El Castillo) is impressive. Two of the sides are really well preserved, while the two other sides are quite weathered. Unfortunately we were not allowed to climb it or explore inside. There were also numerous other buildings and structures which were fairly interesting, like the ball court with concrete hoops (think a type of ancient basketball) and the hall of 1000 columns.

After wandering around for about an hour at Chichen Itza we left and headed for Tulum.

We wanted to stop and swim at some of the cenotes that we would be passing on the way. The cenotes are sinkholes that usually have crystal clear freshwater and are popular for swimming. All of them are different sizes, depths, water clarity and have different facilities. Similar to the ruins, the area has many cenotes – we probably passed about 10 between Tulum and Chichen Itza.

The first one we arrived at allows one person to go in and view it before you pay. This was handy as Dylan could be the scout and although the water was the incredible turquoise we’d been anticipating, it was quite small and shallow, so we decided to head to the Gran Cenote instead.

There were quite a few more people at the Gran Cenote, but once you rounded the corner and looked down into the spring, it was obvious why.

The water colour and clarity is unlike anything we’d seen before and the swim was well worth the cold shower before jumping in (mandatory for all swimmers to keep the water clean).

It’s a good thing we didn’t stop and spend time at the first cenote because just as we got out the water it started to drizzle…and then pour! Being a tropical area the storm clouds roll in very quickly. It can go from sunny and clear to dark and pouring in about 20min. And then 20min later it’s clear again.

After our swim at Gran Cenote it was time to head to Tulum.

Tulum is a small beach town with a beautiful beach, about 2hrs drive south of Cancun on the Caribbean coast. It has become very popular over the past few years with lots of ‘eco-friendly’ hotels and (small) resorts, especially along the beach area.

Due to the Colombia disappointment, we decided to book 2 nights in a luxury jungle hut across the road from the beach, as our ‘honeymoon treat’ (look up Mamasan tree houses, Tulum). We were really looking forward to this little oasis!

The beach area is very scenic, but it is also only a single road along which all the hotels, resorts and restaurants are situated. Therefore traffic is congested and parking is a major problem so typically people cruise around on bicycles.

Once we had made our way through the traffic and found the spot, we were greeted by a very confused receptionist. Apparently, even though they had received our booking (for which we’d received a confirmation), they had canceled it and only had a room available for the 2nd night. They allegedly tried to call us but got no answer. Ironically, we had tried repeatedly to contact them over the past 3 days, by phone and email, but with no luck. Oh well…

Disappointed and angry, we headed back to the town to get internet signal and make another plan (Mamasan were not bothered to assist in any way). We booked into Harmony Hostel, a little yoga sanctuary in the main part of town, for the night. Harmony Hostel was cute and comfortable and offered mostly camping/glamping options, but also had a few rooms for rent. We went with a room option.

It was also only a 5 minute walk away from a cool food truck park, so that was our dinner for the night sorted.

We arrived at Las Palmas food truck park fairly early, just as the stalls were opening. We sat down at the bar for a drink or 2 while the food trucks set up. We ended up staying at the bar for quite a while and having more than just 2 drinks. We sat at the bar making new plans for our trip and chatting to the barman. He was really good and kept us hydrated with many local versions of classic cocktails, usually incorporating one of the many local Mexican spirits. He gave us a lot of interesting info about the various spirits that are local to Mexico. It’s not all just tequila. One of the spirits that we finished the night with (Sotol), has a certain version (not the one that we tried) that is distilled with snake venom.

As an additional thank you for great drinks and conversation, we gave Jorge, the barman, some Inverroche gin that we had brought with us from SA. Overall, it turned out to be a great night!

Jorge (our new best friend) mentioned that the hotel he also works at makes good breakfast so we decided to stop there. The food was great and we finally tasted excellent chilaquiles!

During our booze-fueled night of planning we decided that the stuff-up with the booking earlier was a sign and that we should leave Tulum and head down to Bacalar instead.

Bacalar is the name of a lake and small town about 2 hrs south of Tulum. We heard about this place from a taxi driver one night while we were in Mexico city. Somewhere between his broken English and our broken Spanish we had a conversation and he mentioned this beautiful lake. So we looked at accommodation options and it was a fraction of the price in Tulum. Sorted.

After breakfast we said adios to Tulum and headed for Bacalar.

We got there before our check in time, so we drove straight to another cenote in Bacalar, Cenote Azul.

This cenote was a lot bigger than we thought it would be! More like a dam than a spring. But the water was also incredibly clear, although at 90m deep at its deepest point it was impossible to see the bottom. The water temperature was amazing. So we decided to swim and laze around ahead of our next check in.

The town of Bacalar is quite small, and having the car gave us the advantage that we could book a place slightly outside of town but right on the waters edge.

The accommodation itself was basic, but the view and water access with our own jetty was awesome! They had kayaks that we could use and so we went for a sunset paddle. The lake is incredible, we couldn’t believe that it was fresh and not salt water. The color is like the Maldives, although it was already a bit windy by the time we arrived.

The water was a bit choppy in the afternoon and while paddling we watched the next showers come closer from across the lake. By the time we got back from our paddle it started drizzling again and then poured.

In the morning we managed to get up early enough to go for another paddle before the wind picked up, and watch the sun rise. During our paddle we spent some time looking for empty plots of land along the lakeside (in less than 24 hrs we were already making retirement plans).

After our paddle we headed out for some breakfast at lovely place called Selva, right on the lake.

After breakfast we hit the road again, back to Cancun for two nights.

Cancun wasn’t on our list originally, but we learnt about the underwater museum and decided it would be a great opportunity to go diving in the Caribbean. We booked into Selina Hostel right on the Laguna strip.

Cancun was a totally different place compared to Bacalar. It’s just hotel after hotel after hotel along the strip. This was not a surprise though and we knew what to expect. We would gladly have spent an extra night in Bacalar if wasn’t for the diving which was only being done on Fridays.

The diving was only from 12:30, so we had some time to kill in the morning.

We woke up early and headed to the beach to check it out and maybe see the sunrise. The beach was quite nice with white sand, tropical, warm, blue water and the sunrise was pretty good, but it stank of old beer and piss. There were even a few vomit spots from the night before. That kind of set the tone for cancun, unfortunately.

On the plus side, the diving was really enjoyable. We did 2 dives, the first at the MUSA underwater museum about 30min offshore from Cancun and the second at a natural reef close by.

The MUSA dive is an exhibition of underwater statues that have been placed to create a sort of artificial reef. Not sure if that was the main intention or if tourism was the main intention. Either way, it was really cool to dive after seeing photos of it elsewhere. We also managed to see a turtle which is apparently not that common to see there.

The second, reef dive was also really enjoyable. We saw loads of colourful fish and big coral fans, but not too much else.

The visibility on the dives was great, although we were told that it is usually a lot better, but the rain and rough seas of the past week or two had stirred up the silt. Would love to see the better conditions! The water temperature is also amazing. It was warmer in the water than sitting on the boat with a light breeze blowing.

That evening we were knackered so we went out for some food and had an early night.

We awoke the next morning with the intention of finding an internet Cafe and printing off a few documents that we required for our entry to Cuba later that day. The internet cafe, along with the whole mall it was in, seemed to be deserted – no AC, hardly any lights and the escalators were off. It was very eery.

Anyway, we decided that we’d wing it a bit and just have the necessary documents on our phones to show at Cuban immigration, hoping that we wouldn’t get trapped for hours (as some blogs implied). We had a quick pool side breakfast and then packed up and said Adios to Cancun and headed to the airport.

Mexico really surprised us and captivated us, we definitely could have spent more time there and hope to go back one day!