tulum
the weather is holding. kind of. i'm not quite sure what kind of freak pressure system we've found ourselves in but the forecast for the week was grey and rainy, so the half days of glorious sunshine which start to fade away into grey and intermittent drizzle as the afternoon wears on are actually a bit of a relief.
playa del carmen is a strange place, a complete tourist ghetto catering to americans and not backpackers with mcdonalds, diesel stores and high prices to match. to be fair the food is not expensive on a gram for gram basis: it's just that the portions are so inexplicably huge. actually an explanation is close at hand in the obese bellies and gargantuan arms on display all around. still, i'd much rather pay half prices for meals then sending half my meals back... forget kiddie-adult, they should do europe/us prices.
we went down to tulum today, a set of ruins perched on a set of cliffs overlooking the caribbean. after a minor diversion caused by me absent mindedly getting off the bus a few miles early, we arrived at our final set of mayan ruins to be confronted by hordes and hordes of gringos: the curse of proximity to cancun, and indeed playa, strikes again. the actual ruins were again strangely disappointing: the juxtaposition of crumbling stone structures with the deep blue-green expanse of the sea should have been stunning, but all views were obscured by people milling around everywhere, like bizarrely clothed camera toting yankee flies. the other problem was the manner in which the authorities have made the site as ergonomic as possible. this may sound like a good thing, but the neat pathways and steps and the relative paucity of structures make the whole area look more like a mayan theme park than the real thing. if tikal was versailles then tulum seems like eurodisney.
strange. anyhow the final days are all about tat shopping and relaxing before heading back into the maelstrom of housemoving, flathunting and work. off to watch a scrap which seems to be brewing between a mariachi band and a crew of panpipe toting peruvian impostors, may the best tones win!
fingers crossed
11 hours on a sweaty bus to chetumal, then another five up to playa del carmen. i've had worse, but not a great day by any means. still three countries in twelve hours is pretty impressive, we got a great deal on a lovely place in playa, and we've now done all our hard yards. from now on it's short day trips and lazing on the beach, providing the weather holds...
tikaled pink
the rain didn't lift in san ignacio, so we set off for flores in guetamala early on friday morning. having made our way to the border we set about looking for a bus, or indeed any form of transportation, towards the small town which serves as a jumping off point for the mayan ruins at tikal. having hunted around for a while we chanced across a minibus packed with well meaning north americans (including a scouse canadian liverpool fan, we´re everywhere) going straight on to tikal. i'm a bit of a sunrise junkie, as well documented elsewhere, but i also like to think of myself as a realist (liverpool are bound to win the title: have that by the way chelsea, ha!) and it was clear that it was going to be too cloudy and arguably rainy to enjoy an early morning over tikal. as such we hopped into the bus, keeping our lips zipped on how little we were paying in comparison to our fellow travellers, and headed off.
the area on the belize/guetamalan border is still subject to dispute between the two countries, the net result being that noone is willing to take responsibility for the first 60km of roads: this led to a tarmacless boggy, sometimes hairy, start to ourjourney westwards. still we arrived at tikal with no harm done, dumped our bags, and headed into the ruins.
tikal really hit all the right buttons for me: it's epic in scale, with regards both to individual structures and also the overall area over which the ruins are laid out, and it remains immersed in the guetamalan jungle. obviously there are well trodden paths hewn into the ground, but these were both stodgily challenging in the rain and continually encroached by foliage and the sounds of the jungle on either side. it was sanitised but it still felt raw enough, particualrly in comparison to the mexican sites.
the actual ruins are spectacular in their own right even without the glorious settings: five huge pyramids, their peaks poking out from above the trees, surrounded by a variety of other structures. you could even head up the pyramids, struggling up perilously steep, slippery steps to be rewarded by some awesome ariel views. great stuff, even the grey misty weather perfectly complemented the faded grandeur of the entire place.
after a few tiring hours trekking through mud and up stone, we headed off to flores. this is an incredibly pretty little place with oodles of charm and cheap accommodation set on a huge lake which we would have probably hung around in (flores, not the lake) were it not for two things: the grey drizzle (which we could have lived with) and the complete lack of cash (which we really couldn't). due to a banking crisis, there are currently simply not enough quetzales in circulation: the atms, the banks, the shops, everyone has run out and were stumbling by on what they had and what they could blag. as the next day was a sunday, wherein there was no chance at all of any cash being released, it was just untenable to stay.
we had a good night though wandering the cobbled streets and culminating in a lively dinner with a couple of expats, si and julio, who were living the tax free life working as oil traders in guetamala city. there eagerness to hear some british accents, tales of trips with the british ambassador and drive by shootings, some controversial views on gender relations and modern parenting, and a few beers and brandies led to a good night all round.
all in all a long, but extremely satisfying day: a 5am bus journey back to chetumal seemed a horrific idea.
