Mexico’s Yucatan & Tulum Stunning Highlights In One Week

When you think of Yucatán, your mind likely goes to Cancun spring-break-mania, with college kids bathed in tequila and sporting fluorescent Borat-style thong swimsuits. And while that may be an allure to some, Cancun and the Yucatán can definitely be a whole other experience!

Situated on the northeastern tip of coastline on Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula, in Quintana Roo, Cancun is a tropical, paradise-location of powder white sand and aqua blue sea. Its temperatures are warm all year around, which makes it a great vacation spot anytime, although some months are a little hotter and wetter than others. It’s become world renown for its beautiful beaches, luxe resorts, wonderful diving, and a lively nightlife. I had been to Cancun when I was 21 years old, and stayed in a resort in the middle of the strip, and this time I wanted to stay somewhere that felt a little more private, but still with all the amenities, and totally easy access to all of the places in Quintana Roo that I wanted to visit. I also decided to go the second week of October, primarily because that was my son’s fall break off of school, but also because it is totally off-peak season, and a lot of the resorts offer awesome deals, and I knew the attractions I wanted to see would be vastly less crowded (and they were!) October is the end of rainy season in the Yucatan, and can also be a bit hotter than the months of November through May, but it mostly just rained a bit in the afternoons, and it didn’t dampen our overall experience one bit!

I had gone to a Club Med in Guadeloupe with my family, when I was around 10 years old, and it was an incredibly memorable vacation, even decades later (Thanks, Mom and Dad!) Wanting to give my son a similar experience for this trip, I decided to book the stunning, all-inclusive Club Med property in Cancun in order to mix fun resort activities with cultural trips to ancient Mayan ruins, vibrant little towns, and geological wonders, like the countless incredible cenotes that exist everywhere in Yucatan. (Read more in my Club Med Cancun blog post all about the awesome resort itself, their grounds, and incredible activities.)

Since we were staying an entire week there, we decided to do a mix of half excursion days & half resort-fun days. The first trip we took, was to the most famous of the Mayan ruins. Chichén Itzá is one of the new Seven Wonders of the World, and it’s really a marvel. Built by the Mayans in the 7th Century, the city of Chichen Itza was the largest and most thriving of all of the Mayan cities. It’s about a 1.5 – 2 hour drive from Cancun, and we left the resort at around 6:30am, and planned to stop along the way to see an amazing cenote, right near Valladolid town.

Side note: One thing I should mention, is that the drive there is extremely straight-forward, on a smooth stretch of straight highway. You have to pay a toll of about $17 each way, but considering a rental car from Cancun airport is just $1-$2 a day, I’d say that the cost of the road tolls were a non-issue. (And Yes, you most definitely read that right! We paid a total of $25USD for 7 full days, including all taxes and fees for our brand new Volkswagen Jetta from Budget Rent-a-Car. Avis, Hertz, Dollar all cost the same, and the people that work there are very helpful.) Also, driving to the main tourist attractions and towns, and walking around, always felt 100% entirely safe. Cancun has, in recent years, gotten a bad wrap for some excessive crime. The travel alerts have since been lifted, since it was cartel-related, and security, especially in tourist areas & resorts, were increased 10-fold to ensure that Cancun’s all-important tourism industry would stay healthily intact. I would never ever put my son and myself in harm’s way, and I only ever felt entirely safe during the whole trip, whether at the resort, traveling to towns, or walking around.

Once arriving at Suytún, you will easily be blown away!!! It totally looks like something from a sci-fi movie, but this is a real place. It is called a ‘Cenote’, and there are literally thousands of them on the Yucatan Peninsula. They are giant sink holes filled with crystal clear water, and they are believed to have been created when a giant meteor hit Earth (the same that ended the reign of the dinosaurs). These Cenotes are not only beautiful, exotic, and geologically awesome (!!!!), but they have provided thousands of years of civilizations with water for their cities, and a cool refuge in which to bathe, swim, and escape the brutal heat and sun. Many of them are connected & provide miles of underground caves and water-filled passage, and some are so deep that you can find some incredible scuba diving there as well. This particular Cenote, called Suytún, is owned by a family, who created a central platform and staircase leading down to it. It is lit solely by the sun coming through a hole in the earth at the top of the sink hole, and if you feel like it, you can take a dip in it’s chilly waters. We got there right when it opened, and didn’t have to share it with anyone, although as we were leaving, more people started to enter. It has become a popular place recently, and I’ve heard that tour buses visit starting around 10/11:00, so be sure to get there before then.

