Today is another installment of the weekly online/social media travel round table called Travelers Night In (TNI) during which travelers from around the world share, discuss and debate one  travel topic. This week’s topic is Animal Encounters and that got us thinking.

We haven’t visited Africa or done a safari there (yet), but we have had some amazing animal encounters in other parts of the world. In Borneo we were essentially held captive by the frighteningly dexterous hands and feet of a young orangutan. In India we were within feet of endangered Asiatic lions and tigers and even a leopard which played a  kind of hide-and-seek game with us (it won).

In November we’re going to get the chance to hang with penguins when we explore Antarctica with Antarctic Dream. Why not take advantage of  our exclusive 30% savings to Antarctica and join us on the November 7-17 sailing, by the way?

Our ongoing Trans-Americas Journey has also given us some amazing animal encounters and here are a few of the highlights:

A herd of buffalo literally roamed our campground in Badlands National Park.

See more in our Badlands National Park photo gallery. Read more in our Badlands National Park  travel journal.

A black bear and her cub explored some downed trees just off a road through Yellowstone National Park.

See more in our Yellowstone National Park photo gallery. Read more in our Yellowstone National Park travel journal.

This young wolf seemd as curious about us as we were about it when our paths crossed on the Gunflint Trail in Minnesota.

See more in our Minnesota’s North Shore photo gallery. Read more in our Minnesota’s North Shore travel journals part 1 and part 2.

A moose and her calf appeared around a bend during a hike in Grand Teton National Park.

See more in our Grand Teton National Park photo gallery.

A female grizzly and her cub let us watch them feasting on blueberries in Denali National park for almost an hour.

See more in our Denali National Park photo galleries – part 1, part 2, and part 3. Read more in our Denali National Park travel journals part 1, part 2 and part 3.

Muskox roam the tundra on the North Slope in Alaska where we spotted them from a helcopter.

See more in our Deadhorse, Alaska photo gallery. Read more in our Deadhorse, Alaska travel journal.

This arctic fox already had its winter white coat on so it was easy to spot in the tundra in the North Slope of Alaska.

See more in our Dalton Highway photo gallery. Read more in our Dalton Highway travel journals part 1 and part 2.

Gray whales put on an impressive show for us in Baja.

Gray whales, including this baby, put on an impressive show for us in Baja.

We wandered amongst millions of migrating monarch butterflies near Valle de Bravo in Mexico.

See more in our monarch butterfly migration post.

Crocodiles of all sizes lazed near our boat as we traveled to La Tovara Springs in San Blas, Nayarit, Mexico.

See more in our San Blas, Nayarit Mexico post.

Mara the sea lion shared her fish breath with us in the warm waters off Puerto Vallarta.

See more in our Sea Lion Kisses post.

Thousands of flamingos went about their strange pink business as we floated through the Ria Lagartos Biosphere Reserve in Yucatan State, Mexico.

We failed to find the whale sharks in Belize but a pod of bottlenose dolphins found us.

See more in our Belize Whale Sharks post.

This spider monkey was just hanging out near Chan Chich Lodge in Gallon Jug, Belize.

See more in our Belize Jungle Surprises post.

A keel-billed toucan stayed put long enough for us to capture its impossible beak at La Milpa Field Station in Belize.

See more in our Belize Jungle Surprises post.

We tried our best to see a jaguar in the wild, but the closest we've come so far is this beauty in the Belize Zoo.

See more in our Belize Zoo post.

A clan of howler monkeys befriended us while we camped at Las Guacamayas in Chiapas.

Wild scarlet macaws gorged themselves in a tree above our tent at Las Guacamayas in Chiapas.

It’s true. Mexico’s Riviera Maya on the Yucatan Peninsula is full of white sand beaches and true blue Caribbean water. But the jungle in the area is also dotted with an unknown number of cenotes which offer gorgeous ways to get wet and cool off without waves, sand or salt. 

Cenotes are basically sinkholes. In the Yucatán Peninsula they’re usually caves that have become flooded causing the roof to collapse which often exposes an almost perfectly circular opening to the sky above giving people and animals easy access to the water below. 

The water level of some cenotes is at ground level,while others, like this one, require a climb down to reach their refreshing freshwater pools.

And what water! Cenotes aren’t just filled with fresh water, they’re filled with rain water that’s filtered through the surrounding limestone. The result is water so clear it seems impossible. Yes, you can see clearly all the way to the bottom of a cenote (except for the ones that are 500 feet deep), but you can also see anything swimming in the water (people, fish, turtles) with amazing (and kinda spooky) clarity. 

No wonder the Mayans consider cenotes sacred. 

