Tulum or not Tulum...

After an extremely heavy night in Miami, Priya and I found ourselves chatting to a group of people in the lift up to our hostel. I was chatting to a Russian girl and Priya, a Mexican man called Arael. We would see him from time to time during our stay in Miami and up til then I hadn't said much to him except 'Hi'. During their 20 minute chat he told her that he lives in a place called Tulum, that is very beautiful and has many ruins & cenotes nearby. He also said that if we came to town he would show us around. Very forward for a 20 minute conversation, but he seemed like an alright kinda guy so we agreed. As it turned out Arael is a lovely bloke and a true gentleman.

Tulum is everything Arael described and more. Whilst we were there, we visited two sets of ruins; Coba and Chichen Itza. Both were astonishing and very fortunate to still be standing. You see after the Spanish invaded Mexico and South America, they would take apart these temples and important buildings and build Catholic cathedrals and churches in their place, using the same stones!

Coba is a Mayan city which is in the heart of the jungle and the buildings are quite far apart from each other. We chose to ride bikes to get to each building, which just added to the sense of adventure. Coba is also great because you can climb the largest pyramid, which gives a breathtaking view of the jungle below.

Chichen Itza is the largest set of ruins in the state of Yucatán and the second largest city in the Aztec Empire. The Pyramid is the main focal point of the ruins, with a massive ball court close by. It is mainly out in the open, with few trees to shade you near the main buildings. Chichen Itza is also extremely touristy, with locals selling carved goods and Mayan clothing around every corner, with selling tactics that even Del Boy would be proud of!

Tulum is situated in the Yucatán province, which is famous for more than just the ruins. Cenotes. They are underground caves that have become flooded over millions of years of rising seas. Under the Yucatán there is an underground river with dozens of these openings known as cenotes (which comes from the Mayan word for well). Depending on the type of water in the different cenotes you can either snorkel or scuba dive in them.

As we don't scuba dive (which I am bitterly disappointed about) we went to a freshwater cenote called 'Gran Cenote', which was no further than 3km from our hostel. The water was freezing, but lovely considering the heat outside the water. There were lots of little fish swimming about and I even saw a fully grown turtle just before we were about to leave, which I hear is almost unhead of in that cenote. But the thing that hooked me was the fact we were swimming with fish, inside caves complete with stalactites and stalacmites, the occasional flash light illuminating invisible darkened caverns from scuba divers below, the icing on the cake being the bats flying above. It was both frightening and exhilarating. I generally find snorkelling fine, but the whole experience left my breathing panicky and uncontrolled. This, i thought, felt like a real adventure!

I could go on about Tulum for a very long time. It is a real gem and has so much to offer. All I would advise is go before everyone else does and it gets too touristic. It has begun to already and we possibly may have caught it one summer too late, but there is no doubt this small town will become over populated with people searching for the perfect holiday destination. Dare I say it, they might be right.

PS.