Preliminary notice: female visitors should stay away from reading this post!

Just kidding! As I said before I was going to take a couple days to enjoy a deeper splurge into “culture” - no better way of doing it than this way I guess!? Anyway, place of action: Merida. Theme: movies. Temperature: 30C (35C around parades). Atmosphere: relaxed though intense. People: diverse, really nice and fun-loving. Music: all sorts. Personal level of energy: normal (= severely hyperactive). Dancing abilities: bad as ever. Stamina: getting worse by the day… Summarising: All systems go!

The reason I have once again backtracked was because Merida was “most accessible and diverse for a celebration such as this one” - Muhaha! Besides I needed my kick of non-logic since things had been going straight for too long now ;) So basically there`s not a lot to this carnaval that you don`t know from TV yet; parades are colourful and all about the demonstrations, there`s stages throughout the entire city center hosting bands, DJs and whatnot playing all kinds of music. Add about 200.000 visitors (daily average) to this scene and it all evolves into one big, cool party. Viva carnaval!

Since carnaval is all about the demonstration I guess the pictures below should tell the story, so have fun viewing them while I am going to spend 14 hours on a bus heading off to San Cristobal de las Casas, up in the mountains. Yes -it`s time to get cold again (why am I doing this to myself!?) and do some hiking, climbing and whatever else can be done up there! Till soon!

-Rene

PS: Before heading back to Merida I visited two nice waterfalls too - so pics of those have been added as a little appendix :)

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First arrival - still fresh despite the temperature!

Not sure which team they were supporting

This stuff is heavy...

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Update 20-Feb: comment function is now open. Sorry guys!

Dear diary Whatever. As promised, here`s a post which - in terms of quality - should exceed the previous two. Can`t be too hard, right? At least my predictive capabilities (”worst viewed posts ever”) still seem to work after all these travels, which feels like a delight ;)

Well then, so after having fun on Cozumel and spending most of my time in fairly small places, I felt it was time for some big city life. The place of choice: Mérida, famous for Yucatec culture, its “bustling” weekends, markets, architecture, people, surroundings… in other words: quite the place to get stuck in for a while! What can I say… the weather was nice (nothing but sun, 28C and rising temps), the company was very pleasant (hi guys!), the food was great and the beer was cold - what more could you wish for?

The city functioned as a base for exploring nearby cenotes (3 in total) - which was both fun and stunning. The latter is because in order to see one of the cenotes you need to climb down an 8-meter ladder… and the top step broke while I was climbing up, so I was almost part of yet another bodycount (sounds familiar?). I keep wondering how the people that were still down there got out though! :)

Also, we visited the Chichen Itza ruins (yes, more ruins), which were a bit of a Disneyland-experience but still pretty impressive. Other than that the city itself was good fun, providing basically everything one could look for. Cultural events such as traditional Yucatec dancing - which seems boring at first but then all of a sudden gets impressive - provide a little extra.

Still happy about cities, I moved on to Campeche and hooked up with some people I also met in Merida… yes, I`m still on a well-trodded trail at the moment! Campeche is nice but VERY quiet, the old city centre feels like walking through a candystore with all those hard-coloured buildings. Anyway, the company again was very good! Next day took a night bus to Palenque and after a nice little ride and even less sleep went to visit (MORE) ruins! Anyway, these were the most impressive so far and by now I`m getting a little ruin-tired (and so should most readers) so I promise I won`t post too much on these things anymore.

Anyway, enjoy the pictures (bigger series this time too, whoo-hoo!!) and on to… CARNAVAL! (This way, not this way!)

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One very weary traveler

This is how the Maya kept their kids under control

Chichen Itza skyline

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Exit post #2 this time! We´re about to take Mayo to the airport so here´s a little coverage on what we did in the last few days. Let´s see, hmmm, right… ehm… not much! After Rio Lagartos we made another effort to get to Isla Holbox. Once again: no bus! 2 seconds of thinking (accumulated) made us decide to go to Isla Mujeres instead. We don´t understand why everyone is so lyrical about the place, you might as well call it Little Cancun. Anyway, the beach was OK and we got to chill out a bit. After all things have been so intense… ;) Oh yeah, the turtle farm was nice and so were some ruins we visited. Pity they locked us in and we had to climb over the fence to get out, which then again was good fun!

Our third effort of getting to Isla Holbox succeeded and we got to stay in a real mellow place, a crossing between a campsite, cabaña-thingies, dormitories, hammock-hotel etc! Holbox is way more laid-back than Isla Mujeres and we decided to stick around a bit longer. Some walks down the beach (the entire beach is over 27km long) took us along some very interesting spots, such as mangroves and weird sandbanks. The latter can be decribes in one word: surreal! See pictures of course :) Another short horseback riding trip was fun too, mainly because Mayo´s horse started kicking the **** out of Rene´s. Anyway, even Rene didn´t fall off and the scenery was nice too!

At this moment we are back in Puerto Morelos (anything is better than Cancun ;)), in a situation as described above. Enjoy the short series of kitsch pictures. Take care!

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Isla Mujeres - Playa Norte

Mayo. Oh yeah, and a sandbank.

Sandbank, nice view!