We consider cenotes a great way to cool off and we jumped into them as often as possible. Drive any road in the Yucatán Peninsula and you’re likely to see hand painted signs with the names of cenotes on them along with a crude arrow pointing the way to it. For a few pesos the property owner will allow you take a swim. Some cenotes have been built up with ladders and snorkeling gear rental and others have been left pretty much the way they were found. They’re all refreshing and gorgeous. 

Check out our underwater video pieced together from a number of great dips in various cenotes, caverns and underwater rivers. 

We even went SCUBA diving in the  Dos Ojos (two eyes) Cenote with Hidden Worlds Cenotes Park.  Because cenotes are not fully enclosed like intact caves, cenote diving is considered less extreme and less dangerous than cave diving. We’re here to tell you that’s it’s still one wild experience whatever you call it. 

As we’ve said, the water in a cenote is hyper-clear–so clear that when you’re SCUBA diving in it it sometimes looks like air, not water. It’s also very dark once you swim back into the chambers of a cenote, past the point where the collapsed roof lets in light. And a little claustrophobic. 

And then there are the areas where sea water is seeping into the cenote and mixing with the freshwater, causing something called a halocline. Imagine swimming through absolutely perfectly clear water one second, then everything around you leaps out of focus in a swirl as if some unseen hand just smeared Vaseline all over your diving mask. Then, just as quickly as you entered the halocline, you swim out of it back into crystal clear water and the world, thankfully, jerks back into focus. It’s absolutely disorienting and kinda fun. 

Karen enjoying the Sky Cycle through the jungle at Hidden Worlds Cenotes Park.

Another way to play in cenotes is at the numerous adventure parks in the Yucatán Peninsula. We were impressed with the serious fun at Hidden Worlds Cenotes Park when we went diving with them in Dos Ojos. Then we learned that this park, one of the very first in the area, has not one but two rides found nowhere else in the world. 

That’s easy to do when your founder and current co-owner is not just a world-class cave diver/adrenaline lover but a pretty badass (self-taught) engineer as well. Gordon “Buddy” Quattlebaum’s first invention for his Hidden Worlds park is a thing called a Sky Cycle. It’s essentially a modified bike that runs along a robust wire like that used for zip lines. You sit on the seat and lean back, recumbent style, then pedal your way above and through the jungle. 

Eric's view from the seat of his Sky Cycle through the jungle at Hidden Worlds Cenotes Park.

Karen pedaling her Sky Cycle into a cave-like overhang at Hidden Worlds Cenotes Park.

The other ride that’s exclusive to Hidden Worlds is a creation Buddy calls the Avatar, claiming it’s the world’s first roller coaster zip line. Lucky (?) for us, Buddy was debuting the Avatar at  Hidden Worlds the day we were there and we got to take part in some “test rides.” 

Once harnessed in we were attached to the ride a standing position–just as if we were about to take a traditional zip line ride. Unlike traditional zip lines, however, the Avatar runs on a rigid rail like the ones that rollercoasters run on. This rigidity gave Buddy and his team the ability to bend and curve the rail incorporating steep drops, swift climbs, vertebrae-jarring hairpin turns and other features normally associated with a roller coaster. 

It’s a quick ride but a dramatic one and it culminates by dropping riders through a dark tunnel into the  mouth of a cenote where you descend at full speed through a winding, dark route for roughly 50 feet before splashing down into the water. 

Our slide shows, below, demonstrate just what the heck the Avatar is all about. The first one shows a random Hidden Worlds guest. The second slide show is of Karen who, by the way, hates roller coasters. Suffice to say it’s a good thing there’s no sound with this… 

This enormous multi-hued bad boy on display at Xel-Ha was definitely a supermodel among iguanas.

Occupying the other end of the Yucatán Peninsula nature park spectrum is Xel-Ha. Xel-Ha, and her sister parks Xcaret and Xplor, dominate the scene with relentless advertising–not unlike a Yucatan version of Disneyland. The approach works.  Xel-Ha alone averages 2,000 visitors (vs a  couple hundred at Hidden Worlds) every day. 

Luckily, Xel-Ha also has some impressive eco-initiatives in place to reduce the impact of all of those visitors. You will never be given a paper bag. Or a straw. Or a map. Or a plastic water or soda bottle at Xel-Ha. Map billboards dots the vast property, soda and water are dispensed from big machines in to bio-degradable recycled-paper cups and straws simply aren’t allowed. Or necessary. Still, the park generates 4,000 pounds of trash a day which is recycled or composted. 

A massive nursery on the park’s property grows a range of indigenous plants which are used to keep the park grounds lush and are also donated to area villages where park employees live. We were also happy to see a permanent policy of offering all residents of Quintana Roo 50% off admission to the park. 

The quality of the snorkeling gear for guest use was also surprisingly high. Ditto for the food. The only disappointment was the lack of fish in the water. We snorkeled and snorkeled in the cenote-fed waterways of Xel-Ha but failed to find much life at all. Still, we had a really relaxing day at Xel-Ha (the hammocks! the beer!) and we were glad that we’d been advised to come early. Between the buffet and the snorkeling and the bike trails and the inner tube float we were there from opening to closing. 

