Cancun

Saturday December 27…10:15pm

We left the Coba ruins carpark just before 8am. We headed out on the side road that links up to the main road to Cancun.

It was a very narrow raod, and we had to slow down and pull to the side for every car and truck that came our way. Fortunately, it was not a busy road, but it still took us about 3 hours to do the 160 km’s to get to Cancun. Although we did stop for S&G to buy gasoline, and we both needed propane as well.

Speaking of propane, S&G were ahead of us at the pump on the outskirts of Cancun. It’s a very backwards system, whereby the guy who fills your tank has the readout of the pump facing away from you…like you’re filling with the pump on the opposite side of your vehicle. Anyhow, when the guy resets the pump and whistles, the guy on the inside starts the pump. Then when it’s full, you have to go to the guy in the booth, tell him how many litres the other guy put in, and the guy in the booth writes you a hand written receipt, and you pay him…in cash only. Steve came and warned me that the cash guy tried to rip him off with the wrong change. Sure enough, when I went in to pay, it was 352 pesos. I had a 500 peso bill, and the guy tried to only give me 120 pesos in change. It was so blatently obvious that he was trying to rip me off, and I grabbed a 50 pesos note out of his hand and gave him the 20 back. He was then quick to point out that I now owed him a further 2 pesos and I threw it on the desk out of my pocket change. It’s a shame that this kind of thing still happens here, but they are just trying to take advantage of the “turisticos”.

Glen had set up with a couchsurfer ( www.couchsurfing.com ) where we could park outside her place in Cancun. Now, the Cancun hotel district is fairly simple. But the old city itself is almost half a million people, and we had to stop and buy a map of the city in order to find her place without driving all over town. But, we did find it, and Carmen, our host, is very welcoming and helpful. We met her dog Geeah, and her 16 year old daughter. She let us have a normal shower, and maybe we can catch up on some laundry tomorrow.

Our parking spot near Carmen's house

We went for a walk with S&G and familiarized ourselves with the area. Maybe tomorrow we’ll check out the hotel distrct and the beach area. Apparently we can ride the bikes to part of it.

Total nights sleeping in a motorhome…430

December Fuel $418.00 CAN

December Grocery $222.70 CAN

December Overnight costs $118.20 CAN