The ferry from Cozumel was in good time, and took about 45 minutes to reach Playa del Carmen. Here we trekked through the crowds, back to the collectivo stop, and were very pleased to board a nicely air conditioned collectivo direct to Cancun. Again, the collectivo journey zipped by, even with two drunk young chaps sat in front of us blaring out music. We were dropped off somewhere in Cancun, and hurried to get a taxi to the port, Puente Juarez, for the boats to Isla Mujeres. We knew there was a boat in 10 minutes so were rushing somewhat. We made it in time, bought our ferry tickets and went to it, only to be told that the ferry was full. With no ferry for another hour, we asked for our money back. We walked 5 minutes to the other, more expensive company, and bought a ticket with them instead. Apparently journeying to Isla Mujeres is big business as the boats were very busy.

In just 15 minutes, we'd reached Isla Mujeres . We had nowhere to stay, and no Lonely Planet information to fall back on, so took a wander to a likely place (we later found information in the Lonely Planet - never mind). The likely place turned out to be alright, with decent air conditioning, so we agreed to stay. Isla Mujeres was so busy we weren't sure if we were going to like the place much, so set about immediately to find a dive shop to negotiate some diving. There were four on the PADI website in our immediate vicinity, so we went to them. All bar one were shut, so the open one was the winner! We booked to go diving with them the following day to the underwater museum, known as MUSA, followed by a reef dive to the Manchones reef. Both would be shallow dives, meaning we could take the underwater camera and share the pictures with you lucky people.

In the late afternoon we grabbed some dinner from a nice veggie friendly place, where the owner had Indian parents, grew up in South Africa, went to school in Devon, lived in the USA, and now lives in Mexico . We had a nice chat. Feeling fuelled, we went to Playa Norte, a few blocks away, and went for a snorkel just before sunset. There wasn't much to see just off the beach, and it looked like a number of things had been put in the water to encourage reef growth. One of which looked like a giant carpet. That was all a bit odd, so we admired the odd fish swimming by, and then the sunset which just kept on giving, as different parts of the sky turned various hues of yellow, pink and red. It was delightful.

Isla Mujeres is another Mexican island, which offers island chill-out time, diving, snorkelling, water sports, and golf buggies for hire. As standard, our draw was wildlife and diving opportunities. As mentioned, the place was much busier than we had expected, and also took in cruise ships and day trippers from the mainland. The beaches were pretty but the town was fairly unremarkable.

On Monday 3rd, we went diving! We had a huge breakfast, which wasn't the best idea, and headed to our dive shop. They took us to another dive shop to collect our gear. We headed the few blocks to the pier, and were assured that the boat would arrive soon. Eventually, we were told that the boat had one engine that wasn't working, hence why it was taking so long to arrive (this seems to happen to us a lot). An hour later, it chugged up to the pier and we boarded to head to the (thankfully) nearby MUSA, the underwater museum . Which was actually more like an underwater art gallery, with statues of people, bombs, grenades, houses and cars. These had started to be incorporated by the plant and wildlife, and it was interesting to see nature start to take over. It was surprisingly good, and whilst the items were quite far apart, we got to see plenty of fish and some other wildlife on the way - including a spotted eel, a stonefish (highly poisonous), a tiny flounder, and a southern stingray. The dive was to 9 metres for 43 minutes, and we thoroughly enjoyed the experience.

The second dive was to the Manchones reef, also to 9 metres and for 45 minutes. This was cool because we got to see a hawksbill turtle! Which was turtle-y awesome! We also saw some young barracudas, a spiny Caribbean lobster and a porcupine fish, related to pufferfish. The reef was in good shape, and there were so many fish there. It was a lovely dive though it was a touch short - neither of us had made it to half tank for either of the dives .

In the afternoon, we did the rounds and looked for a less costly trip to go and swim with whale sharks! After some serious negotiation, we booked for the following day and were very excited about it. We wandered around to the other side of the island - this was only a couple of blocks away! But it was pretty all the same. Dinner was had, and it was quickly bed time.

