Central America - Mexico

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Welcome to Davina’s Central American travel blog. I’m travelling in Mexico and Central America for 4 months and at the end of it turning 40 so a little older and maybe a bit wiser...or not! So my sister Ali is accompanying me on the first two weeks of my trip, after that it’s just Cedric and I for a while. Cedric is a small lovable cuddly turtle who Ali brought back from Sante, Greece.
Anyway on with the blog...first stop Playa del Carmen, Mexico. Well we arrived after a long flight after watching several films (one of which was the Book of Life which is an interesting animation on the Mexican day of the dead traditions). We couldn’t find a taxi when we arrived at the bus station as some of the roads were blocked off. We later discovered this was because there was a shooting in a bar! The hotel we’d booked was a little far from the centre but actually it was probably quicker to walk. We ended up at a busy main road in the early evening and there weren’t many places to ask directions. However there was a security guard sitting outside a Gentleman’s Club so he kindly pointed out that we’d reached our turning. We later discovered that this wasn’t the only Gentleman’s Club on the road so basically we were staying in the red light district!
On the plus side the area seemed safe, there was a nice restaurant selling food for half the price than on the tourist strip and we stayed in a lovely hotel! We had two double beds, a rooftop terrace/pool and met the resident parrot called Chapis. In Playa we went to the playa (beach), met my friend Tanya, had lunch on a snakes and ladders placemat, were served Piña Coladas from waiters balancing it on their heads and somehow managed to get free drinks at a nightclub.
After two nights in Playa we moved on to Tulum for about a week. We stayed in a lovely Airbnb apartment here run by an Italian lady called Laura who gave us so much information about where to eat...we were not going to go hungry here! She told us that there was not much nightlife and that everything shut down at midnight. However we didn't turn into pumpkins as there was a mojito bar where they made their own sugar cane juice which stayed open late. They had live music every night (including some flamenco fusion) and one of the bands included a cool dog called Mambo. We met up with friends Ferida and Kate and of course ended up in the mojito bar. It was a hippy kind of place and there were lots of men with man buns! Another night we ended up at a Cumbia party which was partly in a bar and partly in the street. I danced Cumbia with a Venezuelan guy who sang with the mojito bar band as he knew how to dance it and I just kind of followed!
Anyway in the daytime we mainly went to different beaches. The beach was too far to walk so we got the colectivo (mini van bus) or taxi. A taxi ride in Mexico was generally accompanied by salsa or cumbia music so that was an extra bonus! The beach had beautiful white sand and turquoise sea. There were quite a few different seabirds too like pelicans, small wader type birds and birds which glided and looked like the mobiles you hang up with string...er I will have to get round to looking up the name of them! One day we walked along the north end of the beach and up a cliff to try to get to the Mayan ruins. There didn’t seem to be a pathway but we did discover an old lighthouse and lovely view of the bay. We met an American guy Carl who told us that the lighthouse was a great place to watch the sunset over the jungle so we went back another evening to watch it along with nearly twenty others crammed into the top of the lighthouse. It was an old building so we had to scramble up some make shift ladders and a post to get up there. However some people still managed to bring up bottles of beer to the top!
On another we day we managed to get to the Mayan ruins which are called Zama or city of Dawn as they are on the cliffs over looking the sea where the sun rises. It was a lovely place and they have a small beach closed to the public which is reserved for turtles to lay their eggs (Cedric’s friends!). The ruins themselves are now home to lots of iguanas who find it a great place to sunbathe and stay relatively camouflaged.
We also went snorkelling at a Cenote (underground lake) and saw fish and turtles. It was an nice place to swim as it had stalactites in the cave and turquoise water.
One day at the beach a lady sculpted a mermaid from the sand so feeling inspired I tried to sculpt a turtle friend called Fredrick for Cedric at another beach. Not bad for a first attempt and I rediscovered that childhood bucket and spade type of joy!
The food in Mexico is great and we tried all kinds of fajitas, burritos and tortilla based dishes. I also tried ceviche (raw seafood/fish dish), arrachera (Mexican steak cut), and chicken with mole (chocolate sauce). There was also an amazing bakery which Ferida and Kate told us about! Now I’m not a massive tequila fan but when in Mexico... We met friends Ed and Vilija one night for dinner at an Italian restaurant which didn't have an alcohol licence so Ed popped across the road to a Tequila store for some BYO. I discovered a similar drink called Mezcal which has a smoky flavour and there was one called Divino so that’s practically like my name so I bought a small bottle. I’m just going to have to finish off my mouthwash so I can fit it in my backpack!

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