One photo was by my ex husband. One of the bird is a stock photo. The third a friend took. I have photos taken of me underwater and I will use them as they can help tell a story.
Now, I've done some outlandish things in my travels, but this, this takes one serious part of curiosity and a second much larger dose of courage. Diving in a cave? I'd rather ride a wave and wipeout on a reef than get lost in a dark, cold underwater nowhere land!
Color me wicked impressed! And slightly cowardly too. I ain't afraid to admit that.
Plus, the largest underwater stalactite in the world, dayum!
A tale most excellent in the retelling. Most assuredly so.
On days we were bored, we go to little tight places where you had to take all your gear off and push it through the restriction then put it all on again on the other side. For fun.
Excuse my French, but fucking no way. Not ever. No how.
Stuff like that be freaking me out. Here in the Hill country, we have a lot of artesian-well fed creeks and rivers. Lot of limestone erosional caves to be found in creeks and rivers from Uvalde on the Nueces to Leakey on the Frio, Utopia on the Sabinal, Bandera on the Medina, Kerrville on the Guadalupe and up to the Blanco in Wimberly, all present underwater caves and I was taught very early on that caves we a NO GO zone. It was one of those rare absolute prohibitions I was presented with growing up—running wild and feral as I did most days. So I tended to pay attention when absolutes were handed down from on high. Over the course of my life I reckon I've read or watched media accounts of at least 200 people that died fucking around in underwater caves, what got stuck and could not be saved. The big round hole ‘bout where Wimberly—hell if I can remember the name, Hamilton Pool. maybe?—just killed someone just last year. No thankee!
So I internalized the prohibition of my youth and changed it moving forward into a best practice.
Tight spaces underwater?
Nope.
But I applaud your audacity, genuinely. That’s serious business, requiring a stout heart. Says much about you. Very much. Takes tenacity to do such, as I see it. Tenacity being right and proper.
Wow, Kay! What a great experience! And a great story! I remember those days if the Riviera Maya... except we didn't stop at cenotes to dive, only to swim and snorkel, but I remember the small hand-painted signs, locals with a cenote on their land trying to make a buck... But to be the first cave diver in an unknown cenote/cave. Pretty amazing!!!
Once again, brilliant Kay! I remember that sign! It wasn't until out second stay through LG that we were brave enough to go off 307 to Actun Chen, their sign wasn't as shady looking. We walked the caverns, marveled at the sights, was impressed at the makeshift lighting they installed and was stopped by 'their' photographer to get a photo of us with a huge snake around our shoulders.
Mark writes of the 'Cancun-Tulum' corridor. That first drive down when you booked us in Playa Caribe, was in the dark. The stories we could tell about that drive! They just started pouring parts of 307 with concrete. 4-6 in drops on and off, on the dark! The only sign we were looking for was a big one you said, that said Akamal, but be careful, there is only one hanging light bulb over it!
I loved this, Kay, because it so reminds me of the country I also call home. The hand-painted sign, ten pesos, a Coca-Cola, and the willingness to stop the truck….brilliant.
Exploration is just having enough intention to know what you’re looking for, along with enough openness to abandon the plan when something interesting appears at the edge of it.
Sending the magazines to your parents as proof you weren’t wasting your life made me smile. We spend so much of our younger years trying to justify the paths that only make sense once we’ve lived them long enough.
Thank you Ruben. This Mexico is gone in much of Quintana Roo. Of course bound to have happened. My experiences and memories are priceless which is I part of the reason I am writing these short stories. It was not so long ago. Life was simple and raw. I felt a connection, respect and gratitude for being accepted with everyone I met.
What a wonderful adventure Kay! You were so brave to do these dives, but the beauty must have been overwhelming at times. I love the light. Thank you for sharing these experiences.
I first went to the Riviera Maya back in 1990. We still called it the "Cancun-Tulum Corridor" back then, before the big developers moved in and created the Riviera Maya marketing scheme 10 years later. I stayed at Capitan Lafitte, now called Petite Lafitte, I think, and it was the most laid-back place you ever saw. For some reason, I even stood once at the outdoor palapa bar there in my boxer shorts (possibly because I couldn't find my pants) and got into an argument in Spanish about economics with the bartender. Which was interesting because I barely speak Spanish and know nothing about economics. I don't think the current groovy version of the resort would let you order drinks in your boxers. And then there were the two Austrian nurses that I took for a ride into the jungle in my rented Jeep only to find, during an intense tropical downpour at about four in the afternoon, that the "convertible" roof didn't actually close, so we stopped in a bodega on a dirt road to get out of the rain, bought some beers, and danced among the rice sacks and crates of canned goods to mariachi music from the clerk's transistor radio. You bring back such wonderful memories of a time gone by. A time we will never see again. (Jeez, I could probably get a Substack column out of this!!)