No matter which cenote you jump into skip the sunscreen and the insect repellent. Even the bio-degradable versions leave an ugly and toxic slick on the top of the water over time. 

Xel Ha, where a massive network of natural water features have been tamed just enough to let thousands of people a day enjoy them.

GLAD WE HAD
Our Crocs. Yes, they’re the ugliest shoes on earth. But they’re the perfect sturdy, non-slip, lightweight footwear for getting into and out of cenotes and for exploring the area’s watery adventure parks. 

The Mexican state of Jalisco claims to be the birthplace of a few pretty important cornerstones of Mexican culture including Mariachi music and tequila. A lesser known contribution, which can be traced back to Jalisco, is the charro or Mexican cowboy.

Charros and charreadas (Mexican rodeos, which we’ll take you to in an upcoming Lagos de Moreno post) pre-date cowboys and rodeos in the US. It’s true. The unique riding skills and equipment here in Mexico evolved in the 1500s after necessary amendments were made to the riding styles imported when the Spanish invaded (some of their techniques and gear proved a little too prissy for the cattle and the terrain the average charro faces).

Ready to ride in front of beautiful Hacienda Sepulveda.

Charro riding techniques and the western riding techniques that we’re taught in the US are similar in a lot of ways. However, there are differences and though they’re subtle, they’re important–as we quickly learned (sometimes the hard way) when we spent a few days horseback riding around Lagos de Moreno.

1. The horn on the saddle is enormous–think dessert plate. We’ll tell you why in an upcoming trip to the charreada.
2. It’s all in the legs–reining in Mexico is an exquisitely delicate affair. Some riders hold the specially-knotted and weighted reins simply by hooking one finger through them. Uusually the pinky. This was the biggest shift for us since we’re used to horses trained to neck rein fairly heavily.

The Camino Real snakes through the Lagos de Moreno area (and much of Mexico). Sections of this historic road still make great trails.

The terrain and trails we rode on were just as old and different as the reining. Cactus, stone walls, small fields, more cactus, some mesquite, a creek, then more desert. Sometimes we were actually riding on sections of the original Camino Real which was unexpectedly thrilling.

Karen parking her horse during a lunch stop at Hacienda La Labor.

Our destinations were steeped in history too. Each day we set off from either El Ahito, or Hacienda Sepulveda bound for a different hacienda where we met the occupants and enjoyed a long delicious home-cooked lunch and a tour of the generations-old houses. Some were elegant. Some were fortress like. Some had elaborate private chapels. Some were only half-inhabitable. Some contained a museum’s worth of charro history and accessories. All of them were fascinating.

Once we were even met on the trail by the hacienda owner on horseback bearing a bottle of tequila and glasses so we could all sip on a pre-lunch amuse-bouche as we rode the final distance to the hacienda. To call it civilized is an understatement.

The food and the entertainment were both excellent during lunch in the extremely European dining room at Hacienda La Labor.

This aint jump rope. After lunch, intricate traditional charro rope work is expertly demonstrated by the grandsons of Don Jesus (in the background), Mexican cattleman extraordinaire and owner of Hacienda La Labor.

Karen, always happiest on a horse.

Most days we were in the saddle for about six hours. However, one very long day (with a particularly languid lunch) turned into eight hours and we ended up riding back to Hacienda Sepulveda  in the dark.  And you thought the heavy elk-skin chaps (made by Lena Kissling) and stiff wide-brimmed hats were were wearing were just for show! Nope. Those were the only things between us and an invisible world of eye-gouging, skin-tearing thorns as we rode in the dark through a tightly-packed forest of cactus the size of trees. If this doesn’t teach you to trust your horse (and vice versa) we’re not sure what will.

Days in the saddle are sometimes long but we loved every minute and didn't mind when we returned well after dark one night. Though riding through a tightly-packed forest of cactus the size of trees in the dark was a new experience.

Riding through the signature scrub and cactus that cover the hills and mesas around Lagos de Moreno.

Now’s a good time to mention one additional important difference between the way we’re used to riding in the US and the way people ride in Mexico: spurs. Every rider wears them. We’ve never seen anyone in Mexico kick their horse but we have seen a lot of judicious use of gentle spurs to get big results. A pair of spurs might have helped Karen urge her horse out of a drinking hole before good old Cheese Face (forever more known as Shit Face) decided to lay down with her still on top furiously trying to send a meaningful message to the horse with her spur-less boots.

Karen looking a bit perturbed after her horse tried to roll her in a watering hole.

One of the horses enjoys a sunny rest while we enjoy lunch at Hacienda San Cayetano.