Wierdness and Wonder

There's lots of wierd and wonderful stuff in the Yucatan and in and around Playa del Carmen.

Have I told you about the caverns of Aktun Chen? No? It's a large cave system out in the jungle in the interior of the Yucatan. I was doubtful about going in, not being very good with enclosed spaces or heights (as in lots of steps downwards to the caves) but I survived and, in an odd way, enjoyed it. Some great sights deep underground, with stalagtites and mites, water dripping, underground lakes, very spooky.

A similarly odd experience is to walk around the cemetary at XCaret - I don't think anyone is actually buried there, it's more of a memorial park than a cementary, but it's full of gravestones in glorious colour, some serious and some incredible fun.

One of my favourites was what I think of as the 'glam rock' grave in green and yellow with boots dangling under a sunshade - loved it! Another was the gloriously colourful 'fruit basket' grave. We wandered round a couple of times and saw different graves as different aspects catch your eye or different times of the day when the sunshine catches different parts of the graves.

The mound of the cemetary was hollow inside with a couple of shrines to the Virgin and a big cross in the centre surrounded by a spiral waterfall. That was very strange and, in its own way, very beautiful.

I didn't quite get the whole death thing in Mexico and I don't recall it at all from my trip years ago. There were shops that mainly sold death stuff, skeleton figures in various clothes - even skeleton dogs with bones in their mouths. Most odd.