White sands, turquoise seas and turbulent skies in Mexico

Mexico……a place that is strangely known by everyone, yet very little is known about it by most people.  Say the word Mexico and people will think, la cucuracha, tequila, cancun perhaps……..or perhaps high crime rates, Mexico City  and immigration fences with the USA!  But Mexico is so much more than this; for a start, it’s huge.  Again, the amorphous mass of land between North and South America tends to get overlooked in most people’s brains, but trust me it’s BIG.

We were off to the area around Cancun, about one and a half hours south of it, called Tulum; site of a small Mayan port outpost and also now a thriving hippy-esque tourist industry.  Friends (Dave and Paddy) had been there back in 2000 and I am sure it’s changed a lot since then.

By the time we landed in Mexico we had been travelling for a good 18 hours…..though I’d love to see the day that travelling for 18 hours can actually be said to be “good”.  Carrying the bags is a joy when one of you has is in a wheelchair and the other has been stung by a scorpion on the elbow.

The trip to Tulum was a rain sodden one. By the time we arrived at the gates of our new home, we were knackered and emotionally drained.  Still, we had 12 days ahead of us in paradise on an almost private beach in Mexico.  Couldn’t be that bad!

We moved in and thankfully the rain stopped for a while as we decanted our bags from the car and walked up into our little apartment.  Then the heavens opened and we went to sleep, utterly spent, to the sound of rain and a thunder storm. 

The path to paradise

No words required

Beach?  Check.  Beer?  Check.  Nice

Upon awakening, we realized we were indeed in paradise.  From our bed we could see, across our terrace, the beach.  There were some tall palm trees between us and the beach, but we could see and hear the waves rolling in on the shoreline and the sussuration of the palm tree leaves and the slow crash of water on sand…well….it was divine.  It was also a wee bit damp J  needless to say, with no air-conditioning, the windows were open the whole time and with the sea so close and the rain so prevalent, everything was a little bit damp.  This got a little worse once the roof seals failed and the previously quaint ceiling beams began to drip water into the room. 

Fancy that! Another beer!

When you’re this relaxed though, nothing seems to matter.  The manager shifted us one room down and this time we got somewhere with a meaningful fridge!  Nice.  Funny the sorts of things that can make you smile.  So we stocked it right up and spent the first few days utterly unwinding and resting up.  Julia had a quick trip to the Red Cross, which you may have read about in our last post and aside from that there was nothing but the odd bit of sunbathing on our pristine stretch of sand or catching up with ourselves.

Spot the snake

Julia’s foot was unfortunately not healing as well as my scorpion sting.  To be honest the whole “Affaire du Scorpion” sounded much more dangerous than it was and in the end the whole thing was a bit of an anti-climax.  I’m not a grasshopper and so I wasn’t going to die. 

In what seemed to be a concerted effort at giving the pain in her foot some company, she then proceeded to turn her lovely little backside into a curious shade of tomato red.  To be fair, other parts of her were also that lovely carmine colour, but that’s the part I remember the most J 

Cactus.....Julia couldn't believe they actually ate it....until we did later

Chile sir?  What sort?

The place we were staying in was basically one house, with some suites upstairs and a big suite covering the whole of the ground floor.  As it was at one end of the beach in Tulum, next to a nature reserve, there was barely any beach traffic and it truly felt “private”.  Some of our fellow guests took that as a cue to share their “private parts” with us on the beach…..which was not so nice!

The sea wasn’t as calm as we had thought, but not rough either.  Constant rolling waves and a beautiful clear turquoise colour, it never really got that deep until you went quite a ways out.  Antonio the caretaker brought us some coconuts to enjoy in the sun one day and on another the shrimp man came by and we bought 1kg of the biggest shrimps I have ever seen (at least 12 inches head to tail).

This is Julia's "don't mess with me face"

There was a lot of card playing during these days and Julia (typically) brought her own style and panache to a game called Spite and Malice that I have played for years with a particular friend.  He and I would embody the name of the game and take great pride in being as spiteful and malicious as we could be.  Julia didn’t like this style….she found it ugly and quite wrong, so she introduced her variation; Love and Care.  It worked.  Like a chess grandmaster’s signature move, it swept all my attempts to play the game as intended before it……..which was, in itself, the most annoying and spiteful thing she could have done.  ARGH!

