Mexico editor Gay Nagle Myers was in Cancun for the annual Cancun Travel Mart for buyers and suppliers. Her second dispatch follows. Click to read Gay's first dispatch.
ISLA HOLBOX — Two hours by road and 20 minutes by ferry from the hubbub of Cancun lies the exact opposite of that resort destination.
Isla Holbox (the Mayan name means Black Hole, although the island isn’t black and the only holes are some fairly deep puddle potholes created when the rains come) is a seven-mile-long narrow island with dirt roads, golf carts instead of cars and a laid-back barefoot lifestyle with small hotels that don’t have alarm clocks, TVs or phones in the rooms.
Internet is sketchy, hammocks are everywhere and the vibe is, well, relaxed to put it mildly.
Here’s how I spent a day on that island, population around 2,300 people plus a high number of well-fed, well-cared-for dogs,
which I don’t see in many other Mexican towns and cities where strays roam the streets.
I went fishing with Caceres Vicente, a fishing guide for 39 years. He knows these waters well and I fished the traditional Holbox way — a simple line, a weight and mopich (the word means “little fish”) for bait — dropped over the side.
No fancy poles, no expensive boat.
I caught a lot of Sargassum seaweed. Fortunately, others in the boat caught several mero, pargo and clownfish. We were fishing for our lunch and when we ate and what we ate depended upon how much we caught.
An hour later, after a refreshing dip in the Yum Balam cenote, we ate the fish, served ceviche-style prepared by boat captain Pablo Avila and presented by Vicente.
I had more seafood later at the third annual Holbox Food Festival. It was my first time trying octopus. An interesting taste but I’m not so sure it’s on my top 10 list.
I finished off that day with an outdoor shower at Hotel Holbox Villa Flamingos. My room had an indoor shower, too. No fancy-schmancy rainshower showerhead but an artificial log running across the top of the shower with holes in it. When I turned on the faucets, water spurted from the holes.
On a ride into the small town to wander the shops and market, the golf cart/taxi got stuck in one of those puddle potholes.
A recent rain had turned the dirt roads on Isla Holbox into a clay-like, quicksand consistency. I hopped out of the cart when the driver needed to push it out of the muck.
I got stuck in that muck. Marchelo, the Italian driver who’s also a chef at the only pizzeria in town, extricated me and my flipflops and we continued on, both of us a bit mud-spattered but none the worse for wear.
It was a great day.