Roam With Me! -- Holbox Island, Mexico

Now let's get to my absolutely most favorite place in the Yucatan Peninsula (and quite possibly my most favorite place on Earth!) -- Holbox Island. This was my second visit to this magnificent place, and I'm hoping it wasn't my last.

Holbox Island, or more correctly Isla Holbox, is situated off the northern tip of the peninsula, pretty much smack dab where the Gulf of Mexico waters meet those of the Caribbean Sea, 

Our route took us from Merida across through Vallodolid and eventually up to Chiquila where you have to leave your car in one of the many family-run parking facilities. From there, you take one of the ferries operated by two different groups and cross to the island. Ferries run every half hour until about 11:00 at night. There is a constant stream of men/boys on special bikes who will find you and transport your luggage to the dock if you need it -- believe me, as soon as you get out of your car in whichever parking area you choose, there will be a guy there ready to assist you -- and these guys work only for tips.

Here is a photo of my daughter and my friend's daughter about to get a lift while we adults walked to the dock. 

The ride across to Holbox takes just under a half hour. You can ride inside if the weather is poor, or you can ride on top of the ferry as we enjoy doing.






The town of Holbox has about 2,000 actual inhabitants, but many others come regularly to enjoy its non-touristy vibe and to swim with whale sharks during the time of the year when they are in the area. That's the main reason I went two years ago, but I returned this summer because I fell in love with the island and also because I wanted to see the whale sharks again and properly this time with my newly purchased prescription snorkel mask!

When you arrive, you can either walk to your hotel or house, or you can rent a "taxi." All vehicles on Holbox are golf carts with the exception of the few delivery trucks and construction vehicles that have to come across the waters on different boats. The streets are made of a fine white sand only, and they are quite pitted with holes, so any ride in a golf cart you take is a very jolting one. Nothing is so far that you can't walk as long as you are able to walk, but when you arrive laden with luggage, then it's best to rent a taxi.

The fare will always be 30 pesos no matter where you are going, and the taxi will only take four people. Since we were a group of five, we did a little begging and pleading with the taxi driver, who finally relented and took all of us, but when we left the island, my boyfriend did walk to the dock and let us ladies ride in the taxi -- what a gentleman!




On my last visit, we had stayed in a small room-only hotel many blocks from the beach, but this time we booked a room far in advance in a place called Amaite Hotel and Spa.

This post isn't meant to promote or disparage the hotel. I'm glad we stayed there as it offered a large suite with three bedrooms that accommodated all of us under one roof. Two of the rooms were air-conditioned, and the un-air-conditioned one had a ceiling fan that could have doubled as blades to make a helicopter take flight -- that sucker really moved. The suite was right off the beach and faced the sea, and there was a daily continental breakfast of fresh fruit, toast and juice or coffee. The drawbacks were that there was only one bathroom for everyone, and the water temperature was hit-and-miss. When we first arrived, we found boiling hot water awaiting us in the toilet, but then when we needed hot water in the shower, there simply wasn't any. Here are some photos of the suite and our views --

    

 







Our first evening there we ate at the seaside restaurant across the street. Then we went for a walk along the beach where I took one of my three favorite photos while there. Here it is --


The next morning we had some early beach time fortunately because a long-lasting rainstorm set in and lingered all afternoon, flooding the streets, which is a common occurrence there. My friend and I took advantage of the poor weather for a long girl talk at the hotel restaurant/bar which is open to the sea air. It was lovely to watch the rain pour down only feet away while having a drink with my best friend. Then we took a walk through the flooded streets to do a little shopping and find a place to eat for supper. There are many places to eat, and they are all very near each other.

  

There are beautiful murals painted on many of the buildings of Holbox.




I especially love this one because it depicts a whale shark, and one of the main reasons to visit the island from July -- September is to go swim with the whale sharks that are in the area. I don't have photos of swimming with them, though, as we used disposable cameras, and the photos didn't turn out the best due to the speed in which the whale sharks swim away from you and the sheer size of the animals when they are close to you -- you simply can't fit them all in the frame.

