Cozumel, Mexico
Perhaps hiring a beat-up car without a working handbrake wasn't such a good idea. To be honest it didn't exactly seem the best plan at the time either but as we run onto the highway to stop a multiple pile-up we're cursing our impetuous choice of rental car agreement. And it had all started so well!
Wind back a few hours and we get up nice and early and make our way down to the ferry port next to our hotel for the 8am crossing. After all, we've been watching these ferries cross the straits to Cozumel from our sun-loungers most days and we couldn't really skip the chance to visit the island.
So as we're buying tickets we're approached by a chap from a local car-hire company who offers us the 'Mexican Ferrari' at a very reasonable $60 for the day, to pick up once we arrive. We do all the double-checks and everything's in order, but with the ferry about to depart we don't have a huge amount of time to think so we hand over the dosh and jump on board.
Various friends, along with the trusty Lonely Planet Guide and the top tips section on Trip Advisor, have all suggested that the best way to see Cozumel is to hire an old VW Beetle convertible and tour the island. Sounds ace, so we're all sorted in advance of arriving.
We sit out back on board the ferry named Mexico III, having walked past the rather casual-looking army patrol toting huge guns and sniffer dogs, and feel the spray on our faces as we cross the eleven miles to Cozumel, the third largest island in Mexico and named Ah-Cuzamil-Peten (Isle of Swallows) by its earliest inhabitants back in 300AD.
It's 9am as we come into port at the only town on the island, San Miguel de Cozumel, looking at four enormous cruise liners moored at the terminal a little further south and docking next to the still sizeable Disney cruise ship also berthed in the ferry port. We're warned that with these behemoths all disgorging their passengers, today will be a busy day to check out the island.
Sure enough, there's a guy from the car hire company waiting for us and a Dutch-sounding couple, our names written on his clipboard. He leads us away from the port on a wander through the backstreets of San Miguel to his offices. The town is much more authentically Caribbean than Playa del Carmen, its low-rise painted houses and little grids of streets reminding us of parts of Havana or the Cuban colonial towns of Trinidad and Cienfuegos on its southern Caribbean coast, just a couple of hundred miles from here.
We're encouraged - heavily - to take out extra anti-collision damage insurance for a further $35 and after a bit of discussion we decide to agree. Once we see the car, we know it's a wise choice. The wreck we're presented with is the most dilapidated thing either of us have ever driven.
The handbrake doesn't work ("Don't worry sir, eez same with all ze cars, I promeeze!!"), in-built airconditioning means unclipping the roof and rolling it into the back, the lights switch on and off at random, the gears crunch and groan with alarming volume and the driver's seat moves of its own accord. But hey, we've paid cash, it's a small island and all that advice can't be wrong... can it?
Once I've managed to get the damn thing started and out of first gear it chugs along OK so we pootle down the seafront to Cozumel Palace, the sister hotel of our own, where with a bit of help from the car park attendant I manage to find reverse and manoeuvre the car off the main road and park up outside the front of the hotel.
We can use Cozumel Palace like the Playacar Palace, it's all inclusive to us, so we stop off there for coffee and a bit of extra breakfast and to get some advice on things to see and do. The hotel, although billed as equal to ours and charged accordingly, isn't a patch on the Playacar and we're instantly grateful we're not staying here. But as we're discussing where to explore with the concierge the carpark attendant runs in waving his arms and shouting, "Sir, sir, your car, it's moving!!!"
We run outside and sure enough the Beetle is rolling forward from the forecourt and straight onto the main highway into all the traffic. I leap in and slam on the brake with my foot, crunch back into reverse and we avert disaster by the skin of our teeth. An angry phonecall to the car hire company ensues.
Fifteen minutes later yet another guy arrives from the company with a different, yet similarly knackered Beetle, and professing not to speak very much English, fails to acquiesce to our demands for our money back, just gesturing at the replacement car - which also has no working handbrake. He at least manages to tell us we need to park the car 'in gear' next time.
To be honest, I've quite enjoyed the little drive so far so rather than waste more time arguing we just get back in our original car and decide to carry on. The sun's shining and within ten minutes we're on the quiet coastal road that encircles the island and most of the traffic disappears.
What replaces it is the pungent, fragrant and almost overpowering smell of marijuana. Originating in Mexico (alongside tomatoes, avocados, corn, turkeys, chocolate and many of life's other essentials), marijuana seems to be growing all over the place. So it's no surprise that when we reach Punta Sur, an ecological reserve at the southern-most point of the island, we're greeted by the Rasta Reggae Bar, complete with a ropey statue of Bob Marley, lots of 'Legalise It' graffiti, the reverance of Haile Selassi and Zion everywhere, heavy dub bass pumping out and a black, red, gold and green colour scheme going on. Drop in and drop out, senor!
