Day 1: Dec 29, 2016
Airport and AirBnb
Edda and I, we're flying from Florida, FLL and we reached the airport at 3.30pm and we're waiting for Anis, Amirah, Aisha and Zainab; they're all from Detroit. 30 minutes later, they arrived and we had to wait at the front of arrival door because
TIPS 1: Cancun Airport has no wifi, be prepared with your roaming plan; or at least one of you should have it, just in case!
We took the taxi to our Airbnb home and we had to pay 100 USD for the one-way trip for five people to that place and we got lost!
TIPS 2: Ask your Airbnb host specifically on where shall you meet and bargain to get the cheapest taxi fare!
We had to wait at the 7/11 store near the house then the host guided us the way. The house was in a jungle, legit jungle and we thought of how screwed we'll because there's no way a bus could reach the house! Our hopes weren't crushed completely, though! The house has its own jacuzzi, hammock, swimming pool; a resort in a middle of nowhere. The host, Marco, he's a photographer and art therapist; thus the house looked very artsy and we are all in love with the house! Then he took us to one of the malls, we went to change money and ate tacos at this one restaurant, the tacos are very cheap, less than 2USD and my favorite one is ceviche! When comes to think about it again, ceviche is pretty much similar to Sabahan dish called umai. Guess I love familiar food! Marco, our host, he's aware that it was difficult for taxi to reach our Airbnb thus he gave us the contact number of this particular taxi driver who used to send his guests back home, Juan. Unfortunately, Juan couldn't make it that night but Juan was nice enough to be on the phone with Alfredo, a random taxi driver to guide him the way!
TIPS 3: Remember your way back home so you won't get lost and know a bit of Spanish, thus
TIPS 4: Download google translate application on your phone, you can use it even without the internet 😝
Total amount of spending per person = 25USD + 200 pesos
Day 2: Dec 30, 2016
Isla Mujeres
We decided to go to a small island, Isla Mujeres (direct translation: Woman Island). So this island promised us nice snorkeling experience and we could snorkel to observe statues at the bottom of the sea, known as Musa Museum (never know my grandpa has his own museum but ok). Based on our intensive research, the package will cost us, 45USD excluding tax, but the agent offered us 28USD per person including lunch and snorkels and life jackets and we paid extra 2USD for tips and we obviously took the offer! Again, bargain! Queen of all bargaining activities was definitely THE EDDA NADIRA, she's so good at this! Me, on the other hand, I will just smile and talk in Malay with Edda, urging for her to bargain for the cheaper price lol! The snorkeling part was.... Long story short, my life jacket was not tight enough thus I almost drowned. I had to hold on to the rope and thank God I survived! But I still could see a school of fish and most of them looked like Dory! But the wave was so strong that I accidentally drank the sea water, so I couldn't continue my swimming and decided to just be on the boat. Then I felt so nausea and almost vomited, but I didn't lol. The next snorkeling pitstop was the lighthouse area which was supposedly where Musa Museum at, but I did ask everyone on our boat, nope, no one saw that lol. Maybe it was at the other side of the lighthouse, or maybe it did not exist at all! Lol!
TIPS 5: Prepared mentally, you might snorkel at the sea with crazy waves and pray to God that there won't be any Titanic incident happening!
Next pit stop was the lunch place! Everyone loves the food, the atmosphere, OMG it's like another level of ikan bakar! Tikin-xic is the name of Mexican ikan bakar and for some undiscovered reasons, Mexican rice is da bomb! Me lovin' it! The best part was, we could eat as much as we wanted, so you should know who won the battle lol!
After that, we made our way to the mainland of Isla Mujeres and every corner of the street was never the same! They're all decorated with colorful garlands and the festive vibe was everywhere! I swear we stopped at every street for pictures! Before the sunset, we made our way back to Cancun and did I mention, the total of ferry fare was 200pesos, round trip!
TIPS 6: Yes, they ask you to pay for tips, very American but oh well! The tour is usually paid in USD, while the food, taxis, ferries they're all paid in MXN Pesos!
So the total amount of spending is 30USD and 200pesos.
Day 3: New Year's Eve!
Playa Del Carmen and Hotel Zone at nite
We went to Playa Del Carmen, another city in Mexico, not far from Cancun! Usually, people would go there to take a ferry to Cozumel and do all of the snorkeling activities but you know, we're done with the sea, so we just spent out morning until afternoon at the beach. Sunbathing and listening to poems by Rupi Kaur, narrated by Amirah and we had some serious conversations regarding social issues in the world, regarding women! They all had taken women studies class and the conversation is really interesting and tbh, I realized that we all have matured and our perception change based on our surroundings, educations, friends and books we read. While having the intellectual discussion with the fellow chicas, a drunk man came approaching us talking how he wanted to spread love in the world, well the message was good but his approach was kinda scary! That's the queue for lunch, though, so we left the beach, heading to good cheap restaurant!
