Maddy's Travels
MADDY’S MAYAN JOURNEY
YUCATAN, MEXICO
MARCH 2009
Valladolid
Ruinas Mayapan
Cenote Dzitnup
When you watch the fish being delivered, (knowing just minutes ago they swam in the turquoise water a block away), fish tacos, washed down by a Negro Modelo beer are the obvious choice for a first meal. I arrive solo in Puerto Morelos, Mexico, a small laid back beach town only a half hour south of Cancun. (Shh...... don’t let the secret out about this place.) My friend Terri, her 17 year old daughter Jasmine and friend Emily will meet me here in a couple of days. I sit and eat my tacos, watch the action (or lack of), not reading or doing sudoku puzzles, and just allow the cold stress of winter to melt away.
The first two points I would like to make about this country are these:
-The ONLY thing to be scared of in MEXICO is crossing the street.
-The food is not all smothered in Cheese.
I have another day until Terri and the girls join me. I am enjoying my solitude. I snorkel one of the most magnificent reefs I’ve ever seen and later eat a whole, fresh caught fish for lunch, head on and big old eye staring at me.
My friends arrive. Terri and I almost immediately become invisible. Mexico is MY place - waiters used to chat and flirt with me. Now the attention goes to the girls. As we travel from town to town, the girls go off on their own adventures (which often involve lots of free drinks), leaving Terri and me to leisurely explore the markets, learning the names of exotic fruits and spices.
DRINKS
1) Chelada- (con Sol):
lime juice, ice, straw, salted rim, beer on the side to be poured over ice and stirred
2) Michelada-
same as above, but with Worcestershire and Tabasco
3) Sangrita-
shot glass of spicy tomato juice, lime, shot of
good sipping tequila like Don Julio Reposada
4) Paloma-
Grapefruit soda (like Fresca) and tequilla
5) Margarita-
description not necessary
We begin our journey with a five hour bus ride to Merida, capitol of the Yucatan. The hotel is beautiful, terraces on every level, a pool constructed out of boulders and and rooms decorated in true ”House and Gardens” style. The owner is from Georgia and we call him “Mr. Crabcakes”. It’s time for him to leave friendly Mexico and get a role in “La Cage Aux Folles”. The breakfast menu says “breakfast is NOT included in the price of your room - it is a gift from the owner”. We find this hilarious. Mr. Crabcakes freely provides great towels though, and plenty of them. Even in the nicest places in Mexico, your are expected to discard used toilet paper in a small trash can next to the toilet, so it was nice to balance the bathroom experience with good towels.
We snag Ruben, a great guide and driver to take us to the Mayan ruins of “Mayapan” and “Tres Centotes”. Cenotes are underground caves with deep, clear groundwater running through them. There are thousands of them in the Yucatan. Light may or may not filter in from the ground above. Stalagmites and huge tree roots searching for water hang down from the ceiling, several stories above. Ruben takes us to one with no other visitors and respectfully turns around as we skinny dip. The ruins we visit that day, “Mayapan”, are quite deserted. We climb the pyramid and are overwhelmed by a mystical vibe of ancient gods and times.
This feeling eluded us later in the trip when we go to Chichen Itza, one of the biggest Mayan ruins. We are there on the spring equinox together with 12,000 pilgrims to watch a once a year event. The shadow of the serpent will descend the pyramid and connect with the stone head of the snake at its base. I expect a hippie love-in type event, but it’s more like Ground Hog Day, Mexican style. A cloud covers the sun at the very last minute and obliterates the desired effect.
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We move on to the small town of Izamal, where we’ll spend the night. The town is entirely painted yellow, cabs are drawn by horses and everyone rides motor scooters. We see a family of four on a scooter. The mom and dad have helmets (a rarity), but not the infant and the two year old.
It’s very noisy in these small towns, what with all those crazy birds and roosters, but our hotel is a Zen-like retreat. I always wondered where professional dancers went when their time was up. I found one teaching yoga in the jungle.
At Valladolid, a small colonial city, we find more cenotes, more markets, and eat more pibil, poc chuc, pibs, salbutes and panuchos - not dishes you’ll find at the local “Border Cafe”.
Our time is almost up. I am always sad to leave Mexico.