As you can see.....I am NOT winning

Chuffed that she whoops me again

Matteo’s Bar and Restaurant on the “strip” (grand name for the only road….dirt road….in town) was the scene of some great games and we marinated ourselves in some nice strong margaritas a couple of times as Julia whooped my ass once again.  One night out for a slap up meal, where we ate cactus (straight up....we ate cactus) and realised that we'd rather cook ourselves than eat expensive meals that honestly we could cook just as well.

Smile - you don't have to cook tonight!

Cactus.....looking exactly like it did in the supermarket

One for Eddie Mackie......"the randomiser"

Another fine mess the dealer got me in to!

As with Costa Rica (though not as bad) our ever-present friends, the mosquitos, kept us on our toes.  Since leaving London, there have been few things we have missed.  I can certainly say that a lack of any meaningful (and annoying) insect presence is one of those things.

Smiling....we hadn't started playing yet

In New Zealand we “spread the love” by picking up hitch-hikers along the way and we continued this tradition in Mexico.  And we finished it there as well!  You see, helping your fellow man is all well and good, but it would be so much nicer if they helped us in return…..by taking a shower once or twice a year!  The people we picked up were an interesting bunch though and I suppose that’s the yin and the yang of the situation – an interesting chat in exchange for an interesting odour.  I am sure we’ll have better luck in the USA.

Towards the end we managed a couple of outings, one to go sailing and the other to Coba.  I was adamant Julia would have crutches before I would let Julia go near the ruins of Coba (and the pyramid she wanted to climb).  So first off, we went and bought some….then….sailing.  Wow, what a wonderful few hours we spent with Fabien and his catamaran.  He sailed in to our place and pulled it up onto our beach, we climbed aboard and then ….whooosh!  We were away. 

After sailing the length of the nature reserve we had next door to our place, we then decided to head to the ruins of Tulum and see them from the sea.  What a fantastic trip that was.  The water was a wonderful turquoise, the wind was just perfect and Julia took the helm and had her first taste of skipping across the sea in a 19’ catamaran.  Not a bad way to start your sailing career!

Seeing the ruins from our vantage point was a great experience and one we appreciated even more as we noticed the queues (or lines) of tourists slowly making their way in a rather disconsolate looking procession around the grounds.

Julia thinks this photo is funny

We on the other hand were cavorting in the waves, having great fun J  As we turned and headed for home the sea showed she was always in charge and was about as temperamental as a woman can be.  All of a sudden she threw a large and solitary grey cloud at Tulum, with backing vocals of a strong wind and fairly heavy rain.  

To be honest, it was so warm that the rain was fairly welcome and the wind just meant the ride got more interesting.  

Of course Fabien, charged with not capsizing us, might remember this differently, but Julia and I loved it.

By the time we pulled up again, we were ready for beers in the sun…..so we had beers in the sun.  Which was nice!  Then I popped upstairs and continued our tradition of making puttanesca wherever we went and Fabien joined us for lunch.  It was lovely, sitting outside in the mottled shade of the palm trees above us, sharing a meal with a new friend.

Fabien with us on the beach after our trip

Next day we headed off to Coba.  We had intended to leave by 7am, to make it there for the 8am opening.  Instead we left at 7.30am and arrived at 8.30….or so we thought.  We had forgotten that Julia’s clock was wrong on her phone so it was actually 9.30am and the crowds had already descended.  Poo.

Coba Limousine

Alex doing his best "mm, yes....I see now" impression

We grabbed a guide at the gates, jumped in a Coba Limousine and were pedaled around what was a truly interesting complex.  It was basically a “hub town” that acted as the centralized market and place of worship for the surrounding areas, with many of the Mayan roads leading to or radiating out (depending on your viewpoint) from the central pyramid of Coba.

