Tulum, marriage and cenotes in Quintana Roo and a quick trip to Belize.

Tulum

Lunch with the newlyweds, Jeff and Karla.

I know, right?  Who writes a title that long?  Well, I kind of had to because it has been so long since I have made a blog post.  Sorry, it has been a busy couple of weeks.  My sister, my only and MUCH older sister (she always loves that), got married on Feb. 1st in Cancun so Marne and I took a flight over to the Caribbean side to take part in the festivities.

Cenote in Quintana Roo

Cenote diving with Rawly, Aven, Marne and the Captain.
(click on this link to see the video that Rawly did)

While we were there we drove out to a cenote in the state of Quintana Roo (very close to Cancun). Cenotes, or sometimes spelled xenotes, are cavernous underground, fresh water rivers and caves that flow sometimes on the surface and sometimes far underground.  The Maya regarded them as holy waters and they were definitely an important part of the civilization here on the Yucatan peninsula.  They are amazing!  Crystal clear water surrounded by lush jungle.  As you approach it appears to simly be a really nice swimming hole.  However, once you jump in, and if you are daring enough to freedive down some dark sketchy tubes, you will be rewarded with light at the end of the tunnel (most of the time) that will have you finding the surface far from the spot where you dove down.  Honestly, how beautiful they are is hard to describe with words.  Go to YouTube and look up Cenote diving in Yucatan.

One of our spare days Marne and I drove down to the ruins of Tulum, a complex of Mayan ruins that sits right on the aqua blue coast of the Caribbean.  They are incredibly beautiful but somewhat encumbered with the vast amount of tourists that come to view them.

As we cruise in Mexico we have a visa that allows us to be in the country for 6 months.  That creates an obvious problem if you plan to stay in the country for 9 months as we are doing this year.  You cannot get it renewed at a consulate. You must leave the country and then return in order to get a new visa.  One afternoon about 2pm we were looking at a map for things to do and we noticed that the Belize border was not that far away.  So a quick and last minute decision was made to drive Karla's rental car the 3-4 hours to Belize, cross the border and then re-enter to take care of our visa problem. It was a long trip but we got what we went there for and then headed back north to Cancun.

On the way home we decided to stop at a local, side of the road taco place to grab some dinner.  They had various cuts of meat (that is a pleasant way of saying a variety of body parts) but they were all borrego...goat.  I know it doesn't sound good but we had some at a flea market in Santiago and they were delicious.  We decided to go with the tongue tacos and were a bit surprised when the gal brought out a complete, boiled goat head, cut the tongue out and then chopped it up and slapped it on the tortillas.  A bit graphic before eating but hey, we are in Mexico!  I wouldn't say they were delicious but they were pretty good and they did the trick!

The trip back to Puerto Vallarta was riddled with a total of 6 hours of delayed flights and then finally a taxi ride to La Cruz where we arrived at 1:30am, about 5 hours late for our dinghy ride out to the boat.  So we had no way to get back to the boat unless we wanted to make the 1/2 mile swim at 2 in the morning. The night guard was kind enough to let us into the La Cruz yacht club building where we attempted to sleep on the floor in the VIP room.  The VIP room is air conditioned VERY well.  Laying on the floor with only a t-shirt and shorts we felt like we were trying to sleep in a meat locker!  Many times necessity is the catalyst of ingenuity so we gathered all of the seat cushions from around the room and stacked them on top of us for some insulation.  They worked quite well but sleep definitely evaded us that night.  It was a LONG day!

We are happy to be home here on the boat anchored in La Cruz.  We will hang out here for a few days to take care of some projects then we will most likely head north a bit to look for some surf.

Ciao for now.

SV Liahona
Bret and Marne