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Published: December 4th 2012
Sanote
A deep well said to be made by the Mayans to supplement their water and now used as swim holesAfter the frenetic pace of the last couple of weeks we slowed down at Cancun…. Cancun is a place built on mangrove swamps with waterways everywhere marked with signs of the local fauna – crocodiles. The developers built a large spit going out in a large rectangle (20 km), and the whole strip is infested with hotels!! American hotels – and BIG! Our small hotel has several swimming pools and a large outdoor area so we don’t really have to move anywhere.
Tequila is definitely the local drink and it’s very cheap – about $10 a bottle, which Roman had a little of each evening. We had a magnificent smorgasbord including paella, fish and prawns, deserts and coffee, with a couple of drinks included for the princely sum of 160 pesos each (about $15). But in Cancun, we ate where the locals ate because otherwise you get done!! Even hamburgers can cost $15 if you go to the wrong end of town – and the strip is the wrong end – old Cancun gets you the right deals!! The hotel strip is also full of nightclubs to attract the young dripping with money that they want to shed. Lots of
Cancun
note high rises behind - up market Gold Coast Qld big name acts come here including Rhianna etc…. boring for us old farts.
We visited an island called Isla de Mujeres – the island of women, a small island about 11 km long and about 2-3 km wide where there are lots of hotels, streets and the locals hire out golf buggies at 180 pesos an hour (
We spent 3 nights in Cancun and then visited the Mayan site Tulum on the way to Chetumal. Interesting fort built on the edge of a cliff, it was sighted by the Spanish in the early 16
th century but they didn’t do anything about it until much later. We endured a very long bus ride to Chetumal staying overnight and then .......
Goodbye Mexico and Hello Belize!!
to Belize City the next day and finally on a water taxi to Caye Caulker. BC was exceedingly grotty as was most of Belize… a very poor country. The locals are a mix of Spanish conquistadores/ Mayans/African, and they speak in the Caribbean patois which is quite pleasant to hear as well as mixes of mayan and something else gallifrais or something – Belize is the only country around that is
English speaking because the English pirates claimed this part of the coast as their own.
Caye Caulker was everything that Cancun was not – much friendlier/cheaper/ and more Rottnest like – no cars but bikes and golf buggies. It is a coral atoll that was probably built up with mangroves and then the people moved in!! very flat, and sandy though when it rains the sand seems to soak up the water very quickly. We explored the island the first day and we got stuck into the lobster meals at $20B ( about $10AU) which included prawn kebab, salad and rice or potato and a whole grilled lobster… hard to not like!! The next day, one of the girls Amanda and I went manatee spotting and snorkelling off the reefs while Roman went fishing with the local called Papa Joe. Roman caught all the fish – 2 large barracudas and 4 smaller snapper types. He was well pleased and the one fish fed five of us with a couple of steaks each and the rest of the group had the remaining fish as entrees, though they complained that they could hardly finish their own meal they ordered!!
Too
Iguana
Many iguanas live amongst the ruins soon we had to leave the island for our next adventure, though we were sad to go, we were delighted when we arrived at Flores in Guatemala and it was like Lake Como (so said one of the group who has been there) small island off one side of the second largest lakes in Guatemala with streets going up and down and a church a the top with lots of restaurants and cafes along the water’s edge. Lovely!! We visited the largest archaeological site in Guatemala (Tikal) - well worth the effort though it was not quite what I had imagined – it IS in the jungle, though the locals have really cleared the area so it is much more park like with swathes of jungle which have all the fauna such as spider monkeys, toucans, foxes, racoon like creatures whose name I have forgotten and lots more that we didn’t see. Palenque in Mexico is more as I had imagined because the site is partly excavated but much of the site we visited in the jungle can only be partly seen or glimpsed.
After a long night on the night bus from Flores through Guatemala city to Antigua,
Belize City
Run down and decrepit, Belize has definitely seen better days we dumped our gear, had a quick shower, and brekkie, then explored the town – it really looks like the classic Spanish Conquistadores city with the square in the middle and streets radiating from that with lots and lots of churches almost at every corner. The big difference here is that we have a few volcanoes looking down at us.
The following day we took a hike up the Volcano Pacaya, still a going concern, and we toasted marshmallows in the still smoking caverns while the freezing wind howled around us. Roman didn't make it as vomiting and diarhia got him the night before, and I went with the group. A very steep ascent made me choose the horse to walk up the mountain. And I am glad I did. So ends our tour.
Today is the last day of our stay in Guatemala and many of our tour group have already gone. Our plane leaves tomorrow morning.
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Elizabeth Skliros
non-member comment
Hi you two
Sounds like you had a fabulous time, lots of great experiences! Sorry you were sick Ramon. Thanks for sharing your holiday with me, lots of love.