Ok, right on schedule….where were we?

I almost skipped the yucatan my 1st time on mainland Mexico, and was pleasantly surprised with what I found. There was plenty to hate, like the long boring straight roads, and of course the heat. I took a small road through Tabasco, mainly because I wasn’t sure I had ever been through Tabascio previously.  It was pretty flat and open, nothing to thrilling….though Churro and I did find an appropriately painted church considering easter was in a few day.  Later we then found a stall on the side of the road selling some salchipapas…..and you know I can’t pass up salchipapas.  Yup, Semana Santa was about to kick off so I was moving quicker than I would like, but I was on my friends vacation schedule now, so on we pushed.  I headed for Campeche, I was extremely bored with this city on my previous trip, but it is pretty, a good sized city, and located as a decent stopping point.  Well, once again I was bored to death.

There is nothing going on in this city, ever.  There is barely anyone here doing anything, ever.  The locals evidently agree based on the numerous for sale signs through the centro, even they don’t want to be here.   Ok, well it’s not that bad, it just bores me….check it out, you will probably have a good time.  Unfortunately even the food bored me.

Little did I now I was meant to be here in Campeche even if I didn’t want to be.  Yes, god had a larger plan in motion for Churro and I that day.  I left the hotel and entered the circle immediately outside the hotel as Churro was ready for a quick departure from this city of boredom.  It was a nice day, the sun was shining in my eyes, and I hadn’t had coffee yet when suddenly I was going down.  It happened quick yet felt as though it was in slow motion. I spun around a full 180 as the wheels slid out on me, tucking in to protect my body.  Luckily no one was around and I was fine, so I just pulled Churro off to the side of the road.  I gave Churro a quick look over.  The shift pedal was bent so I manually bent that back, but this was just a dumb spill because I hadn’t been paying 100% attention, and completely missed the water pouring across the street.  None of this mattered though, in the grand scheme of things.  Suddenly something caught my eye lying on the road, the reason I was here.  What….it can’t be…an Easter miracle….HE IS RISEN. 

Morty lives….Welcome back you son of a bitch!  Rather than finding his eden and ditching us it turns out Morty had fallen into the rat nest of wires hidden behind Churros headlight.  He must have hung on for dear life as we encountered many off road adventures, yet some how he hung on, here he is right before my eyes.  Amen.
I thought about contacting the pope, I mean how often do miracles of this magnitude happen?  Problem was, my friend only had so many vacation days, so I had to get to Valladolid to kick of this Semana Santa thing, so Churro and I set out sights for Valladolid….not the normal spring break of choice…but this was where we were meeting.  But before reaching Valladolid, I took a detour and made a stop at the Edzna ruins.  I had previously seen Uxmal, and know it is one of the best in the area…. So since there are a million ruin sites around I figured this one was as good as any other after that one.

As it was a weekday, and covid, I just about had the site to myself, which was great.  It was hot in the sun, but as there are only a few buildings I didn’t need a ton of time to see things anyway.  I brought Morty so he could enjoy it too….a little bro time.  Unfortunately they would let us bring in Churro, but he was there in spirit.

My next stop was Valladolid.  I don’t mind it, but I don’t love it either…but it is nice place to spend a couple days.  We ate at various spots, checked the sites, hit up the cenote in the center of the city, as well as a couple others nearby ones as we went on some day trips.

On our last day I woke up thinking there was an earthquake, with the building shaking and a load of noise….but the noise didn’t stop and I quickly realized it was a truck crashing into something.  But no, the building did shake a bit, so I jumped up to check things out.  I looked outside and see a pickup truck halfway through a wall, with a couple other cars nearby with damaged as well.  A couple people were telling the guy to stop as he was spinning tires trying to back up, and then push past one of the cars he already hit.  Despite it being 8:45 I thought he was probably drunk and trying to run.  Turns out he was sober, something just went wrong, he was probably trying to get out of where he was due to embarrassment or adrenaline, but they finally got him to shut the truck down and relax.

I never got the story, but a few weeks later I stopped in the city for a night and saw they made great progress with the repairs…..hanging a tarp over the hole in the wall.  Problem solved.

We then did beach stuff at Holbox, and Playa del Carmen before heading down the coast to Bacalar.  Churros TIP was going to expire so this was a perfect time to run down to Chetumal and get a new one while I was out here.  That was a piece of cake, I came upon a check point with the immigration building in site, but as the Belize border was closed due to covid I had to explain I didn’t actually want to leave Mexico, I just wanted to do the paper work.  They had no problem with this, and I was the only one there so the process was a breeze.

Holbox

Playa del CarmenNo trip is complete to Mexico without stopping in at the traditional spot “Senor Frogs”

Bacalar

I stopped for some pics….let my guard down for 1 minute, next thing I know Churros up on the sidewalk begging for pics, that crazy bastard.

From here we headed back North, hitting up Cozumel, Isla Mujers, and Cancun so that my friend could catch their flight home.  I brought Churro with us to Cozumel, but since Isla Mujeres is so small I left him behind when we went there.    I am sure I am forgetting things but it was more relaxing than a spring break kind of vacation, so I am not sure anything happened anyway.

Cozumel

Isla Mujeres

Cancun