Love the ocean and cenotes

Valentines Day, our last full day in Tulum!

We exchanged Valentine haikus (see below). Our Monday afternoon destination was the beautiful nearby beach, created from finely crushed coral, not silica. It was a warm, mostly sunny day with a refreshing breeze that brought in rolling white capped waves. The beach stretches for miles and miles and is lined with low slung small hotels, most with thatched roofs. We walked, splashed in the waves and enjoyed watching the beach activity including kite boarding.

In the morning we visited two different cenotes, sinkholes, which are windows to vast underground rivers that flow through submerged caves. One was a pretty jungle lake [photo], the other was like looking into a cave from above with water flowing in the bottom with many tunnels and caves leading from the sink hole (one could explore it by diving). The best part was Jose, the engaging, charismatic host, who gave us a good lesson on local history, geology, plant and animal life, as well as Maya and Spanish language. He had learned his English while working in Raleigh, NC.

Valentine Haikus (17 sylables). Without collaboration, the same theme resulted.

From Ruth: Love bud ’63 went dormant: now you’re my 11 year valentine.

From Tom: Two friends reconnect, They play travel live love, Together forever

Birthday at the Ruins

Sunday February 13, 2011

Ruth’s birthday. We awoke to overcast sky, cool breezes. Ruth and I took our morning walk to town and enjoyed our cappuccinos (see other posting) and WIFI availability. When we arrived back at the condo, Dick, Carole, Roger and Kathy were coming down the stairs, and we followed them to the pool area. They had set up an hombre piñata (imitating Tom), flowers, orange juice & champagne next to the pool for a birthday surprise for Ruth. Blindfolded, Ruth tried to bash the piñata with a stick [photo], but even with a few good blows could not break it. We found out later there are two types of piñata, and this type is not made to break.

After celebration and breakfast, Dick, Carole, Ruth and Tom left for a trip to the Maya ruins of Coba (pronounced cov-ha, meaning turbulent waters). We had a little car that just barely fit us in, and a great driver named Ruben, who enjoyed teaching us Spanish (he didn’t speak English).

The ruins were extensive, and only partly excavated. Our Maya guide Mario gave us the basics of the site and a good history lesson involving the Maya civilization and the Toltec invasion. These ruins are pure Maya, while the others nearby have both Maya and Toltec influences. Coba has the only Maya temple that tourists can climb to the top, which we did, of course, with many others, but we may have been the oldest. Photo: Ruth climbing up.

The Maya people had a sports court with slanted concrete on both sides with rings for “goals.” They could only advance the ball with their shoulders, hips, knees and elbows, and the ball was made of heavy rubber about the size of a soccer ball. The lucky captain of the winning team was rewarded by his beheading. (Think any games were thrown?) Only the royalty witnessed these delightful games. More Coba and Maya information here.

In addition to the temple climbing, we did lots of walking throughout to the entire grounds [Carole, Dick, Ruth & Tom on Ruins] visiting the many renovated stone buildings and wandering through the jungle. Ruben drove us back to Tulum.

Beach and Jungle

Fri. Feb. 11. After driving down a decent road to the main beach and hotel area near Tulum, the road became very rough for our next 10 miles or so. We barely reached speeds of 8 KPH. We saw jungle on both sides, with glimpses of pristine beach now and then.

We were in the Sian Ka’an Biosphere, a Mexican national park, named a world heritage site by UNESCO. It is a 1.3 million acre wilderness area with miles of remote uninhabited beaches. The entrance to the main area was a stone archway and a little farther along was an interpretative center. It had a lookout tower with beautiful views of jungle (wherein resided monkeys, many snakes,exotic birds—we saw some birds, but not the others) lagoons (with crocodiles), the end of the peninsula, and beaches (see photos). The tower structure was limited to only two people at a time, for good reason, swaying like a Disney ride, but real.

From the center, they
launched small boat tours, and there was a little museum on the flora and fauna of the jungle and lagoons. Without Roger and Kathy we would never have found the overgrown pathway to the incredible white beach, where we were the only ones except for three women who had to dress quickly when they saw us (no photos available).

We walked, swam and hung out on the beach for a while, then headed back through the jungle to the car for the rough ride back to town, with six of us piled on top of each other. Within the wilderness area was a restaurant, which we were amazed to find, in a gorgeous location. Looking out on the jungle and beach, we ate another great shrimp dish (we learned more ways to fix shrimp than we could imagine.)

Three mujers and three hombres

Tuesday Feb. 7: We fly from Dallas to Cancun

We met Ruth’s sister Carole and her husband Dick at the Cancun airport. We were there at the very kind invitation of Ruth’s sister Kathy and husband Roger, who are spending much of the winter in Tulum. The town of Tulum is about 100 km from Cancun. It has a very "real" old time Mexican village look and feel, nearby Maya ruins, and miles and miles of beautiful beaches. No modern hotels or high rises but hundreds of small hotels, including many along the beach, most of which have a grass hut feel to them.

