A Few More Days in Valladolid

We have been here  four full days, leaving for a two bus journey south east to Bacalar today. Yesterday was a hang around the town and explore day.  There's a decent market with the usual almost complete bodies of meat animals hacked open and hanging on giant hooks.  Piles of entrails next to a pigs head on the counter, it's gruesome  but that's how the meat is sold.  In a separate area are colorful fruit and vegetable stands, a sweets section, and finally a huge variety of small restaurants to choose from to get a cheap and delicious meal.  

Since Mexican folk art is so appealing to us, we paid a visit to Casa de Venados, a private 18,000 square foot restored colonial home that houses the owner's massive collection of folk art with a focus on Dia de los Muertos themed pieces.  A tour in English, for a donation of  $5, taught us so much about this type of folk art.  So many beautiful peices.

Back to our beautiful hotel,  http://casavalladolidboutique.com/, for a long rest, a swim, and then another great dinner.

Today we decided to rent bikes again and this time ride 4 miles out to Cenote Samula.  We rode through through Valladolid to the outskirts of town where we had an easy pedal on a dedicated bike/pedestrian road that ran along a main highway.  

This cenote is part of another Eco park that also includes Cenote X'Keken.  We paid only to go into Samula because it was more of a cave with a smaller hole on top.  It was pretty crowded so that made the interior echo very loud.  Half the folks there were on a large tour and were not really swimming but instead sat at the foot of the steps in a large group blocking the way to the water.  We had to slip through the crowd to get to the water, which we only swam in for about 45 minutes.  We lost a mask in the deep water  so that made the vibe worse.  We just wanted to leave.  We made our way up and out and soon after the tour group came out and went to X'Keken which made us decide not to bother going there, a crowed cenote is so not fun.  Further up the road is Cenote Saamal.  That place had two gigantic tour busses in the parking lot.  We were swarmed by tour groups! We had such a great time at Oxman we decided to bike 4.5 miles along a different highway, no shady path this time but in the blazing sun...... 

We made it, of course , and recreated our delightful afternoon at Oxman with only a sprinkling of people that came and went. 

Riding the 3 miles back to Valladolid, trying to beat a thunderstorm rolling in, we were treated to clouds of butterflies flittering in patches on the way.  Pretty magical.