We'd been advised to sample the lobster pizza while we were there. I'm not a fan of seafood, but I was willing to give in a whirl. We did, though, also order a pepperoni pizza for the kids, and I'm glad we did as I ended up eating that when I got a look at the lobster pizza. Sorry, just not for me, but my boyfriend and I my best friend enjoyed it.
 
The above photo is another of my three favorite photos taken while on the island. We were heading back after wandering the sandy and flooded streets of Holbox. That's my guy, my best friend's daughter, my best friend and my daughter -- four of the most important people in my life sharing a beautiful place and experience with me.

We had just done some shopping where my guy had bought me a wonderful silver necklace made by a local artisan named Noa. She has her own metallurgy workshop at the back of her small store, and she makes all her own molds of whale sharks, sea horses, shells and other local fauna. Since I am in awe of whale sharks and find them to be the most beautiful animals in the sea, I naturally selected a solid silver whale shark pendant and chain.  I'm a lucky gal to have friends and family who will travel to a place I love and to have a man who will buy me such a great memento to wear everyday as a reminder.

We did go swim with whale sharks, and this time around I had a much better experience than last time. First, we took motion-sickness pills prior to boarding the boat because last time we got really ill from the rocking of the small boat at the whale shark spot, but I don't think we would have needed it because the water was much calmer due to fewer sharks and only a few boats when we arrived at a spot where some sharks were feeding at the surface.

Secondly, I had my prescription mask, so I could actually see the animals clearly, and so that my mask didn't leak like the defective one they gave me last time did. I sucked so much salt water into my nose last time that I was more focused on breathing and surviving than actually seeing the sharks. This time I saw them up close and personal, and in my third time in I shared a brief eyeball-to-eyeball moment with one of the giant fish. Glorious! In my second time in, the shark thumped me on the shoulder with his tail as he swam past. Loved it!

Third, we stayed out longer because this tour group took us fishing for our lunch. Nobody but the captain and the guide actually caught anything, but everyone had fun trying to catch some fish. The captain and the guide chopped up the fish and made ceviche while we snorkeled in shallower water. They let us swim for a long time, and we managed to see two sea turtles. My daughter swam along behind one for a while.

The tour operators were Tour Moguel. Again, I'm not supporting them, but they did a nice job, so I'm just letting anyone know who might like to know.

One of the main things I wanted to do on my second visit to Holbox was to explore the island better. The best way to do that is to rent a golf cart, which we did, but the problem for us was that it had rained a LOT on our first full day there. The water just doesn't run off; it sits in large puddles on the streets for a long time afterwards. Some of the puddles are simply not navigable with a golf cart because the water is too deep for the cart to go through without getting the engine works wet, so even though we did drive around the town a lot, there were areas on the outer limits that we just didn't get to -- guess that means I'll have to go back someday!

Here are some final photos of the trip. I'll begin with the final one of my three favorite photos I took there:


 

 



Just to prove I was actually there:

Roam With Me! -- Progreso and San Crisanto, Mexico

Hola de nuevo (Hello again). I promised in my last post to write more about my Mexico trip. This time I'm focusing on two towns near Merida -- Progreso and San Crisanto.

Progreso is about a half hour drive north of Merida, and it's a decent sized town of about 50,000 when you take in the surrounding areas that have grown into Progreso. Even though I've been to Progreso often on my visits to Merida, my main experience with the town is simply the malecon area. It's where the people go to walk along the beach, and it's where you'll find most of the restaurants and vendors. A few of the restaurants even have pools, so your kids can swim while you linger over drinks and conversation.

The gulf waters at Progreso tend to be a bit wavy, and there is usually a fairly brisk breeze coming off the water, so in my opinion, it's not really the best place to go for a dip, but it is a nice beach for a stroll. 
As you can see, the beach is a lovely white, and it is really quite smooth on the feet. The long pier you see in the photo is the world's longest pier at 4 miles in length! Progreso is a port town, so there exists a need to allow ships to dock here, but the water is really shallow very far out, so the pier had to be really long to reach the deeper water for large ships.

