Yucatan visit [Latin America]

From: HH on 1 May 2007 13:05

Please help me decide on an itinerary for a visit to Yucatan. I want to see
Merida and the principal Mayan sites. I would appreciate it if you would
give me your comments on the following rough itinerary. Please also
recommend accommodation. I like small hotels or guest houses, older but
modernized, with local ambiance. Would this work:

Day 1 Arrive Cancun in mid-afternoon, drive to Merida on the toll road,
arriving in the evening. Night in Merida

Day 2 Night in Merida

Day 3 Night at Uxmal.

Day 4 Night at Chichen-Itza

Day 5 Night at Tulum

Day 6 Night in Cancun

Day 7 Fly home

From: Technobarbarian on 2 May 2007 01:42

"HH" <hhhague(a)comcast.net> wrote in message
news:B96dnWoaGLxz76rbnZ2dnUVZ_syunZ2d(a)comcast.com...
> Please help me decide on an itinerary for a visit to Yucatan. I want to
> see Merida and the principal Mayan sites. I would appreciate it if you
> would give me your comments on the following rough itinerary. Please also
> recommend accommodation. I like small hotels or guest houses, older but
> modernized, with local ambiance. Would this work:
>
> Day 1 Arrive Cancun in mid-afternoon, drive to Merida on the toll road,
> arriving in the evening. Night in Merida
>
> Day 2 Night in Merida
>
> Day 3 Night at Uxmal.
>
> Day 4 Night at Chichen-Itza
>
> Day 5 Night at Tulum
>
> Day 6 Night in Cancun
>
> Day 7 Fly home

This is similar to what we did a couple years ago. I've been able to
hang out down there for longer periods, but we were only able to spare a
week for that trip. If you turn south from the airport you come to the
Cancun bypass very quickly. The toll road to Merida and the highway from
Cancun to Tulum are couple of the only places in Mexico that I'll willingly
drive after dark. By the time we got to Valladolid it had been dark for
quite awhile. The hotel El Meson del Marques is right on the main square.
Valladolid has quite a bit of charm in its own right. Just across the street
from the hotel is one of best places to pick up local craft items from the
people who made them. The Mayan ladies are mostly selling traditional
dresses and other needlework, but you can also pick up hammocks there.
Valladolid has a nice small traditional mercado. There's also an interesting
cenote there that you can walk in.

http://www.cancunhotel2000.com/hotels/valladolid/elmesondelmarques.htm

The next day we visited the ruins at Ek Balam, Chichen Itza and the
Balanchance cave that was used for ceremonial purposes. From there we drove
to Merida. I consider both the INAH museum and the big traditional mercado
there to be must sees, but there a lot of interesting stuff in that area. We
stayed at the Hotel Caribe. It's a nice older hotel. I like it because it's
centrally located, an easy walk from there to the mercado, and reasonably
priced.

http://www.travelyucatan.com/hotels/hotel_info.php?View=Info&asoc=travelyu&ID=707&Type=hotels&AY=2007&AM=5&AD=2&DY=2007&DM=5&DD=9

After visiting Merida we drove to Santa Elena about 9 miles south of
Uxmal. On the extreme south side of Santa Elena is a pleasant little RV park
and campground with some rustic cabins hand built by the owners called Sacbe
Cabins and Camping. Watch for it on the right side of the highway a little
past Santa Elena proper. The owners live on site. They're trilingual:
French, English and Spanish. If you sign up for them in advance you can get
nice meals there at fixed times for very reasonable prices. The place oozes
charm. You can see a lot of tropical birds there, including flocks of
parrots at times.

The next day we visited Uxmal and some of the other nearby
archaeological sites. I particularly recommend Kabah, it has some very nice
artwork. We got pleasantly lost trying to drive across from a town that
produces handmade pottery to Mayapan. (Hey, we were in the Yucatan, how bad
can it be, even when you're a little bit lost?) Mayapan is nice because it
has pieces of some of the original murals and gives you a better idea of
what the temples looked like with their painted surfaces. We ended up in
Piste just because that's where we were at the end of the day. We stayed at
the Thunderbird hotel for no particular reason. It's nice enough, but not
one of the better buys of our trip.

From there we drove to Valladolid and south to Coba. Coba is more
typical of the archaelogical sites in the region than Chichen Itza. I like
it more for the wildlife on and around the site, than the actual ruins.
There are crocodiles in the nearby lake. This highway is thinly paved and
usually has a lot of widely scattered potholes. It ends on the coast at
Tulum.

The archaelogical site at Tulum is fairly small. Unlike many of the
other sites it wasn't the center of a city/state, but had been built for
ceremonial purposes. Because it's a small site that gets a lot of visitors
it's best to get there first thing in the morning. The town doesn't have a
lot to recommend it. There are some nice open air restaurants on the highway
and some pleasant looking hotels on the beach. It's a long time favorite of
counter culture types because of it's budget accomodations. The main part of
town, between the highway and the beach, is very poverty stricken.

