In which Roz and Layla paddleboard in a lagoon (and do not stand on their heads)

By Roz

After two happy hour mohitos in Casa Violetta, we decided it was more than time for dinner, and we headed back to Zebra, where we had been on our first night, to have their delicious pepper, potato and cheese dish. We wolfed this down as though we hadn't been fed for ages (the excitements of the day had clearly made us hungry) and then headed back to Casa Violetta for a nightcap and dessert. Only this time as we walked along the beach we began to notice that the ground was alive with crabs. I'm not sure how we had managed to miss this the first few times we'd been on the beach at night, but it certainly made this romantic wander home less romantic (and more focused on suppressing embarrassing shrieks). But all in all it was a very jolly evening. 

Next morning, we were up early. Again. Layla, you see, doesn't believe in lie-ins. Our alarm went off and I began with my usual tactic of suggesting she shower first. I have now perfected this to such a degree that I don't actually have to wake up to do it. Her second attempt to wake me (after she'd showered, at the late hour of 6.55) I had little option but to crawl out of bed. But I must admit it was for a good cause: our plan was to go paddleboarding and we'd been told that we needed to get there early. And so we had an early morning romantic march along the beach in time for a quick breakfast overlooking the sea before hopping in a car with a very nice Mexican guy (who'd lived in Brighton for a year and missed fish and chips!) who was to take us out paddleboarding for the morning. A not very long drive took us to a lovely lagoon - part of the national park that we'd been to on our first full day in Tulum - and then it was time to hop on to the boards for a very lovely, serene paddle round the lagoon. It was fun to have the place entirely to ourselves, and even better to find that - despite the small waves - we were still able to stay upright. We had a mini lesson half way through on how to handle boards in the sea - which ended up with Layla and I almost being able to do a small jump to change our foot position. Layla wussed out of doing a headstand on the board, despite my best efforts to goad her into doing one (blackmail and so forth) but otherwise it was really fun. The water was perfectly clear, there were tons of fish and we were entirely surrounded by jungle. After a while, we slipped into the water (me carefully keeping my hat on to protect the burn from the sun) and pottered around for a while looking at fish - and waiting for them to nibble at us (as we had been told they might) - and contemplating the 80ft hole in the middle of the lagoon, created by a meteorite and where some believe there is a spaceship. Fortunately, however, there was no sign of either of Martians, nor of the small crocodiles that we'd heard could also sometimes be seen. 

Out of the water and headed towards the car, we had the brainwave of persuading our guide to take us to a nearby-ish cenote. This turned out to be fab. Much bigger than we expected, there was a few different pools, all connected by caves and channels and it was fun to swim through and explore them. Layla had a snorkel mask which meant she was able to steer us both away from random rocks (whilst I used my burn as a good excuse not to have a snorkel - I am an idiot and don't really like having my face into the water). The temperature of the sun and the water was perfect, and though there were some other tourists kicking around, none of them spoke English which made them less objectionable! 

It was then time to return for drinks and then lunch, with lovely ocean breezes to keep us cool. I, however, was so transfixed by my book (Goldfinch, the new Donna Tartt) that I was barely able to look up from my book to eat (or look at the sea). Eventually Layla persuaded me that it was time to go in the sea. We'd hoped to take out paddleboards but our guy from the morning wasn't around any longer. But in searching for him, it emerged that the restaurant was willing to lend us boogie boards - which was almost better. We bounded down to the beach and into the sea...and then noticed we were pretty much alone. One look up at the sky told us why - it was almost black, with a storm clearly on its way. We agreed that we'd stay close to the shore but decided to press on anyway. (This turned out to be a perfectly sensible decision, since we were later joined by an over ambitious paddleboarder and some swimmers - and the rain never made it to shore.) We had a lot of fun trying to catch waves with our boogieboards, despite the fact that we usually failed, and were out until we were pretty much exhausted. We shared a beer and briefly returned to our books before heading home sandily for a shower. 

We headed out for the evening feeling virtuous, having just packed, and went back to Casa Violetta for one of their delicious mohitos and some guacamole. With delight I returned to my book and quite some time passed before we both realized that we were getting hungry - and felt completely shattered after our exertions during the day. We shamefacedly decided to stick where we were for dinner rather than being more adventurous. But we had a lovely meal and managed to keep ourselves entertained until 9 or so when we decided to give in and slowly make our way home. Not a very magnificent last night in lovely Tulum, but we enjoyed ourselves! 

I was asleep almost as soon as my head hit the pillow. But I was woken in the night by the loudest rain I have ever heard. The storm that had been threatening us whilst we were on the beach had finally arrived. This meant we woke up (6.30 alarm again!) to a very sodden town. We splashed our way along the road to the lovely place we had had breakfast on our anniversary morning and ate breakfast with a fairly cheerful air, congratulating ourselves at leaving Mexico at exactly the right moment. From there, we headed to the bus and I returned to my audiobook (which I am also transfixed by) and gazed at the rain as we passed through the countryside. And now: home.

