Filipe Carillo Puerto

We had no issues with the trip from Bacalar to FCP with Mayab bus company. It took 1.5 hours on a very empty bus that had poor air-con but uneventful. It dropped us off in the middle of  the town at the bus station and as it was so hot we paid a Taxi the 80p he asked for to take us to the hotel which was not far but the sun was at its strongest and we are old and weak so took easy street. Funny enough the first taxi we approached was so drunk he could not remember where our hotel was as he made excuses with his glassy eyes and drooping eyelids, which  is quite a feat as there are only 3 hotels in town and ours was the biggest. I guess he don't like gringo money. Worryingly though he picked up another guy straight after us and had no hesitation taking him to his destination. Perhaps he was concerned about our safety as he was too drunk to drive properly. What a nice man!

Good church goers always like to bash the crap out of a Santa pinata in spring.

   The hotel was on the edge of town, called Turquesa Maya and was well appointed and the room was huge with a kitchenette area. The town, even though being the capital of the Yucatan Peninsular, was a small affair with not much going on. We walked into town in about 15 minutes, poked around the market which had a healthy trade in machetes and pinatas.We also grabbed lunch at a typical non-tourist greasy spoon that we spun the menu roulette and ordered 2 things we had no idea what is was as it was in Spanish and local food only but turned out pleasing. Now we know what Fundidos and Casadillas are. As you would expect they both contained corn flour tortillas which it is impossible to order anything without having a pile of tortillas accompany it.

The street art was impressive.

   We then found a HSBC bank which allowed us to make a larger than average withdrawal for cash with a small fee which was a nice surprise after all the hundreds of pounds we have had to pay in bank charges over the past year. That's one factor you never expect to budget for when you come away, especially when you take cards that charge no fee on the English side but the foreign banks don't mind charging you between 2.5% to over 5% to take out your own money. Last time we travelled we never paid a penny in withdrawal fees.

Typical church from ye old times.

   We then took a walk around the main square which was nice with a free museum which featured heavily on women's rude body parts and some Mayan history which also had a lot of women's 'bits' incorporated in the exhibits. Strange! There must be some very frustrated artists in this area. We then walked a couple of blocks to the main exhibit the town is famous for.....the Talking Cross. Here was an overgrown park which contained a wooden cross from the 18th century which as legend has it, 'spoke' to the towns folk to do battle with the local bad guys in government and 5 years later  after lots of people died they won. They hailed it as a miracle as you would being god fearing catholic but Kathy and I were more cynical so went to check it out. We both spoke to the cross in English and Spanish but I can report the cross was unresponsive at both attempts so have to conclude one of 2 things. The cross did not like atheists or someone locally has got a fertile imagination. After being so cruelly shunned by such a legendary symbol we skulked off to the shops and bought some goodies to munch and drink and retire to the hotel to escape the heat again.

Not the talkative type.

Next day we attempted to go to an ecological park nearby that had a cool lake to swim in but the only way to get there is by taxi and we could not convince a taxi to take us there, wait for us for a few hours and then bring us back. Being in the middle of nowhere we did not want to be stranded so it was important that we had a homeward bound ride. I think the issue was the taxi driver did not want to drive 3km down a dirt road. Instead Daz went for a haircut (stop snickering at the back please) and visited our favourite fruitier who was so enamoured by our repeated visits that he decided to give half his stock away to us for free for whatever reason. I think he liked us asking him what all the stuff was called in Spanish.  We went to order a pizza to be delivered and suddenly the heavens opened and it really did come down on us. We struggled to get back to the hotel in the downpour and on the way Daz's trousers became so sodden that they fell down on the street so he had to hold them up and try to run at the same time. Back at the hotel we were treated to amazing light show from the storm that continued into the early hours. Our next destination is going to be Tulum.

A friendly welcome from the local market.