TIPS 7: People will look at you in a unique way when you wear hijab, trust me, during the whole trip, people will always ask about why do we wear hijab and do answer them politely cause they don't know. We need to tell them and enlighten them. We're the only hijabists in the town for sure! And some might mistaken us with people from India, so people will either greet us with salaam or namaste, funny ey? But Mexicans are the friendliest people I've met!
TIPS 8: Ask. Ask. Ask! Ask around for best local food (read: seafood) and they will tell you where and trust the locals! Not all fancy restaurants have great food! Find the Mexican version of mamak, their food will never go wrong!
Side note: Mexicans are selfless, they always help each other even if they're competing in the same business field. For example, we wanted to eat at the restaurant suggested by the locals, but we didn't know the way so we asked the other restaurants' owners/waiters and they just showed us the way without hesitation. After lunch, we took a shuttle bus to a beautiful cenote also suggested by the locals; Cristalino Cenote. It's like a natural pool, with fish and you can jump off the cliffs and dive in and swim with catfish in the pool inside the cave. I wished I could stop the time and enjoyed more time there! This is the most expensive cenote we've been to; 140pesos which is pretty decent for the kind of nature it has to offer. TIPS 9: Cenote is a must place to visit in Mexico! There're lists of cenotes you can find on the net, the famous ones are pretty but they're all overrated, so many people so I personally prefer to going to the underrated ones, famous among the locals but have really nice views!
The total amount of spending: including bus tickets, shuttles, lunch, cenote fee and life-jacket = 400pesos.
ALERT!
After getting back from Playa Del Carmen, we decided on going to the Hotel Zone just to witness/feel the NYE vibe in Mexico. So we went to the Coco Bongo area where people would pay 180USD just to watch performances and got free flow alcohol or people would book a table for 2000USD and they could eat whatever they want. But as a broke university student, we just went to a taco stall, near that area, which had 5USD ceviche and enjoyed our night there.
We called Juan to pick us up but he was busy that night (it was his birthday and we only found out about it the day after), so we had to take another taxi. So this one taxi driver in some ways was forcing us to get into his taxi, and he was so desperate and we too were desperate to go home and he kinda pushed us to the taxi, I felt like getting kidnapped and in the taxi then only he told us to pay 500pesos for the taxi, which was double of the amount we always paid Juan. We could do nothing, so we showed him the way to go to our Airbnb and guess what? He stopped his taxi, in the middle of the jungle and told us that he couldn't send us till that far. He's legit the rudest and most heartless person on Earth I've ever encountered. Who would leave a group of girls in the middle of the jungle, right before midnight and the place is located a few meters away from a memorial place (modern version of the grave) and we had to walk for another 2km to get to our place. He's loco!
So he made us pay him 700pesos for the trip and without even negotiating with us, he slammed the door and drove us home.
TIPS 10: Negotiate the taxi fees first before getting into the taxi, regardless how desperate you're.
DAY 4: HAPPY NEW YEAR!!! 2017 SHOULD BE A BETTER YEAR FOR ME!
Hotel Zone and more of Cancun!
We're so traumatized and tired so we spent our morning by having a photoshoot session at Marco's place and we went out to meet Zainab, another Michigan friend at the beach area near Hotel Zone. This area has a big sign of CANCUN and we literally queued up for 20minutes just for a picture there. It's that famous. The beach is really nice, even the sand is not as white as the one at Playa Del Carmen, but the sea is more picturesque. The wind was so strong thus it was less hot so we had a nap there. After having some Kaho Naa Pyaar Hai scenes, we took a bus to downtown. We stopped at Plaza 28, bought some souvenirs, bought some cheap tacos for dinner and waited for Juan to pick us up.
Oh, cheese tacos are better than mushroom tacos; so my friends said. But I love mushroom tacos nevertheless, lol.
On our way back home, Juan told us something that I found it useful to be shared.
TIPS 11: Plaza 28 is different that Market 28. The owner of the bus that we rode owns Plaza 28 too. So the bus will only stop there, and not at Market 28. But the real place to buy unique and cheap souvenirs is at Market 28.
