Let’s go to Coba…
I know everyone knows I’m staying in Tulum right now and expects a report on that. I’m going to put that off for awhile because I have mixed feelings and want to sort those out. In the meantime, I will post my experience at Coba today.
Okay, so I bought this map of the Yucatan when Border’s was going out of business a couple years ago. It cost me about a dollar and I couldn’t pass it up.
Before I go on with the rest of my post, I want to mention that I decided to rent a car while staying in Tulum. I knew I wanted to do some exploring but have heard some bad stories about renting a car…but I went ahead and did it. I was referred to a place in Tulum by the person who owned the hotel where I was staying so I felt better about that. It cost $35.00 USD a day which included insurance, so that didn’t seem bad to me.
I was kind of nervous about driving a car in Mexico considering all the crazy cab drivers. But to tell you the truth I’m kind of a confident (sometimes kind of crazy) driver myself (having lived on the east coast), so I thought I’d give it a whirl. Here’s my new wheels…
A Hyundai! Whoo-hoo…I own a 2009 Hyundai Elantra! This is what the inside looked like. A standard transmission…and I forgot to take pictures of the torn upholstery.
While driving down the road, I thought I’d take a look at the odometer. I thought maybe it had tenths or hundreths of the mile at the end, but I timed it and this is the actual number. If that’s the case, then my 2009 Elantra (with only 19,500 miles on it right now) should last the rest of my lifetime.
After getting used to the extremely loose gear shift, I was feeling pretty good. I think this car has had its share of topes. Speaking of which, one of the biggest warnings I would give to people is to watch out for the…
The road bumps. That’s right…they are EVERYWHERE! Just when you least expect it, one will appear out of nowhere. That’s why no vehicle in Mexico has any suspension. The topes. They can look like this…
Or like this…
Or they can be about four feet wide and about a foot tall. Those are usually on main thoroughfares and I didn’t want to stop traffic to take a picture of one of those.
Okay…on to Coba. Coba has one of the few natural lakes in the Yucatan which i did not know about.
Here’s the layout of the Coba ruins…
So I went in and starting taking pictures…
After I took this one, I started getting a beeping noise every time I wanted to take another picture. My camera told me that the memory card was full. WHAT??? It only had about 20 pictures on it and I didn’t bring the new 16 GB card with me because I didn’t think I’d be taking that many pictures! I went back down to the souvenir shops and found a place that sold me a 4 GB card for 300 pesos. Bleah!! This is one of those times when you eat your stupidity for the sake of getting photos. Live and learn. But I’m glad I did…you’ll see why.
So, at the beginning of the ruins, there’s an area where they will rent you a bicycle or will transport you with a trike to the ruins. After I purchased the expensive memory card, I went back in and said “posh” to the bikes/trikes. After a million miles later, I wish I had opted for the bikes/trikes. After hiking about 20 minutes from the entrance, I got to this…
And then after another 20 minutes, I got to this…
So now I’m thinking, “Is this really worth all this walking???” Then I get to this and I think, “Well, this is a little better.”
And again after another 10 minutes (and a prayerful thank you for a refreshment booth), I finally got to this…
And I’m thinking, “Oh, my God…you really CAN climb it!” Then, as I got closer, I thought, “Yikes…do I really want to?” It’s a million degrees out here and that is WAY up there!
So, I tell myself…”You came all this way…you talked about climbing ruins. This is it.”
So I did it. I had to stop about three times to rest on the way up, but a bunch of people who were younger than me had to do the same thing, so that made me feel better.
Here’s the view from the top. The one benefit was that there was a really nice breeze up there.
I was really hoping there would be some kind of restroom up there so I could fix my hair for a nice picture…but, alas, not…this was all they had…
Which is why I look pretty sorry after trekking up those rocks…
I went down backwards the whole way…that way I didn’t have to look down and I held on to the rope. It also helped that I was a tomboy when I was young…my three older brothers would have given me sh** if I hadn’t done this. A lot of women went down on their butts one step at a time. It is an intimidating sight to look down.
After I got down, my legs were so weak, I had to sit and rest. When I finally got up to walk, they were still shaky, so I had to take a trike ride back. My one wimpish part of the deal.
By the way, I’ve heard that they will be not allowing people to climb this ruin soon, so if you want to do it, you should do it pretty quickly.
So I went to the main restaurant there afterwards because I hadn’t even had breakfast before the big climb. The chicken tacos were so-so…
But this definitely hit the spot…
Next stop…Playa del Carmen!
