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Latin America 2021

January - June 2021
A 142-day adventure by Gemma Craig Read more
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  • Gemma Craig HLatin America 2021
    1
    Day 1

    Mexico Day 1 - Cancun Town

    January 11, 2021 in Mexico ⋅ 🌧 25 °C

    After a long and delayed flight we finally arrived to our hotel at midnight local time - after watching a weird local TV programme which seemed like a mixture of Love Island and Takeshi's castle we settled for a well earned comfortable sleep!

    We set off early for a mexican breakfast at a place called '100% Healthy' which was definitely a questionable claim based on the volumes of cheese flying around! After surviving the confusion of being asked how I wanted my eggs cooked following what I thought was a perfectly spoken Spanish order we both enjoyed a delicious breakfast, a combination of eggs, tomato, cheese, ham, peas, cactus and who knows what else!

    We then set about sorting currency, local sim card and other necessities before a walk along a pathway surrounding a seemingly deserted development that we assume will be beautiful once finished but actually seemed like something from '28 days later' or central London on lockdown 3!

    We then wanted to try out some street food at a local park (Parques de Papales) and had empanadas which were ok but very greasy and we also had a platter of tacos/quesidillas and some of the spiciest dip you could imagine from El Rinconcito de Puebla a local restaurant.

    After all that food we managed to find a nice bar near our hotel called Hunters for a few drinks before heading back to the room.

    That evening we were both keen for some traditional mariachi music and after some research settled on La Parrillas which didn't disappoint! The service was brilliant with waiters laughing and joking between carrying up to 4 glasses (the size of small buckets) full of margaritas around on their heads and the band walked between tables playing classics and lots of traditional Mexican songs! The food here was amazing also, fish toastadas were something else!! (Thanks Paul and Jo if you're following for the cash for our first dinner!)

    We then headed back to the hotel for an early one knowing we had a long bus/ferry journey the next day!    Read more

  • Gemma Craig HLatin America 2021
    Day 2

    Mexico Day 2 - Holbox Island

    January 12, 2021 in Mexico ⋅ 🌧 24 °C

    We were up early again this morning for a bus journey to Chiquila before a ferry across to Holbox Island. The bus was surprisingly nice given the price and made the journey easy. Arriving at Holbox we discovered there were no cars on the island and everyone gets around by golf buggy, luckily our hotel was only a short walk from the ferry port.

    We're staying at Casa Ch'ujuk which is part of a group of hotels - the other is right on the beach and luckily we have access to that as well. After a quick walk round most of the island we settled on the beach loungers for the afternoon. For lunch we ate at Las Panchas and they served up a beautiful Shrimp Ceviche which was so packed full we had to leave some but the sauce was incredible.

    That night we found a bar playing live music which had 3 different restaurants inside similar to Boxpark called Barba Negra. We had the best tacos so far with various combos of Mushroom, Fish and cactus!    Read more

  • Gemma Craig HLatin America 2021
    Day 3

    Mexico Day 3 - Holbox Island

    January 13, 2021 in Mexico ⋅ 🌧 25 °C

    We had a chilled out day on Wednesday starting with breakfast at Amiete and relaxed by the beach. We found a lovely bright traditional Mexican place on Holbox square for Lunch called El Cocal De Holbox. Right after we arrived back at the hotel for the afternoon the heavens opened UK style (we timed it perfectly hah).

    Once the rain stopped we decided to venture out for some dinner to Arte Sank, a tiny vegan cafe that Craig found (number 1 on trip advisor for the whole island)! What should have been a simple walk was like being a contestant on total wipeout as all the roads were flooded!

    We had some drinks at a place called Hot Corner which had a great atmosphere and a live band. Due to the flooding all around we joked that it was like being in Venice!    Read more

  • Gemma Craig HLatin America 2021
    Day 4

    Mexico Day 4 - Holbox Island

    January 14, 2021 in Mexico ⋅ ⛅ 24 °C

    After another nice breakfast on the beach at Amiete, we went to visit the local dog shelter. We found out in advance that you can help out by taking the dogs for a walk on the beach. My dog Niquila was really underweight - you could see all her ribs but she still seemed happy enough to be out on a walk. Obviously, as soon as we reached the beach, Niquila did a huge diahrroea poo in the sand right in front of a lovely hotel (and we only had one poo bag each)!! 💩 So that was fun.

    After returning the dogs we went to Roots pizza, the best place on the island to try lobster pizza. Although I try to avoid wheat, meat and dairy, it was an absolute yes to all 3 if in lobster pizza form! And it was so good.. probably the best pizza we've ever had.

    In the evening we decided to do a bar crawl for our last night. We finally saw a sunset at the rooftop bar of Hotel Mittoz. We moved on to Casa Las Tortugas a fab beach front bar with some lovely Texans that we met in the previous bar. They taught us all about tiquila and mezcal (smoked tiquila).. at least we now know it comes from the Agave plant. We finished the night in a craft beer bar on Holbox Square with more margaritas and shots (and a hangover - perfect idea for the next day's 2 ferry and 2 bus journey to Cozumel).    Read more

  • Gemma Craig HLatin America 2021
    Day 6

    Mexico Day 5 & 6 - Cozumel

    January 16, 2021 in Mexico ⋅ ⛅ 23 °C

    After a day of travelling (which was surprisingly easy) we arrived at Cozumel around 6pm. After dropping our bags at our lovely guest house Caribo Cozumel, we headed out for some local food at Taquiera El Pique. It was a recommendation for its Tacos Al Pastor (spit roasted pork) and they were amazing!

