I didn’t stay in Cancun very long and caught an immediate bus to Tulum. I arrived in Tulum in the late afternoon and immediately did laundry. I stayed in a hostel called Hostel Lum – this was the highest rated hostel in Tulum (roughly 9.5/10) and so I was excited. I wasn’t disappointed. Travelling on my own, they made it easy to make friends. The staff were all foreigners who decided to stay in Mexico for a while and work.

I met a couple guys who were from the UK and Australia upon arriving. They were all on one of those tour the world trips, but separately. One was a chef and they invited me to join them for dinner. We had some awesome vegetarian pasta after picking up some ingredients down the street from the hostel.

This part of the trip was chill and rightfully so. I didn’t want to do much of anything after the last few days in Chiapas (where San Cristobal and Palenque are). I caught up on sleep, checked out a lagoon and then some cenotes. Cenotes were by far the coolest thing I’ve ever seen! This was the highlight of the entire trip for me.

The first cenote (Grand Cenote) was 2 km outside of Tulum and so I borrowed a bike from the Hostel and went there. It was quite magnificent but there were just a ton of tourists and it was very commercialized. Upon returning to my hostel, one of the staff members recommended checking out “Taak bi Ha” cenote. It did not disappoint.

I caught a collectivo outside the hostel and made my way there. Unfortunately, all the ATMs in the area were down that afternoon and I was 5 pesos short for the trip back. But figured I’d risk it as he said it would be easy to hitch hike back with other tourists and I could borrow 5 pesos if need be… It was totally worth it. I had to walk about 30 minutes (a few kilometres) to the cenote after getting off the collective and was blown away by what I would see next.

I ended up getting a ride with a few folks back to the main highway from the Cenote and was waiting for a collective back to Tulum. After about 10 minutes though, a few other tourists going back to Tulum came by and I caught a ride with them back to the downtown area of Tulum.

Other than that, I ate a lot of good food in Tulum before heading to Holbox.