About twice a month they open the pier for people to go out and stroll on it and enjoy the sunset. We made plans to do this on one of our last days in Mexico, and I had really been looking forward to it; however, as luck would have it for me, I wasn't feeling very well. Let's just say I couldn't get four feet from a bathroom, let alone four miles! So, while we didn't wander out very far on it, we did go a short ways -- far enough to snap a few photos of us on it and the sun behind us.
    
 
Bless the people handing out bags of water! Yes, bags of water. Not only did they quench our thirst on a hot day, but they also made for good fun for my daughter to squirt my boyfriend and best friend with very cold water! Don't worry, they definitely returned the favor!

I'm showing you this picture because 1. -- you can't go to Mexico and not have at least one margarita (and this was the only one I had), and 2. -- this is on a beach restaurant right by the long pier and at the very start of the malecon. Like many places in tropical regions this has a palapa roof, and I love them. You'll find them shading single beach chairs on beaches, covering homes, and cooling diners while they eat. They block the sun but still allow the lovely breezes to flow freely.
 But when it comes to Mexican alcohol, nothing beats a Sol cerveza! I like beer above any other type of drink (except a Bloody Mary), and I especially like Mexican beer. Dos Equis and Sol are my favorites, so when I saw this giant Sol, naturally I had to stop for a photo! Here is a photo of a stroll along the malecon part of Progreso.

Now, the real reason I took the photo was to get a shot of the white car with a toy car strapped to the top of it. It made me laugh, but in the end, I just like the photo for the lighting and the activity it shows (and for the peek at my best friend's tatoo -- ha ha!).


You can't have a port without a lighthouse. This one is actually located a few blocks inland, which I thought was odd, but what do I know about lighthouses!

Not too far east of Progreso is a very small town called San Crisanto that carries a bit of fame in the world of tourism for the mangrove tours offered there. We had been there before, but my boyfriend had not, since this was his first trip out of the country, so we revisited it, and I'm glad we did because sometimes you get more out of a second visit than you do on the first one.

First you have to find the palapa covered building where they sell the tickets to the mangrove, which is called manglar in Spanish. Then, after you pay, a man on a bicycle will lead you down a sandy road to the grove itself and a nice shady place for you to park your car.


The start of the trip down the sandy road.


Getting closer.

When you arrive, you get in very small boats that can accommodate no more than six passengers. We were five, so it was o.k., and one of us was a small child, so that made it even better. The guide then pushes you through the swamp canals with a long pole, so it's sort of like riding in a gondola.

  

As you glide along in this very quiet place, you see what appear to be gigantic globs of poop in the trees.  
These are termite mounds, and they are very prevalent throughout the mangrove. Part of why people like to go through this mangrove is to get to the ojo de aqua, which means eye of water, located in the heart of the mangrove. Apparently, according to our guide (who didn't speak English as most of them do not), there are over forty of these ojos de agua throughout the mangrove, but all but one of them are located in areas where it's just too unstable of ground for people to go into them.

Basically the eye of water is a place that lets ground water come up and make a natural small swimming hole. 
Here my best friend, my daughter, and my friend's daughter enjoy a refreshing dip. She is perched right over the hole, so it is deep where she is. The bottom of the swimming hole is quite slimy actually, and it feels funny on your feet, but the water is very nice. They've built a walkway around the hole, and a palapa covered shady spot for people to rest. The guides just wait in their boats for you to swim and take your time.


The following photo is the road leading away from the mangrove, and I just really like the photo, so I'm going to leave you with it. I'll be back to tell you all about my very favorite place in Mexico, Holbox Island!

Roam With Me! -- Merida, Mexico

Most of my friends think I'm crazy for visiting Mexico in July and August. Well, I am a little crazy, but that's not the point. I go at that time because that's when both my best friend and I are free from school obligations, and she's the reason I visit there so often.

She and I are both teachers. I teach Spanish here, and she teaches English down there. This coming year, her role is changing a bit, and she's now the coordinator of all the elementary English teachers at her school.

