3) Chichen Itza and a horrible tour trip

7 am in the morning (02.01) the tour bus picked us up from our hotel in Cancun and the worst tour trip started that we ever had. 3 hotel pick ups later we had to wait 45mins because someone was getting a coffee at Starbucks and didn't feel guilty about letting everyone in the bus wait. This let us arrive a bit late at the connection terminal in the Hotel Zone (if we knew about that we would have come there directly, instead of sitting 1.5h waiting in the bus to get there). There we had to wait for the next big tour bus to come. We then started 9:20 am to go to Chichen Itza. The ride was supposed to be 2.5 hours starting from our hotel and we ended up taking 8! hours to get there. Our guide, a Maya himself, started to explain us about the Maya culture. He was desperately trying to sell us that child labor is a good thing in Maya culture because the children love to help their parents. The very common incest in Maya village culture leaves Mayan people with many handicapped children, especially children with down syndrome. However, we were to learn that this was not a burden but a blessing to all the families as down syndrome children are only born to good and friendly families - aha! He then told us that the bus would stop for several shopping stores. That way Mayans would no longer sell their goods on the streets to tourists with high risks of being driven over. So for the peoples sake we stopped at vendors selling touristy crap goods. On the way we also stopped for a short sightseeing in the city of Valladolid. The city was not really worth visiting. At least we knew now that we wouldn't have missed anything if we skipped the city as planned. The last stop before Chichen Itza brought us to the lunch buffet place. But this stop was not without trying to sell Mayan Shaman medicine, Mayan miracle stones or our names written in Mayan language - only 20 bucks each^^ About 3pm we finally arrived in Chichen Itza. Our guide was super boring and we quickly left the group and explored the place on our own. It was packed with tourists but the main pyramide still looked really great! We then had fun making pictures with the pyramide and bargaining for some souvenirs I would bring my niece and nephew. I thought going down to 40% of the first price announced was a good deal. After sunset all the vendors tried hard selling their goods and we found out that going down to 10-20% of the original price would have been a really good deal. We didn't return on the tour bus but took our luggage and went to the local bus. However, entering the local bus right after sunset is no good idea as everyone tries to leave the place. With difficulties we made it into the bus while some other people had to wait for the next one (1 per hour). Cramped in the bus we met a french couple Fabio and Lorie. They came on a day trip from Merida, the city we were going to now. As they were interested in exploring Mayan places and a huge limestone cave around Merida, we would meet the next day to share a taxi for this trip.

On arrival in Merida we went to our hotel Maria del Carmen, which we also can highly recommend :) We then walked around the town a bit and had dinner at Los Trompos near Plaza de la Independencia before we went to sleep.

selfie at Chichen Itza ruins

Franzi's jumping picture in front of the famous pyramide

making some fun pictures...

...and more...

:)

2) Cancun and Isla Mujeres for NewYearsEve

In Cancun we stayed at the IBIS hotel in downtown, which we can highly recommend. We quickly realized that the main beach is in the Hotel Zone which is located past the lagoon quite some kilometers off Cancun. However, plenty local buses were running to the Hotel Zone and back. We jump right onto one to enjoy Cancun's beach. Between Coco Bongo and Mandala was a public entrance to the super long Cancun beach. The sand was not as smooth as in Playa del Carmen and it had no palm trees, but the water was crystal clear and had some nice waves we could play with^^ From this place we also could watch nice sun sets over the Hotel Zone. Before leaving the Hotel Zone, we had a long discussion with the guide tour operators and finally booked a trip to Chichen Itza 3 days ahead. On the way back we stopped at Plaza de Toros and enjoyed dinner at Las de Guantos. We had tacos and a quesadillon - the latter was the best quesadilla I ate so far :).

nice waves and crystal clear water at Cancun beach

best quesadilla at Plaza de Toros!

The next morning (31.12.) we enjoyed the breakfast buffet at our hotel before we took a taxi to Puerto Amada where we hopped on a ferry to Isla Mujeres. I was eager to go diving at the famous Cancun underwater museum. I booked 2 dives for the afternoon. Before that, Franzi and I enjoyed the fine beach of Isla Mujeres. The sand is great and the beach got plenty palm trees. The water is very shallow but clear. We relaxed half in the sun and half in the shade of palm trees. Then I went to the dive shop. Franzi joined our drive to the other end of the island, where the boat was waiting for us. In the meantime, Franzi went to a turtle farm and then back to the beach. Unfortunately, the dive boat started with more than an hour delay. The water was very shallow and during the first dive there was not much to see. Some course-divers had to train some skills while I took photos of nearby fish. The second dive then brought us to the underwater museum. First we saw gadgets like houses, a grenade, a sea mine, and a VW beetle car. I saw two big lobster under the latter^^ Then we swam towards the statues resembling people. It was a strange feeling to see the shapes of people appear on the ground. Moreover, some of the statues got quite a scary looking! When we ascended from the dive, a great sunset was waiting for us. At this time our friends back home in Germany were only minutes ahead of celebrating the new year. Back at the pier there was a further delay in our transport back to town. Thus, Franzi had to wait more than 2 hours not knowing when I would come back... that made her quite angry.
Back in Cancun we got ready to go out for dinner. First we were unlucky in finding a place but then we ended up in El Asador. Shortly before New Year, we went to the city hall and hoped for some fireworks and celebrations. Unfortunately, we were to be disappointed. No firework in all Cancun, except for a few single fireworks at the Hotel Zone. All in all disappointing to us. Neither did the people celebrate, but they only wished each other a happy new year. So did we, before we went for some dance club called Dallas on Av. Yaxchillan next to the restaurant we ate at. The club was much fun and we ended up dancing for a few hours and had a great time right in the new year before we took a taxi back to our hotel.

relaxing at the beach of Isla Mujeres 

diving :D

a nice swarm of fish

underwater grenade!

Would you touch the sea mine? I couldn't resist^^

Unreal how the human shaped statues appear from the blue background of the sea

some of the statues looked rather scary

fabulous sunset after ascending from the dive!

romantic NewYearsEve even without fireworks :)

The next day (01.01.) we went out to the Hotel Zone again. Our failure was to walk the first bus stop station towards the Hotel Zone, which was much further than we anticipated^^ We then hopped on the bus and drove to Playa Delfines which has the biggest public beach. Also here, we enjoyed the waves a lot but we missed the palm trees. Later we hopped on the bus again and drove to the public beach part we visited the first day. We used the sunset for some fun photoshooting ;) Afterwards we had dinner and some drinks in the Hotel Zone at Mextreme. The most interesting part was the dancing entertainment that the staff performed every hour. Franzi joined in for the dancing^^
On the next day (02.01.) we left Cancun for Chichen Itza and Merida.

Tok-Tok: our beach game we played almost every time at the beach^^

laughing selfie while the sun sets over the Hotel Zone

photoshooting with this amazing sunset :)

I encounter a funny idea for some photos...

the running ghosts of Cancun^^

Franzi dancing at Mextreme :)

Sunrise over the Hotel Zone from the window of our hotel room