Cenotes of the Yucatan

After the Independence Day celebrations my friend Suzie left for Brazil and I stayed back meeting other travelers and seeing more of the Merida area. With a group from the hostel I took a tour of the gorgeous cenotes in the area. Cenotes are underground caves that are partially open and partially submerged in the water table. They are all over the Yucatan peninsula and the ones we saw were a beautiful sight and refreshing break from the heat.

To get there eight of us took a van from the hostel in Merida about a hour outside of town passing several Mayan villages and a few ruins along the way. In the small village where the cenotes were we saw plenty of bike taxis. To get to the three cenotes on our trip we used a horse drawn cart that ran along narrow gauge tracks. Around a hundred years ago the tracks were installed to carry a fibrous plant from nearby fields to a factory that turned them into rope and fabric. A hurricane had destroyed the factory some time ago and the crop was no longer used to produce ropes and fabrics so the carts were converted into carriages to ferry tourists down the tracks to the various cenotes in the area. Tourism is now the main source of income from the community. Before we started on our trip we also had a look at a guy making hammocks. In the Yucatan area hammock sleeping is as common as using a mattress and you can find some of the best hammocks made here.

















Our trip was about 2 and a half to three hours with about a half hour visit at each cenote. The first cenote we made it to had a large opening with stairs down to the crystal clear water. The top of the cavern had stalactites hanging down with birds flying in and out. The water was 30-40 feet deep and where there was sun light you could see all the way down with goggles or a mask.



























The second cenote had a narrow entrance and couple of small openings with one of them letting a mangled mess of roots trail down to the water. There was a set of stairs the led down to a platform that we all jumped off of into the deep, crystal clear water.






















The last cenote that we visited by climbing down a ladder into a narrow hole in the ground that led the water level. It was the dark but there were several openings that shed small amounts of sunlight into the cavern. In this cenote it was dark enough that there were bats flying around.



















After leaving the cenotes we stopped off to get something to eat then made it back to the hostel. Later on we bought a couple bottles of tequila and some beer and went out on the town.



















Hanging roots