We arrived in the tropical island paradise of Isla Holbox to torrential downpours. The sandy streets were boggy sandpits or flooded with a foot of water. Golf carts, the primary mode of transport, struggled and there was zero chance of getting anywhere and staying dry.
When the rains stopped blue skies appeared and the heat resumed so Robina and I took to wandering about the town with our new friend Sabrina from San Fran. It's a cute town of brightly coloured little bars, restaurants and souvenir shops, the beaches were clear green water lined with small fishing boats, pelicans would sit on the boats or circle above before face planting straight into the water and there were lots of tour shops advertising what we were there for - whale sharks!
Robina was like 'wow, those bites are massive, stand still so I can get a picture!', but after she got her pictures had some sympathy for me and suggested we change accommodation to somewhere with aircon.
Because the bites were so painful except when in aircon or cool water we ended up at a lovely rooftop bar that had a pool most nights - I know, it sounds terrible and I'm sure we wouldn't have been there every night anyway! It did also have the most beautiful sunsets.
One day we decided to go out of town to Punta Coco, a point with lagoon on one side and beach on the other, to see if we could see some flamingos. We hired a golf cart and immediately got it bogged in the first puddle we tried to navigate. I was like 'what the hell, we can't be bogged, it's too shallow!' I got out and was shin deep in muddy water looking at the wheels but there was nothing blocking us, Robina revved and the cart didn't seem to be even trying to turn the wheels, which didn't seem right, but a couple of local boys appeared and gave us a push and out of the puddle it seemed to work again.
We stopped to pick up some supplies, but when we went to reverse the cart wouldn't go into reverse, we rang the hire place and a guy came. He kept putting the cart into forward and telling us it worked, we kept saying, 'no, no reverse' and he just shrugged his shoulders, like well don't reverse then.
So we got to the lagoon a couple of k's out of town and parked in an open area so we wouldn't have to reverse.
We had a swim, saw lots of flamingos and also heaps of the giant grasshoppers they have here, but when we were ready to leave our golf cart started but wouldn't move. No forwards or backwards.
We were just trying to figure out how we were going to explain to the guys at the shop where we were when a Mexican couple walked by and didn't think it was totally weird when we asked if they could make a phone call for us. So they rang the hire place for us and explained where we were, what was wrong with our cart and they stayed with us until Victor the mechanic appeared.
Victor agreed our cart was broken and gave us an oily rag so we could reach down into the back and push the gear in manually. The problem was once it was in it didn't stay in so we had to reach in and shove it back into gear every 30 or 40 metres. It was a long trip home, but our new friends hitched a ride back with us, so it was a bit of a laugh and the golf cart hire guys were nice enough to return our money when we finally made it back to town.
When the rains stopped blue skies appeared and the heat resumed so Robina and I took to wandering about the town with our new friend Sabrina from San Fran. It's a cute town of brightly coloured little bars, restaurants and souvenir shops, the beaches were clear green water lined with small fishing boats, pelicans would sit on the boats or circle above before face planting straight into the water and there were lots of tour shops advertising what we were there for - whale sharks!
Our whale shark tour began early morning, it was still dark when we climbed aboard a very small boat and then headed straight out from the coast for about 3 hours. As the sun rose there was no land in sight and no sound except our little lawnmower-like engine as we sped over the top of the glassy water.
We spotted some movement in the water and slowed down, the roiling, boiling spot of water was a school of fish bumping against the surface trying to escape the gaping maw of huge manta rays cruising about enjoying their breakfast.
Soon we spotted other boats in the distance, when closer we could see all the movement in the water, for every boat there were probably about a dozen whale sharks. There were hundreds of them, just cruising about ignoring all the snorkellers kicking about trying to follow them.
We jumped into the water in pairs and the guide yelled from the boat 'swim! swim!' as a large shark went past. I was giving chase when the shark did a big poo and suddenly I was paddling my way through yellowy-brown water thinking 'oh no, don't go getting water in your snorkel now!'
But even being poo-ed on couldn't ruin the experience, it was amazing, they're so huge and spotty and wonderful! In the water their colours look much brighter and their big vacuum cleaner mouths make them look like they're smiling.
