2026 Merida

 Our flight home was in the afternoon so we had another delicious leisurely breakfast, then packed and checked out of the room at 11. We left the luggage at the hotel and continued our exploration of Merida. We walked along Calle 53 to the English Language Library. Phil told us about it because he goes there regularly for English/Spanish conversations, lectures and other events. Unfortunately, the library was closed because it was national holiday. Many stores and other places were closed too. We walked around Centro Historico some more, and then back to the hotel on Calle 55. We took an Uber to the airport, which was very quick because there was no traffic. Both our flights were on time, but we had a strange experience in Dallas. We had to go from Terminal E to terminal A so we had to take the airport train. We got on the train in the direction of terminal A (3 stops), but at the first stop there was an announcement that the train won’t go any further and  everybody has to ge...

  Day Seven 2/1/26 (Sunday) Merida and Progreso   After another spectacular breakfast, we walked to Parque Santiago and explored a small outdoor market (mostly Chinese junk) and the real indoor market, which has lots of food stalls and also fruit and vegetable stands. It was absolutely full of people eating, drinking and socializing. Then we walked along Calle 57 looking at the myriad of colonial houses in different colors and conditions, stopped at an art gallery (Cirque) and some little stores.   At 1 pm we met Carolina, Bo’s online Spanish teacher, at the restaurant Chaya Maya Casona. The restaurant serves Yucatecan food and is very popular and very big. Phil was running late, but eventually joined us. We ate and talked…. And when we were done, Carolina gave us a lift to Noa’s house in her lovely brand new Toyota SUV. She lives not far from Noa, in an adjacent suburb.   We took the car and decided to drive to the coast to the port/beach town of Progreso. A...

We had a lazy morning. – coffee in bed, shower, amazing breakfast in the hotel. Then we decided to explore the neighborhood of Garcia Gineres and Avenida Colon. García Ginerés is one of Mérida’s oldest neighborhoods outside the downtown core. W e started from Parque de las Americas, famous for its Deco Maya fountain, amphitheater, Jose Martí library, and Children’s park. We also saw the Fatima Church in art deco style with beautiful stained glass windows. Then we walked down Avenida Colon admiring the grands casonas (most from the 1920s), some beautifully renovated, some being renovated and a few still in the state of decay. When we got tired of walking, we took an Uber to Plaza Grande   and started looking for a place for lunch nearby. On the little map the hotel gave us, we found a fish restaurant called El Marlin Azul and decided to go there. We almost missed it because it turned out to be a hole-in-the-wall tiny place and it was full of people, all Spanish-speaking. W e man...

We slept well in our sparse casita in spite of the noisy peacock and dogs. Al brought us coffee from the kitchen at 7:30am and we went for a walk to explore the neighborhood. Then breakfast at 8 am, another walk in the opposite direction, and meeting in the lab at 9. Tomas showed us how they document items found in the field, clean and catalog them and store them. Then we drove to the town of Mani to visit the town, its old church and the site of the auto-da-fe, which happened in July of 1562 ordered by a Spanish Franciscan monk Diego de Landa in which many Mayan cultural objects, including 27 codices were destroyed and 69 Mayans were killed ( https://theyucatantimes.com/2025/01/the-auto-de-fe-of-mani-yucatan-1562-a-dark-chapter-of-colonial-history/ )   Mani is a lovely town designated as Pueblo Magico. We walled around visiting embroidery shops and one female dog kept following us all the time. We had no food to give her so we bought something at a grocery store for her. I ...

 We got an early start (6:30 am), checked out of the hacienda and took an Uber to Noa’s house to pick up Phil and Chenda (Noa’s husband), then stop at the Diplomat hotel to leave our suitcases, and then go to Parque Santa Ana  - the 8:30 am meeting place for the start of our Mayan Archaeology tour. I didn’t know how to order an Uber with two stops so negotiated an off-Uber ride with the Uber driver. We had a hard time finding Noa’s place because the address is somewhat imprecise, but the rest went fairly smoothly and we arrived at Parque Santa Ana at 8:15 am and decided to grab a quick breakfast and watch the meeting place from the restaurant. Bob (the organizer) told us there would be 10-12 people on the tour, but when he arrived at 8:30, he said it would just be the 4 of us because other people didn’t make it because of the snowstorm. And he was not going with us…. We got an SUV and a driver/guide called Arjel and off we went… 2.5 hours later we arrived at a closed gate in t...

  We decided that instead having breakfast at the hacienda, we’ll walk to the supermarket again and have some street food along the way. On the way there we spotted a stand with empanadas that seemed to be popular, and then another one with tortas (sandwiches). We tried both on the way back, but also bought yogurt, granola and banana at the market just in case. The empanadas were nothing to rave about They were made from tamale masa and stuffed with meat, with some red sauce on top. The sandwich wasn’t great either. Then Phil picked us up and we drove to Mundo Maya https://yucatanmagazine.com/museum-maya-world/ . The building itself is very impressive and so is the content of the museum. When we were visiting the second part of the museum – devoted to traditional crafts,   we spotted a young woman who was wearing a very unusual blouse, which looked ethnic and modern at the same time. Phil approached her and commented on her clothes and we started talking. It turned out th...

  We had breakfast at the hacienda restaurant, on their outdoor patio. The patio was pretty full with a mix of English- and Spanish-speaking people, couples and families with children. Then we walked around the large, park-like grounds to look at other areas. They have 3 pools, a gym, a spa with yoga/meditation terrace, and nature walking trails with beautiful vegetation. Then, we decided to explore the neighborhood beyond the hacienda walls so we walked through the village to the local supermarket to buy necessary supplies (i.e., wine). We saw many small mom and pop eating establishments on the way, and also many cats and dogs. Phil picked us up around noon to go to the relatively new and modern museum of the Mayan culture – Mundo Maya. Near there, in the Costco parking lot there is a cenote that they discovered when they were building the Costco store. Now it is fenced and protected and you can look at it … so we did. Once we got to the museum, we found out that it was closed...

  Both United flights were good and on time. When we arrived in Merida, we had to go through Mexican immigration and customs . The immigration was very quick, but customs line was surprisingly long and slow. It looked like they were checking many people. Our friend Phil picked us up in a car and we started driving north towards the village/suburb called Xcanatun where we were going to stay for the first 3 nights at Hacienda Xcanatun. We had some difficulty finding the place in the dark driving along narrow streets without any signs or lights, but finally we got there. Even in the dark, the building and grounds were beautiful and impressive. Our room was in the original hacienda main house, and it had a patio facing the garden. We had a light dinner in the hacienda restaurant and called it a night.

    We have to start with the day preceding travel day. It was very stressful. The biggest snow storm in years affected many airports and for the past 3 days, airlines were cancelling 12,000-14,000 flights each day. Dallas airport was one of the most, if not the most, affected. Our flight to Merida was scheduled via Dallas so we        were very relieved when in the morning we got notification from American Airlines that we can check—in for our flights. Our joy didn’t last long – about noon, we were notified that our flights got cancelled and they are working on rebooking us. We decided not to wait for their rebooking and try to rebook ourselves with another airline. WE got very lucky and managed to rebook on United via Houston, which was not as badly affected by the storm. The departure time was just an hour later that our original flight, and we arrived in Merida at 7 pm instead of 3:30 pm. Good enough. A few hours later, we got an email fro...