Tulum

Tulum is surrounded by cenotes, beaches, and tons of things to do. Though the beach is mostly made up of resorts there are some budget options too. Staying in town is cost effective but the strange setup of Tulum means the town centre is about 3km from the beach. There are also the ruins which look incredible with the backdrop of the sea though it can get busy and the entrance is more of a themepark than a centre of cultural importance. We stayed 4 nights here and barely scratched the surface.

El Jardin de Frida's courtyard

We awoke from our nap still feeling very worn down after our mammoth journey to Tulum. It was about 5pm by this time and we decided we really needed to get out for a walk, have an explore and grab some food before we went to be for the night. We went down stairs and got some advice from one of the friendly hostel staff.

We walked back up Tulum Avenue, the main street in Tulum town center and eventually decided we’d try a Mexican resturant called “El asadero” at the top of the top. When we found the restaurant we saw it was definitely one of the nicer restaurants in town. It was very clean and modern, very different to the cheap and cheerful taqueria joints we’d walked past along the way. We had 3 tacos each and were pleasantly surprised to receive some free corn chips (something we found out later actually to be the norm). I had a cactus taco, a chicken and an asadero beef. All 3 were incredible. And it was still incredibly cheap. With 2 beers, full meal and tip the whole thing came to 200 pesos, which is about 15 AUD! Awesome!

We strolled back to the hostel and on switching on the light Kate was extremely unhappy to find a gecko staring back at her. I actually like the little lizards because they will eat the insects in the room which I find far more annoying. They also stay well away from humans, which insects do not. Even so, as chief “deal with any troublesome animals” I was called to remove the lizard from the room. I few taps of a broom, a couple of whistles and shouts of “come by! come by!” later and the lizard was shepherded out of the room. A very relieved Kate closed her eyes and didn’t wake until many hours later, when she got up to go to the loo. She got back in to bed and as I was no awake I decided to do the same. Kate clearly (and somewhat luckily) hadn’t switched on the light, because she would have come face to face with a lizard. I, on coming face to face with said lizard, promptly shut the door and began what turned into an epic battle. About 5 minutes into the battle, after about 5 minutes of trying to stay quiet and trying to collect the lizard with a bit of tissue paper I was reminded that all a lizard really needs to do is run in my direction and I will knock everything in the vicinity flying. A very concerned voice came from the other room, “Are you OK in there?!”. “Damn!”, I’ll have to come clean. “Just disposing of a lizard!”. Kate was obviously very upset that she could have sat on the lizard while doing her business and learnt her lesson to always switch the light on!

After another 5 minutes and the introduction of a towel in to my weaponry the lizard was in my grasp. I was quite sad I’d caught him in the end. I really like lizards and I felt we’d bonded over jars of knocked over soap. The things one does for love… FLUSH!

As I got back into bed Kate said “I really hate lizards, but the worst are cockroaches…”. As I closed my eyes and fell back to sleep I thought to myself “me too”.

Trying out the hammock in the room

Day 1

We woke up after having about 12 hours sleep. We still felt groggy but we wanted to get up and see some of Tulum, and specifically wanted to see the ruins! We showered and got dressed. And went downstairs for breakfast which was incredible pancakes with different toppings, including banana, coconut and Nutella, banana and cardamom and a tutti-fruity topping made out of mango and tomato. This came with 3 bits of homemade bread with chia seeds. It was an excellent start.

We talked to the staff again about renting bikes, they have a deal with a rental shop down the road that rents a bike for 24 hours for 80 pesos. We walked down to the bike shop where they told us it was 100 pesos for 24 hours – but we’re staying at Frida! – ah, ok 80 pesos. Perfecto! They brought out some very shoddy bikes that were pretty much falling apart and were pretty rusty. Though they all looked like that around Tulum. I had to give either my passport or 1000 pesos as a deposit, we didn’t have a 1000 pesos so I reluctantly handed over my passport as security. Hopefully I’d see it again!

