An Interesting and Delayed Start

Well here we go again as I re-engage my writing skills after a three week hiatus and hope that I skill have an audience willing to check out my posts. As you may know, if you read my last blog I set off for a three week trip down in Mexico, travelling along the Mayan Riviera. Basically from Cancun to Tulum is where I spent the majority of my time. The trip itself didn’t start as planned , as per my prior post I was delayed three hours, well that ended up being nine hours and we didn’t leave until about midnight, fun! Now I’m in a battle with the airline to receive some compensation due to the fact three hours of the delay was caused directly by them, but talking to an airline is like having a conversation with brick wall I’ll leave this story for another time. Being as late as we were arrival time in Cancun was 3:30 a.m. and that is about as bad of time for landing as there is. The airport is empty, my plan to take the bus downtown scrapped as they don’t run that time of night, so the only option waiting out front like vultures are the airport taxis and if you’ve been to any Mexican airport you know what I mean. It’s basically like a cartel like run taxi service, different then the ones you can catch around the city and it’s a scam. I was the first one through the doors, because of my light load (backpack) they jump all over me and I’m tired. $83 American is what they want for a twenty minute ride downtown. I tell them to take a hike, not a chance, I’ll sleep in front of the bus terminal before I pay that. I try to get on a shuttle rented by others on the flight and just tell them I need to get downtown, the taxi drivers follow me and basically threaten that driver not to let me on, since I’m not booked on that particular shuttle, SHIT! I wander back into the airport and sit in front of the bus kiosk to wait the four hours for it to open. Fifteen minutes later I’m approached by the taxi service again, I tell her to beat it, but she has a different offer this time allowing me to split a ride with a couple locals heading downtown for 400 Peso, still much more than I wanted to spend, but the super tired part of me gives in and agrees. It takes about twenty minutes to finally get into a taxi, the system they have is meant to distract, fusterate and basically wear you down so you’ll fall for their scams. Be very aware of this, I had no choice because of my late flight. Other families were forced to pay up to at least $200 USD to get to Playa de Carmen.

Now I’m finally on the road and it’s getting close to 4:30 a.m. no the ideal time to be out and about in downtown Cancun. I get dropped off at the ADO bus terminal and from there it’s only a short ten minute walk to my first hostel, which I’m now ultra late getting too. Finding your accommodations in Mexico can be an adventure in itself, not a whole lot of signage or even house numbers can make things…well interesting. I find myself walking through a park and down a side street, everything is closed up and streets are completely empty. I see what I believe is the hostel I’ve booked for the night give the door a pull “shit” it’s locked, now what? As I’m about to put my backpack down on the ground and use it as a pillow I hear someone stirring on the other side of the door, “Hola?” is what I hear from the voice. I explain to him who I am and that I’m ultra late because of the flight. He lets me in and all I can think about is laying my exhausted body on any bed right now and after a bit of paperwork I to my dorm (8 beds) find my bunk in the dark, throw my stuff in a locker, locker it up and slide into my bottom bunk, I prefer the bottom most times and fall into a dead sleep, it’s 5am and I have to check out at 11, delayed flights suck!

I awake the next (same) morning to the shower running at 9am, it’s directly through the wall behind me, the joys of hostel living, also everyone else in the room is stirring about and this is the first hostel I’ve stayed at where there is no curtains to draw around the bed for a little privacy. I try to bury my head in the pillow to no avail, oh well, I get up, put my swim trunks on, mind you there’s not much privacy and I’m tired, so without a care in the world I put little effort into hiding anything and to be fair nobody else really does either. I slide open my door which leads to the pool and a 34 degree day, this is more like it. A quick morning plunge and instead of packing up I go down to reception and book again for another night, I’m in no rush or mood to travel far today, it’s another $22 CAD to spend the night, so it doesn’t get much cheaper. Instead of heading back to bed, which is what I felt like I spied a small breakfast place just down the block, yup in my bathing suit and flip flops nothing else, so many things I love about Mexico and the dress code is one of them, cause it doesn’t matter. For my first meal I have a delicious Americano at $3 CAD and a massive plate of Chilaquiles at $6, so you can do the math and another thing I love about Mexico and eating local, cost! Considering I was attempting budget travelling and severely overpaid for my cab ride, I now have to find ways to make that up. The next stop on the way back to the hostel is the OXOX, if you’ve been anywhere in Mexico you know these exist on every corner and it’s where I’m heading to grab some cerveza, I grab a six pack, along with some snacks and head back a local directing traffic out front of the hostel is friendly and I stop and talk with him for a quick minute, I like to conversate with locals to improve my Spanish and their always willing to help me pronounce words correctly. I hand him a cold beer and get a warm smile and fist bump before I head up the stairs to sit by the pool, joined by a few other travellers we start to talk, I’ll leave that for the next post, but talking with others from around the world has become one of my favourite past times. It helps put life into perspective.