After that, we continued on to Chichen Itza, getting there also before it got too crowded, at around 10:00. It’s hot, and there isn’t much shade, so be sure to wear lots of sunscreen, a hat, and bring water! Also, bring some little cash, as the tree-lined shady spots on the pathways that connect the ruins, are also lined with dozens & dozens of merchant tables, eager to sell you some of their mayan crafts. We found some incredibly cool carved animals that can also create the sound of animals (like jaguars and birds) when blown into. The kids thought these were awesome! Luckily though, they were equally impressed by the Castillo step pyramid, which is the central focal point in the 4 mile square complex of multiple stone buildings. All the buildings have unique stories, most specifically the ball court where losers of the game were often sacrificed! Again, fascinating to the kids, who had tons of questions after that! When I visited Chichén Itzá about 20 years ago, I was able to climb up the steep, narrow steps to the top to see the whole view of all of Chichen Itzá, but after a fatal accident in 2006 (when a woman fell), they no longer allow visitors to climb.

But during the spring and autumn equinoxes, the sun creates the illusion of a snake ascending or descending the stairs of the Pyramid of Kukulkan (the name of the Castillo), an awesome phenomenon that attracts thousands of people. And also, Chichen Itza hosts an incredible light show every night after dark, with images projected onto the pyramid that tells the story of the ancient Mayan civilization. You’d have to visit at night to see this (it is a separate entrance ticket and fee), but I have seen many images & videos, and it is spectacular.

After walking around Chichen Itza, and working up a substantially wet sweat, we decided to hit some cenotes to swim and cool off. But first, we opted to have a bite in the beautiful little nearby town of Valladolid with its colorful, colonial buildings. We had an amazing lunch (in one of the oldest buildings in the town, called Hostería del Marques), including fresh guacamole, made tableside, fueling up before heading off to the rest of our adventure day.

Next stop was Cenote Zaci. This incredibly refreshing cenote is smack in the middle of the city of Valladolid. Surrounded by buildings and businesses, it is a hidden underground oasis that one can easily miss and mistake for a simple park that’s about a city block large. The entrance to the cenote is a staircase in a cave through the ground, that’s just about a 4 feet wide by 6 foot high hole. We jumped in to cool off after lunch and a steamy stroll around beautiful Valladolid town. There’s a 30 foot ledge you can jump off from, and my crazy child did it!

After spending about an hour in this cenote, we decided to head off to see another one, that was close-by, and that I had seen photos of on instagram. Cenote Oxmal was incredibly awesome, and the kids’ absolute favorite. It is the clearest definition of a ‘sinkhole’, where you can peer down into it’s pit from a 20 foot diameter hole in the Earth. After walking down the stairs, you can enter the water via stairs, or a rope swing managed by one of the Oxmal staff, whom you can tip if you’d like, which I always strongly encourage! We all swung more times than we could count. It was a definite adrenaline rush!! A few things to note about getting to this cenote: It is a very remote, single-lane, unpaved, pot-hole dotted, bumpy road to get there from Valladolid center. But it is only about 10-15 minutes, so if you don’t mind a few bumps, I would say it’s definitely worth it. Plus the estate area has a hotel, pool, restaurant, in addition to the cenote, and it is extremely lovely there, once you’ve arrived!