From there we cycled along the busy and uneven streets doing our best to work out where we were supposed to cycle, we never really did work it out. Along the way I noticed a little shop selling camping stoves! I promptly stopped my bike and ran in. “Tener camping gas?” “Si", followed by undecipherable Spanish. I took a look at the selection he had and it looked like he only had gas for refillable canisters, not the one time use ones, with a twist on thread, I needed. After some classic random hand movements and pointing at things he replied with a nod and “Manana” – tomorrow. I didn’t hold out much hope but we’d come back tomorrow and see.

We continued cycling until we hit a main road with a cycle path next to it. This would take us up to the Tulum ruins. It was a very hot cycle and by the time we’d cycled the 2km up the ruins we were both drenched in sweat. We locked the bikes up in the shade before realising we could cycle passed the car pack and another kilometer down to the ruins entrance. They also put on a little train service from the main gate to ferry tourists who don’t want to walk it, however it really isn’t far and you have to wait for the train. We on the other hand could just cycle. We locked up our bikes and went and got our tickets which were about 70 pesos each.

The ruins were really cool, if a little crowded. They are situated right on the coast and look spectacular with iguanas and other lizards roaming around and sunning themselves everywhere. We didn’t get a guide which were an extra 10 dollars, we didn’t think it was worth it but if you had enough cash or a bigger group it would certainly be very interesting. We spent about and hour and a half at the ruins, we could have spent longer but it felt like enough.

From there we cycled back along the road to the beach and stopped off at one of the beach side restaurants to walk along the beach. Tulum is quite strange in that the road is set quite far back from the beach to allow all the resort developments to take their own part of the beach. It’s nice one you get down to the beach but it doesn’t really look like anything from the road. We wondered down to the beach and then along to see what we could find food-wise. The Tulum beach area is a lot more touristy and expensive than the town of course so we had to suck up the prices, but we found a very nice restaurant called Pocna where we set up for a couple of hours. We had seafood nachos and some cheese tacos which were both delicious and Kate reckons her food highlight of Tulum.

We spent a bit of time on the beach before we were rained off, then we cycled back along the road parallel to the beach and up towards the center of Tulum. Along the way we passed a Mexican shop called Chedraui. It's kind of a mix between Walmart and Aldi, and sells everything from groceries to fridges. I thought it might be a good place to look for camping gas. At first it seemed promising, traversing the shelves, from camping equipment to hosepipes. There must be some barbecue things here. After a long search and a few questions asked of staff we unfortunately left empty handed. We'd have to check the other shop again tomorrow.

We were very after all the cycling and decided to have a quick dinner and an early night. We decided to go to Restaurant Barracuda which is just up the road from Frida. It looks unassuming (as many Mexican Restaurants do) but serves delicious seafood. We both went for grilled fish, Kate on it’s own and mine in tacos. I would recommend them both. Then it was back to the hostel for an early night.

Day 2

We woke up the next day and decided to go Grand Cenote. Cenotes are basically small lakes which often form underground or in a big hole. They are great for spending a hot day as they have plenty of shade and you can dip in everytime you want to cool off. Grand Cenote is one of the more famous ones as it’s reasonably big and looks cool. We wanted to get their early to avoid the crowds. We had our breakfast (which again was delicious pancakes) and unlocked the bicycles and got on the road. We had to cycle up to the main cross roads in Tulum then take a left towards Coba. Easy in practice but this appeared to be a super hot day and the sun was beating down on us before we even made it to the cross roads.

At this point to took a little detour to go and grab a coffee from Tulum art cafe. This place has some really cool art (obviously) but the food and coffee is awesome too. Kate’s addiction to coffee had been saitiated, for now.