    After a good sleep and a morning exercise we set off to explore the island with a walk around. There are so many great looking bars and restaurants scattered across the promenade and after some research we settled on a local Burrito place for lunch called Gorditos. I accidentally led us to the wrong restaurant so we ended up eating at Crazy King Burritos instead! They had two sizes available, one of which was a tortilla the size of a table... luckily they showed us examples before I had the chance to order 'the crazy special' which would've placed me into a self induced food coma no doubt. The 'small' shrimp burritos we ended up with were beautiful!

    After chilling at our hotel for the afternoon we walked down to 'Lobster Shack' for dinner - I had the roll and gem had another burrito. It was perfect again and today was definitely the best overall so far regarding food! Afterwards we went back via the supermarket where we got chatting to Alex, a local diving instructor that was now out of work.. We spoke badly in Spanish and he helped us with translations and also offered us some great tips for snorkelling spots along our trip!    Read more

  • Gemma Craig HLatin America 2021
    Day 7

    Mexico Day 7 - Cozumal

    January 17, 2021 in Mexico ⋅ ⛅ 22 °C

    Not sure if we mentioned but the new Gemma and Craig are much more budget conscious than we were on our last trip so we had another self made breakfast of porridge and cereal at our hotel (probably also good for our waist)!

    At 2pm we had a lunch and tequila tasting booked at Casa Mission, only a two minute walk from the hotel. The food was delish - it included a margarita, soup, nachos, and any main from the menu.

    Then on to the tiquila tasting... We tried 4 tiquilas: some aged longer than others, resulting in a darker colour. They were all pure agave - none of them burned and were dangerously close to drinking water. Then we tried 4 liquors. I loved the chocolate one and Craig loved the coffee.    Read more

  • Gemma Craig HLatin America 2021
    Day 8

    Mexico Day 8 - Cozumel

    January 18, 2021 in Mexico ⋅ ⛅ 24 °C

    Today was our last day on Cozumel Island and we decided to hire a car to explore the more remote beaches on the island. After initially insisting on a little Micra/Fiesta type car my head was turned seeing so many of the older nicer looking colourful Jeeps flying around so we went for one of those...

    After a quick look round it to identify as many of the most obvious scrapes and dents as we could (there were loads) we tried to set off... With no handbrake the car was already in gear which was an immediate stall. Finding first gear was easy enough but second was a mystery and 3rd, 4th and 5th impossible. After a while we discovered 1st 2nd and 4th and after a call to the hire company finally how to get it into reverse.

    After that everything went smoothly as the roads were huge and very quiet. The scenery was beautiful and the beachs we stopped at for an hour or so each were worthy of at least a few days!

    Arriving back safely to the hire place we had Tacos de Altor at our favourite local spot and jumped on the next available ferry back to Playa Del Carmen - time for some beach days over the next week or so.... Lovely!!    Read more

  • Gemma Craig HLatin America 2021
    1
    Day 10

    Mexico Day 9 & 10 - Playa Del Carmen

    January 20, 2021 in Mexico ⋅ ⛅ 26 °C

    We didn't visit the 'Hotel Zone' in Cancun but I imagine it would be similar to the '5th Avenue and Tourist Beaches' of Playa Del Carmen. Walking on our first day exploring we found lots of American'isms from chain shops to guys dressed as Spiderman! However only a few blocks away from the madness we found so many great restaurants offering great deals and amazing food! We had burritos, pork tacos, falafel and various Egg based breakfast dishes all from £4-£6 each!

    We had two quiet days really - exercising in the morning and relaxing on the quieter locals beaches in the afternoon! These days were easily the hottest since we arrived.

    The first evening we relaxed in the room and played cards and the second we decided to check out some of the rooftop bars. Firstly a bar at the top of the Thompson, which had sofas in the swimming pools and lots of great views across the town, here we got chatting with the barman Juan about our travels and showed him our planned route. He gave us some recommendations from his hometown of San Cristobal De Las Casas (which was already on our list, something he seemed quite proud about).

    The walk to the next bar was so brilliantly normal we both stopped to appreciate it, a bustling street (still probably only at about 30% capacity) with people all enjoying themselves made us feel so lucky! We arrived 5 minutes after the bar opened at The Palm Rooftop and expectedly we were the only customers, it was definitely more of a 1am club type place so we sat and took in the views with some good music for a drink but left just after to head back to the hotel.    Read more

  • Gemma Craig HLatin America 2021
    Day 11

    Mexico Day 11 - Playa Del Carmen

    January 21, 2021 in Mexico ⋅ ⛅ 26 °C

    We had breakfast in a jungle and dinner a cave.. literally.

    La Cueva del Chango was the breakfast place on the other side of Playa (about 20 min walk from our hotel).

    Dinner was at Azul, a restaurant in a cave and it didn't disappoint. Our table was right next to a little lake and we even saw bats flying past us! The food was a little overpriced but we expected that given the cool setting.

    After blowing the budget for the day we grabbed some street food for desert. We decided to try Marquesitas.. a really thin pancake filled with Nutella and cheese... And they were actually quite nice!    Read more

  • Gemma Craig HLatin America 2021
    1
    Day 12

    Mexico Day 12 - Playa / Tulum

    January 22, 2021 in Mexico ⋅ ⛅ 27 °C

    We had a wholesome final morning in Playa entailing a run and work out at the local sports centre and then an amazing breakfast at 'Bio Natural'. Craig had eggs Benedict and I had poached eggs with chips and beans (but a flavoursome spicy Mexican version)!

    Once fed and exercised we packed up and got the bus to our next destination - Tulum. After dropping our bags off in our hotel in downtown Tulum (the cheap part vs the very expensive beach resorts a few kilometres away), we explored the local area and stumbled across a bar selling $1 beers and then an Argentinian restaurant selling $2 empanadas which were AMAZING (we got some back in Cancun from a street vendor which were very average so couldn't believe how good these ones were!)    Read more

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