The ruins of Tulum in Mexico have one of the most scenic and picturesque settings for any ruines, set high on a cliff face overlooking a white sandy beach.
The mix of the history, sun, sea and beach is hard to beat and is why, despite its small size and the fact that Mexico can boast more than thirty archeological sites of great interest, Tulum is considered by many to be one of the most beautiful to visit, attracting at least a thousand tourists every day.
For me, I had not known of this place until K' mentioned it to me, but then Tulum is not to blame for my ignorance any more than Snorkling is to be considered a new sport just because I have only just come to enjoy it.
The guide, however, could do a lot more to improve upon his technique and I have never been on any tour where partly through the guide himself decides to cal it a day and instead he told us all to go and join a bigger group that were being showed round in only English, which left him to dedicate his time to just the locals - and this is why I gave barely 30p as a tip for him as this for me was the height of bad manners and organization.
I was a little confused by the guide as he went on about the fact that you could tell who had lived here, and how many, by the bones buried in the graveyards as I had earlier been told that the Mayans were big on cremating their dead, so I will have to consult a few more text books to find out which is accurate, but whatever the truth nothing can take away that it felt special to gaze at yet more buildings that were built by a specific design along accurate lines of direction and with even more examples of their scientific and astrological abilities.
The other thing that confused me was the guide saying that the Spanish Monks that came over, once it had been conquered by their soldiers, copied the calendar, but did so badly and thus creating the modern gregorian calendar, as again I was sure that I had read somewhere that the Roman Caesar Augustus had altered it many hundreds of years earlier to include himself as the month of August, so once more I will need to investigate further.
After the official guide finished we were given about half an hour to explore and take a few more photos, but considering how much I like to take photos this was hardly enough time and often I wasted valuable minutes while stupid tourists would stop right in the way of me taking a photo just to talk to each other, adjust their clothing or take a drink, why more people do not realise that they can be so more accomodating if they wait til they are sitting under a tree to do all those unnecessary things I have no idea.
Despite almost getting trapped in the lush jungle that marked the edge of the ruins, I managed to make it back in time for the bus, barely as the exit was not well marked at all and on the ground the salir sign only took you right back into the jungle, and then we headed off back to Xel-Há to pick up the rest of the group that chose to stay in the water park and then finally started the journey back to the city centre.
On your way to the city centre you go past the Hotel District and it is around 28 kilometers of modern road with some of the biggest and most expensive hotels you can imagine, all brightly lit up not only for Christmas but all year round, and I particularly liked the fake palm trees that were all lights.
I arrived back at my hostel around 8pm, too dark to do much and with yet more new faces in my hostel all either asleep or about to go clubbing, that for the first time on my trip I really didn't feel like trying to make friends with anyone here and instead just headed on out to get something to eat and drink before having an early night, as in the morning I had both a trip to the beach and to check out and prepare myself for the flight back to Mexico City.
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