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Scuba diving and snorkelling

Marine conservation scuba diving and PADI courses

Jungle cavern snorkelling, Mexico

The cenotes of the Yucatan
Matt Scott writes...

No sooner had we put on our wetsuits than we were starting to take them off again; a summer in Mexico is not the time to be wearing close-fitting neoprene. Luckily, the jungle mobile arrives before we have completely stripped. Looking more like a large apple crate with an engine attached than a people mover, the Jungle Mobile is pained in tiger stripe yellow and black and we hop on the back, wetsuits still dangling by our waists.

Courtesy of Hidden Worlds Cenotes

There is a road running through parts of the jungle, but it is far from level and the ten of us are thrown around like ping pong balls in a shoe box, ducking as low braches brush over our heads. The sun beats down on our pasty white bodies, but covering up would be more of a torture than burning in the sun. Luckily it is only a ten minute journey before we reach Tak be Ha; the place of hidden water. Cenotes - underground pools of fresh water - are found all over the Yucatan; some appear as lakes - the roof having fallen in - others are only partially open to the elements. Over 1,400 cenotes have been identified in the Yucatan state; it’s believed there are well over 4,000 and the cenotes and caverns that run beneath our feet make up the longest underground cave system in the world. The IMAX film Journey into Amazing Caves was filmed here and divers come from all over the world to experience the thrill of cave diving in this incredible environment. Mask and snorkel in hand I have high hopes. ‘It wasn’t the most fun I’d had when I was wet, but it was definitely the most memorable’ a comment in the visitors’ book said, among others of ‘incredibly majestic’ and ‘paradise underwater’.

The temperature immediately drops as I walk down the small ladder into the cavern below; I can hear the sound of water dripping and feel damp in the air; it is a refreshing change after the humidity outside. The group slowly makes its way into the cave and we gaze around at the formations: stalactites drop down from the roof like twisted limbs and a few coloured lights shine on large formations growing out of - or is it into - the water.

Our guide, Sylvio, explains that the Mayans used cenotes as a sacrilegious offering place and it’s thought that the dead were brought to the dry caverns in some kind of funerary ritual. Many of the caverns at the Hidden Worlds Dive Centre have yet to be explored; who knows what they might find? As we enter the water its temperature comes as quite a shock; in front of me someone gradually inches up to their waist and lets out little squeals as the water finds its way into their wetsuit.

Courtesy of Hidden Worlds Cenotes

The views above had been impressive, but as I put my mask on and look below it is simply magical; connecting caverns can be seen; some just through small gaps in the rock, others through vast openings; stalactites, stalagmites, columns and flowstones form a gentle pallet of pale colours as they appear in every inch of the cave. Long flowing columns reach down next to me, below, wrinkled fingers of stalactites grow from the bottom; it is a natural masterpiece of epic proportions. We swim slowly though the cenote and into smaller chambers.

On the bottom of the cavern lies broken pieces of rock and calcium carbonate and what appears to be fine sand; the water itself is crystal clear, its slow movement means that little is carried and visibility only fails where light no longer penetrates the caves. As we move through this labyrinth the roof gradually closes in until it is just inches from my head; vast columns appear to support the cavern roof, whereas pencil thin limbs drop down and rise up, some just a few inches long, others reach down over a metre below me. I hear my snorkel catch on a few stalactites (or are they dada straws? The interpretive commentary falls to the wayside with such a sight) and I dare not look up for fear of impaling my head. We slowly move forward, into a cavern almost totally covered in stalactites; thousands hang down from the ceiling, thousands more stalagmites poke up from the water below, each no bigger than my snorkel, but so tightly packed it looks like a 3D bed of nails.

Courtesy of Hidden Worlds Cenotes

While I have visited many caves in Europe and America, nothing can compare; the scale of the formations in both size and number is incredible; the water only adds to the feeling of being in an alien world. My snorkel constantly fills with water as I twist my head too much one way, then the other. I’m still coughing through my snorkel as I realise we are back in the first cenote, and the tour is over. Few of us speak as we wait to climb the ladder back to the surface; in awe of the sights we have seen. As I climb, I take a last look back at this hidden world before emerging into the hot jungle; the Yucatan will never look the same again.

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