Last week we traveled to Mexico for one last summer jaunt before fall hits and our schedules ramp up. We took the red-eye flight from San Francisco to Cancun, then rented a car and spent 5 days exploring the Yucatan Peninsula. It was the best time. The people, the pace of life, the food…we just loved it all. After landing bleary eyed, we skipped the bright lights and touristy parts of Cancun and went to Isla Mujeres instead, a relaxed little island just off Cancun. The water was the most beautiful blue. We swam around and had coronas and ate fresh ceviche. My favorite part was when we took a boat out to go free-diving with the docile, plankton eating whale sharks. It was amazing to see about 50 or so of these massive animals up close. Our captain took us about an hour off-shore in deep blue waters until we saw fins. Trey and I would sit on the edge of the rocking boat and when our captain gave us the signal to jump, we’d jump into the water and dive down to them. Swimming along with them was like swimming with dinosaurs. They grow up to 40 feet long and are just mammoths! When I was a grad student at Scripps (UCSD), there was a whale shark embryo specimen in our fish lab. It was about a foot long. To see the adult version that was 40x larger was just too rad. We were exhausted after that and took naps in the shade at the hotel pool when we got back. The next morning we packed up and headed south to Playa del Carmen…photos from that leg of our trip coming soon!
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