I booked the dolphin interactive swim the night before after much hagging with "The dolphin man". It was a bit difficult to get up relatively early 9 am, as I had to be at the Aquarium for something like 10:30 and it's a good 45 minutes on the bus to get to where I needed to go in hotel zone. I jumped onto the R1 bus, this time a lot more confident then last, with my map and got off at Kukuclan Plaza, the place the tour guy had pointed at on the map.
I walked around this modern/western style plaza and could not find this 'dolphin aquarium'. I asked a couple of people and all they could tell me was that there was no aquarium there. So I found a seat to gather my thoughts, and figure it out, but time was getting on. Then I remembered that I had seen an aquarium at the outdoor/marina mall I had been to a couple of days prior so I decided to start walking there and give it a shot. Sure enough by the time I got there on foot, this was the place except I had missed my swim section by half an hour. I managed to get booked in for the next one, but I had time to kill so I went and had some lunch/breakfast by the marina, it was great. Then I made my way back to the aquarium and watched some people do the more in depth swim with the dolphins which I opted out of because I was being cheap and well I didn't know what to expect. I was the only one my age in the group the others were kids and an older family with a baby. We were given all the rules in childlike detail and sent off. The trainer we had seemed a bit sharp at first, but once it came down to doing the interactive swim, he was great. I felt bad for the Dolphins being stuck doing this, but it looked like they were enjoying except for the points where they had to be still (like for the kissing picture etc).
I have to to say the facilities at the aquarium are great, very modern, I was impressed. Another goal checked off my list.
Next up was Isla Mujeres, I was going to book a tour, but then I decided to save some money and just take the ferry down and do my own thing. I got on the bus, with my map of hotel zone and this time I knew exactly where to get off. I bought my ferry ticket, and waited at the bar until the time came up. It didn't take long to notice I was the only one going on this ferry! I guess nobody needed to go at this time in the afternoon. It was great though because I had a nice conversation with the ferry workers and the captain.When I got to the island, I just set off on foot, I knew it wasn't going to be that big. I went to the back part which was great because there was no one around. I was struck by how colorful and photogenic the island was. It was hard to stop taking pictures of everything around me. After the little photoshoot I wandered around the small streets and shops and walked from one end to another, then I went to relax on the front beach.
I still had about 30 minutes or so till my ferry so I decided to get a beer at the bar, to which I noticed for the first time how the locals put salt and pepper in their Sol beer. During the line up for the ferry I was 'accosted' by this older American lady who was very drunk. She was a nice drunk though, just complimenting me so it was okay, but this drunk interaction went on for a long time as the ferries were running late and it was freezing cold and windy. I did recognize one of the workers from where I took the ferry originally in Cancun, we exchanged smiles and a light hug. That was the beginning of people remembering me in Cancun.
Once I got back to the hostel it didn't take much convincing to get me to go out. I was hearing so many crazy stories about Cancun already. I had dinner at the hostel which included some craziness with an older Canadian hippie married couple that made it a point to buy everyone alcohol and cigarettes and hit on the younger ones.
So "City club" was our destination, just looking at the place from the outside I knew it was going to be madness. Somehow I ended up being the only girl with about 5 or 6 other Brits.
Quite a bit of craziness ensued that night, I lost my jacket, one of the guys got kicked out, another got caught pissing outside and had to pay 400 pesos to get out of it, bikini contests, hookups, breakups, crazy table service with entire bottles of vodka! I couldn't handle it anymore I ended up leaving on my own and getting back to the hostel at around 5 am.
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