So picking up from where Sophie left off, early the next morning we boarded the Ragga Empress, a lovely catamaran for the three day trip down the coast to Placencia. The boat stays inside the Belize reef for the entire journey which meant plenty of snorkel stops, lots of little islands and cayes to check out and more fresh fish than we could possibly eat for dinner. The Belizean reef is second only in size to the Great Barrier Reef in Australia and the locals are...

So after a 3.5 hour boat trip from southern Mexico we pulled into Caye Caulker, a small Belizean island in the Caribbean sea (so small it won't even pick it up as a place on this blog....San Pedro is another island!). The sun had already set but I knew I loved this place already as from the boat all I could see were lots of fairy lights on small bars and restaurants lining the water's edge (I love a good fairy light, as you might have worked out from our ...

So continuing the saga of the bus journey, for some reason the bus drivers in Mexico are compelled to keep the temperature inside the bus as low as the air-conditioner can possibly go. In our case that meant a four-hour trip in conditions not often seen outside of the Arctic. It was bitterly cold and there was not much to do except peer out at the sun-drenched tropical countryside on the other side of the window. We'll be better prepared for the next journey ...

We made our way to Valladolid on Thursday morning where we were staying for the next 2 days. We mainly chose Valladolid as it was a good base to visit one of the new seven wonders of the world, Chichén Itzá. What greeted us though was a beautiful provincial town with gorgeous cobbled streets lined with sun-splashed pastel walled buildings. We checked into our lovely colonial-style hotel which was similar to a Moroccan riad, before heading out to walk around the...

After a lengthy, uneventful flight we finally touched down in Cancun, where a bar handily placed right by the airport exit door was only too happy to exchange our remaining British pounds for ice-cold bottles of cerveza and agua. We jumped into a shuttle and headed straight for the city of Tulum, about 120km south of Cancun along the Riviera Maya coastline. On arrival we checked into our 'tube' hotel - each room is made from a concrete tube with just enou...