A snail once again.

I have left Bogotá and this was kind of the place to write about Bogotá.  But you all know where it is now and I couldn't be bothered setting up another one.

So I started traveling again, I didn't have the sort of pre-travel excitement that people kind of expect.  I felt more obligated by the opportunity than excited by the possibility to be honest with you.  After I got of the first days worth of planes I felt a little more interested in what I was doing, a change of culture can do that.  Cancún is like a mini-USA whacked on the end of mexico.  There are mexicans living there, that's true but they aren't really mexican mexicans.  A lot of them are chewed into the influence that the tourism boom has brought to the town.  Sure it's nice and everything, it has a beach.  Nice white sand and crystal waters beautiful really, but then so does the entire western coast of the Yútucan. What was it that made the sleepy little seaside town of Cancún a household name around the world?  As far I can see there are two very important factors that lead to this occurring; the minimum age for buying alcohol in the united states is 22, while in Mexico it is 18.  Cancun is very close to Miami.

Those two things kind of snowballed I think because there is now a separate section in Cancun that is full of hotels. Massive hotels form what is called the hotel strip, big chain hotels from the US.  Great imposing structures that get knocked over every few years due to the hurricanes that cross the peninsula.

Cancun is fake Mexico, the people who go to those hotels do not go to Mexico nor do they want to.  They get what they were looking for in booze, beach and bars.

Many happy tourists from England as well. 

I personally cannot imagine going somewhere with the intent of completely ignoring the place. All that said though, I did find a nice friendly hostel and a little local park with a bunch of little food stores where all of the locals take there kids and grab a bite to eat.  Cheap food that was pretty good and a nice atmosphere.

Oh, and there are cheap flights to Cuba ...

I went to Havana for 4 days, have always wanted to go just to see what it is like there.  I didn't actually get to sample the April sun in Cuba, but I can tell you that the September sun did not treat me so right, so right. 

 It actually burnt me. 

Luckily there doesn't seem to be a massive hole in the ozone layer above Havana and I managed to fix the burn up in a day or two.  I don't look like have spent 9 months in Bogotá now.  I have parts that aren't paesty white. 

Cuba is an odd place, I probably noticed it more because I set out to look for what kind of place Cuba is, and I could talk to people.  They have two systems there, one for the working class and another for everyone else.  The working class is paid in Cuban Pesos, The tourists have Cuban Convertible Pesos, officially a Cuban Peso is worth 1/25th of a Convertible Peso but realistically it is almost worthless.  The Workers are paid in these pesos, and because of that they can't really go to any of the shops for the tourists because they only accept the CCP.   The miserable amount that they get paid also means that they can't really afford good food and quite a lot turn to crime.  A criminal can make in a day what others make in a month, if they are robbing tourists.   The are doing it because they feel that's the best way to survive and they don't want to be bad people so the crime is pretty much all non-violent.  That will change though I am sure, and there will be places in Havana like there are places in Bogotá (and London and Sydney and whatever other principle city) where all tourists will just avoid.  The people in the country are living very poor apparently. 

All of this negative viewpoint I picked up from a local who worked at the edge of Central Havana fleecing tourists with  fake cigars with his cousin.  I took him to lunch, well I bought him a Cola, he didn't want anything to eat as he thought it was terribly expensive ($4.50).  We had a good chat about his life ( he was about 55) and how he lived and what he thought about Cuba.  It was interesting to talk to him because he had lost all respect for the government and spoke negatively of the situation, which no one else did.  They tended just to say nothing when posed a question that would illicit a negative response about Cuba. 

To sum up my impression of Havana I would have to say that it is a beautiful city with a fascinating, impressive and tragic past.  But also that is has a fascinating, impressive and tragic present end future.  It is an accident happening, not because of the political model in place but because of the introduction of the incongruous capitalist element.  The innate rebelliousness within the people that stems from Cuba's torrent past will become evident in some form or another.  The world is waiting for Fidel.

Tulum in eastern Mexico is another beach town. It is less touristy, in that it has less tourists but the intent is pretty similar to that which exists in whatever seaside town a few hours from a big destination.  Think of anywhere near the gold coast and you will have a good idea.  Places that rent bicycles, scuba equipment and things of that nature.  Tulum also has a bloody great set of ruins from the Mayans as well.  These come complete with ropes to stop you from getting too close to the actual buildings themselves.  Its good that they are making efforts to conserve these elements of another time but it does take the fun out of it somewhat. 

I did go and climb something that I wasn't meant to.  I felt better for it.