Our first night in Isla Holbox turned out to be not so excellent. I woke in the night itching and sweating, covered head to toe with bedbug bites, literally - I had bites on my ears and my little toes! It was so painful and all I could do to alleviate the the pain was soak my sarong in the sink and wrap it over me. In the morning I looked like I had measles or chicken pox, the bites swelled up into big lumps and every time I started to sweat (which is pretty much all the time here) they started to itch again.
We spotted some movement in the water and slowed down, the roiling, boiling spot of water was a school of fish bumping against the surface trying to escape the gaping maw of huge manta rays cruising about enjoying their breakfast.
Soon we spotted other boats in the distance, when closer we could see all the movement in the water, for every boat there were probably about a dozen whale sharks. There were hundreds of them, just cruising about ignoring all the snorkellers kicking about trying to follow them.
We jumped into the water in pairs and the guide yelled from the boat 'swim! swim!' as a large shark went past. I was giving chase when the shark did a big poo and suddenly I was paddling my way through yellowy-brown water thinking 'oh no, don't go getting water in your snorkel now!'
But even being poo-ed on couldn't ruin the experience, it was amazing, they're so huge and spotty and wonderful! In the water their colours look much brighter and their big vacuum cleaner mouths make them look like they're smiling.
Robina was like 'wow, those bites are massive, stand still so I can get a picture!', but after she got her pictures had some sympathy for me and suggested we change accommodation to somewhere with aircon.
Because the bites were so painful except when in aircon or cool water we ended up at a lovely rooftop bar that had a pool most nights - I know, it sounds terrible and I'm sure we wouldn't have been there every night anyway! It did also have the most beautiful sunsets.
One day we decided to go out of town to Punta Coco, a point with lagoon on one side and beach on the other, to see if we could see some flamingos. We hired a golf cart and immediately got it bogged in the first puddle we tried to navigate. I was like 'what the hell, we can't be bogged, it's too shallow!' I got out and was shin deep in muddy water looking at the wheels but there was nothing blocking us, Robina revved and the cart didn't seem to be even trying to turn the wheels, which didn't seem right, but a couple of local boys appeared and gave us a push and out of the puddle it seemed to work again.
We stopped to pick up some supplies, but when we went to reverse the cart wouldn't go into reverse, we rang the hire place and a guy came. He kept putting the cart into forward and telling us it worked, we kept saying, 'no, no reverse' and he just shrugged his shoulders, like well don't reverse then.
So we got to the lagoon a couple of k's out of town and parked in an open area so we wouldn't have to reverse.
We had a swim, saw lots of flamingos and also heaps of the giant grasshoppers they have here, but when we were ready to leave our golf cart started but wouldn't move. No forwards or backwards.
We were just trying to figure out how we were going to explain to the guys at the shop where we were when a Mexican couple walked by and didn't think it was totally weird when we asked if they could make a phone call for us. So they rang the hire place for us and explained where we were, what was wrong with our cart and they stayed with us until Victor the mechanic appeared.
Victor agreed our cart was broken and gave us an oily rag so we could reach down into the back and push the gear in manually. The problem was once it was in it didn't stay in so we had to reach in and shove it back into gear every 30 or 40 metres. It was a long trip home, but our new friends hitched a ride back with us, so it was a bit of a laugh and the golf cart hire guys were nice enough to return our money when we finally made it back to town.
We returned to Cancun for our last couple of days where we went to Coco Bongo a giant club/theatre thing which was awesome. There were stages with performances and dancing themed from movies like Beetlejuice, Spiderman and my favourite was a battle scene from Tron, people were swinging overhead and falling from the ceiling on ribbons and the whole time you watch you're dancing because it's a big club. It was a lot of fun.
Not so awesome was getting attacked by bed bugs again followed by an allergic reaction to the cream I got from the pharmacist. So after that causing me more misery I was ready to jump on a plane home and to a bug free bed.
Not so awesome was getting attacked by bed bugs again followed by an allergic reaction to the cream I got from the pharmacist. So after that causing me more misery I was ready to jump on a plane home and to a bug free bed.
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