Touristy Tulum, quiet lagoon and incredibly blue water in Bacalar

Friday 16 November, Campeche

This post will start in Tulum, which was my stop after Valladolid. After a short busride Memo, Ana and me arrived in this carribean town on the 7th of November. A cousin of Memo had been there a few years ago and had praised Tulum's beach as the most beautiful of the world. So we checked in our hotel, of which the nicest part was the garden, and went to explore the 'town' a bit. Actually everything in Tulum is located along a busy highway and basically all there is is tourist shops. In a side street we found a local Pizzeria and got really nice Pizza for half the price of the tourist magnet on the main street. The rest of the evening we spent playing a game called Deluxe Weed which was a lot of fun (no actual weed involved ;)) and I was offering some of the Lytchee liquor I got in Jicaltepec. 

The next day we were eager to see the beach and in order to do so we rented bikes in our hotel. Arriving at the coastline we were confronted with endless private properties, mostly hotels, resorts and estates which made it impossible to reach the acutal beach... So we had to cycle 2 km more to get to the actual 'public' beach, which was also lined by beah bars and restaurants. I know that I have actually no right to complain about beaches but... Tulum wasn't all that amazing. Of course the sand is super white and the water is very blue. But in our case the beach was also covered in tons of seaweed and the water was also full of it. In front of the hotels they cleaned the beach from seaweed and piled it up on the side, but the more lonely stretches were not really passable. But besides that, which is just nature and probably a temporary thing, what really turned me off was the over colonialization with (american) tourists. But we still spent a a few hours lazing in the sun and I massively burned my buttcheeks :D 

This looks quite paradisy actually ;)

After this day we decided to leave Tulum behind. In my guide book I found a recommentation for a Maya-run ecotourism camp which I really wanted to see. Memo and Ana were up for it as well, so we made our way there the next day. After a bus- and a taxiride we arrived at this beautiful lagoon, and the camp was the most peaceful place. We spent two really relaxed days there, enjoying nature and the simple life as there were only 2 hours of electricity for the night and a fireplace to cook. We were also the only guests, so quite the opposite of Tulum :D

Preparing dinner the first evening.

Sunset first night

Sunrise and morning swim the next day

Homemade cheviche, we helped to prepare it so it was extra tasty!

The camp is called 'Siijil Noh Ha'

Our cozy hut

Sunset on the second evening. Taken from the watchtower.

I slept in the hammock one night, with this cool mosquitonet construction.

At the shore of the lagoon, was a cenote of 25m depth. That looked really cool and was a good lace for jumps! 

Totally reenergized we left this peace of nature and went to another lagoon, the village of Bacalar. Stumbeling from one beautiful place into another and always thinkng it can't get better but then it does :D A really common feeling I had the last two weeks, exploring the Yucatán Peninsula. So in Bacalar we found another cute place to stay and, again, had two really nice, relaxed days in this beautiful village. I treated myself with some really tasty pasta and pizza and some pastries called Pastes. 

Another cenote which is 180 (!) m deep.. was a bit scary to swim to the other side :P

After Bacalar I left Ana and Memo and had an adventurous trip to a village callled Xpujil, from where I visited the maya rins of Calakmul. But as I already spent 2 hours in this internet cafe, uploading pictures with slow internet, this part will follow one of these days. 

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