We pull over and check it out, parking next to a bunch of other Beetles (no working handbrakes there either we learn, which is oddly reassuring) just as a huge convoy of jeeps full of whooping and hollering tourists from one of the cruise liners roars up, pushing ahead of us into Punta Sur. We follow them in and have to wait as they all pull up to look at crocodiles.
Coman, who is driving at this point, tries to navigate his way around them as they all just stand around in the road hi-fiveing each other, but they selfishly block our way far more interested in their own mindless posturing than letting us pass. Well, it transpires that one thing which does work in the Beetle is the horn, very loudly, which sends them scurrying. Eat dust, you muthas!! Hasta la vista...
Off we roar towards the lighthouse at the very tip of the island and then on past the lagoons towards the remote beach from which we can snorkel. Unfortunately these shallow reefs were badly damaged by Hurricane Wilma which wreaked massive destruction on Cozumel, Cancun and Playa Del Carmen, amongst its swathe of horror, but left Tulum untouched.
The deep water reefs that the large snorkel boats and glass bottomed tours go out to remain intact and stunning but we don't want to spend half the day and another hundred dollars doing that so hire snorkels, life vests and flippers from a shack on the beach, pop our belongings in a little wooden locker and swim a hundred metres or so out to sea. Underneath us the coral is sand-covered and pretty uninteresting but around us flit various yellow, blue and silver fishes, the clear water giving amazing visibility.
As we near the reef we see a stream of tourists heading down the beach and into the water. It's the people we honked at earlier, so hoping that our masks will conceal our identity we carry on with our swim while they start to reach us. Fortunately the disguise works and we are undisturbed, calling it a day after 45 minutes. To be honest, it's not anywhere near as impressive as the snorkelling we did on the Great Barrier Reef and with Coman's equipment playing up repeatedly we're happy to have ticked that box and head back for dry land.
We leave Punta Sur with a trip up the lighthouse for some spectacular views, and while up there spot the convoy of jeeps heading out of the park before us, still whooping and hollering like a keg-party of idiots.
Back at the Rasta Bar we bump into the other couple from the car-hire company, who had taken a jeep for the day. They are indeed Dutch, hailing from Amsterdam, and on a month's backpacking vac ation. She's just finished her pHD in neuroscience and he's a musician in a punk-reggae band, with the funky beard to prove it. Apparently all the Mexicans in Playa del Carmen have been calling him Mr Whiskers.
We eat nachos and salsa together, swap tips of things to do in the local area and find out that they are Iron Maiden fans, having recently watched the 'Flight 666' documentary of Maiden's 2008 world tour. They're fascinated to find out my first visit to Mexico was on that very tour, along with Costa Rica, Colombia and Brazil.
As avid travellers themselves, and no strangers to rock'n'roll touring, we could chat for ages but Coman and I need to catch the 5pm ferry back to the mainland so say our goodbyes, jump in the Beetle and head up the eastern coast of the island, exposed to the wilder seas of the Caribbean and more windwept and rugged as a result. It's beautiful and totally undeveloped.
The road turns back towards San Miguel de Cozumel and we have no time to detour to San Gervaiso where there was a temple to Ixchel, goddess of fertility and the moon, to which all Maya women were expected to make a pilgrimage at least once in their lifetime.
We pull in for gas at a service station where the attendant insists on serving us and, we think, rips us off completely but with the clock ticking we have to press on and try to negotiate San Miguel's one-way system and find the drop off point for the car, which we manage to do with minutes to spare. It may be a heap of crap that wouldn't be allowed near a piece of tarmac back home but we've grown quite attached to its convertible fun, with the sunburnt foreheads to prove it.
We make the ferry just in time and settle back on the crowded boat for the crossing, only for Coman to point out that our seats - the only ones left - are right next to a drum kit, and sure enough a band strikes up as we set off. Ahead of us the Disney cruise-liner is steaming towards the horizon, its red and blue livery making it look a bit like the QEII, while in the bay pirate ships offer sunset cruises, allowing passengers to pretend to be Henry Morgan or Jean Lafitte, both notorious brigands who used Cozumel as part of their smuggling empires.
I'm suddenly so tired that the rocking of the boat lulls me off into a bizarre doze, my waking dreams soundtracked by the band right next to me playing tracks such as 'Baby, I Love Your Way' and 'La Bamba' at full pelt with audience singalongs, while to me they become distant themes, ending my day.
But there's no end just yet. Tonight is our rescheduled romantic dinner on the beach and we need to get showered, changed and down to the candlelit tables asap. We make it and take our seats.
A new tale for another day...
