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Published: March 2nd 2011
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Getting to Mexico was a bit of an ordeal. We had to return our van to Hertz in Houston airport at 11am, but our flight wasn’t until 7pm. So basically it was a long wait. To make it worse it took a few hours for the café to open (there was hardly anyone in the terminal until early afternoon), and we were flying a cheap Mexican airline- Viva Aerobus- whose check in counter only opened 75 minutes before the flight left (Viva Aerobus only fly from the US twice a week, so they hardly had a permanent desk- very cheap flights though). We passed the time in the airport by watching a movie on my laptop (Beetelguese), then as time went on we all got to our own little activities to stave off boredom- I started sketching and writing in my journal (which I hadn’t touched since my first trip to New York in July), Jordan took a lot of photos of nothing, and Emma got out all her coins left over from America and arranged them in different patterns. Jono slept at the table we were sitting at.
After what seemed infinity we were finally on the plane. It
took over an hour between taking our seats and the plane taking off. Then we arrived in Monterrey to find that Emma’s bag went missing in transit (she still hasn’t gotten it back despite a lot of emails and phone calls to Viva Aerobus, which to make things worse have staff who don’t speak the best English and no permanent staff in Houston). Trying to sort all this out at the airport was a bit of a nightmare, especially after such a long day at the airport. We trudged around from one terminal to the next with all our stuff while Emma struggled to make herself understood. Eventually she got everything she needed and we made it to the hotel.
We got 8 hours sleep then woke up to head straight back to the airport again. We would have liked to see Monterrey for a bit, but it was much cheaper to fly ASAP, so we did. We caught a flight to Cancun. During that flight they confiscated my hot sauce and nail polish, which I had forgotten about, from my carry on. In fact, I must mention that I have never had by bag checked so many times
and as thoroughly (including before even reaching the check in bag) as I did in Mexico. And I thought airport security in America was bad!
Anyway, from Cancun airport we caught a 45 minute bus to Playa Del Carmen, then after some hassle, managed to all fit in a taxi to take us to our hotel. After almost 2 full days of transit we were finally able to settle down in beautiful Playa Del Carmen. We spent 5 glorious days there, which was mostly spent eating good food, going to the (stunning, turquoise water and fine-as-sugar sand) beach and generally lazing around . It was exactly what we needed after so long on the road. We stayed at a place called Hacienda Mariposa, and I would certainly recommend it to anyone- great atmosphere, good location, free breakfast and not a bad price.
The only things of incident that interrupted the blissful laziness of Play Del Carmen was a report of a woman getting her arm bitten off my a nesting female shark in nearby Cancun (it did not prevent us from continuing to enjoy the perfect water however), Jordan getting very sunburnt, and the place where we ate
breakfast nearly catching on fire the second last day. Basically, we’re not sure exactly what happened because we were shooed away from the street, but from what I heard there was a lot of smoke coming out of the building behind our breakfast place, but firefighters were squirting hoses on both buildings (perhaps as a preventative measure, I don’t know). All I know is that I walked back from the beach, and a mere 10 minutes later as I was taking a shower I could smell the smoke. Luckily our building (which was right across the street) was fine, and we didn’t have to evacuate.
Our last beach town was Tulum, and definitely my favourite of the two. Unlike Playa, Tulum was an actual town (rather than a series of streets choc full of Italian restaurants, hotels and tacky tourist shops). You needed to take a taxi to get to the beach which was delightfully near-empty. We were staying in a great little place called Mama's Home, which was the first guesthouse-type accommodation I had had on this trip. On our arrival, our room wasn't ready yet so they made us tea and coffee, and served us biscuits while one of the workers told us about her travels around Mexico and Australia.
One of the other nice little things about Tulum was a gelato shop right near our place. Delicious ice cream, we ended up going there at least once a day. We spent pretty much ever day at the beach. At one point Rachel, a friend of Emma and Jordan came to stay with us. We went to Tulum ruins. Truly spectacular: ruins right on a cliff looking over a gorgeous beach. The Tulum ruins made it to front cover picture of Mexico's Lonely Planet and it certainly didn't disappoint.
The superbowl also happened to be playing while we were in Tulum. Jono and I went to watch it from the beginning (the other girls decided to spend more time at the beach). It was great sitting and watching a game I now kind of know the rules for while drinking a few beers and eating guacamole. Also, the Mexican ads they were playing during ad breaks were hilarious (not intentionally). The girls arrived sometime after halftime, so we after the game was over we went to hit the town (not that there were many people around on a Sunday night). Probably the best thing about the night was seeing a live band playing- they were really good.
On our last full day in Tulum we went snorkelling in the world's second biggest reef- after the Great Barrier Reef. Though we got to sea turtles the whole experience was a bit underwhelming. The water was pretty deep for reefs so nothing seemed very colourful, and there weren't really that many fish or coral around. It was in Tulum that we said goodbye to Jordan who headed home. Meanwhile it was time for Jono, Emma and I to head onto Merida...
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