They are cheap, you can get 11 keychains for less than 5USD, meanwhile, at Plaza 28, the price of 4 keychains is 5USD.
Juan took us to Market 28 on the next day and it was as quiet as a library and the sellers were so nice to us too. I wish I knew this place earlier.
Total cost = 600 pesos for transportation, food, and souvenirs.
DAY 5: Page 2 of 364
Chichen Itza and Ik-Kil
Chichen Itza, not chicken okay? This place is one of the 7 wonders of the world. Little did I know that I would ever visit Chichen Itza in my life. I thought it would be the Great Wall of China or Colosseum in Italy or Taj Mahal cause they're relatively near to Malaysia as compared to Mexico. I really thank god for this opportunity. Our tour guide, Efrain, he is a Mayan descendent and explained about his culture and beliefs along the way and I could hear his enthusiasm in every story he told. He took us to a Mayan village, where they sold souvenirs made by the Mayan people and the profit is used to support the education of the less privileged kids of Mexico. All of us ordered our Mayan birth certificate and I love the design on my Mayan birth certificate and the paper is unique too! It costs me 20USD. It's a bit pricey but to know that the money goes to charity is good enough :)
Then we enjoyed lunch buffet provided by the Mayan communities; they served rice, eggs, pasta, fruits. Oh well, they tasted more like Western food tbh, but as long as it's buffet, I'm down for it!
Then we went to visit Chichen Itza; the first 1 hour we had our tour guide, his name is Manuel and he looks a bit like my grandfather and the way he told stories was pretty much similar, lol. It's amazing how people during with ancient times could come up with such civilization and technology -- they spent million of years to come up with all of them-- and it's sad to know how colonialism can destroy all the good things that a civilization used to enjoy in less than 3 days.
After listening to useful information about the Mayans, we got to spend one hour on our own to take pictures before we went to the ik-kil cenote (one of the famous cenotes in Mexico).
We only got one hour to spend at the cenote, so we could only dive into the cenote twice, lol.
Total spending = 60USD including souvenirs and the tour package
DAY 6: January 3, 2017
Fancy Restaurant
Amirah, Anis, and Aisha went to xplor one of the theme parks in Cancun, that uses nature as its concept. Edda and I didn't go because we went to DisneyWorld and Universal Studios Orlando so we had less money to spend in Cancun. So, we had lunch at Flamingo Restaurant (suggested by the locals) and enjoyed tikin-xic again! It looks so much like a fine dining place but we only spent 10USD each for the meal! Then we spent time at the beach while waiting for Amirah, Anis, and Aisha. Then we went to Market 28 before going home at ate our maggi heh.
Total spending: 15USD including food, transportation, and souvenirs.
DAY 7: Last day~
Tulum, Coba and final cenote!
We woke up early to catch our bus to Tulum, Coba, and another cenote. Tulum and Coba are all Mayan cities and they both have spectacular views. The Carribbean sea is damn beautiful but we didnt have time to spend time on the beach though. At Tulum, we only had less than 2 hours there; on my way back to the bus, we got lost. We only had 10 minutes to walk to the bus and the journey should take us 20minutes. I literally ran (read: fast walked). Cause if we missed the bus, we had to take the taxi which I'm pretty sure it'll be so expensive. But we made it!!!!! Next trip is to Coba! We had to cycle for 5km to get to the tallest pyramid in Yucatan Peninsular. Then we had to climb up 120 steps (137 feet in height) just to be at the top of Nohoch Mul pyramid.
Getting down was harder cause the steps were slippery and we had to hold on to the rope to get down safely. This time, because we got to cycle to the entrance of the park so we had more time, and there was no rush.
TIPS 12: Rent a bike to get to the pyramid because you do not wanna walk for 5km. Save up the energy to climb up the temple, you will love the view!
Next, the bus took us to the last cenote, it's inside a cave. We had to take 90 steps down a hole to witness this magical place. The water is so clear and fresh. Swimming in a cenote > snorkeling!
That marks the end of our Cancun adventure!
Total spending = 50USD
I went back to Montreal the next day and my flight was at 8 am, had to wake up at 4.30am, Juan drove me to the airport at 5 am and the first transit was Atlanta, I love the airport, everything was smooth, alhamdulillah and the flight to Montreal from Atlanta was delayed so I reached Montreal 1 hour late than the ETA.
Oh, I had a morning class the next day! Lol
Cheers to a new semester!
Did I tell you last Fall semester was such a failure but yeah whatever?
I feel like I really need this vacation and tbh, I really feel like I start this semester with new hope! To a waaaay better semester ahead!