Silvia is her name, and she was the first exchange student I ever hosted. She is only ten years younger than I am, and, sadly, her parents died in a car accident a couple years after she stayed here. Since that time, I've spent a lot of time there getting to know the rest of her family since I unfortunately never met her parents, and she's returned to my home to see the family she gained here.

This trip was extra special since she got to meet my boyfriend of one year, and he got to meet her. My daughter accompanied us as well, making this her third trip to Mexico and her fifth trip abroad with me.

Silvia lives in Merida, the capital city of the state of Yucatan. The Yucatan Peninsula is comprised of three states -- Yucatan, Quintana Roo and Campeche. The state of Yucatan is located on the western side of the Peninsula and abuts the Golf of Mexico.

Merida is not widely known in the U.S. despite the fact that there are around one million people living there. I'd say this is mostly due to the fact that the city is not located on a beach; however, those at Progreso are only a half hour drive from Merida.

Most travelers from the U.S. to Mexico want to visit the tourist towns on the beaches in Mexico, but I am not one of those people. Yes, I love the beach, but I despise "touristy" destinations. I want the real life experience. That's what I get when I visit my best friend who lives in Merida.

I also like the smaller international airport in Merida over the larger and busier one in Cancun. This means I have to pay a little bit more for a ticket to Merida, but it also means that I don't have to pay for a bus ride to Merida once I land or for the gas for my friend to drive all the way to Cancun to pick me up. It also means I have to plan my arrival time a little more since there are only a few flights in and out of Merida each day as opposed to the numerous ones in and out of Cancun's international airport, but I'm o.k. with that.

There are plenty of tourists who find their way to Merida, don't get me wrong about that. They just aren't as plentiful as they are in places like Cancun, Cozumel and Playa del Carmen on the Caribbean side of the Yucatan Peninsula. Many of the tourists use Merida as a jumping off point for visiting various Mayan ruins like Chichen Itza.

Since I mentioned the best known site of ruins, let's start with Chichen Itza, which is in the state of Yucatan, too. We didn't visit it during the daytime like most tourists do; instead, we attended the night lighting show which was an amazing feast for the eyes. We were the only gringos in attendance that evening from what I could tell. The tickets are free, but they have to be ordered online in advance, and then when you arrive at Chichen Itza you have to exchange the tickets you got online for the actual tickets. Apparently the online tickets are simply tickets that you have a reservation! Even Silvia couldn't make sense out of the "logic" behind needing two separate sets of tickets for the same show.

The lighting show was phenomenal. I don't have photos, though, because they don't allow photography during the actual presentation as it distracts from the pure enjoyment of just sitting there and watching, and it's also a serious distraction to those around you who are trying to enjoy the show. However, prior to the show, there is a lovely lighting display on the main pyramid (of Kukulkan) where it simply changes colors while you wait.
  

During the show, there is a magnificent laser light show of the history of the Mayans and of Chichen Itza. It is conducted totally in Spanish, though, so if you don't know the language then your enjoyment of the spectacle is diminished a bit, but only a bit because the show is so breathtaking that you don't really need to understand what is being said. I'm glad I did, though, because I prefer to understand the whole thing. I spent the show occasionally whispering tidbits of translation to my boyfriend on one side of me and my daughter on the other side. She  speaks Spanish, but not enough to understand a show like that.

Prior to the show, we visited and swam in the largest cenote in the peninsula. It's very near to the Chichen Itza ruins, and it's called Ik-Kil. Cenotes are sinkholes that form in the ground in the Yucatan Peninsula where the ground is comprised of rock. The water in the cenotes is freshwater, and many of them are connected by underground rivers, which are the only kind of rivers you'll find in the Yucatan Peninsula.

This particular cenote is well-known and very deep. The signs there state that it is 50 meters deep or roughly 150 feet deep! The water is cool because it's essentially in a cavern, and there are hundreds (or thousands) of tiny catfish swimming in there with you. I deliberately tried to touch a few, but I only managed it a couple times because they are speedy little suckers! The only photos I took in there were on a disposable underwater camera, and I haven't yet developed them to even see if anything turned out, so I will steal a few photos from online, so you can see just how spectacular this place is.