Books read by Layla whilst on holiday: Pigs in Heaven (Barbara Kingsolver), Entries from a Hot Pink Notebook (Todd D Brown), Oryx and Crake (Margaret Atwood), A Cure for Dreams (Kaye Gibbons), and half of The Year of the Flood (Margaret Atwood). 

Books read by Roz whilst on holiday: Memoirs of a Geisha (Arthur Golden), Oryx and Crake (Margaret Atwood), The Room of lost Things (Stella Duffy), Tepper Isn't Going Out (Calvin Trillin), Mr Penumbra's 24 Hour Bookstore (Robin Sloan) and 3/4 of both Goldfinch (Donna Tartt) and The Year of the Flood (Margaret Atwood). 

In which Layla and Roz celebrate their wedding anniversary in a mangrove channel

By Layla

A two and a half hour bus ride through the dark countryside brought us to a very different-feeling Mexico: Tulum. Having done lots of research of Caribbean beaches in Mexico, I decided Tulum sounded the right mix of beautiful, bohemian, and non-18-30s-drunken tackiness a la Cancun reputation... And it proved to be so. I don't like arriving at beach places at night, because as our taxi drove us from Tulum town, several miles in complete blackness, I feared we'd found ourselves in some awful abandoned place. But after checking in (and realizing we'd left all our toiletries in the last hotel and dashing to a little shop to replenish and mourn the loss of Roz's hair product...) we headed down to the beach. We couldn't see the sea, but the sand was soft under our feet, the waves lapped at the shore, and the stars were amazing. We walked along the beach to a beachside restaurant called Zebra, drank mohitos, ate chilli poblado, which was delicious, and after sheltering from a sudden and short rainstorm, strolled home along the beach.

The next day was our 4-year wedding anniversary (indeed, also the 4-year anniversary of this blog!) and we had booked a tour Tripadvisor reviews had assured us would be romantic - a boat tour through a beautiful nature reserve dotted with birds, mangroves, and Mayan ruins, called Sia'an Kaan. Off we puttered in our little boat across the lagoon and into the mangrove channels, watching the water turn from blue to brown-ish to black to yellow-ish to clear... At which point we were told to hop out of the boat into the crystal water of the mangrove channel, and use our life jackets as floatation devices. For 20 minutes, we lazed on our life jackets as the current slowly but determinedly pulled us through the channel. Roz and I were at the front so all we could see was the water, the greenery, blue skies, and an occasional heron. It was both idyllic and bizarrely delightful - we were very sad when it eventually ended, we reluctantly clambered aboard the boat, and were conveyed back to dry land for lunch overlooking the Caribbean. 

We spent the afternoon swinging in hammocks, reading, and drinking the anniversary bottle of wine given to us by the hotel. When it got dark we headed over the road to Om bar for less-good-than-last-night mohitos, before taking a cab to Restaurare, a well-reviewed vegan restaurant, of all things. It was in a beautiful jungly/twinkly candles location, and other than their food being so spicy I could hardly eat it, had a very nice time. We returned to Om - for beers this time - and ended the evening lying on a beach lounger, listening to the waves, and gazing up at the stars - with me yet again impressing Roz by identifying Orion's Belt... 

A comparative long lie this morning, in honour of a day without a strict schedule - and then a tedious hour trying to make Paypal work for a course I was trying to sign up for - and eventually we set off for a beachwalk and ruins day of fun. It was lovely and gloriously picturesque walking several kilometers along the beach, our feet in the lapping waves. We stopped off at a nice beach restaurant for breakfast, then later as the heat started to crush us, a cool beach club for guacamole, beers, a book, a breeze, and lots of water. We gazed out at the sea (and someone doing a hula hoop dance) before hopping in a cab for the final leg of our journey. At last we arrived: the Tulum ruins!

These ruins are apparently the second most visited in Mexico but we arrived sufficiently late that most of the bikini-clad tourists from Cancun and Playa del Carmen had got back on their coaches, and it was fairly relaxing to stroll around these ruins which, while less impressive in scale than Uxmal and Chichen Itza, were interesting, had some cool structures, and gave a nice impression of a real little Mayan town in a beautiful seaside location. We paused by the viewpoint, enjoying watching a woman on a paddleboard on the waves trying to do a headstand and feeling nervous about the paddleboard adventure we're planning for tomorrow (no headstands in our plan though...). 

On the way back from the ruins we stopped off at a beach club where we hopped into the sea and spent the rest of the afternoon jumping in the quite substantial waves, before strolling home along the beach, watching the sunset. We are now de-sanded and installed in another beachside bar where we are enjoying basil mohitos and the sound of the waves. All quite delightful.