Our next day trip, was south of Cancun, and also very easy to access via a straight-shot highway with very well marked-signs. About a 90-minute drive from Cancun, is beautiful Tulum. We decided to start the day with a cenote, very close to central Tulum town, after being in the car for 1.5 hours, and also because I had read that this particular one was very beautiful & very popular, so we wanted to hit it early to beat the crowds. Grand Cenote is its name, and it is popular for a reason. Its waters are so crystal clear that being under water doesn’t seem like you are. The unfiltered photo below was taken on the more secluded, shallow side, but if you swim under the cave to the main section, the water goes quite deep, but still stays just as clear. We got there right after it opened, and so we didn’t have to share it’s beauty with too many others… except the teeny turtles swimming around with us. Afterwards, we decided to get a smoothie at Raw Love, a restaurant and retreat on Tulum beach that has a bohemian feel-good vibe. I found the amazing art installation I had been searching for (more info below), and after our smoothies, we walked a bit of Tulum beach to check out the other retreats. One bit of helpful info- a lot of the hotels/resorts in Tulum (an area also known as the ‘Mayan Riviera’), are adult-only, with no children allowed on the grounds. This is a nice option for travellers who would like a bit more of a quiet, grown-up, exclusive experience. I didn’t get to check it out, as I had kids-in-tow, however one of the incredible ones of note is Azulik. If you go to Tulum sans-kids, check it out!

Our last stop on this day trip was to the Cenote, Cristalino. It is actually one of a group of three clustered Cenotes, and I believe you can buy access to all 3, or just one. We opted for just one, as it was getting later & it looked like it could rain. This is an open-air cenote with lots of little off-shoot smaller natural pools, and the water is of course, crystal clear blue. Some of the fun novelties of this cenote are a 10 foot jumping platform, which again the kids loved, and the au-naturale ‘fish spa’ where tiny fish will nibble the dead skin off your feet in a free, albeit semi-creepy pedicure! Lots of people were taking advantage of this nature-made service, but I just watched from the safety of the platform. But for a total cost of 150 Mexican Pesos entry fee for the cenote ($7.50USD), leaving with silky smooth, soft footsies, is a definite bonus!

The last excursion we did, was purely for the kids, (although we had a great time too!) It was an adrenaline-filled day at Xplor, a themed park, about 45 minutes from Cancun, that combines the diverse ecosphere of the area with thrilling rides through the heart of it, to explore it all. The highlight was definitely the ziplines, with about a dozen combined high-flying lines, some of which end through waterfalls & into water. They are definitely not for the faint of heart, but if you like that sort of thing (which my son & I do!), then your heart will be happy there! We also drove fun rugged-terrain buggy vehicles through the jungle (through caves and water pits too), and took both a raft, and swam through the water-filled cave tunnels that drip with amazing natural stalactites and stalagmites that are millions of years old! It’s got a bit of a hefty price tag ($120 per adult, $60 per child), but with a full all-you-can-eat buffet lunch included in that cost, in addition to as many rides as you can possibly do, it is worth it for a full day of non-stop entertainment and activity. And the best part- your kids will be so wiped out from all the fun, that they will sleep GOOD afterwards! You can use your own GoPros, cameras & phones to take photos, or you can buy a package from them, where their strategically and abundantly placed cameras will snap photos of you enjoying the activities through the entire park. The cameras know it’s you because of a strategically placed micro chip in your groups’ mandatory safety helmets that you wear throughout the park, so when you’re done with your day, you can collect all your group’s photos conveniently online using a personal code you’re given. Brilliant!

But my absolute favorite part of Xplor? Was getting to hang with the Coati. Don’t know what that is? Join the club! This adorable unusual creature surprised the hell out of me when I took a break from all the zipping to get a mid-morning snack of coffee and cookies at the gratuitous smoothie bar, in the middle of the park. It turns out, I wasn’t the only one wanting a cookie, when a fuzzy little anteater-raccoon-fox-monkey-looking-thing came right up to me to see what goodies I had. Wha?!?!?!? Shy little animals, but brazen enough to sneak a peek at what food you might be handing out, they are part of the raccoon family, I learned, and are called Coati. The babies came up to me too, and licked my GoPro lens, no doubt hoping it was chocolate-flavored! I could’ve watched these little cuties for hours, but they eventually scampered away back into the jungle where they live freely. Soooo fun!!!! Take a look at this video….

Anteater-raccoon-fox-monkey? Coati!

Until next time……. Aloha, Yucatan!