Tulum

Tulum was our next adventure!! It is a city of scholars, named after its wall, and there was so much to hear about and learn about!! 

And now for a preachy bit. Because I cannot help myself. On the way into the city, there is always a lot of indigenous people selling souvenirs. Some of them are very high quality, and some are inexpensive, the sort of thing one can get a bunch of to give to all one's friends and family as a memento, just to say "I thought of you" and it is all very beautiful. I always try to buy all our mementos directly from the indigenous people. This is the only source of income that is directly allotted to them, and even then, I assume they have to pay some sort of rent for being there. Yes, we even paid for goofy, possibly somewhat culturally inaccurate pictures (though actually I see an owl man in there!) All the money that we pay for airplanes, hotels, etc, may or may not trickle down, but the money we spent on hats, our gorgeous new chess set, traditional clothing, pictures with artists, etc.. all of that went directly to the local families. And that makes me very happy.