OH MAN! Am I EVER on the Missus' Sh-t List!

Mrfish55 · #1 09-01-2009, 12:54 AM

That looks nice, when are we leaving?

Lance · #2 09-01-2009, 01:10 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mrfish55

That looks nice, when are we leaving?

End of January, and you can't go 'cuz you're on emergency call for my tanks!

Delphinus · #3 09-01-2009, 02:58 AM

My wife & I stayed at Barcelo Maya in 2000 shortly after they opened. FABULOUS place, awesome snorkeling right off the beach. Hopefully the reefs haven't been destroyed in the 9 years hence. It's close to Xcaret and Xelha and Tulum and Chichen Itza and .. um .. some big sinkhole (cenote) whose name I can't remember but was awesome. Check into doing all these things!

Lance · #4 09-01-2009, 03:27 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Delphinus

My wife & I stayed at Barcelo Maya in 2000 shortly after they opened. FABULOUS place, awesome snorkeling right off the beach. Hopefully the reefs haven't been destroyed in the 9 years hence. It's close to Xcaret and Xelha and Tulum and Chichen Itza and .. um .. some big sinkhole (cenote) whose name I can't remember but was awesome. Check into doing all these things!

Sounds terrific! Thanks Tony. Did you dive the cenote?

Delphinus · #5 09-01-2009, 05:03 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lance

Sounds terrific! Thanks Tony. Did you dive the cenote?

Swam in it for sure, can't remember if we took snorkel gear or not. It is insanely deep. I didn't think it would bother me but it's a bizarre sensation looking down and realizing it may as well be a bottomless pit. I was like .. I could totally see myself dropping my car keys down there (good thing I didn't have any).

Lance · #6 09-01-2009, 04:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Delphinus

Swam in it for sure, can't remember if we took snorkel gear or not. It is insanely deep. I didn't think it would bother me but it's a bizarre sensation looking down and realizing it may as well be a bottomless pit. I was like .. I could totally see myself dropping my car keys down there (good thing I didn't have any).

Yeah, I can see that being kind of creepy. Maybe I'll just stick to the reef and leave the cenotes to the experts.

Delphinus · #7 09-01-2009, 05:15 PM

No no no, do check it out if you can. It's really quite spectacular. That whole peninsula is former reef limestone ..it's like a big giant porous piece of dried out live rock (with grass and trees and stuff growing on top). Anywhere you see a puddle, that puddle is probably connected underground to every other puddle, and probably the ocean. I remember seeing a pond, or what I thought was a pond, on the resort grounds, only a couple feet in diameter in size (ie., tiny) and then noticed that it was at least 6 or 7 feet deep, and had reef fish swimming in it. They got there themselves through some underground maze.

I think the cenote is usually done in conjunction with another day trip. I can't remember if it was Tulum or Chichen Itza. Although neither are rather reefy, they reek of history and you can really feel a buzz (well, if you're into history and old things and stuff). You HAVE to check these out in my opinion, you won't regret it.

The one and only complaint I had about Barcelo Maya is that there was a 1/2 hour limit per day with the catamarans. Being that I pretend to be a sailor in my other hobby, this was sort of disappointing to me because 1/2 hour of crashing about in those waves was over in a blink of an eye. They also had kayaks and windsurfers though with unlimited usage, but windsurfing for me was impossible in those waves, I'm not a strong windsurfer so it was an exercise in futility. I'd just get upright and then knocked off balance instantly.

Maybe they have more than 2 beach cats now. For the size of resort, having only 2 and rationing them out like that was rather silly.