Playa del Carmen, Mexico

I'm writing this retrospectively so there won't be much detail. I think what i will try and do is just put a few photos and write a few little memories just to document trips that i've had in the past. Hopefully this will then turn into a fairly comprehensive site of the travels i've undertaken and the experiences i've had over the last few years.

Charley and Andy (very close friends of mine that i met in Madagascar) started working in Mexico for a conservation NGO in 2004. They were living there for about two years and it wasn't until almost the end of their contract that i managed to get over there for a visit. They ended up based in Playa, just south of Cancun. Really the time spent in Mexico was more to see the two of them than to site see but we managed to get to a few places in the few days i was there. The Mayan ruins being one, and of course a little bit of diving. It looks like we spent most of the time at the beach by the photos that i am posting but i think basically that is what we ended up doing. Lying around talking and generally relaxing.

The set up of Global Vision International (GVI) is similar in many ways to Frontier although ultimately much more focussed on the conservation and social development as apose to the money that the organisation might gain from taking on paying volunteers. Charley and Andy helped set up one of the projects in Mexico and really managed to make a huge difference whilst they were there. It was nice to experience all this and in many ways really made me miss the type of lifestyle that they were leading. I think this was the start of my thinking about travelling or living overseas again. I always seem to be happier when i'm busy meeting people and learning from a different culture. It was a short visit but a really special one. The nice thing about it was that i would see them in in just a few weeks when they returned for Christmas and were then moving back to the UK for good.