We stayed in a nice third floor condo in a small complex, which is located in a regular neighborhood, one of the nicer ones, but right on the edge of the jungle—across the street. We understand there is a three story limit on the height of buildings, so there will be no high-rises to ruin the small town atmosphere.

We began nearly every day in Tulum with a walk of about two KM into and through town, exploring streets and neighborhoods. We'd leave about 7:00 AM and arrive at the delightful café Flor de Michoacan for a delicious cappuccino and to do business on the internet.

At that time of morning the town was getting ready for the day, opening shop fronts, getting merchandise ready for tourists or for townspeople (probably half each). There seem to be hundreds of shops and cafes, many no larger than a closet, most very specialized. Some merchants work from bicycles with huge front baskets, and some run their “store” from pick-up trucks. The residents are very industrious with everyone seemingly busy; and they are very polite and friendly.

Also friendly are the many town dogs throughout; they weren’t really friendly, but just went about their own business, and they weren't a nuisance, they are just part of the everyday life. Sometimes the dogs and cats just watch the street goings-on from rooftops.

The biggest negative was trash everywhere in town (even though there is a daily garbage pick-up), but the shop owners keep their own area very neat and the attractions are very well attended to. They use every transportation mode; most travel by bicycle or motor scooter, but also cars, busses and taxis. Every child goes to school schoolchildren attend in uniform—both for private and public schools—no matter what economic conditions they live in.

More things that we did, to come.

From South to North Texas

On Superbowl Sunday the weather continued to improve and we squeezed in a round of golf north of San Antonio at Olympia Hills Golf Course near Randolph AFB. The course was a little rough after their “winter” weather, and our games were a little rough (spent much time in the rough). They say that once you learn to ride a bike you can just get back on and ride again, but that’s not true of golf-the game needs constant work. But we had a great time and it was good to get out. After golf we drove quickly to Austin and were able to track down a great sports bar in downtown Austin to watch the Super Bowl.

Monday the 7^th we took a look around Austin, had lunch at one of the largest Whole Food stores anywhere with about 20 different food counters. Downtown Austin was bustling and full of young people. We fit right in. Hope to go back someday, but we had to head north to Dallas for the next day’s flight. We spent a nice late evening of conversation and friendship with Ruth’s stepsister Dawn and Dan Powell.

Kites in Texas

Friday Feb. 4. (we're catching up)

It started to warm up in south Texas, so we headed to the kite festival on South Padre Island. This isn't just a bunch of people flying kites, it's an international competition. They make the kites jump and dance to music, usually in groups of three to six kite controllers. We witnessed incredible skill; skittering colors.

South Padre Island is a gorgeous strip of sand and beach, most of it undeveloped, but that which is developed is really developed—the southern 10 miles or so—with high rises all along the gulf coast side. After a delicious lunch of fresh shrimp at the “only place,” Dirty Al’s, we took a drive along the beach (yes you can drive, and it’s a state park) and a romp through the big dunes. Our guides and hosts for all this were Ruth’s cousin Jimmy Dammann and wife Lynette, from Glencoe, MN, who are spending a few winter months in south Texas.

Starting Ruth & Tom's next adventure

We hit the road Monday January 31, 2011. After a day of driving, we pulled into the classy sounding town of Van Horn Texas on the first night of our 75-day adventure.

When we left Tucson, it was a warm sunny morning, but we drove into an increasingly ominous darkening sky, following I-10 east.

The tough part was packing everything for our trek into the Prius: golf clubs first, then everything else had to fit around them, including espresso-maker of course.

Once on the road it felt good. We took a break and a walk in the very historic, unfortunately very run down, section of Las Cruces, NM. A monument commemorating the history claims things got much worse after “urban renewal” efforts in the early 70s.

We left New Mexico, drove into Texas through El Paso. We were surprised that much of western Texas along I-10 was at elevations over 4000 feet. We checked into the historic El Capitan Hotel (actually, the only classy thing we could find in Van Horn) and enjoyed a wonderful Cajun shrimp angel hair pasta dish from the dining room, cooked by the chef who helped us carry in our bags.

By Tuesday morning, we were on the edge of the big winter storm hitting the mid-section of the country. It was snowing and blowing hard in Van Horn, but that didn't stop us from bundling up and walking the main street in blowing snow. In an otherwise woebegone looking main street [see photo] stood the elegant, renovated 1930s era El Capitan Hotel, with palm trees in its southwest style courtyard.

Looking ahead, San Antonio may not be as tropical as we expected, with highs in the 30s forecast the next few days. That’s OK; we’re going there to visit cousins Carolyn and Steve Kelley and their mother Audrey. We’ll bundle up for the River Walk.

Please share your experiences.

We’d like to hear your experiences of places along our route: unusual things to see, great places to eat (preferably with vegetarian selections), and golf courses you like. Next stops will be the South Padre Island (a kite festival ), Dallas, Cancun (yes, we have to leave the Prius and fly there from Dallas), then Thibodeaux and New Orleans, LA. [Please share your experiences by comments to this blog or by personal email to Ruth or Tom or on our Facebook pages.]

-Tom & Ruth