Oh I loved Capitan Lafite, and I worked with them as Petit Lafite. Did you ever go to Kailuum? Yes you could get a Substack column from your experience. I used to radio up to Kailuum just north of Capitan Lafite, for dinner reservations. They were a glamping place before glamping was a "thing." No phones then, only marine radios. Once they knew we would show up, we often made reservations for a family style dinner, and an honor bar. There definitely is a book there as a complication of your stories, mine and more, of a time, not so long ago, that was pure, raw, and not something that could be captured by "influencers" that would do it justice.
Oh thankfully so. However you probably could have shown up in your skivvies. Tales from the tropics exist about those owners. I knew them. He had found a square grouper did time in Chetumal. But money bought him a meager hotel room, maid and a cook. So I heard.
Great stuff as usual. I’ll bet you’ve got lots more tales tucked away!
More tales to follow of course!
The photos are incredible! Are they taken by you or your team a the actual dives?
One photo was by my ex husband. One of the bird is a stock photo. The third a friend took. I have photos taken of me underwater and I will use them as they can help tell a story.
Enjoyed this. Really interesting. I need to know what happened to Harry now though. 😥
Oh Harry?! You won’t believe it @Martyn Stanley i look forward to your thoughts.
https://kaywalten.substack.com/p/riviera-maya-my-dead-friend-harry
aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhh sounds wonderful.
Now, I've done some outlandish things in my travels, but this, this takes one serious part of curiosity and a second much larger dose of courage. Diving in a cave? I'd rather ride a wave and wipeout on a reef than get lost in a dark, cold underwater nowhere land!
Color me wicked impressed! And slightly cowardly too. I ain't afraid to admit that.
Plus, the largest underwater stalactite in the world, dayum!
A tale most excellent in the retelling. Most assuredly so.
Craft question. Is there anything you would have liked to have read in this piece? Aside from perhaps a sanity test.
Let me re-read and ponder a while, so I can give you the assessment you’re looking for, deal?
I reckon by close of buisness today, I’ll have something for you.
No rush at all, totally at your convenience and desire.
I found the deepest one too, +400’. But that’s a story for another time.
My inner claustrophobe is already wigging out.
This was not a tight spot but silty
Awww, hell no.
Like, unh-uh!
Cool pick, though!
On days we were bored, we go to little tight places where you had to take all your gear off and push it through the restriction then put it all on again on the other side. For fun.
These typos are going to be the death of me.
Excuse my French, but fucking no way. Not ever. No how.
Stuff like that be freaking me out. Here in the Hill country, we have a lot of artesian-well fed creeks and rivers. Lot of limestone erosional caves to be found in creeks and rivers from Uvalde on the Nueces to Leakey on the Frio, Utopia on the Sabinal, Bandera on the Medina, Kerrville on the Guadalupe and up to the Blanco in Wimberly, all present underwater caves and I was taught very early on that caves we a NO GO zone. It was one of those rare absolute prohibitions I was presented with growing up—running wild and feral as I did most days. So I tended to pay attention when absolutes were handed down from on high. Over the course of my life I reckon I've read or watched media accounts of at least 200 people that died fucking around in underwater caves, what got stuck and could not be saved. The big round hole ‘bout where Wimberly—hell if I can remember the name, Hamilton Pool. maybe?—just killed someone just last year. No thankee!
So I internalized the prohibition of my youth and changed it moving forward into a best practice.
Tight spaces underwater?
Nope.
But I applaud your audacity, genuinely. That’s serious business, requiring a stout heart. Says much about you. Very much. Takes tenacity to do such, as I see it. Tenacity being right and proper.
Wow, Kay! What a great experience! And a great story! I remember those days if the Riviera Maya... except we didn't stop at cenotes to dive, only to swim and snorkel, but I remember the small hand-painted signs, locals with a cenote on their land trying to make a buck... But to be the first cave diver in an unknown cenote/cave. Pretty amazing!!!
