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Arriving in Mexico city late on the 29th December, it was nice to see that Mark had made it over the Atlantic with minimul problems. Both pretty tired, we got some much needed sleep ready and raring to go the next day. On this day we decided to take an open top bus tour around the city, which was fairly entertaining for the first 45 minutes but after 3 hours, had got pretty boring. We did however, hop off the bus at one point to visit the Anthropology museum which housed a pretty impressive collection ancient Teotihuacan, Aztec and Mayan extracts. Returning back to the hostel late in the afternoon we hit the bar on the roof terrace and looked over at the historical district, the area where we were staying, and met and chatted to various people. The next day we took a day trip to the Teotihuacan Pyramids, 45 minutes outside of Mexico City, where the second highest pyramid in the World stands at 68m high. On route we also visited a tequila farm, where we sipped the local liqour, and were also shown how various arts and crafts were made by hand out of volcanic rock. The pyramids themselves though, were very impressive, and the view from the top was definitely worth the steep climb up the uneven and rather large steps. This night was of course New Year´s Eve so as you can guess we hit the bar early and drank copious amounts of corona and and bottle of honey and almond tequila we had purchased from the farm. We opted to stay in the bar all night rather than join the huge celbrations by the Monument de la Indepencia, basically because we were told we wouldnt be bale to get an authorised taxi back and as a result there would be a reasonable chance of not making it back to the hostel with our wallets, or even ourselves!. Nonetheless, we had a good night on the roof terrace, with a bunch of people we met, and drank until the early hours. Very hungover the next day we took a stroll around the Bosque de Chapultepec Parque before catching an overnight bus for 13 hours to Palenque.
Arriving early, we checked into a hostel and hit the Ancient Maya Ruins, situated deep in the jungle. These ruins were partucularly impressive as many had been untouched, located next to gushing waterfalls with the sound of thousands of howler monkeys deep into the jungl. We did plan to stay the night in Palenque, but due to the buses being full for the next 2 days we were forced to catch another overnight bus to Merida. Merida is the culltural capital of Yukatan. It was a pretty town, with not a great deal to do but we were able to do a cool excursion to some cenotes (sink holes) where we were able to snorkel in the clearest water I have ever seen. We also met a bunch of people who we went out with to a club on the saturday night, where we basically paid 7 quid to get in and have a free bar! Leaving Merida we headed to cancun, but Via Chichen Itza, one of the 7 Modern Wonders of the World. Having this new title, you can imagine what a tourist trap it was, and in my opinion not as impressive as the two previous sets of ruins we had seen. So quite glad to leave we got to Cancun in the evening, and not feeling particularly great I took an early night. Cancun is pretty much exactly as I imagined. Full of annoying American tourists, with nothing to do but get drunk. So that we did the next night after a lazy day on the beach. We went to a club called Coco Bongos, probably the most entertaining club I´ve been to, with caboret acts ranging from the Matrix to Michael Jackon to the barmen sliding down the stair railings with a stack of glasses on a try in one hand.
Quite glad to leave Cancun the next day we headed only 11km off shore to Isla de Mujeres. This was a tiny island, with beautiful beaches and much more a backpackers scene. Staying in the much loved Poc-Na hostel we spent 3 days lazing by the beach, driving a golf buggy around the island and hitting the beach bar until the early hours of the morning. Here we met a lot of people, who we later were to meet up with again. Leaving Mujeres,we got the boat back to the mainland and caught a 2 hour bus down the coast to Tulum. With us, was Jop who we had met on the island and we spent a day in Tulum visiting some smaller ruins located right on the beach, and soaking up the sun and catching a few waves on a couple of Tulum`s gorgeous beaches. Leaving Tulum we headed and hour north to Playa de Carmen where we spent the 3 nights. Playa, as it`s known to the locals is a lot like Cancun, but is more family orientated. The weather unfortunately was crap, it rained pretty much every day, so spending most of the daylight hours bored we made up for it once the night sky set in. here, in Playa we met up with Lizzy, Fiona, Joaquin, Richard and two of Mark`s friends, Leah and Sarah. There`s not a great deal to tell except for we got drunk every night and had a massive waterfight as the roads floaded from the torrential rain.
We are now currently in peru and Start the Inca Trail tomorrow (21/01), so you can all look forward to hearing about that when I return...hopefully I return!
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