Having decided to leave PoMo on Thursday, I woke up thinking I would post to my blog first thing and then leave. Well, as I mentioned in my last post, the wifi in my room was considerably less than dependable, so I ended up going out for breakfast instead. I went back to Pelicanos because I knew they had Huevos Motulenos…my favorite Mexican breakfast as many of you already know. They also served a complimentary dish of fruit.
Hell would freeze over before I would ever have a Coke for breakfast when I’m home…I always have a couple cups of coffee when I get up. But I almost never get coffee when I’m in Mexico because it’s so darn hot! In fact, I had TWO Cokes this morning because there was hardly any breeze and, well, it was so darn hot! Here are the Huevos Motulenos. I’ve had them here before and they are very good.
While I was walking to the restaurant, I saw these flowers in front of one of the shops in town. I don’t know what they are but they are so pretty.
Finished breakfast, got packed up and it was off to the bus. It’s about a two-mile cab ride to the bus pick-up area. The cab driver dropped me off on the highway, then I had to cross the highway to the other side, buy my ticket to Playa del Carmen because you have to stop there to get another bus to Tulum. Then I crossed back over the highway and waited for the bus. The wait turned out to be about 30 seconds as I saw him coming down the road…perfect timing!
Buses in Mexico are awesome. The United States could learn a few things from Mexico about public transportation within the country regarding these buses. They are very cheap (my fare to Playa del Carmen was 26 pesos which is somewhere around two American bucks), extremely comfortable and air conditioned…and they play movies. This is a horrible picture, but I’m posting it to show what they’re like. They have curtains on all the windows so that you can pull them shut if you don’t want to see outside.
This bus was playing the movie, “Date Night,” with Steve Carell which was dubbed in Spanish. It’s so funny to see an American movie dubbed in Spanish because it usually doesn’t sound anything like the real actor. I had never seen this movie before, but I was laughing along with everyone else even though I didn’t understand a damn word.
So, here’s the bus station in Playa del Carmen. While I was on the bus, I decided to just stay the night in Playa. I have reservations on the 3rd and 4th at a place in Tulum, and I thought that maybe they would have a vacancy tonight as well. But I knew I would be able to find a place in Playa because it’s a much larger town and they have a lot more hotels.
The big touristy area in Playa is a strip of stores, restaurants and hotels that runs about 10 blocks. It is full of souvenir shops, restaurants, high-end stores, bars, fast-food restaurants, drug stores, real estate offices, tour guides, etc. You don’t want to know the number of times I heard, “Hey, lady…come in my shop!” I’m not a Playa fan. It is too big, too glitzy, too over-priced and too slick. But I didn’t want to take the chance that my hotel in Tulum didn’t have a vacancy tonight, so I decided to find a place to stay.
While walking down the strip, I spied this place with a vacancy sign out front. It’s the Hotel Lunata.
I walked in and found this wonderful oasis. This picture doesn’t do it justice because it was truly a lush garden and you didn’t feel like you were anywhere near a big city.
Complete with the resident cat…
I decided to go for it because it was really cute! Look at that beamed ceiling! And the inlay of river rock on the tile floor…
And all the wood…
And is this the cutest bathroom you’ve ever seen or what?? Look at that wood sink counter!
This is just outside my doorway…
I looked in the little refrigerator in the room and instantly thought, “Sweet!!!”
Then I saw the sign on top of the fridge. Darn it.
It’s a good thing this little trinket was glued to the shelf because I would have taken it. Haha…I kid, I kid.
It also had a tiny balcony where you could see what was going on on the strip. Here’s my view to the right…
And to the left…
The one bad thing about the place was that I couldn’t connect to the internet in my room. So, since I didn’t have internet access in the morning to do a post in PoMo, I needed to find a restaurant that had wifi so I could do some work. I found one very close to the hotel and just had to order their cheese stuffed poblano pepper. It was VERY good.
And here are my friendly waiters, Ricardo and Hugo, who endured me sitting there for a couple of hours while I blogged and checked e-mails. Hugo looks a bit serious, but he was a very nice guy.
Only a block away from the strip is the Caribbean Sea.
Toes in Playa sand…
The beaches are kept very clean of seaweed here.
It always bugs me when people get in the way of my pictures, so sometimes I just take them out…haha!
This looks kind of fun. Maybe on another day…
Here’s a shot of the shoreline. It’s always pretty crowded in Playa. I think a lot of nationals come here on holidays.
They even have a Harley store here…
I want one of these for my font porch back home…
I went through one shop with the strangest signs I’ve ever seen. I’m thinking maybe the owner is not real “guy-friendly”…
They needing some English editing on this one…
This one just totally creeped me out…
Towards the evening, a lot of “entertainment” comes out with people trying to make money in any way possible.
Lots of artists…
And strange sights…
I’ll have some time in the morning before I have to catch the bus for Tulum, so I may get a few more shots of Playa.
