Travel Blog 2010

I haven’t manage to update for a few weeks, as we have been camping, so expect a few updates over the coming weeks. From dull Campeche we travelled to Palenque, a relatively non descript jungle town which is pleasant enough, but is 10km down the road from some spectacular ruins:

The amazing thing here are not only the ruins but the fact that you can go in them, and also the incredible jungle setting. Carved into a wall we saw epic skull #1

Its also near a beautiful series of waterfalls, Agua Azul:

The water here is normally vivid turquoise (I have been here in February 10 years ago) but we came during the one month of the year when the water is vivid brown. Still, there was a rope swing at least:

We found a company that could take us to the ruins in the morning then onto Agua Azul, then drop us off at San Cristobal de las Casas, our next stop. We got there late, but could already tell that we loved the place. It is so beautiful, and full of the most amazing people.

We found it incredibly humbling being here as loads of kids from the surrounding villages come down to the town to sell their goods. We bought loads of this stuff, as when a bare-footed 4 year old asks for 10 pesos for a little doll, its impossible to say no.

From San Cristobal it was on to Oaxaca (the correct spelling for that dreadful restaurant chain in London). This involved taking a night bus. You would think by now we were very used to these, and we are. The last time I took a night bus in Mexico however, March 2000, William Carleton and myself were taken hostage for 12 hours and robbed of everything we had, which was rather inconvenient. Needless to say I was slightly apprehensive, but the journey went very smoothly (for a journey in Mexico, only 5 military checkpoints) and Oaxaca is another incredible city

We visited an expensive but great museum and cultural centre where, amongst other things, we found epic skull #2

We met John Gregory Smith here, as he has been doing some travel himself and he treated us to a fancy dinner. Food was great service was hilarious and restaurant was loud (they blamed it on a water pump) but it was a nice reminder of home and the finer things in life.

After Oaxaca we went to Mexico city, where we only had one full day, so we had a lot to cram in. Unfortunately the zoccolo was hosting some kind of yogurt themed festival, which is a shame as it is the most impressive city square I have ever seen.

We wandered round taking in the city and went up the fake empire state building to see the view(ticket valid all day so we went up again after dark)

Mexico City is fantastic, and although on paper it is quite dangerous in reality it is safe as anywhere and the people are incredibly friendly.

We decided rather last minute to go and see a Luche Libre (Mexican wrestling) match. Luckily the night we went it was a 12 man cage fight. Unfortunately though there is nothing for me to show you as we weren’t allowed to take our camera in. Needless to say, I will definitely go again next time I am in Mexico. I did manage pick up a souvenir though:

(apologies for camera-phone picture)

We are very sad to be leaving Mexico, it is such a great country totally mis-represented by western media which sells by being overly dramatic. Still, next stop USA, and San Francisco is our first City. Coming soon is a food special blog about Mexican food, so until then, Fight The Man, man.

I have wanted to visit the island of Cozumel for a very long time. It seems though that I have missed my chance to see a beautiful Mexican Caribbean Island, as now it is just a resorters paradise/travellers hell. No local restaurants really remain, so we just ate in the supermarket. Although there is a nice waterfront to sit and have a drink on, the amount of hustlers and pedlars there are yelling “hey buddy, Cuban cigars?”  or “special price for honeymooners” makes it a really offensive place to be. I only bothered to take the camera out one evening as there was a nice sunset:

The main attraction of Cozumel are the coral reefs that surround it, second in size only to the Great BarrierRreef. Unfortunately, as we are not divers we couldn’t see much of it as the shallower parts were largely wiped out by hurricane Wilma. Still, it was an ok-ish snorkel trip:

Whilst we were on Isla Cozumel Tropical Storm Alex rolled in and stayed with us for the next week or so, meaning our stay inour next stop Playa del Carmen was fairly miserable. Whether this was due to the storm or the fact its easier to to get a Whopper with onion rings than tacos and guacamole I’m not sure.

As the storm started to clear we headed south again to Tulum, a place that I have been looking forward to returning to very much. Again, however, we were very disappointed. The Cabanas where you could hang a hammock that used to cost a couple of dollars a night have gone and been replaced by $100 a night cabanas with beds in, that look really really overpriced. We just camped on the beach, but even this has turned terrible, the sand is still icing sugar white and the waters still vivid turqouise, but there is so much litter now that it is quite an unpleasant place to sit. Whether this is from the recent development of hundereds of resorts and apartments in the surrounding area I do not know, but this will definitely be my third and final visit to Tulum.

The ruins, are still amazing, but whereas before there may be 2 or 3 other people there with you today it looks like this:

I can understand why, as they are amazing:

After this 3rd disappointment in a row we left Tulum beach and headed into Tulum town, a few miles inland. Here we arranged to snorkel one of the Cenotes in the area. The whole of the Yucatan Peninsular is linked by a series of underwater tunnels and sinkholes, known as Centoes. The jungle above is fed from the water in these which is why it can be so lush here even during the dry season. The snorkeling was amazing, and I only have this terrible photo of nikki swimming through one of the caves to show you, but if you are in the area I highly recommend it. You can just see in the foreground a small tetra fish, which live there alongside catfish and cichlids.

From Tulum we headed off to Merida, the State Capital of Yucatan, where we had only planned to spend a night but ended up spending 3 as it was so nice:

We stayed in a hostel with a pool, and generally got on with enjoying travelling again, after 10 fairly terrible days. From Merida we headed to Chitchen Itza, the Yucatan Peninsula’s most famous Mayan ruins. They were incredible, especially the main pyramid:

It was actually cheaper to book a tour than to make our own way on public transport to the ruins, and a nice bonus was that we got to see another cenote, a 40 metre deep sinkhole full of black catfish, the best natural swimming pool I have ever seen:

After much persuaision I got Nikki to jump of the diving platform. She is on the left, i’m on the right.

 

 

 

 

 

After Merida it was onto Palanque but we decided last minute to go via Campeche, the most boring colonial town we have yet visited, but with a nice view from the hostel roof.

The dorm was unreasonably hot at night, so after a few beers I asked if they would mind if I pitched our tent on the roof. They didn’t, so we managed to accidently stumble across epic camping site #5

We are now in Palenque getting ready to visit the ruins and various waterfalls in the morning, then onto San Cristobal, where we will be meeting a certain JGS.

As you may know by now our plans have changed and we are coming home about three weeks earlier than we thought on 6th August. I will try and do a couple more blogs before then. So until next time, I shall not be as smug.