All Mayan roads led to this pyramid...well the ones in this region of course, not ALL of them!

We'll never forget how beautiful this moment was

The road system they built was actually very impressive, especially when you consider they had no pack animals.  Instead, they had to rely on physiologically tortured workers to manhandle baskets of stones to wherever they wanted to build something.  The torture involved binding the workers heads when they were infants so that they grew in a strange almost conical shape with a long and flat forehead.  The reason was that the strap on the basket of stones would fit perfectly on their deformed forehead.  They would lean forward, balance the basket on their back and carry their loads to wherever required. 

We were shown evidence of how the neck vertebrae eventually fused together and this added to the rather brutal impression we were getting about the culture.  The Mayans didn’t go in for human sacrifice that much.  Of course there was the odd ceremony, but, unlike the Aztec, they weren’t culling tens of thousands of captured humans at any one time.  No, the Mayans like to blood-let as a means of purifying themselves and appeasing their Gods (clearly quite a sado-masochistic bunch, the Mayan Gods!).

The Mayans also had a form of basket/football.  It was a curious mix of the two games, with two teams of 3 able to use only their knees, elbows, hips and shoulders in their aim – which was to get a bloody heavy 3kg ball of rubber through a rather difficult to reach stone circle.  It wasn’t designed for a high scoring game, but apparently it did involve lots of injuries and brutal play, which was apparently de-rigeur back in the day.  

Captain to Referee: "Let me get this straight, you reckon I'm going to hit a ball with my hip and get it in that hoop?"

From the Romans to the Spartans, the Incans to the Mayans to the Vikings, there was, apparently, nothing like a bit of brutality to put a smile on someone’s face.  Weirder still, it was kind of a privilege to be chosen for the game, though they only happened once every 20 years or so….mainly because if you won, you were sacrificed and your blood was used to purify the land.  If you lost, you were sold into slavery for the rest of your life!

The tourist tree's bark

That be poison there

Our guide also showed us some other interesting facets of the Mayans life – such as their use of the tourist tree (named after its constant shedding of its red skin) and other plants for dyes or poisons.  Finally we arrived at the main pyramid and our guide left us to enjoy ourselves.

Two colours one bark....them Mayans were right clever!

All the way up like that!

Assuming that climbing 43m up a precarious stone pyramid in the midday heat is your idea of enjoyment.  If it isn’t, then try adding a reliance on crutches to the mix.  Maybe that sounds better?  NO?  Well there’s no pleasing some people apparently! 

Sweaty Bettys

Julia wasn’t to be deterred though and so off we set, with the shouts of a guide in our ears, forbidding us to climb any higher because it was dangerous.  There is nothing so cute or so annoying as a well-meaning guide making up rules to make themselves sound important, under the pre-text of “keeping you or the monuments safe”.  Pah!

Managing to look elegant in spite of circumstance

It was surprisingly steep

Insert Russian caption about the heat here

Some 30 minutes later we were looking down through a crowd of Russian tourists at the jungles below and though slightly sweaty, we were rather pleased that Julia had made it up there.  Then journey down again was a slow one, with Julia “scooting” her way down the steps on her backside.  Elegant!

Julia pulling her "I'm Invisible!" magic trick

Silly grins in the water

Next stop were some local cenotes.  These are fresh water-fed cave systems that open up for swimming and cave diving.  If you ever get a chance to visit them make sure you do, because they are stunning.  Cool, fresh and visually beautiful, it was a fantastic change from the oppressive heat and sunshine above ground.

A remote town (San Juan) out by Coba

San Juan Mayor: "We could pick that fence up, but then what would the tourists have to take photos of?"

Happiness is octopus, guacamole, ceviche and .....chile!

Our final few days in Tulum were a little more sun-blessed and we had the chance to enjoy the beach a lot more.  Then it was time to bid farewell to our secluded little sojourn and head off to the airport for our flight to LA.  It wasn’t long before we were standing (or in Julia’s case sitting) in line to check in and begin the next journey and visit our next and last continent.

We were off to Los Angeles to begin our round trip of the national parks in Western USA.