Tulum!

We made it to Tuluum todday. Wow, this place is amazing. It's definitelly more expensive to stay on the beach ($40 for an average room in Playa, more like 2-4x ). it's so desolate and beautiful here.

The day started out a little rough as Lacey was sick. She of couse pulled through it. I was particularly impressed that she made it through a 45 min van ride with 15 other people.

Speaking of whuch, the colectivo was pretty cool. It's a local van, common in Mexico, that for about $2 runs betwwenn cities about an hour apart. It doesn't have degined stops, other than at the beginning aand end. Instead, you just stand on the road annd wave. If there's room, they stop and you pile in and off you go.

While the colectivo was awesome, the taxi driver we took from the Tulum grocery store to our hotel was a jerk. He tried to overcharge us, and although he lowered his price when he discovered I spoke Spanish, he still overcharged us. Then to make it worse, he got lost and couldn't find the hotel. For anyone who sees just how small Tulum is, you'll understand how ridiculous this is. We tried saying our hotel name in three languages and spelling but got nowhere. Lacey thinks he was illiterate, he even tried to drop us off at a national park, saying itt was our hotel. We finally got out next to an abandoned shack, got help from some locals picnicing at the beach, and walked to our hotel.

Our hotel, mezzanine, is awesome. We highly recommend it if you want to pay more and get more. The photo of me is 5 min after we arrived . We were so happy to be here.

After we got here, we sat on the beach and relaxed. There's a picture of Lacey with someone's pet turtle, Quita. If you look, you'll see his owners painted his shell with nail polish. We turned in pretty early, but not before seeing the stars. It's so dark here (the beach is off the power grid) that the stars are amazing. I only wish a picture of them would come out.