If you are staying along the Riviera Maya in México such as in Playa del Carmen or Tulum, the ruins of Coba are nearby and easily accessible. While other Mayan sites such as Chichen Itza and Tulum are certainly worth visiting, unlike those places the ruins of Coba are not nearly as crowded.
Set in the jungle, the ruins of Coba have a different feeling compared to the other sites. Here, the ruins have only been partially excavated and restored giving Coba the feeling of discovery. Coba means ‘waters stirred by the wind’ or ‘ruffled waters’ as the Mayan city is located on two lagoons; the Coba Lagoon, which can be seen as you drive up to the ruins entrance and Macamxoc Lagoon, which we were unable to see as the jungle hid it. These two lagoons were the key to the success of Coba as they provided water for irrigation and agriculture and surrounding villages.
The largest pyramid at Coba is called Ixmoja, part of the Nohoch Mul group of buildings. The pyramid is 42 meters (138 feet) tall and was the heart of the city.
At its height from 600 AD to 900 AD, it is estimated that Coba had an astounding 50,000 residents. Coba traded extensively with other Mayan areas as far away as Honduras. There is evidence that they borrowed architectural ideas from as far away as the Aztec site of Teotihuacan in Central México. Sometime around 900 or 1000 AD, Coba began a lengthy power struggle with Chichén Itzá. In the end, Chichen Itza won in this dispute and became the Yucatan’s power.
We were fortunate to be greeted by a beautiful Ocellated Turkey. The turkey was not shy despite all the tourists surrounding it taking pictures.
In addition to the ruins, I was fascinated by the flora. There were all sorts of bromeliads growing in the trees, especially tillandsias.
Your’s truly holding a fallen bromeliad.
We went on a tour, which was the easiest way to get there and I would recommend doing it. My only complaint would be that I would have liked to have more time to explore the area. Coba is definitely worth visiting!
I finally got up the courage (with Covid still causing problems) to fly out of the country for a vacation just before Christmas. Having been to the Riviera Maya on México’s Yucatan coast, we thought it would be a relatively easy trip. We were wrong.
I haven’t traveled around the Christmas holiday in years. The big mistake was thinking it wouldn’t be busy if we traveled before the Christmas-New Year week. We flew from Albuquerque to Houston to Cancun. Another mistake I made was not checking the flight schedule. We had about ½ an hour to make our connection. Of course, we had to travel from one terminal to another to make matters worse. We ran through the airport and just made it in time. Lesson learned. I’ll never do that again!
We arrived in Cancun only to find hundreds, if not thousands, of people trying to make it through immigration. Because the lines were longer than the entry area that was roped off, people were just trying to find a way in including us. After a few hours, we finally made it through and out of the airport. After a couple of hours on the highway, we made it to our destination, the Grand Sirenis Riviera Maya resort.
We arrived tired and hungry as we had very little to eat during the day only to find out that the only restaurant available to us was the buffet, which didn’t open until 6:30 PM. Needless to say, when we finally got to the buffet, we ate our fill!
Breakfast at the buffet
The resort grounds are beautiful and the pools are very nice. We especially enjoyed the lazy river pool, which is like a stream that winds through and around some jungle vegetation as well as some other parts of the resort. The other pool we liked was called the relaxing pool because it was basically a quiet pool surrounded by vegetation. It had a wonderful juice bar close by where we enjoyed getting very healthy smoothies.
One of the hotel complexes and one of the pools
Our favorite swimming place; however, was definitely the beach. The reason I chose Grand Sirenis Riviera Maya in the first place was the access to a private cove in the Caribbean Sea and the snorkeling right off the beach. We were glad we took our own snorkels for a couple of reasons. For one, snorkeling equipment is available at the resort but you can only use them for an hour at a time. Two, we had full-face covering snorkels, which made breathing easier and they didn’t leak due to the tight seal of the mask. The cove is quite nice with rock outcrops in the water that attracts a wider variety of fish. While I don’t know most of them, I am able to identify some of them: Sergeant Majors, Blue Tang, and Butterfly Fish. This was indeed, my favorite thing about the resort. The staff is out raking up the seagrass that washes in each morning and they keep the beach area clean. In fact, the whole resort is very well maintained.
The Caribean Coast at the Resort Snorkeling around the rocks in the cove was very rewarding with lots of colorful fishThere is a large stretch of beach on the resort grounds away from the crowds that is practically unknown
The resort has kept large patches of native vegetation in various areas of the resort. The hotel rooms encircle small ones of the jungle. What was fun about that was seeing chachalacas and other birds, agoutis, coatis, and rock iguanas in these and other places in the resort. It seemed iguanas were everywhere.
One of the resort paths through the jungle vegetationThe jungle vegetation is very pretty and interesting
Rock Iguanas were everywhere at the resort
As far as a beach vacation is concerned the resort was very good for that. Unfortunately, the resort is not the best when it comes to food. The buffets were extensive, but the food was not kept up to health standards as far as I can tell as it wasn’t hot when it was supposed to be. The resort advertises a variety of restaurants, but access is limited to them all. We got there only to find that they were all booked during our stay except at 9:00 PM for two of them. So we grudgingly booked late-night meals at the Mediterranean and Thai restaurants. They also have Japanese, Mexican, and French restaurants. You only get to choose two a week though. The other nights you must eat at one of the buffets. This was a real disappointment but even more disappointing was the food itself, good but not great. It looks good though, lol.
There are various bars around the resort. They had live entertainment at the Sky Bar above the restaurants, which was fun. The other bars are around the beach including one next to the beach with a small restaurant next to it. They had hamburgers, tacos, hotdogs, and a variety of snack and lunch foods. It was actually pretty good.
The entertainment and activities were pretty lame. The shows consisted of lip-syncing and dancing to music. The circus was the best with contortionists and acrobats. We didn’t find many organized activities for adults and information about these and the resort, in general, was very difficult to find.
A five-star resort shouldn’t have mediocre food and they definitely need to do something about the reservations and restaurant availability; however, we still had a fun vacation thanks to the pools and the beach.
If you travel outside of the country as we did, be sure to have all your vaccinations against Covid, especially for returning to the US. You need to get tested on the day before you leave to return home.
While we were in México, we visited the Mayan ruins of Coba. It was a highlight of the trip. I’ll be posting about it soon. In the meantime, stay safe and happy travels.
Ted’s Universe: Travel, Art, Nature 