The cycle down to Grand Cenote is about 3-4km, not far at all, unless you are on extremely heavy and inefficient bikes… which we were. Before long we were dripping in sweat and cycling down a completely unshaded and sometimes busy road. The road isn’t really busy, more the traffic that does use the road is very large buses or dusty trucks all overtaking each other as many times as possible. We eventually saw a sign for another Cenote and took another look at the map and couldn’t quite work out where we were. The road signs and tourist attraction signs often seem to just stop, or appear in a non-sensicle order. Maybe we’d misjudged the distances. We’d stopped at a very thin part of the road and decided to move a bit further forward in the hope of seeing something. We rounded the next bush and found a sign for grand cenote and a parking lot (thankfully not full yet). We parked up our bikes and went in. I think it was about $150 pesos each… or thereabouts.

We got changed and showered and then headed down to the cenote. As with all the water features in Mexico (sea, lakes, cenotes) the water looked amazing. The Cenote has a staircase going down to a platform in the middle and then a section to the left and right to swim in. On the right it also goes in to a cave and opens out in to another section. Behind the platform and in a circle in the middle is the turtle section where you aren’t allowed to swim but can observe loads of turtles swimming around and sunning themselves. We slowly lowered ourselves in (it was pretty cold, but refreshing). We had a snorkle mask between us so we could have look around at all the fish (of which there are a surprising amount) and also see how deep the cenote goes. It doesn’t go straight down however it goes down into a network of submerged caves in which you can make out people diving. We didn’t opt into the diving but it looked pretty cool and even just peaking under some of the submerged ledges I could see there are a lot to explore, as well as a lot to hit your head on!

Shortly after we got in and took a few photos the bus loads of people started to arrive and spoil all the fun. So we decided to dry ourselves on the grass above the cenote and decide what we wanted to do for lunch. Unfortunately we hadn’t planned ahead enough to organise lunch so we decided to head back to the art cafe for some aircon and a cold-brew coffee. We knew it was going to be another tough cycle back, though we hadn’t accounted for the headwind! By the time we got to the cafe we really needed some food and drink. I got the chalito smoothie which has milk, peanut butter, coldbrew and banana, and Kate got a cold brew. I’d highly recommend the smoothie! For food Kate got a massive bowl of chia seeds and I got the ham and cheese omelette. Both were great. We also made full use of the wifi! While we were at the art cafe we got thinking about what we wanted to do the next day. Currently the plan was to bus up the Cancun and go to Isla Mujeres however we were finding it difficult to confim a campsite we wanted there as they had a big group staying. We were really liking Tulum and thought it might be worth staying another night. We decided to head back to the hostel to see if we could stay another night. If so then we could go see the beach in Tulum properly and do some more planning.

On the way back to the hostel Kate picked up a hat and I stopped in at the gas shop to see if there was anything of use in stock. I’d brought along the jetboil gas fitting to see if we could find the right type of gas. I went into the shop and again the man showed me some gas for refilling. I got out the jetboil and showed him the attachment. He picked up what looked like a large aerosol canister and took the lid off. It wasn’t what I was expecting but it appeared to say butane and propane on it, and had the right attachment. I asked if we could give it a go. We attached the jetboil and lit it up. We had success! Though the canister was 11 inches high instead of the usual jetboil 3, so I wouldn’t be able to back the canister away snuggly. $45 pesos later and we were ready for camping.

We headed back to the hostel where we booked in another night, and we went up to our room to plan our next move. The next moved turned out to be a nap, but after that we started to discuss what we’d like to do the next day and what we’d like to do after Tulum. Somewhere during planning we found two places that we’d like to add to the list of places to go Mahahual and Coba. Coba was about an hour away from Tulum and I wanted to hire a scooter the next day and go there in the morning then Tulum beach in the afternoon. The day after we’d head down to Mahahual which was about 2 hours south and was apparently 30km away from the Banco Chicorro reef (the largest reef in the Northern Hemisphere) and also a beach paradise.

For dinner we went for tacos at a tacqueria – “?????” we found in the lonely planet book. This was Kate’s first experience of a cheap tacqueria and she wasn’t overly impressed. We ended up sitting in a very loud area of the resturant next to the television blaring out at full volume. The food was good, especially for the price and as it was so busy it must have been good. We were easing ourselves into backpacking though, no need to rush. After dinner we went up the road to a bar called Kaluha for a drink. Before long though the day caught up with us and it was time for bed. I wanted to be up early to hopefully hire a scooter.