On Tuesday 4th, we went swimming with whale sharks! We had done this on a previous holiday to the Philippines, and it was an absolutely amazing experience. In the Philippines, the whale sharks were encouraged to the area by people feeding them. We got to go in the water and snorkel with them for approaching two hours. It was pretty exhausting and so worthwhile. Seeing the gentle giants so close, and so many of them, was simply spectacular. So we were hoping for a similar experience in Mexico. In reality, it was different. The whale sharks are not fed in Mexico, and are simply going about their feeding business. We had to wear life vests and were only allowed in the water two at a time for 10 - 15 minutes, and then occasionally four at a time for no apparent reason. Whenever we poked our heads out of the water we were told to 'embarco', or get back on the boat, whether or not we had had our 15 minutes. We were only allowed in three times, and the second time we were told to get in where there were no whale sharks . So all in all we didn't feel like we had our fill of the whale shark activity! Having said all of that, the experience was very, very cool. When we were swimming with the whale sharks we were swimming hard to keep up and of course trying to keep out of their way. Sometimes we could see two at once, and if we lost one we could generally turn around and find another. These were big fish, about the size of the boats surrounding them, and swimming with them is a bit surreal. At one point, a pod of dolphins turned up for good measure as well. We weren't told when we were leaving, the boat just started up and headed back towards shore. All in all the time allowed was disappointing, but the whale sharks were just awesome. This again was big business, with a veritable flotilla of boats doing the same thing as ours.

The boat journey back to shore took about an hour, and we stopped in a snorkelling spot not far from Playa Norte. It was okay but there wasn't a huge amount to see . We had a sandwich for lunch, refused the ceviche on offer, and watched a 'party boat' go past us, full of dancing naked people.

After returning to the hostel to get clean, we decided to go to the Turtle Farm. This was a place breeding and releasing turtles, encouraging conservation, and looking after sick turtles, we were told. The place was at the other end of the 7km long island, so we took a taxi. Which took us to the wrong place. The taxi driver had gone before we knew, so opted to walk the 10 minutes to the turtle farm. Ten minutes turned out to be 30 minutes, and it was scorchio. Still, it wasn't all bad as we were iguana spotting along the way. The turtle farm was well worth the visit. Our first sight was of a huge vat of baby turtles, swimming around together! There was a sign saying don't touch, but a man from the place said we could touch the baby turtles. Jayna picked one up, gently. It seemed very chilled out but we don't know if being out of the water causes them stress . After a couple of quick snaps we put him back of course, gently. In the next few tanks were more, bigger, turtles, of varying kinds. We weren't sure why they were there as it looked small and boring for them. Around the outside were various lobsters, seahorses, lionfish, stingrays and an octopus in small aquariums. There was also an open tank where a man from the turtle farm was encouraging interaction with starfish, small rays and horseshoe crabs. Horseshoe crabs look docile but were terrifying to see from the bottom.

Next we wandered outside to see a large sea area with a pier, containing quite a few turtles, rays and what appeared to be nurse sharks. Next were several outdoor tanks with turtles in, by a 'hatchery' where the turtle eggs were being kept secured in very neat and methodical ways. We saw a couple more tanks of turtles and finally some terrapins, before hailing a cab back to the centre. It was a happy hour of turtle action.

Dinner was left over pizza from the previous night's dinner, and we had a quiet one with some box wine that cost the equivalent of £1 .20 for a litre. Crazy prices. We formulated our onward travel plans, and decided against going to Isla Holbox, our intended next destination. We couldn't find anywhere to stay on the island for less than £42 a night, which was out of our budget. By the time we had travelled there and found out whether or not there was anywhere for cheaper, we'd be stuck on the island anyway. As it was considered high season on Holbox, we sadly agreed that it was sensible not to go, and formulated our plans from that point on.

On Wednesday 5th, we woke up early and went to a vegetarian restaurant for breakfast (we'd found this too late to eat there at any other time!) and had more delicious shakshuka. We packed up and checked out of our hostel ready for the next destination - Valladolid and Chichen Itza!