Life's a beach in Mexico

For those of you that know me, you know that I love the beach. I crave very hot weather, powdery white sand and crystal clear waters.

 

 

I didn't have a lot of time to to discover secluded beaches is Mexico so made the most of the popular tourist haunts.

My stays in both Playa del Carmen and Cancun were little pieces of luxury. Together with three new friends, we checked into all inclusive resorts in both beachside towns.

In Australia it is rare to find an all inclusive resort so I had never experienced this type of holiday. It was good but there is a trap .... the cocktail intake was very high and drinking commenced quite early in the day. But it's hard to refuse ... actually I didn't even try.

I loved Playa. While it is jam packed with tourists it has a load of charm ... kinda like Palm Cove in far north Queensland but on a much bigger scale.

Cancun on the other hand is the Gold Coast on steroids. You wouldn't be mistaken for thinking you are in the US rather than Mexico. But the beach was amazing. And the fact that a little man would deliver cocktails to you on the beach made this place perfect.

There were loads of random dudes dressed up like this ... one way to try and make money I guess.

 

With my fabulous friends Teresia, Olga and Gemma ...

After this luxury I headed south to Tulum. Mmmmm amazing beaches. Think the finest white powdery sand you've ever seen .... it compares to White Haven beach in the Whitsundays. I spent a few days relaxing on the beach and swimming in the clear blue water.

But I did manage to do a little bit on sight seeing. It wasn't hard as the Tulum Ruins are perched on a cliff overlooking the beach. I wandered around checking out the ruins but actually had more fun watching the iguanas that seem to run the place.

I wandered through the ruins for a bit but soon the water beckoned .... there is nothing quite like the waters of the Carribean.


A few more pics .....

Mexico - Last Days

Mexico - Tulum

Amazing Mayans .... Chichen Itza

If you're in to Mayan ruins, then Chichen Itza is a must see.

This site is one of Mexico's most famous archaeological sites .... as the hordes of tourist buses would attest to.

But we arrived relatively early so managed to see most of the site before the multitudes descended.




The main area of the site is the Great Plaza which is home to the Castle Pyramid, El Castillo. It is designed to represent the Mayan calendar and our guide (who was also our bus driver) got very passionate about giving us intricate detail about angles of the sun, time of year etc etc. It was really rather interesting and he managed to hold my attention, quite a challenging thing to do at times.

The pyramid is a series of steps and if you look across the corners each step is a perfect right-angle triangle. There are smaller steps running up the middle of each side. You're not allowed to climb on this pyramid so the dude who was doing maintenance half way up thought he was pretty special.

There is an enormous ball court called Gran Juego de Pelota. The court has a ring half way down each side, but they are so high it makes you wonder what kind of game these dudes were playing. The acoustics in this area are amazing .... I clapped a few times but really should have belted out a song or two to really test it out.

The temple at one end of the plaza has a sacrifice stone. If you've read some of my earlier posts you would know that we tried to make use of these stones whenever possible. In another area around 50 skeletons have been found .... not sure if they were naughty and were sacrificed or if they were special people who were honored.

The detail in some of the stones is amazing. I particularly like the rows of skeleton heads.

As with all major tourist sites, the touts are about. Actually there is an over abundance of them. This would annoy many people but I managed to pick up a cool skull singlet at an over inflated price, but I was happy.

As we left the site we met a wall of people coming in. The ruins are cool but if I'd arrived a bit later I may have turned around and kept on going.

Mexico - Chichen Itza

Roadtrippin' thru Mexico .... Palenque & Merida

We decided to hire a mini bus to make the trip to Palenque.

We were delayed slightly (read that as 2.5 hours) when the locals decided it was time for some fund raising.

They blocked the only road through town and everyone had to pay to get through. Cars, buses and trucks were lined up for miles. Soon the streets filled with kids trying to cash in on this captive audience.

Ok so we got a little bored and had to play on the roof of the bus...

After a long drive it was a relief to stop at a waterfall and have a dip. The water was refreshing to say the least.

Palenque is famous for it's Mayan pyramids. These ruins seem to have grown out of the rainforest. The precision and detail of the buildings is amazing. While very different, there are loads of similarities to the Egyptian pyramids. Kinda made me wonder if the Mayans and Egyptians had ever shared building stories over a tequilla or two.

This site is one of the best examples of Mayan architecture in Mexico. There are hundreds of ruins spread over about 15 square km's but only some of the buildings have been uncovered. Probably a good thing as it was way too hot to walk the entire site.

The area was first occupied in 100 BC but flourished from AD 630 to 740. It's incredible to think that all the buildings were constructed without the use of metal tools, pack animals or the wheel. Quite impressive really.

We may have 'sacrificed' Fabian on the steps of the ruins.....

The walk out of the ruins kinda reminded me of being in Tasmania ... except it was very hot.

The next stop was the town of Merida. I got off the bus and headed to the hotel. It was only after I'd checked in that I realized that my bag of presents for my family were still under the bus seat. It took a trip back to the bus station and another to the bus depot the next day to retreive the bag. After all that running around I headed straight to DHL to ship the stuff back to Oz. Bloody nightmare.

Merida is known as the cultural capital of the Yucatan Peninsular. There are cobbled streets, impressive plazas and interesting little shops. I did a spin round town on the tourist bus to check out the sites.

Soon it was time to hit the road ... more ruins and some beach life coming up.

Mexico - Palenque

Mexico - Merida