The Earth + Nat

To get around Central America without wheels of your own, you have two options: chicken buses, or tourist shuttles. Many travellers are nervous of chicken buses and choose to pay very high prices for shuttles, but you don't need to! Here is my list of reasons for shaking off the chicken bus fear and taking the wild ride with the locals: - Chicken buses are cheap! The general price for an inter-city chicken bus is about $1-2 per hour of driving. For example, the bus between Leon and Managua that takes around 2 hours generally costs 50-60 Cordoba or $2, while the minimum shuttle price is $9 for the same amount of time! - There's snacks on chicken buses! Nicaragua in particular has a thriving network of people dedicated to selling fresh food on chicken buses. Whether you want some fresh baked corn bread, donuts with treacle sauce, coconut bread, hot tamales, pineapple pastry popcorn, sweets or just some fruit and veg, the chicken buses have it all. The vendors board the bus ...

I thought I would end my blog's long hiatus by doing a few posts about the 6 months I spent in Central America, most of that in Nicaragua. First up in the series is the iconic method of public transport in all Central American countries: the Chicken Bus! These types of buses run inter-city and suburban transport routes across Central America. The name comes from the habit of some locals to take their farm animals with them, and the name has stuck in the tourist community. It isn't as common as people make it out to be - I think in over 100 chicken bus rides I only saw a handful of chickens and a few boxes of chicks. That said, it does always make you giggle when you hear the box above your head tweeting as you drive. To run the bus you need at least two people: the chofer  (driver) and at least one  ayudante  (assistant). The driver's job is simple: navigating the route in as little time as possible, usually achieved through driving that would make Vin Diesel ...

One of the temple buildings from the Palenque ruins My visit to Palenque was a bit weird as I was only there for three nights and spent two of them horribly sick, again. I really need to learn how to tell the good tacos from the bad ones. However, I think I saw enough to give this place a review. Palenque is a cool little town that sits in the only spot of real tropical jungle in Mexico. With that jungle comes steamy tropical heat, which was different to the dry heat of Yucatan. One of the main tourist activities in the area is a ritual sweat bath called Temazcal which is supposed to be a spiritually cleansing experience, but to be honest catching a minibus with no open windows was probably close enough. I certainly felt like a new person when I stepped out into the breeze. An astronomical tower at Palenque. One thing I have learned about the Maya is that they were keen astronomers If you've seen the opening to Raiders of the Lost Ark, that's the vibe of the areas...

Tulum was a name I heard up and down the Americas. People raved about the place. Everyone on the web had good things to say. But for me, it wasn't quite what I had expected. Lazy days in the lazy waves The one thing I heard over and over again was how beautiful the area around Tulum is, and it absolutely was. Lush Yucatec forest, white sand beaches, turquoise water and fascinating Caribbean wildlife surrounds the area. You can see Iguanas, Sea Turtles, colourful tropical fish and enough parrots to fill the shoulders of every pirate in the seven seas. I took so many photos that I filled up my camera, deleted some, then filled it again. There are some really cool ruins nearby as well. Not as breathtaking as Chichen Itza , but still good. There are cenotes too of course, and I went with friends to a cool festival held next to one of them.  To say that this place is a natural paradise is an understatement. However... I couldn't love it. At one point this place had ...

Before coming to Mexico I thought I knew what a sleepy town was. I mean, some parts of South America are pretty laid back. However, they were positively buzzing compared to Valladolid. The whole town feels like it's in a repose, where nothing need be done and rushing is a foreign concept. Very quaint, very hot and very, very relaxed. In this part of Yucatan, time passes lazily and the urge to chill is almost irresistible in the heat of the day and the cool of the night. There are only a handful of bars in town, and those that exist are very cosy. Most people drink in the comfort of their homes and hammocks, plunging the depths of relaxation and zen. Ek'Balam Mayan site That said, there are a great many things to do in the area if you are so inclined. There is of course Chichen Itza , which I visited first. However, there are many other ruins in the area that you can visit, so we took a trip to another spot called Ek' Balam. This site is not as large as Chichén Itz...

The insects are quiet, only the birds are awake. A winding path lined with ancient stones leads through thick trees, towards a time-frozen slice of antiquity. The sun slowly rises above the forest and shines on one of the most iconic landscapes in the world - the Castillo Pyramid at Chichén Itzá. These are the bones of one of the great Mayan cities of the prehispanic age. The site includes the El Castillo Pyramid, the endless columns of the Temple of a Thousand Warriors, the Great Ball Court, and a myriad of smaller structures, as well as two cenotes. Most of the structures were religious, though some were administrative and a few were residential. All of them once hummed with the life of tens of thousands of Mayans, replaced in modern days by an equal number of tourists. The Temple of a Thousand Pillars The tour around the area, filled with archaeological information, was mesmerising. The first and foremost relic, the El Castillo Pyramid, was apparently a temple for ...

This  campesino  farmer style was very common I came to Merida mainly to see events relating to the Day of the Dead, and I planned to stay for a week. Unfortunately, this town was not a good place to hang out for that long. Apart from a few quaint colonial streets and the festivities, it is little more than another medium-size town. I also got food poisoning for only the second time this trip which was a bummer. That said, the Dia de Muertos festivities did not disappoint. I took a bus from Cancun on October 27th with some friends having heard that there would be a parade on in the town that evening. This turned out to be the Paseo de Animas, the Passage of the Souls, where the townsfolk walk from a small plaza to the main graveyard in the south of the old city. The most glamourous death masks of the night from the local drag scene When the night fell, we realised that this wasn't an organised parade but a mass of ordinary townsfolk walking down the street in ce...

What do you think of when you hear Cancun? Spring Break, outrageous hotels, big clubs and 5 figure holiday packages? It sounds like fun, but it doesnt sound like a good spot to be a backpacker. I only flew here because it was cheaper than Mexico City and I only expected to spend a night here before bugging out. What I ended up discovering was another side of Cancun, separate from the tourist catered beach strip, which lured me in for close to a week. Playa Delfines - the hotels in the background are spectacular at night To say that there are two very different Cancuns is an understatement. Next to the beach is Tourist Cancun. My ride from the airport took me past the hotel strip first where each building competed to be more fantastically lit than the next in the sticky Caribbean night. I was in a van that dropped a few people off in front of hotels where valets whisked the bags and clients through glass doors to fresh air con. This part of Cancun is its own world, a self-...