You climb up the wooden ladders to get out of the water and down them to get in if you don't want to just jump in from the side. The higher platform is for the more intrepid to leap off of into the deep, deep water. I did it once many years ago. Once was enough as this is a "swim at your own risk" cenote.

Now, let's get back to Merida. Merida is a very old city, having been founded officially by a Spaniard named Fracisco de Montejo y Leon in 1542. However, it is actually much older than that because he founded the city upon a Mayan city, but he changed its name to the name of a city in Spain called Merida. The Mayan language, culture and way of living are still to be seen throughout Merida and in its surrounding communities, most of which still bear their Mayan names. (Thus making them difficult to pronounce!)

We visited the main plaza a few times including once at night to watch a re-enactment of the famous game of "pelota" or the ball game that was once played by the Mayans in their ancient cities. In it, two teams face off to attempt to get a small hard ball through a stone ring mounted sideways on a wall. The players can only use their hips and chests primarily. I've seen a much better re-enactment two years ago during the finale at Xcaret on the Caribbean, but this display was interesting too.

Here are the players preparing to start the game in front of the main cathedral.

The main cathedral of Merida lit up at night.

The cathedral closes to the public at 8:00 p.m., so we had to return another time to go inside. My boyfriend is Catholic, so he especially wanted to see inside. It's not ornate like the cathedrals in Spain and Italy are, but it's still pretty impressive due to its size. 

Looking up!

Mass is conducted throughout the day, and people can just come and go. Around the edges on the floor you'll see engraved stones in the floor -- these are grave markers as the cathedral is also a cemetery.  

While in the main plaza, a person can people watch like crazy or one can visit the main government building and the numerous stores and markets that are in the area. Inside the government building, there are impressive paintings that tell the history of the area and of Mexico.

The interior courtyard of the government palace.

The above painting shows the "conquista" or conquest of the Mayans by the Spaniards, and the painting below shows them being shackled and sold into slavery.

Here are my boyfriend, myself and my daughter in the long side room of the government palace. You can see the above-mentioned painting over his shoulder.

The above painting shows the emblem of the national flag -- an eagle holding a serpent in its talons while perched on a nopal cactus. Now, let's look at the size of this painting in relation to me and my daughter.

 Pretty darn big, isn't it! Now for my favorite painting in the government building. The following one shows the true and authentic liberator of the Mayan slaves, and I love it so much because of the books in it. These show that education and literacy are the mark of true freedom no matter where you are. 

As I mentioned, while in the heart of Merida, you need to visit the stores and markets. Sometimes in the markets you can bargain a bit for a better price, and sometimes you can't. I'll tell you this, though, once they know you speak Spanish, they immediately reduce the price for you. That shows that they appreciate your effort to understand them and their culture. Here are a few photos of the market areas on Merida. Understand that the prices are in pesos and not in dollars. While we were there, the exchange rate was roughly 15 pesos per every U.S. dollar.


  


The one shows a tortilla making machine, and the other shows a variety of fruit you can buy to which you add chile if you like it that way.

Here is a view of one of the streets in the heart of Merida later in the day.

Surprisingly, belly dancing is quite popular in Merida and has been for many years now. Two years ago, when I was last there, we attended a belly dance performance in a small square. This time, though, we went to a two hour performance of dances done by the dance school where my friend's daughter goes for belly dance lessons. Here is a photo of many of the performers on stage at the end of the show along with the main teacher, who is dressed in the pink outfit.

While in Merida, we often ate "sorbetes" or sherbets at branches of the well-known store called El Colon. 

"Elote" is corn. Yes, that's right. Corn. It is the favorite of my friend's daughter, and it wasn't bad. I preferred the lemon one myself, and I also liked the pitaya one. That's a fruit that is common and popular there at this season. 

From Merida, one can easily get to the towns along the coast for some adventures. I'll share those in my next post.