Bound for Cancun, we set off bright and early at 5.30am. Travelling days are always long the flight and even customs were uneventful as we made our way into Cancun central and found a hostel. Splashing out on dinner (and not understanding the conversion rate yet) we hit a nice looking restaurant complete with an oompa band. The waiters were halirious, Lucy's drink arrived balancing on the head of the waiter.
Hitting up the beach at Cancun we were pleasantly surprised to find it reasonably quiet compared to Nga Trang in Vietnam. There was a little Seagrass covering it but nothing on what was to come in Tulum. We swam and read and walked along the beach then repeated all day before retiring to our hostel with Mexican like tans! Getting sunburnt seems like a thing of the past now… It really is quite scary to think how powerful the sun is in NZ.
Moving on to the backpacker island of Holbox where there is no cars or sealed roads just white sand beaches and whale sharks! The murals and brightly coloured buildings were very cool and there was a great vibe around. The whale shark snorkelling tour was an awesome experience if rather pricey and maybe a little cruel. We set off in a boat with 8 others and eagerly kept lookout. Once a shark was spotted the location is radioed around to all the other boats. We were lucky and were the 6th boat to the shark (one girl said there were up to 24 boats when she went). Slowly circling it we jumped in the water in pairs for our 2min worth of snorkelling.
The shark was huge and rather graceful and did not seem at all phased to have 4 other people swimming with it. We swam along next to the worlds biggest fish and admired it some more before our time was up. I guess if the shark was not impressed with us he could have swam off or dived down but he just cruised on the surface.We fished for our lunch and had excellent ceviche, snorkelled with turtles and rays while Pelicans tried to steal any left overs and then saw a flock of pink flamingos on the way home all in all a very good day out.
A 5am ferry meant a stumble to the wharf before a bus took us to Valladolid. This old quiet colonial town was a nice surprise with old VW beetles everywhere adding to the picture. Being hot it was time for a dip in a cenote (collapsed limestone sinkhole). A friendly local gave us a lift in the back of a ute and we walked in to find a swimming pool and a whole lot of deck chairs. We both looked at each other hoping we hadn't paid for just a pool! Finding the stairwell we proceeded to descend 7 flights of stairs to the bottom where we found cliffs to jump off and a great rope swing. A long bomb session commenced complete with back flips off the rope much to the locals (who were swimming in lifejackets) delight. A few local kids tried unsuccessfully to replicate the flips and quickly gave up when Lucy showed them how it was done!
Chichen Itza was next on our agenda and we walked around in relative peace as we made the effort to get here early before the crowds. The ruins were pretty impressive as too the number of people selling sourvinars. It is hard to comprehend the age of such structures and to think how well built they are. Exiting at about 11am we were shocked to see the lines of people waiting for tickets snaking back for ages and glad to have been there early!
The beaches in Tulum are stunning in all the pictures but at this time of year there is a real problem with sea grass. We hired bikes for the day and explored the beach front. Only with a lot of effort was it possible to swim as the sea grass was not only piled high over the beach but also extended 10 to 15m out to sea. It was keeping the locals busy trying to rake it up and remove it from in front of the hotels but they were fighting a loosing battle. We found another cenote to hang at instead. The hostels in Mexico were generally well equipped with kitchens so we whipped up a huge guacamole for dinner and washed it down with a rum and fresh coconut that Nick acquired with his good climbing skills.
Our final night in Mexico was spent at a small village called Bacalar which is on a large freshwater lagoon. We had booked a tent for the night which was tiny and had little in the way of a mattress but it was fine for a night. The lagoon was nice and warm although a little choppy but a peaceful spot to spend an evening next to. We gapped it early the next morning as we were off to the island of Caye Caulker in Belize.
This involved taxis, 1st class buses, chicken buses some walking and a ferry but we made it before sunset and even had time for a belikin beer! Our busy driver into Belize was a very nice man who tried in vain to help us across the boarder without having to pay the departure tax (our airline ticket receipt didn't cut it). He also gave us some much needed advice on things to do in Belize which unfortunately weren't all that positive….Belize City especially doesn't have a good reputation with either tourists or locals so we will be getting a bus straight out of there when we leave this little island.
Caye Caulker is right in the middle of the second biggest coral reef in the world and home to a good number of Caribbean Rastas. The island has no cars and only dirt roads and a lot of backpackers. Checking into our classy hostel called dirty mc-nasty we made short work of the nightly free rum punch and proceeded to make many new friends from around the commonwealth. The free omelettes for breakfast and a swim sorted out our heads and we spent the remainder of the day going slow as they say out here. More of the same was in order for the next day as we failed to book into a snorkelling tour in time. Instead we grabbed a canoe and paddled around the mangroves which was cool. We saw lots of small fish plus some huge tarpon and a wee crocodile. A feed of fresh lobster and more rum punch while watching the full moon rise saw the end of another day.
The much talked about and very expensive snorkelling was on the agenda. We piled into a small boat with 6 others (including the 1st kiwi couple we have meet in the last 2 months) and headed out manatee spotting. Without too much effort we found a couple of these very slow moving sea cows and spent 20 min cruising along side them. To describe them as graceful would be an overstatement but they were pretty cool and un-phased by us. We made 4 further stops where we snorkelled through an old barge, with a loggerhead turtle, rays and sharks and through a wee cave. The nurse sharks and rays were very tame and used to being fed so didn't mind the odd touch and the small green turtles too were very used to people. The coral reef itself wasn't too spectacular although there were some impressive fans.
A parting beer shot as we leave the Caribbean and head for the jungle...
Looks epic! X
ReplyDelete