When we got back we decided to book our accomodation and travel in Mahahual. Kate booked a hostel called El Jardin (it turns out Jardin is a common name for hostels) and I attempted to use the ADO site for booking the travel. After several attempts with different cards I found it was impossible to book on the website with my cards. Possibly they only take Mexican cards but there was nothing in the help and FAQs. We could risk getting the tickets in the morning but there was only one bus per day and it was already booking up. I decided to go back out to the bus station to get our tickets. It was about 9pm by this point so I was pretty sure the bus station should still be open. I navigated the gaunlet of dogs around the roads and picked up the last seats sitting together. Then it was back to the hostel for bed.

Day 3

On day 3 (our extra day) we go up early, had breakfast  (again our favourite pancakes) then cycled up to the bike shop to drop off our bikes. It wasn’t open and didn’t appear to be opening very soon. Previously we’d got to the bike shop around 10, we were there are 8:15 so it could easily be 1h 45 before it opened. This put a spanner in the works for hiring a scooter for the day, I really wanted to get to Coba early to avoid the crowds which apparently hit in ernest around 11, I didn’t want to get a scooter if it meant we just had to queue all day. I was somewhat disappointed, Kate was somewhat relieved (as the thought of going on a scooter was worrying her).

We decided to go back up to the Art cafe for another coldbrew. After we checked our emails we cycled the 3km down to Tulum to take a look at the beach. We cycled through a short row of resturants and shops (we later found this to be pretty much the main part of the beach) and cycled on. The road follows the sea briefly after this point and then disappears behind an endless stream of resorts that all have their own private beach. The road itself is very quaint with trees all the way along and on the road opposite the resorts are the cheaper beach hut options. You’d still need to go into one of the resorts to access the beach though, and that means paying for drinks… which isn’t a bad thing.

Eventually we felt we’d explored enough and stopped at what looked like a very posh resort hotel for a drink. The waiters were very nice and showed us to a table right on the beach. What you couldn’t tell from the road was how windy it was on the beach. It was perfect weather for kite surfing and we watched as a few people took on lessons. I got a Indio beer and Kate got a mango margerita. Then we ordered them again. We spent a couple of hours on the beach before we felt we were probably going to get burnt. The windy and the cloudy skies made it feel cooler than it was so we thought it wise to take cover.

We cycled back up to the beach town and set up shop in a Mexican restaurant and bar called Mattheos. We got some more tacos and nachos which add mango added to the salsa which made all the difference. The resturant had a rather large lizard walking round it which Kate spend most of her time making sure it wasn’t anywhere near her. The food and drinks were great at the Restaurant but it was definitely expensive along the beach compared to the main town of Tulum.

We got another few beers and chatted before deciding to head back to the hostel, as we left we had a quick look up on the restaurant's sunset bar which gave us views of the jungle behind the beach. On the way we decided to try an ice cream parlour we'd passed a few times. It's just on Tulum Avenue and called the Tulum Cremeire. It's pretty expensive but has great ice cream, perfect for cooling off after a long cycle.

As we cycled back to drop the bikes off Kate had her first and hopefully only experience of wild dogs getting aggravated. For some reason as we were cycling past two dogs took exception to us and started baring their teeth and looking like the might attack. Kate was ahead and did the right thing by continuing calmly (apparently she couldn’t go any faster). We dropped off the bikes as our bus was at 8:55 and we didn’t want to get caught out by the late opening bike shop again before heading back to pack. This being the first time of packing on the trip it was going to be difficult. We went back to Barracuda for dinner as it had been so good before!

I will do a page on what to pack for a trip shortly - this will mostly be based on what I left behind along the way. In Tulum - our first stop - I left 3 pairs of shorts in the room, and tried to leave a shirt (but kate took it as she loved it).