Puerto Morelos

16.01.20 09:20 PM By Putri

So, I am not a morning person. That said, I can be slow in the morning. And when I am in a vacation, I am no person at all. Somehow my body seems to stop functioning, like my organs and brain take their vacation too. I move infuriatingly slow. Nico’s the contrary, he’s like Dora the explorer on amphetamine minus the cringy bob hair. He always gets excited and ready for an adventure at 6 AM. I know he’s hyperventilating in order to hold himself from screaming LETS GOOOOO every time I start my complicated morning routine on slow motion. Lets say it takes us a day or two to synchronize our traveling pace.

It is safe to say that we were wise to make Puerto Morelos our starting point for our Yucatan road trip. This laidback beach town vibe matched with my holiday mood. 

The town is small enough that we could enjoy it on foot or bike so we parked our car at the hotel and started exploring on foot. 

The Christmas decor was put up nicely around the city center when we were there last December with two real-life size nativity sets at the downtown near the main church and one near the square. One thing I noticed; all the nativity sets in the city were missing its baby Jesus. Dun… Dun.. Dun… What’s happening? Was he kidnapped? Did he grow up and leave his crib? It sounded like a case for detectives to me. 


On our way to unfold the mystery of the missing baby Jesus, we discovered the city charms that started my mood for the vacation right up!

Our detectiving started at sunrise. Well, okay, I couldn't managed to wake up exactly at sunrise, so let's say it started at what's left of the sunrise. We stayed at Taffeit hotel with access right to the beach, strolling on this white sandy beach was amazing at any time of the day. The sand on this beach is so fine and the water is crystal blue, a typical Caribbean beach. 

The walk on this beach led to the famous landmark of Puerto Morelos; the leaning lighthouse, or what local knows as la Faro Inclinado. We even managed to capture the culprit behind this leaning tower in frame... Just kidding, it must be just another cheesy tourist blogger doing the cheesy stuff all the cheesy tourists do. Let's ignore her. 

The story behind this leaning light house was actually caused by force of nature in the sixties. That tiny lighthouse was swept by a hurricane and made it lean to the side.  The city then decided to keep it that way as a reminder of the hurricane and the emblem of the city. 

Not far from the lighthouse, there's the city's dock. This tiny dock is a hangout point for both humans and pelicans. Mostly pelicans...            

You can find boats that offer to take you to the Mesoamerican barrier reef A.K.A the Mayan Great Reef,  the second largest reef in the world. This Great Reef stretches along three countries and a big part of it lies right on the porch of the Yucatan peninsula. It’s only 10 minutes away by boat from this dock to snorkel or dive at this great reef. You can even snorkel from the shore. We did our snorkelling on the reef through a diving agent tho. And we were glad we did this because not all boats provide wetsuits and the water can be very cold. 

What I love so much about this city is that although it offers great water activities and awesome underwater life, there are no ‘spring break vibe’ nor all-inclusive-resort scenes. It’s totally a no-frill coastal town. Clean and casual, with a beautiful background of Mexican Caribbean beach. And it's totally NOT a sleepy city. As a small city, Puerto Morelos offers a great range of food and entertainment, from folksy food to European. Restaurants are lined up along the city center, and there is also a food truck area at the zona hoteleria that has a casual live music every weekend. As any other port city, Puerto Morelos is big on seafood, so go for the seafood! Yum!            

It's pelican, not pelican't !

After enjoying the city charms, we’re back to business; finding the missing baby Jesus. Apparently, in the Mexican tradition, the baby Jesus is only placed on its manger on Christmas day, which by history IS his birthday. So it’s only make sense to put the baby on the 25th of December, instead of like most people do (people means me): setting up the nativity scene with complete characters at the same time as putting up Christmas tree and decorations, as soon as Halloween is over. 

Putri