From Calakmul it was a fairly short ride to Chetamul, my first stop in Quintana Roo (state) and first glimpse of the Caribbean. I never imagined water could be such pure turquoise!
I stayed in a nice hostel that night and the owner was asking me how her hostel compared to others I’d stayed in. I told her I’d been impressed by the hostel in Oaxaca, which included not only breakfast but a shot of mescal in the evening. So, not to be outdone, she broke out the Haitian rum. Turns out her husband is Haitian and is working there while she runs the hostel, and brings rum every time he comes back. Smooth but fiery… I’m happy to help!
You know how sometimes when you think you’re something pretty special, or at least are doing something pretty special, something usually happens to bring you back down to earth? Well that was me at this hostel. Thinking I’d done pretty good to get all the way from DC to the bottom of Mexico, virtually incident free, I met Joanne from Scotland. She’s a redheaded 20-something bonny lass, who started her SOLO BICYCLE RIDE to South America from British Colombia. Holy shit, I could not even start to think about doing something like that. Especially if I was a woman… but she’s doing about 60 miles a day, camping out when she has to (something I didn’t do in Mexico cos it’s supposed to be dicey). Amazing. Coincidentally I bumped into her again at a hostel near Tikal in Guatamala… reminds me, I should check where she is now…
I had a couple of things to do on the “Mayan Riveria” – one, catch up with Matteo, a long term Super Tenere owner in Playa del Carmen (he had his bike long before any of us in the US), and two, find a nice spot by the beach to hole up for a while and take a breather after being on the move for so long. Unfortunately one of my criteria for number two was that it would have to be cheap, and I soon discovered that this was the most expensive part of Mexico so far. So that idea got scrapped pretty quickly.
So I really only had one destination, Playa del Carmen, but between Playa and Chetamul lies Tulum, famous for its Mayan ruins on a cliff overlooking the beach. A stop in Tulum was called for… It was kind of a shock to the system to find so many tourists, and inflated prices, after having seen very few in the previous 2 months around Mexico. I had ideas of visiting the ruins, but I REALLY have an aversion to competing with hordes of tourists (I’m sure most of you appreciate the difference between “travellers” and “tourists” – most of us have been both at different times). So the hordes heading to the ruins ruined it for me, so I spent some time on the beach instead. At least you could see the ruins from here.
After a couple of days at Tulum I headed to Playa del Carmen, where Matteo met me on the highway a few minutes outside of town. He then guided me to his luxo pad just off the beach and a few minutes walk from the main shopping/drinking/restaurant part of town. Now I have to say, this was a cut above the hostels I’d been staying in recently! Playa turned out to be a very nice place, but one that wouldn’t have been in my budget at all if it had not been for Matteo’s hospitality. We visited some favourite restaurants and bars, and just hung out in the apartment (did I mention great views over the Caribbean?). Well actually the main reason for hanging out in the apartment… it was raining a LOT for a couple of days. At least we had good views of the ocean, and good tequila.
Matteo and I did a day ride to the Parque Natural Ria Lagartos, a the tip of the Yucatan Penninsula. Gorgeous, but in a different way to other parts of Mexico. We ate cevice in a great seafood restuarant, then had some fun riding fast on sandy tracks. Stopping for a breather, we watched the activity on the lake, where a flock of glorious pink flamingos and other water birds were feeding.
We rode back into Playa del Carmen after dark, in a huge rainstorm. This is when I discovered a fact about concrete roads that I hadn’t realised before. Riding at about 80kph, the front wheel stepped out suddenly. There was a small river crossing the road, but the water was shiny under the streetlights and so was the smooth concrete. It was very difficult to tell the difference. I continued and at one point, travelling in a straight line, I closed the throttle and the rear wheel locked up. WTF? Next I gave it a whiff of throttle and the rear wheel spun up… I looked more closely at the road surface. Concrete roads normally have to have drainage grooves, but here the road mostly worn smooth. Add water and it’s like riding on ice. Matteo and I both had some scary moments, confirmed by the amount of tequila we had to drink when we got back to his apartment.
