The Color, The Crocodile, and the Time Four Strangers Learned I’m a Natural Blonde
I remember the first time I landed in Mexico. It wasn’t the tacos. It wasn’t even the tequila.
It was the color.
That rust-red brick against a turquoise sky, white sand so bright it looks retouched, and a light unlike anywhere else I’ve stood. It’s the closest thing I’ve found to Santa Fe — except Mexico has its own light, its own pulse. You don’t really describe it. You just stop talking and stare at it for a minute.
That’s Tulum. That’s the Riviera Maya. And after more than a decade of going back, I have collected exactly the kind of stories you’d expect from someone who refuses to stay inside the resort gates.
The Golf Course Incident
Somewhere along one of my trips, nature called with zero warning and even less patience, and the nearest available cover was a half-built construction hut on the edge of a golf course. So I ducked in, skirt up, doing what a person does in that situation, thoroughly convinced I was alone.
I was not alone.
Four Mexican construction workers came around the corner at exactly the wrong moment, and I got a very immediate, very public confirmation of something I hadn’t planned on discussing that day: yes, I am a natural blonde. There was no ambiguity left in the situation for anyone involved.
I have never moved that fast in my life. I’m fairly sure I still owe those four men a drink and a formal apology.
The Snake, and Then the Crocodile
That same trip, walking back across that golf course like nothing had happened, a coral snake slid across the path in front of me — that unmistakable red, yellow, and black banding that every child in North America is taught to fear on sight. I stood absolutely still and let it finish its business and go about its day, because you do not argue with a coral snake.
And then there’s the crocodile.
I’ve watched one of the resort’s resident crocodiles — genuinely enormous, the kind of size that makes you briefly question the laws of physics — glide up near the water’s edge and open its mouth. Slowly. Almost lazily. It looks staged, like a prop from a nature documentary that someone forgot to remove. It is not staged. Mexican crocodiles are nocturnal, technically, which somehow makes it worse when you see one out and about anyway. Nocturnal or not, that animal is absolutely, unapologetically badass, and it knows it.
Why I Love Tulum Travel
None of that has ever once made me want to stay away. If anything, it’s the opposite. That’s the thing about Tulum travel. Every time I come back, something completely unexpected happens. This is a place that is alive in every direction — culturally, visually, and apparently reptilically. The charming waiters who remember your order by day two. The Mayan people, some of the friendliest humans I’ve ever met. Cenotes so clear it feels like swimming inside a geode. Ancient channels the Maya carved through the jungle four thousand years ago, still there, still humbling.
I once drove the one road across the Yucatan, Cancun to Merida, with mangrove jungle pressing in so thick on either side that two feet off the pavement you’re functionally lost unless you’re a jaguar. Boats, sky, or that single highway — that’s the whole game. We passed a few federal checkpoints along the way, armed and serious, entirely uninterested in tourists in a rental car. It’s part of why I trust this stretch of coastline as much as I do.
Tulum Trip This November
If Tulum travel has been sitting somewhere on your someday list, this November might be the time to stop thinking about it and come with us. Playful Coconuts is taking a small group back to Tulum November 7th to 14th — my favorite week of the year to disappear, tucked right between Halloween and Christmas, when nobody’s mad at you for leaving.
If you want in on the light, the cenotes, the wildlife encounters (preferably from a respectful distance), and whatever new story I collect this time around — come find me.