We drove up to Pamuul and used that as our base of operations for the
rest of the trip. It's a bit south of Playa del Carmen. Pamuul is mostly an
RV park with quite a few expats who have take up permanent or semi-permanent
residence. They have some pleasant and relatively inexpensive cabanas on the
beach as well as some more traditonal rooms. It sits on a nice little cove.
If you like to snorkel watch for Peacock Flounder and Octopi there.

http://www.paamulcabanas.com/english/index3.php

In that area I'd also suggest visiting the Xel Ha ruins. It only gets a
small fraction of the visitors that Tulum gets, but it has some interesting
murals. There are lots of things to see and do in the area. We drove back to
the airport without ever going into Cancun. Cancun is a fairly new city
built on the site of a sleepy fishing village. For my taste is has too many
tourists and too little Mexico. These days you can get all of that you want
in the tourist section of Playa del Carmen.

Since you're interested in the archaeological sites I'd suggest you
pick up a copy of Andrew Coe's Archaeological Mexico.

TB

From: Calif Bill on 3 May 2007 01:37

From: angela l on 4 May 2007 19:22

On May 1, 12:05 pm, "HH" <hhha...(a)comcast.net> wrote:
> Please help me decide on an itinerary for a visit to Yucatan. I want to see
> Merida and the principal Mayan sites. I would appreciate it if you would
> give me your comments on the following rough itinerary. Please also
> recommend accommodation. I like small hotels or guest houses, older but
> modernized, with local ambiance. Would this work:
>
> Day 1 Arrive Cancun in mid-afternoon, drive to Merida on the toll road,
> arriving in the evening. Night in Merida
>
> Day 2 Night in Merida
>
> Day 3 Night at Uxmal.
>
> Day 4 Night at Chichen-Itza
>
> Day 5 Night at Tulum
>
> Day 6 Night in Cancun
>
> Day 7 Fly home

If you are near Cancun don´t waste your money at all the hype, fancy
places. There are hostels, much better to stay at and appreciatethe
culture; my favorite was at $11 per night on Isla de Mujeres that was
in 2000; it was so awesome! Some are cheaper some are more expensive
on the mainland.

From: Technobarbarian on 5 May 2007 09:57

"Alan S" <nothere(a)there.com> wrote in message
news:vpbg331ge1kah14itp24ns4qmouksbb1k3(a)4ax.com...
> On Tue, 1 May 2007 22:42:04 -0700, "Technobarbarian"

> <Technobarbarian-ztopzpam(a)gmail.com> wrote:
>> This is similar to what we did a couple years ago. I've been able to
>>hang out down there for longer periods, but we were only able to spare a
>>week for that trip. If you turn south from the airport you come to the
>>Cancun bypass very quickly. The toll road to Merida and the highway from
>>Cancun to Tulum are couple of the only places in Mexico that I'll
>>willingly
>>drive after dark. By the time we got to Valladolid it had been dark for
>>quite awhile. The hotel El Meson del Marques is right on the main square.
>>Valladolid has quite a bit of charm in its own right. Just across the
>>street
>>from the hotel is one of best places to pick up local craft items from the
>>people who made them. The Mayan ladies are mostly selling traditional
>>dresses and other needlework, but you can also pick up hammocks there.
>>Valladolid has a nice small traditional mercado. There's also an
>>interesting
>>cenote there that you can walk in.

> Thank you for that excellent report. I'm going to be trying
> something similar, but I'm limited to four nights and public
> transport or taxis.
>
> I was thinking of staying (as a single senior, I'm not a
> back-packer) arrival night in Cancun and the other three in
> a small town like Valladolid and doing day trips or tours
> from there. Any suggestions on other towns with character
> but reasonable ( = aircon and pool) hotels?

I'm not the best person to ask about hotels. Most of my travels in
the region have been in a motorhome. There are a lot of towns with character
in the region, but most of them don't have the sort of hotel that would have
a swimming pool. The cenote in Valladolid is a popular swimming hole. The
Hotel Caribe in Merida has a pool in an unlikely spot on the second or third
floor. Some of the more upscale hotels near Chichen Itza may have pools.

With your time frame and choice of transportation I'd suggest traveling
light and moving around a bit instead of using any one place as a base. The
town at Chichen Itza, Piste, is nice enough for a place whose main industry
is tourism, but I wouldn't call it a town with character. I like Valladolid,
but personally I'd get bored there if I stayed three nights in a row. You
have enough time that you could get into Merida or spend a night on the
coast. Izamal is another town with character to consider.

In addition to visiting the ruins of Ek Balam I'd also suggest
visiting the village of Ek Balam just past the ruins. Most of the homes are
built on a traditional Mayan pattern, with minor modern improvements.
Another site to consider is Dzibilchaltun, a bit north of Merida. The
archaeological site suffers from having been plundered for its stones and
overly aggressive restoration, but there's an excellent museum there. The
cenote there is another popular swimming hole for the locals.

TB

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