Puerto Morelos Update
I had planned on making this post last night, but after editing all my photos I was going to use, I lost all of them somewhere in the ozone and was too tired to do them all over again. Then this morning, my hotel’s wifi was more “miss” than “hit” so I couldn’t do it there, either. Now I’m sitting in a restaurant in Playa del Carmen FINALLY getting to this post. *sigh* On to yesterday’s story…
I had to get up at 4:00 yesterday to make my 7:45 flight out of Austin. I decided to eat at the airport and opted for the Salt Lick booth for a breakfast taco.
I like the Salt Lick, but this was awful. I couldn’t wait to get to Mexico for some good food.
My flights were smooth and totally on time which is always a plus. The line in customs was very reasonable and moved very quickly…
…because all the booths were open. Things were going well…
…until I got to the luggage area where the line went all the way down the room and back again to go through the luggage security check.
But it actually went pretty quickly and I got the green light. Another good sign!
Here are the happy and efficient Best Day people in their usual spot outside the airport and still using the trash cans for their clip boards.
Even though I had to wait about 15 minutes, I got a van with two other couples going to Playa del Carmen, so I was the first stop. Yay! Here we are going down the highway…
When we got to Puerto Morelos, the driver turned left when we got to the town center. I said, “Isn’t the Hacienda Morelos the other way??” He asked, “Oh, is it??” I said, “Yes, it is.” I was right…it was. Here’s the silly gringa telling the Mexican driver where her hotel is in Mexico…haha…go figure. Who knows how long we would have been driving around if I hadn’t known. Anyway, here’s the hotel…
The reviews on TripAdvisor were pretty good, but I was a little disappointed. It’s 80 pesos per night, which I thought was a little high. The room itself was okay…large, air conditioned, with a flat screen TV.
But the bathroom was really dated. And the lights were so dim, it was like turning on a nightlight. At least it hid a few wrinkles, though…haha! I will say it had the best water pressure I think I’ve ever experienced in Mexico. I love the “water droplet” tiles. While I was taking a shower, I noticed that I couldn’t find two matching tiles. Do you think they achieve this by actually dropping water on these tiles some way?? Weird.
I took a walk down the beach and was surprised to see all the seaweed…even in the area where all the people swim. I don’t remember it being this bad on the two prior visits I made here. And the beach was much more crowded than I’ve ever seen it. But, apparently, that’s because a lot of Mexican nationals are on vacation at this time.
I was hungry by this time since all I had had all day was the lousy breakfast taco at the airport. I stopped at Pelicanos for an early dinner. Ahhh…my first cerveza. Boy, did it taste good after that walk on the beach. It’s hot down here, but actually not as bad as I thought it was going to be.
Complimentary chips and pico de gallo…
The pico de gallo was excellent. Another “aahhhh”….
I think there must be some kind of Mexican law that requires all restaurants to wrap utensils in napkins as tightly as humanly possible.
I ordered the fish with a Venezuelan sauce. It tasted good but there were a LOT of bones in there.
Now it’s margarita time! This place is the Cantina Habanero and is just down the block from the Posada el Moro…the hotel where I’ve stayed in the past in PoMo. It used to be the only bar that has live music and is open until all hours of the night. It is frequented regularly by a lot of the ex-pats living there. While walking around this morning, I saw a sign for a new bar called “Cheers,” so I guess they have competition now. I didn’t check it out. Anyway, the Cantina is where I got the scoop that there is a new government in PoMo now that doesn’t really care much about what goes on. A couple of the ex-pats run an English school that used to get a lot of support from the government, but now it doesn’t from the new group.
One of the guys had his dog with him…
What a character. He looks exactly like the dog from “Men in Black,” doesn’t he? Haha!
Some touristy PoMo shots…
Some changes include…
This place is vacant now. It used to be a really nice jewelry store.
And they’ve torn down El Pirata and the gift shop that was on the corner. The guys at the bar said no one knows what is going in there. El Pirata is building another place across the street from the Cantina Habanero.
My first time in PoMo was in March of 2010. They were working on this place then. And they were still working on it in March of 2011. Now it’s for sale…and apparently is still not finished. Very strange little place. It would make a cute…something…I don’t know what.
My traditional “toes in the sand” shot…
And here’s the view from my room when I got back in the evening. Sweet.
I had planned on staying in PoMo for two nights, but then felt like it would have been a waste of my time, so I headed out on the bus this morning thinking I was going to go to Tulum right away. Since you have to stop in Playa del Carmen on the way, I thought what the hell…I’ll just stay here for the night. Kinda fun just winging it.
Random Travel Musings 