I have been fortunate to be the first on several occasions. It is truly some of the best and cherished times of my life.
Once again, brilliant Kay! I remember that sign! It wasn't until out second stay through LG that we were brave enough to go off 307 to Actun Chen, their sign wasn't as shady looking. We walked the caverns, marveled at the sights, was impressed at the makeshift lighting they installed and was stopped by 'their' photographer to get a photo of us with a huge snake around our shoulders.
Mark writes of the 'Cancun-Tulum' corridor. That first drive down when you booked us in Playa Caribe, was in the dark. The stories we could tell about that drive! They just started pouring parts of 307 with concrete. 4-6 in drops on and off, on the dark! The only sign we were looking for was a big one you said, that said Akamal, but be careful, there is only one hanging light bulb over it!
Such cherished times, and adventures.
I loved this, Kay, because it so reminds me of the country I also call home. The hand-painted sign, ten pesos, a Coca-Cola, and the willingness to stop the truck….brilliant.
Exploration is just having enough intention to know what you’re looking for, along with enough openness to abandon the plan when something interesting appears at the edge of it.
Sending the magazines to your parents as proof you weren’t wasting your life made me smile. We spend so much of our younger years trying to justify the paths that only make sense once we’ve lived them long enough.
Sometimes the detour becomes the biography.
Thank you Ruben. This Mexico is gone in much of Quintana Roo. Of course bound to have happened. My experiences and memories are priceless which is I part of the reason I am writing these short stories. It was not so long ago. Life was simple and raw. I felt a connection, respect and gratitude for being accepted with everyone I met.
Ruben I sent you a dm
Love it, Kay. And that photo! And Dive Girl cover, girrrrrrrrl!!!!! How great. And you saw a Motmot right there, too. Great story. Loved it.
Ah thank you, you are so sweet. Yeah Dive Girl I have to laugh that I was on the cover.
I think it’s great!
I have a copy in storage somewhere. It was a British publication. One of the articles in that edition was “How To Wee At Sea” 🤣
Oh man, very funny.
What a wonderful adventure Kay! You were so brave to do these dives, but the beauty must have been overwhelming at times. I love the light. Thank you for sharing these experiences.
Spanglish has given us some amazing experiences too. ☺
Spanglish can work, luckily my Spanish improved over the years.
Gin-clear! I love it.
Thank you!
I first went to the Riviera Maya back in 1990. We still called it the "Cancun-Tulum Corridor" back then, before the big developers moved in and created the Riviera Maya marketing scheme 10 years later. I stayed at Capitan Lafitte, now called Petite Lafitte, I think, and it was the most laid-back place you ever saw. For some reason, I even stood once at the outdoor palapa bar there in my boxer shorts (possibly because I couldn't find my pants) and got into an argument in Spanish about economics with the bartender. Which was interesting because I barely speak Spanish and know nothing about economics. I don't think the current groovy version of the resort would let you order drinks in your boxers. And then there were the two Austrian nurses that I took for a ride into the jungle in my rented Jeep only to find, during an intense tropical downpour at about four in the afternoon, that the "convertible" roof didn't actually close, so we stopped in a bodega on a dirt road to get out of the rain, bought some beers, and danced among the rice sacks and crates of canned goods to mariachi music from the clerk's transistor radio. You bring back such wonderful memories of a time gone by. A time we will never see again. (Jeez, I could probably get a Substack column out of this!!)
Oh I loved Capitan Lafite, and I worked with them as Petit Lafite. Did you ever go to Kailuum? Yes you could get a Substack column from your experience. I used to radio up to Kailuum just north of Capitan Lafite, for dinner reservations. They were a glamping place before glamping was a "thing." No phones then, only marine radios. Once they knew we would show up, we often made reservations for a family style dinner, and an honor bar. There definitely is a book there as a complication of your stories, mine and more, of a time, not so long ago, that was pure, raw, and not something that could be captured by "influencers" that would do it justice.
Yes, ate at Kailuum, didn't stay there. I remained fully dressed, as I recall.
Oh thankfully so. However you probably could have shown up in your skivvies. Tales from the tropics exist about those owners. I knew them. He had found a square grouper did time in Chetumal. But money bought him a meager hotel room, maid and a cook. So I heard.
How exciting. I can picture the scene.
Thank you.