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Lots of different things to write about this time, so let´s try to be efficient and write less than a complete book :) Also, this post won´t be as “blue” as the previous one, promise ;)

So after the ocean, it was time for an environment that´s a bit more “hilly” - we took off to the Cayo district in Western Belize, to a place called San Ignacio. We used it as a base to explore two different Maya ruins; Cahal Pech and Xunantunich (hope this is correct). Both are very different, though equally impressive.

Next up were preparations for a day of celebration: Mayo´s bday (see comments on previous post ;)). We decided to celebrate this one in Hopkins, a pretty out-of-the-way beach town with hardly any roads, no cell phone reception … you get the idea! Stayed in a highly hippy-oriented place - the owners were interesting, our fellow guests were not (ask Mayo for the full story)! After some nice fish-n-cake meals :) it was high time to run off; on to Caves Branch, time for cave-tubing! Surroundings and caves were really impressive. Tubing was fun, though not very fast, pictures should explain it all!

Following this we had the intention to visit the Lamanai ruins (yes, another one), however once we arrived it turned out the place was one giant tourist-trap so we skipped it and instead crossed the border back to Mexico to visit the ruins of Kohunlich! The only way to get there was by hitchhiking, which still is good fun, especially if you need to watch out where to put your feet as the bottom of the truck was full of holes. Anyway, Kohunlich was impressive as it´s still mostly covered by jungle, and has some really nice Mayan masks.

Time to weave further up north; we ended up near Valladolid to swim in a cenote; a sinkhole filled with groundwater. Quite an impressive experience, and it seemed the water was even clearer than in the Caribbean Sea! As we wanted to blend in some more “wildlife-related” activities we decided to head further north, up to Rio Lagartos, where we made a tour through some mangrove forest (incl the marvellous number of one crocodile and lots of birds) and spotted some flamingos in nearby saliñas.

So much for this “diary-wise” post for now - hope you enjoy the pictures once more!

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Cahal Pech

On top of Cahal Pech

Xunantunich - skyline

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Arright! Please allow me to break the silence down here, the last couple days have been sort of disconnected, if not hectic, if not both. Anyway, after two earlier intentions (aka semi-attempts) to go to the Corn Islands, I finally managed to get there! You know what they say - third time lucky ;)

The entire story on the subject is quite extensive, so bearing in mind the majority of visitors prefer a short story (and lots of pics ;)) you´ll find the “director´s cut” below. The full monte can be found by clicking on “read more” at the bottom of this article. Sounds fair, doesn´t it? :)

So here we go… As the islands are pretty isolated (70km off Nicaragua´s east coast), there´s basically two options to get there: by air (aka recommended and preferred) and by bus and boat (aka adventurous and dodgy). This makes for an easy choice: let´s take the latter!

That morning I got away from Lago de Apoyo by throwing both myself and my backpack over the fence. A quick busride took me to Masaya, famous for its “artesanias” - this is where I decided to buy a hammock, bearing in mind the large number of uncomfortable journeys I still had ahead of me (trust me, there´s more to come after this one!). Been there, done that and another busride took me to Managua. Three hours (and three attempts of theft, all unsuccessful) later I was on the bus to El Rama … what is it with Central American capitals!? One I got there all hotels appeared to be full so I spent the night sleeping in the bus - the hammock instantly came to good use :)

After being kicked out of the bus by its personnel (sorry, I have a hard time waking up!) I took the fast boat to Bluefields, and I mean F-A-S-T - the scenery was lovely though I didn`t get to see much as our boat hung almost vertical with speed :) Down in Bluefields I met up with some people (hello Rita and Mario) and together we learnt we missed the ferry to the Corn Islands by about an hour - bummer! Speaking to locals appeared to help though and we learnt a fishing boat would be leaving for the islands from El Bluff, a key just 1km off the coast. Friendly locals and even friendlier fishermen (yah man) allowed us to hitchhike and we got to Big Corn that same day.  We spent Saturday night on Big Corn (Reggae Palaca was nice!) and I left for Little Corn the next morning. I fell in love with the place as soon as I set foot on the dock - once again the pics should speak for themselves! Spent the next days enjoying perfect weather and, more importantly, went scuba-diing! You read that right: I CAN DIVE AGAIN! It was well worth it too; swimming among sharks and stingraysis quite an experience!

Unfortunately all good things come to an end eventually, and I now find myself in Cancun after spending 4 days on boats and buses, ready for the next journey. YAH MAN!

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Sunrise on Rio Escondido ... on the way to Bluefields

More Rio Escondido sightseeing

Our ride to Big Corn!

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As promised, here´s a more visual update on the latest travel bits :) Have fun browsing through them - all pictures are from Nicaragua even though I´m in Honduras (Utila) at the moment. After Granada I passed through Leon, then went to Jiquilillo (don´t try to pronounce that ;)) to chill out for a while and attend a local celebration for Virgin Mary before passing on further north. Indeed, my travel plans have sort of made a little change (Haley and Jes, I hope you realise you are the cause of this!! ;)), so I´ll enjoy my time here on the Caribbean side of Honduras before making a big u-turn to the east (and later on, south) and going back down into Nicaragua. I´m going off the beaten track by quite a few miles next week, so will do my best to keep you posted! ;)

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Sunrise - Lago de Apoyo

Lago de Apoyo - like a swimming pool...

Bulls on the run (and the kid chasing them is a hero!) - Santa Catarina

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