And into Mexico...

Considering it was a Mexican border, our crossing into Mexico was pretty uneventful. I wouldn’t say smooth as it did entail a small bus with no suspension for 5 hours on an unpaved road, but, we neither got held up, chucked off the bus nor refused entry through various protests going on in the local villages due to an extortionate hike in electricity prices. This is what a couple of our mates went through, so we had by the looks of it been incredibly lucky. 

After the bus, we were ushered into a boat to cross the river, squished into a small taxi and driven to customs, sung at by an insolent Mexican official, then roasted for a further 2 hours in another minivan to Palenque. This is the base town for the famous Palenque Ruins, which we were hoping to squeeze in that day but given the time taken to get there, was better saved for the next day.

We only stayed in Palenque town long enough for me to satisfy a slight consumerist craving and buy a hat (I wanted a cap for the US!) before we headed up the road by bus, again, and towards the ruins. The accommodation was much more appealing outside of the town as there were a number of chilled out camping places, including Mayabell. 

The beautiful complex of Mayabell, El Retiro, Mexico

My new hat!

The absolutely amazing swimming pool!

This has got to one of the best places we have ever stayed. Not far from the road but hidden in amongst lush jungle was an amazing open sided wooden bar and restaurant kitted out with tons of fairy lights, serving amazing food and playing really good music. With this as the centrepiece the grounds also housed a number of cabanas, pitches for tents, a huge swimming pool which was surrounded by jungle and where you could spot toucanettes and other ‘exo’ birds (now classed as ‘exo’ birds rather than exotic, as there has to be some difference between these and pretzals / full on toucans!) God, we’re so spoilt now with seeing such amazing birds all the time. There was a pool bar and laid-back atmosphere and that night there was some seriously amazing live music with drums, bongos and some other crazy instruments, incense burning everywhere and fire dancers!

Evening entertainment

Unfortunately there were also some pretty big spiders around and for us, our extremely hot, humid really small tent to try to sleep the night in. It seriously was indescribably hot. In fact, it was probably the hottest I have ever been. Definitely the hottest night of our lives. I had to check with Tim there was enough air in the tent and I wouldn’t die in my sleep. We are never sleeping in a small tent in the jungle ever, ever again. We couldn’t even open the door as there were too many bugs. We were stuck. Taking long breaths and trying not to panic, I managed to get to sleep. Luckily we had also got in without any bugs on us and made it through the night unscathed! I love the jungle, but only during the day and without any tents in sight.

The next day we headed off to the Palenque Ruins. Built again by the Mayans but different to Tikal as many more of the buildings have been restored and although covering a similar area they seemed a lot more intricate – more palaces, small rooms and temples that you could walk around. There was also more information on display on small plaques so we could learn a little more about why each was built. I loved the fact that they painted many of the temples red and blue. It must have looked so colourful. And there was a cool party area. There was also a temple with a carving very much like Frank, the rabbit from the film Donnie Darko which was pretty cool. But for me, I can’t get over the tops of the Tikal temples poking through the jungle canopy, so would have to give preference to Tikal. 

The ruins at Palenque

This was the outside party area!

The face of Frank from Donnie Darko

On the way out we came across some absolutely stunning waterfalls. Although not accessible to the public, I found a way off the bridge and past the ropes to get a shot in the falls. The photo has not been touched up at all but I just can’t believe how surreal it appears. Perhaps it was a dream…

Dreamy waterfalls (with no HDR - they were really like this)

We stayed in the town of Palenque the next day where we found a nice place to order a litre of milkshake. They make them with whatever fruit you fancy, or concoction of fruits and call them ‘licuardos’. They are absolutely delicious. 

Getting stuck into a litre of amazing strawberry, banana and kiwi milkshake

Although we hadn’t wanted to leave the stunning location of where we were camping, staying in town was more convenient for our bus south the next day to the Lagos de Montebello. This is a series of lakes, still in the state of Chiapas where we were planning a bit more camping before heading into San Cristobal de las Casas – a large town famous for its crazy Easter parades and celebrations, which were nearly upon us. We were also looking forward to 3 days of going nowhere and hopefully just eating a lot of chocolate!

We got to Lagos de Montebello by 2pm but it was raining and we couldn’t really see any of the lakes in their full glory. Unfortunately really high prices for cabanas meant we still had to camp and it was very cold and damp. 

Some unappealing lakes in the rain

Luckily the campsite had a common room so we spent most of the day sheltering from the rain, surfing the net and talking over the options of potentially buying a car in the US for our yearly storm chasing adventures. The more we talked, the more excited we got. We really can’t wait to be out in the States and if we’re honest, we are feeling a little travel jaded right now. It’s probably due to having crammed so much into such a short time frame recently. This, together with all the early rises and cramped bus journeys, made the option of having our own car and the prospect of storm chasing even more exciting than it usually is.

That evening we decided that we’d give the weather here a chance the next morning and if it was nice, get some bikes out and explore the numerous lakes, trails and pine forests. But whatever happened, the next evening we were going to head to San Cristobal, this being a day earlier than planned, to start the storm chasing planning, including checking out the possibility of getting our own chasemobile!

The next morning was a bit grey so we knocked up some coffee and beans and headed off to San Cristobal to find pre-Easter celebrations and a faster internet connection for some serious storm chasing planning!